Section 5
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THE LIFE AND TIMES OF A HERO Section 5 |
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THE BATTLE OF THE SOMME 1916
At the end of February 1916, William had fully recovered from dysentery but was still in England and training at No1 Command Depot, Sutton Coldfield camp, with a new draft of conscripts. Whilst there he was again taken ill and diagnosed as having Spotted Fever (Typhus), which is caused by overcrowding and poor hygiene and would have been carried from one soldier to another by body lice. Will's temperature rose and he reported sick. A number of cases of Typhus had already been admitted to the camp hospital and the Medical Officer immediately recognised it when he examined Will. He was sent to the isolation wards. His temperature was very high, and after a week he had developed a rash on his chest, his abdomen and his wrists. He became weak and began suffering with delirium. The V.A.D. nurses in the camp hospital cared for him but at that time there was no treatment for the disease and he had to 'sweat it out'. As the war went on Royal Army Medical Corps doctors realised the damage caused by lice and by 1917 delousing was commonplace for all soldiers coming out of the line or who were serving in support roles and diseases such as Typhus became much better controlled.
The worst of William's suffering was over in two weeks and by 2nd March he was recovering but his stay at the camp was proving expensive because he sent home a letter without a stamp, he was so broke:
8287 Pte Bentley
Company D
2nd Battalion, Hampshire Regiment
Command Depot, No1 camp
Sutton Coldfield
March 2nd 1916
Dearest Mother
I am sorry to hear that you have had so much trouble with sickness at home and I hope that all will soon be alright again. I am also sorry I had to send you a letter without a stamp but I wanted a smoke so badly that I felt I must do so. I do not know what to tell you about trying to get me down this weekend you may try if you think you can manage but for goodness sake be careful because if you send a Tel: they make the police go to the house and see if it is alright. I am afraid I shall not be here much longer as I have been marked fit so you see I shall soon be on the move again. Since I wrote the first part of this letter I have I am very pleased to say I have safely received your letter with P.C. and hankerchief (Sic) in it for which I must thank you very much. Spotted fever was the cause of my not being able to come and see you why it was I had to disappoint you all. Well Mum Dear I must close now with my fondest love and kisses to you all hoping the dears will soon be better.
From
Your loving son
Bill
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wanted to dear
| When he was fully recovered and pronounced fit for front line service he prepared for the 'draft', travelling to Folkestone in Kent, and on Monday 3rd April he left England for France and the front. Delays on both sides of the Channel meant that he did not arrive at Rouen, in France until Friday the 7th. He travelled with hundreds of others, either new drafts, returning sick or men back from leave. William stayed at Rouen for some time, on 'details' with the 5th Infantry. He remained there until, to his surprise and disappointment, he was drafted into the 14th Hampshire Service Battalion and sent to northern France near Bethune. The 14th Hampshires had reached France early in March and were still getting over the awful conditions both in and out of the line, and as yet they had not seen serious action. They were a 'New Army' battalion made up entirely of volunteers from the Portsmouth area and were being supplemented by regulars, who were to inject some experience into the civilian force. Until they were disbanded early in 1918 the 14th Hampshires were to be part of 116 Brigade, 39th Division. |  ROUEN HARBOUR |
MAP OF BETHUNE AND SURROUNDING VILLAGES
William joined his new battalion in the support trenches at Festubert on the 17th May 1916. When he arrived they had been in and out of the line around the mining town of Bethune in the industrial north of France for about six weeks. Their allotted trenches were just north of the Canal de La Bassée and because of the wet nature of the land some of the defences were in fact not trenches at all, but breastworks made of sand bags, wire and wooden frames, and with earth heaped on top. The actual front line was often not a line at all, but islands just forward of the main defences, held by just a few frightened men.
They would spend a few days in the front line with all of its hazards, then move back for a couple of days to the support trenches just behind the front line, when they would be called on to provide ration parties or to take part in trench repair work, then they would be Brigade reserve in billets not far away from the fighting. At times the whole brigade of four battalions (around 4000 men) would be in Divisional reserve some way behind the lines. Here training was done, and usually welcomed by the men as a respite from the filthy conditions at the front.
William was part of a draft of 40 men, who arrived at 3.30pm in the afternoon of the 17th. There was some confusion as they arrived and a clean up operation was taking place. The new drafts soon found out that four German 5.9mm shells had fallen short of their target - an artillery battery to the rear - and had battered the trenches around the Battalion Dressing Station, killing Lance Corporal William Westbrook, an early casualty of the new battalion.
