Tag: food

Belgian chocs away

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8th February 1915

The 15th Brigade fumbled around in cold windy weather looking for the parade ground assigned to them for inspection by the King of the Belgians. Eventually they found it in a field opposite the Lunatic Asylum, which was now host to an aerodrome for 6 Squadron RFC, the second to be established in Bailleul. Most of the brigade fitted inside the field but the poor 6 Bn Cheshires, ever the bridesmaids, were made to wait in the adjoining road.

The King of Belgium inspected the brigade at 11.23am. The diary says “Royal salute & inspections & presenting officers. Went off well.” Whether that was a Royal gun salute (I doubt it) or that King Albert saluted the troops (more likely) it doesn’t say. British Army, Corps and Divisional Commanders were all present for the parade. That would have been General Sir Smith-Dorrien (2nd Army), General Sir Fergusson (II Corps) and Major General Morland (5th Division) respectively.

And so we move into a week I’ve been dreading for some time. It’s been a slog at times, but it’s been fun most of the time, but my six months of daily post writing ends this week. Please be sure to check my posts this week as, weather permitting, I am going to be reporting live from my warm billets in Ypres on Wednesday and Thursday, hopefully nursing a decent Belgian beer and plates of cheese and salami.

Asylum streakers

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Envelope addressed to Miss Crawshaw, 29 etc franked 20 Ja 15
Dated 17th-1-15

Dear Till,

How pleased I was with the parcel which I received alright, which I thought was very good of you. I am glad to hear that you got the P M Gift alright, and if uncle Matt wants the pipe and Tobac he can have it, but I want you to look after the box and card.

Pleased to hear that Doll enjoyed herself along of you and Aunt, yes she wrote me a very nice letter and the Chocolates were very good. Is that oh(?) What she said that she didn’t know if I would be pleased with them.

Yes Till all my things are at Belfast and if you could see your way clear to get them you would be doing me a good turn. Don’t forget to let me know when you are going to get them, I have wrote to Jess and told her that you are going to make arrangements with her for getting them to Brixton.

I have received Bert’s parcel and I have answered it surely he as got the letter by now. No I haven’t heard from Tom for some time now but hope to before long. I expect he is well away at sea now what say you. Please to hear Uncle Matt is taking it out of the knocker.

Well Till we have been having a very trying time lately and that account for me not being able to write before. I haven’t heard any more about the leave but I hope to get it anyway.

Glad to see that you sent Doris a little present. How are you going on alright still mucking in at Stewarts? You say Bert is grieved because they are not going to send him out here, you tell him from me he don’t know where he is best off.

Well Till I am getting on away well as can be expected and still in the pink although I haven’t felt myself this last few days.

Surprised to hear about Dolly staying at Tottenham yes she misses the Green. Now I think this is all the news at present except that things are just about the same here and the weather is still wet and miserable. Remember me to all at home and tell Aunt not to forget to drop a few lines before long so will conclude hoping to hear from you soon.

Your loving Brother

Bid xx

17th January 1915

Now we have confirmation that Frank sent the Princess Mary Christmas Gift Fund Box home and that Uncle Matt got the pipe and tobacco. I wonder what happened to the box? The story I’ve heard, secondhand mind you, about the discovery of these letters, is that they were found bundled up in a tin by my Great Uncle Geoff Debnam. I wonder if they were in the Princess Mary tin?

Frank’s received some chocolate sent from Dolly, his ex-girlfriend. The following section discusses getting Frank’s belongings from Jess in Belfast back to Brixton. I’ve always thought this was just for convenience as that’s where he would take his leave he so hope to get. But can we infer from the previous paragraph, that Frank’s attention is shifting elsewhere and that his ardour for Irish Jess was dampened in the Belgian weather.

Taking it out of the knocker is such a great phrase. I guess it means, seeing as Matt’s a postman, that he hammers away at people’s front doors. It appears that Frank’s mother is a postal worker too, but we haven’t heard about her since the beginning of December. Tellingly, Frank hasn’t even asked after her in his letters home. Uncle Matt appears, over the course of these letters, to be a bit of a sick note when it comes to work. Frank is constantly concerned that Matt’s continuing to work and rather surprised when he is actually in work rather than sick.

Doris Crawshaw had enjoyed her 13th birthday on the 11th January, which explains Frank’s reference to Mabel sending her a “little present”.

The only other curious part of the letter is the reference to “Dolly staying at Tottenham yes she misses the Green”. Is this referring to a different Dolly? A family member who might have moved from Frank Senior, who live on Islington Green at “Stewarts” to the grandparents in Tottenham. Or was it Frank’s ex-girlfriend. It seems a strange coincidence that she would live in both places. Or was Dolly a distant cousin too?

The Dorsets remained in billets for another day. Today was a Sunday in 1915. The 15th Brigade’s diary tells us that the brigade enjoyed “usual church, washing and a rest”. I wonder if they billeted in the lunatic asylum in Bailleul, which was a popular destination for officers and men during the war to strip off their lice-ridden filthy rags and enjoy the hot baths there. In fact, when I get some spare time, I will dedicate an entire post to the asylum as there are lots of references to it in soldiers’  memoirs and books.

Frank admits that “I haven’t felt myself this last few days”. Hopefully a hot bath, fresh clothes and a good sleep out the the rain put a bit of a smile back on his face.

 

 

 

What a bastard

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Envelope – to Mrs Webster, 29 Strathleven Rd, franked 12 Ja 15  – censored by A Griffith
dated 11-1-15

Dear Aunt

Just a few lines hoping this finds you in the best of health. Well Aunt I am getting on as well as can be expected and still in the pink. We are getting on as well as can be expected and still dodging Jack Johnsons. The weather out here is terrible don’t talk about rain the country is absolutely flooded so you can guess what it is like.