For the rest of May, June and for July they continued the interminable movement from front line to support to reserve and back again, losing men almost daily and gaining nothing. They took part in hazardous wiring parties at night, they suffered enemy snipers, artillery and witnessed the blowing (with little advantage) of both British and German mines. Aircraft were a daily sight and on the 25th May they watched in awe as an enemy observation balloon was attacked and hit, cheering as it exploded into a huge sheet of flame in the air. On the 7th June twenty men and an officer took part in a trench raid just before midnight. The excited and inexperienced men achieved very little but came back jubilant despite the wounding of five of their number. There was also action on the 30th June when the 12th & 13 Royal Sussex Battalions plus the 13th Gloucesters and some Royal Engineers mounted a futile attack, made nominally, in order to straighten the line at the salient in the line called Boar's Head. 'A' company of the 14th Hampshires was ready to exploit any gains but unfortunately the attacking force was repulsed by the Germans and the Hampshires were not required. (They did, however, sustain 50 casualties dead, wounded and missing.) In reality the attack was to mask the action about to take place to the south between the Ancre and Somme rivers - the start of the Battle of the Somme.
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Conceived during 1915 when the Gallipoli campaign was grinding to a halt, the 'Big Push' was to be the main thrust of the Allied 1916 summer campaign. A massive and concerted attack would be made on the German lines. The defenders would fall back, creating a breach, through which would charge the waiting cavalry. The whole of the German supply and communication infrastructure would be at the mercy of the cavalry and the following infantry. The German lines would be rolled back and German aggression defeated.
The river Somme marked the boundary between the British armies of General Haig to the north and the French armies of General Foch to the south. This appears to have been the main consideration for the choice of battleground by the generals. Originally the French were to take the leading role in the offensive, contributing 39 divisions to the British 25.
Unfortunately the Germans upset the careful Allied planning and during February 1916 attacked the fortress city of Verdun. Strategically it would have been wise for the French to evacuate the Verdun salient, but this would have been politically disastrous for Aristade Briand, the French Prime Minister, so the defence and subsequent slaughter at Verdun was begun. The French Army totaled 330 infantry Regiments, 259 of whom were committed to and were swallowed up by the 'Mincing Machine' of Verdun, but General Pétain had stated "Ils ne passeront pas" and, at the cost of nearly three quarters of a million French and German casualties, they did not pass.
The effect of Verdun on the Somme offensive was to change the emphasis of both the strategic aims and the composition of the attacking force. Originally conceived as the main Allied thrust of the year it was now necessary to mount the attack to take some pressure off the hard pressed French at Verdun. And because of the massive drain of resources at Verdun, instead of the original 39 divisions, the French only contributed 5, while the British contribution was scaled down to 18 divisions.
The regular British Army was by now supplemented by Kitchener's New Army of volunteers (the 14th Hampshires amongst them), who had been persuaded to join by, amongst other things, the famous poster of Kitchener pointing out and with the words; YOUR COUNTRY WANTS YOU. In 1914 confident that it would be 'all over by Christmas' volunteers had joined in a patriotic fervour, expecting a quick and glorious adventure, then home and back to normal life. By 1916 these volunteers had been training and equipping for a year or more and were fit and ready for action.
THE BATTLE OF THE SOMME
The Somme front extended either side of the river Somme in the French province of Picardy. 18 miles to the north the British held the line and 8 miles to the south were the French. 900,000 British troops alongside 250,000 French faced 800,000 highly trained and motivated Germans. The attack, originally planned for 30th June, was postponed for two days due to rainstorms, which would have made movement of the attacking men and equipment difficult. Consequently at 0730 on the morning of 1st July the 'Big Push' was to begin.
The Allied artillery made the opening move on 24th June. A tremendous bombardment, which was to last for 24 hours a day and for seven days, continuously pounded the German trenches with more than one and a half million shells. 427 heavy guns and 1010 field guns were used to deliver this awful terror to the cowering Germans. The noise was so loud that it was heard in Camberwell, London, and the British troops could not help but feel confident of the outcome of the attack.
To the dismay of the General Staff and the discomfort of the waiting troops the weather slowly became worse. In the afternoon of the 23rd June there were thunderstorms and on the following day heavy rain. On the 25th the weather brightened but for the next two days heavy showers made the trenches more and more uncomfortable and movement more and more difficult. On the 28th there was no change and at 11am a decision was taken to postpone the attack until the 1st July to allow the ground time to dry. As if to answer the prayers of the Staff Officers on the following day the weather brightened and the wind got up, drying the ground. On the night of the 30th June 1916 there was a perfect moonless summer night as the troops moved to their final jump off positions and quietly waited for the morning attack.
At 0720 on 1st July the barrage finally lifted and for a few seconds the whole line was silent. The silence did not last long, however. A massive mine at Hawthorn Ridge was blown just after 0720. Containing 18 tonnes of high explosive it was blown early so that a camera crew in the area could film unimpeded. The initial explosion killed many Germans in the trenches and dugouts along the ridge, but the lifting of the barrage and the early explosion of the mine warned the Germans of the coming attack and they swarmed from their dugouts to set up machine guns in their trenches and in the newly blown mine crater itself.
Other mines were blown at 0728, including the one near La Boiselle. Now known as Lochnagar, it contained 24 tonnes of high explosive and, as reported by an astonished spotter pilot passing by, threw debris 4,000 feet into the air! Unfortunately, despite the horrific initial effect, the newly formed craters made very good defensive positions for the waiting Germans, who set machine guns on the rim and aimed them at the British lines.
At exactly 0730 all along the Allied lines whistles blew and men emerged from the British and French trenches to attack the German lines. The New Army of the British was well prepared, well briefed and well equipped for the coming fight. However the generals felt that because most were unblooded by war, plans for them should be so specific that no mistakes could be made in the heat of battle. Unfortunately those meticulous plans made disastrous assumptions. The Germans were supposed to be so shaken by the previous week's bombardment that they would not present any cohesive defence. The wire was supposed to be blown asunder to allow our soldiers easy passage to the German trenches.
The Germans, in fact, were shaken but because of their deep dugout system (some were 30 feet underground), they were still a fighting force and they knew a big attack was imminent. They were prepared for the lifting of the barrage, which when it came was the signal for them to move to their defensive positions. The wire had only been cut in some places. About a million of the shells used by the British artillery were 18-pound shrapnel that burst in the air just above the trenches of the Germans. The millions of deadly lead balls, however, did little damage to the belts of barbed wire in front of the trenches and the Germans, as we have seen, were hiding 30 feet underground.
The confident British battalions, all along the front, emerged from their trenches and walked, often uphill, with sloped arms towards the German lines, which they thought, were undefended. Almost immediately they heard the rat-tat-tat of the German Maxim machine-guns, and men began to fall. The German artillery was well ranged in to No Mans Land and soon shells started to burst amongst the advancing infantry. Because their orders and training had not prepared them for anything except success they bravely continued on. They fell, killed or wounded, in their thousands. Some of the wounded managed to crawl back to their own trenches, which meant that further advancing troops could not even pass to their own forward trenches. In order to attack, some of those advancing troops climbed out of the second line trenches but before they had reached their own front line they too were cut down by the German machine guns. The Germans could not believe what they saw and concentrated their fire on the slowly advancing troops and on the few gaps in the wire, which the British troops were funneling into. More were killed at the German wire and in the north few survived to enter the German trench system. In fact, by midday the attack in the north had stalled. In the south some gains were made and the push continued.
The tragedy continued in the afternoon and on into the following day, but it was the first day that is remembered as being the worst day in the whole history of the British Army.
By the end of that day the British Armies had lost 20,000 men killed and 40,000 wounded.
60,000 casualties…
More British Army casualties than the totals of the Crimean War, the Boer War and the Korean War…
60,000 casualties…
The census returns of 1911 put the population of the county of Westmoreland at 63,575 and the town of Hastings at 61,145…
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On that first fateful day the 29th Division, nicknamed THE INCOMPARABLE 29th because of their dogged determination and guts at Gallipoli, lost over 200 officers and 5000 men in their failed assault on Beaumont Hamel, a mile north of the river Ancre. The Germans, who they were attacking, lost less than 300 men killed, all ranks. William's old Battalion, the 2nd Hampshires, were part of that particular disaster.
No ground was gained.
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Meanwhile, back in the north, and well away from the Somme, on 30th July, 3 officers and 103 men of the 14th Hampshires made an unsuccessful raid on the German trenches at Festubert. They tried, but failed, to use a Bangalore Torpedo (Saving Private Ryan?) to blow the German wire defences. These were considerable - three belts of wire 25 to 30 metres in depth, and coming up to the chests of the attackers, who could only throw about 200 bombs over the wire into the enemy trenches before retiring. They lost 5 men killed.
Twelve days later they got their orders to move to the Somme and left Bethune, its marshy ground and its slag heaps. On the way south they took part in training at Magnicourt-en-Compte, near St Pol. The rolling farmland in this area is not unlike the downlands north of the Somme and gave the training a more realistic feel, for the Generals if not the men. On the 25th August their training was complete and they went by train to billets in Le Souich and from there marched to Bois du Warnimont, closer to the raging cauldron of the Somme. By the end of August they were just behind the lines at Mailly Maillet, and on 3rd September took part in their first attack from the tiny village of Hamel, just north of the river Ancre.
| On 2nd September they marched to Engelbelmer, less than two miles from the front. They left the village at night so as not to be spotted by the German artillery, which however, was sending over the occasional shell as they did every night to cause disruption and death behind the British lines. They slowly made their way to the front line at Hamel for their first 'battle'. After a massive British barrage they left their trenches at 0510am on the morning of 3rd September along with the 11th Royal Sussex Battalion, plus 118 Brigade and the 4/5 Black Watch Battalion. Covered by a machine gun barrage, which picked off the German defenders as they looked over their trench wall, the attack carried through to the German second line. However, the terrain was difficult, the right flank being the marshy ground of the river Ancre flood plain, about 400 metres wide and with no real opposing trenches. Because of this the right flank became uncovered and enemy artillery across the river had a good view of the attacking troops and were able to prevent supplies of ammunition reaching the forward positions. These had to retire during the afternoon when their bullets & bombs ran short. 570 officers and men of the 14th Hampshires went into the attack and 17 officers and 440 other ranks were casualties. William was lucky and felt that he was specially selected to remain unscathed. Afterwards he and the other survivors made their way to Mailly-Maillet for a well deserved rest. |  TRENCHES NEAR ALBERT |
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Just behind their lines was White City, a chalk quarry used by the British as protection from German shells. It was excavated before the battle and, due to the fact that it was on the lee of a hill, was out of range of the German artillery, whose shells exploded on top or skimmed over the lip of the hill and burst 60 or 70 metres away. Caves dug in the side of the 40 foot chalk cliff gave protection to a battle headquarters, a dressing station and an engineer’s dump. The 14th Hampshires often had to walk past White City on their way up to the front. It was at White City that William picked up and subsequently gave to his mother a photo of a young sweetheart, dropped by some careless or wounded soldier. The pretty young girl had a locket around her neck, which contained a photograph of her soldier boyfriend or maybe her husband. Someone, on that day, would surely have seen the loss of his photo as an omen of ill luck for the fight to come. |
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On 13th November the final assault on the German lines of the Somme was begun and 118 Brigade along with the 14th Hampshires and the 16th Sherwood Foresters attacked the enemy line successfully with little loss. Climbing through Thiepval Wood they filed into the front line trenches at the edge of the wood. Before dawn and after a brief bombardment whistles signaled that they should once again go over the top. They left their trenches and plodded uphill towards the Germans in the cloying mud, which made movement difficult both for the attackers and defenders. However, the British artillery was accurate and effective and the German defenders could not prevent the British infantry from taking their objective of the village of St Pierre Divion, next to the river Ancre, and by the end of the day the German trench system known as the Hansa Line was in British hands. This attack marked the beginning of the end of the Battle of the Somme, which finally faltered and came to a halt in freezing rain and clinging mud on 19th November 1916. The weather was too bad to continue and the British Army needed time to draw breath.
The 14th Hampshire Battalion had cut their teeth on the Somme and had acquitted themselves well. They left the day following the attack at St Pierre Divion, heading back to the north and the fighting in Belgium around the dreaded town of Ypres. They went via the town Albert just behind the lines, marching past piles of rubble that were once houses and shops and through streets thronging with British servicemen.
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Albert is a small town in the French Province of Picardy. The town elders had once hoped to make it into a place of Christian pilgrimage and had built the impressive Basilica crowned with a gilded statue of the Virgin Mary holding up her baby son to God. During the early days of the war German artillery had shelled the Basilica, trying to knock it down and prevent the French artillery spotters from using it. They had only succeeded in dislodging the statue of Mary, which by 1916 hung at a precarious angle just below the horizontal. The British legend was that whoever knocked her down would lose the war, the Germans believed the opposite. |
 THE BASILICA AT ALBERT |
WILL'S MOVEMENTS
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The Battle of the Somme is remembered for the wasteful loss of human life and dreadful conditions of the men who fought there. It can be argued that all of this was necessary and that the outcome of the battle was a success for the Allies, due to the attrition bought on the German defenders. It is often presumed that the generals cruelly and knowingly sent their men forward in hopeless endeavours, but while some endeavours were surely hopeless the generals were not uniformly cruel. What is true is that many were old and timid. Some were inefficient in peacetime and faced with the almost impossible task of defeating the well dug in German troops were completely ineffective. Some were kind and some were cruel, but in any life we can find those people. What must be remembered is that the generals could not 'do nothing' - this would have been unacceptable to the people and politicians back home. Unfortunately when they did 'do something' they were damned by the efficiency of the modern weapons that they were up against and also by their outmoded strategies and primitive communication systems. Siege howitzers, machine guns, carrier pigeons and cavalry on the same battlefield seem ludicrous to us today, but that's what they had. The thinking amongst many of the generals was still conditioned by the 19th Century - cavalry, for instance, featured in most plans of attack. In 1914 the machine gun was still a new weapon and when tanks were first used in September 1916 they were misunderstood and misused.
The human cost of the struggle to gain control of a few miles of farmland is, however, staggering. More than a million men were killed and wounded on both sides during the 5 months of the battle. The Allies advanced to a maximum of six miles in the five months of fighting. That is 75 yards per day - MAXIMUM. Some of the first day objectives were not taken until the Germans made a strategic retreat in March 1917. The battle did suck thousands of German soldiers into the fray, some from The Mincing Machine of Verdun, but that battle was already becoming a series of smaller engagements with the Germans being more and more on the defensive and therefore requiring less and less men. The New Army of Kitchener had tasted their first action and they had suffered dreadfully but they did make the transition from amateur to professional soldiers. The mistakes made earlier in the battle were not made again until the Americans made their appearance on the battlefields of France in 1918. The new wonder weapon, the tank, made its first tentative appearance during September. There were not enough of them, the secret was let out of the bag too early, but the potential was realised and orders for a 1000 additional tanks were made by the Army Council on 26th September 1916 just ten days after their first use at the village of Flers on the Somme.
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To the north, the Hampshires spent a well deserved four week's rest & training near Poperinge, west of Ypres. They were then back in the thick of it at Canal Bank, to the north of Ypres. On 16th December 1916, they went into the line at Hill Top. The defences here were breastworks as there was water two feet down.
They were fortunate to spend their Christmas away from danger at 'P' Camp, near Poperinge, where they cleaned themselves up and had Christmas dinner in relative peace. For Christmas William sent his mother "a little handkerchief, something for you neck, Christmas cards and a 2/- Postal Order for V." The IIIth Army Corps Commander, Hunter-Weston, gave every man a Christmas message, in the form of a small poster, which predicts an end to the war during 1917.
From 30th December until 16th January 1917 they were at Boesinghe (pronounced Boozinger). Here, No Man's Land was only 50 yards wide and cut by the Yser canal. They spent four days in the line and four days out as the weather was so atrocious with sleet, snow and cold. Afterwards they went into billets at the Convent in Ypres. Whilst here William was told that he had been recommended for the Military Medal, which he never actually got. (He probably just received a commendation from the Battalion commander).
Back at Woolwich, William's home town, at just before seven in the evening of January 19th, a 'GREAT EXPLOSION' ripped apart the Silvertown Works munitions factory on the north side of the Thames. Caused by a fire, which ignited TNT destined for artillery shells, it killed 73 people and wounded 426, some seriously. The explosion was heard in Cambridge and the fire that lit the sky above London could be seen 25 miles away.
Edith, William's mother, and the family were at home, less than two miles away, and the explosion rattled the windows and also Edith's nerves. At first everyone came out of their houses and presumed that some German aeroplane had blown up Woolwich Arsenal itself. Quickly rumours spread that thousands of people had died and there was speculation that the war effort would be considerably damaged. The truth, however, slowly filtered through to Edith and her neighbours over the next few hours, but there was still something of a holiday atmosphere in the streets. That night the children stayed up later than usual and their parents did not sleep well with the realisation that the war was actually so close.
The following day Edith wrote to William with her exciting news and on the 1st February he wrote back that he is 'sorry to hear about that turn out on the Port Woolwich side it must have been awful I am sure'. He also mentions how cold he is at the front.
The winter of 1916/17 was the coldest in living memory and living in the open for days on end was almost intolerable for the soldiers at the front. William would walk up and down his small section of trench stamping his feet and flapping his arms to his sides in an effort to keep his blood circulating. When he looked across No Man's Land all was visible was white snow on the ground and a few black stumps of trees pointing towards a cold grey sky. He wore a leather jerkin, which he had taken from a dead artilleryman, that goes some way to keep out the cold. It was filthy and encrusted with mud, but combined with the woollen gloves and hat that his mother had sent him, it helped a little to keep him warm.
At the end of January they were at Railway Wood, where shells and minenwerfer (German trench mortars), caused some casualties. They were here until the 1st February, when they repulsed a German attack, which was preceded by a violent bombardment and trench mortars. On 2nd February they were withdrawn from the front, spent two days back at the convent in Ypres then went by train for rest at Camp 'C' west of Ypres. They were here for over three weeks. However, by the 25th they were back at the front at Observatory Ridge, South East of Ypres. When in support they stayed in huts at Zillebeke, and were in billets at Kruisstraat or Toronto Camp when out of the line. There was much activity from both sides whilst they were manning the front line trench and the men were in constant danger from enemy machine guns, artillery fire, and rifle grenades. At night they were subject to enemy patrols and often had to go into No Man's Land to repair their damaged wire or make raids into the opposing trenches.
MAP OF THE YPRES AREA
At home on April 4th, two days before Easter, Edith received a telegram from her brother Dudley in Plumstead with the sad news that her other brother Willie Elliot Barnard had died at home of injuries received whilst fighting in France. The same day she received this letter written to her by William from his hospital bed two days previously:
2/4/1917
Dearest Mother
I have the greatest pleasure in sending you this letter hoping you and all are in the very best of health. I hope you will not upset yourself to much when I tell you that I am in hospital with a wound in my face but thank God it is not so bad as it might have been. There were four of us sat together two poor lads were killed and two were wounded so you see the old boy is in lucks way after all. Never mind it took old Fritz nineteen months to find me the best of it was I never said a word to him the dirty dog. Well mummie do not worry yourself to much over it I shall soon be better in fact I may see you before long so cheer up and give my very best of wishes to all the friends with my fondest love and kisses to you, children and Dad.
From
Your loving son
Bill
P.S. Do not worry to much Dear
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The morning of the 1st April 1917 had started fairly normally for William. His battalion was back in the front line at Observatory Ridge and he was detailed to erect a Baby Elephant (a canvas tent over metal hoops) to house some of the Battalion HQ. At about 3o/c in the afternoon the British artillery began putting a bombardment into the opposing trenches, but the Germans retaliated and shelled Winnipeg Street, a trench held by the 14th Hampshires. William and three others cowered into the floor of their trench as the shells screamed over. The blasts came nearer and louder until one caught them, killing two of his fellow soldiers outright. He was happy because his minor injury would take him away from the freezing weather and the German shelling, but he could not shed the image of the two shattered human beings that were beside him in the mud. One, bent double in a pool of red, his head and arm missing, the other, a private called Frank, looked unharmed but his eyes remained open and appeared to stare in horror at the shattered body of his comrade. William's face was a mass of blood and his wound was dressed at the front line. He was diagnosed as bad enough to be sent to the rear and eventually he was put aboard an ambulance train bound for Boulogne.
William ended up at No13 Stationary Hospital in Boulogne on 4th April. This hospital was situated right on the harbour in huge sheds, that were used to store sugar in times of peace and there was a pervading smell of carbolic mixed with seaweed. By the 11th he was well enough to be discharged from hospital and he made his own way to convalescent camp, just down the road. Whilst there he took the opportunity of freedom that his wound gave him to visit Boulogne and some of its bars or Estaminets. Here were crowds of noisy service men along with some local fishermen and the inevitable prostitutes. A piano played loud music, whilst bawdy songs are sung by drunken soldiers and sailors, fighting frequently erupting in the smokey atmosphere.
He was fit enough to leave convalescent camp by 27th April and he transferred to No3 Infantry Base Depot at Etaples, just south of Boulogne, to undertake the inevitable training ready for his return to the front. Most drafts and returning men passed through the huge training camp at Etaples. The men were always treated badly and William was glad to get away from the rigours of the Bull Ring, a notorious training ground in the sand dunes next to the sea. (Later in the year a 'mutiny', sparked off by the arrest of a New Zealander, took place here. This was to be the only large scale rebellion made by British troops during the war). He was again posted to the 14th Hampshire Battalion which he rejoined at Moringhem near St Omer on 1st May 1917
SOMME CASUALTIES (dead & wounded) ALL NATIONS ~ 1,070,000 Men....
LAST UPDATE OF SECTION 5 - 6/07/2002
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