I expect you have got over Xmas by now I see you had a full house, I wish I had been at home. Tom is getting plenty of leave, I wish I could get away for a few days, but I believe I am getting seven days before long, but it will be some time yet, but still lets hope it will be soon, and then we will have a good time together all of us, that’s providing all goes well out here.

Aunt have you received my two PC, well I expect you only got on, for I have [heard] that one lot of mail got burst (?burnt) and I expect your PC was in it. Please to hear that Uncle Matt is still on the knocker let’s hope he as the luck to keep it. Old Till’s Johnnie seems to be a knut tell her I have just received the Chocolate from him, and he said he had a good time at Brixton, said he nearly got (succled ?) on cold tea. Well Aunt I don’t think there is any more news at present, so will conclude hoping to hear for you soon, and also Uncle Matt.

I remain

Your affectionate Nephew

Bid xxx

11th January 1915

Let’s deal with the censor first. We meet a new officer in charge of Frank’s section, and I’m pretty sure this is Lieutenant Allix James William Griffith. He’s joined as a reinforcement from the 3rd Battalion. His father was the Venerable Reverend Henry Wager Griffith, who was an army pastor out in the Punjab, India, where Allix was born. He’s only 19, a pupil of Charterhouse and a typical Public School Boy product of the British Empire. I talk about officers being posh but this chap takes the Bath Oliver. He’s as posh as his almost-namesake, Alexander Armstrong, and comes from the same lineage too. This website lists him as a direct descendant of that old Norman bastard, William the Conqueror.

Griffith, sadly, didn’t survive the war. He was transferred to the 2nd Battalion and sent to the Middle East, after being wounded in St Elois later in 1915. He went missing in Mesopotamia on the 25th March 1917 and is commemorated on the Basra War Memorial in Iraq. He was one of the 1200 Allied men who were casualties in the battle of Jebel Hamlin, as the British tried to push the Turkish out of Iraq. The battle, fought largely unsupported by artillery against a well dug in enemy (surprise, surprise), was disastrous for the newly reconstituted 2nd Battalion Dorsets who lost nearly 220 out of 500 men in the action.

Frank’s letter to his Aunt Caroline is filled with his usual abundance of positivity, but there is one line that expressed his resignation about the situation he finds himself in: “that’s providing all goes well out here”.

He’s very complimentary about my Great Grandfather, Carl Robert Debnam, of whom the beer of Brixton seems to have got the better of. A “knut”, according to the ever-excellent Edwardian Promenade’s glossary, is “an idle upper-class man-about-town”. (My grandfather, Bob, wasn’t a man who could hold his beer and I don’t have hollow legs when it comes to ale either – although we both enjoyed a pint when he was alive). He’s also finally got the chocolate promised back in November.

The Dorsets hunkered down in their soggy trenches while the artillery on both sides played out a deadly game of cat and mouse. The landscape, once liberally dotted with farms and villages in November, was slowly being reduced to piles of rubble and heaps of mud as the two sides pounded any landmark that might offer advantage to the other side.

Loaf letters

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9th January 1914

The fourth page of the 4th January letter to Mabel contained an extra letter Frank had written five days later on the 9th January. He then went onto write another letter to his Aunt. They are both included below.

On a fourth side another, more closely written letter dated 9-1-14 (he’d forgotten what year it was)

Dear Till,

I have received your last two letters and got the 2/6 alright. Now I am pleased to hear that you had no trouble getting the money, and now I want you to spend it on yourself and Aunt. I don’t want it and if I do I will let you know.

Tell Aunt I have not forgot her for am going to write to her next. We are lucky at time to strike a small town or village and then we are able to buy things and they don’t half charge 10d for a loaf so you can guess what it is like.

We are having some hard times for the country is absolutely flooded and mud in heaps so you can guess what the trenches are like.

I have just finished scraping mud off myself, wet through to the skin. That’s where it is, if only they would send me out some of Kitchener’s Army to relieve us it would be alright.

Now Till I have been out here 5 months and have not had chance of a good rest, which I can say I am in need of, for we have been on the go ever since we left Belfast. That’s where it is fellows at home won’t enlist and enjoying themselves and us out here putting up with the hardships of it, it will be a long time before this War is over!

Now I will pack up and will write soon. Remember me to all at home and I hope you enjoy yourself along of Dolly and Edie on Sunday.

Love to all at home

Bid
xxx

We get some more first hand descriptions of the conditions facing the men in Belgium that winter. The other interesting information is about money.

Firstly, Frank now has the postage money to send back the Princess Mary Christmas Gift Fund Box to his sister. I wonder if we’ll hear about it again in a later letter?

We’ve found out already that Frank has been incredibly generous and given over some of his pay to his sister. She’s already managed to get hold of it. quite how that was done is something I will come back to in a future post. He’s insistent that she spends it on herself and their Aunt Carrie. What a decent fellow.

We find out that the soldiers are being absolutely fleeced. The UK Cost of Living index was started in July 1914 and records that a loaf of white bread cost about 1 pence (1d). So to be charged 10d was daylight robbery, even if there was a war on. It’s very common to find soldiers complaining about the price of goods in their letters and diaries throughout the war. Local trades people knew that they had a captive client base and so prices naturally soared.

Frank is beginning to complain regularly about a lack of rest and the fact that there’s no sight of new recruits on the horizon. But it took an awfully long time to build a new army. Especially an army of amateurs. He’s right to complain about men dragging their heels in volunteering, but the fact was that the British Army didn’t have the resources to process to the sheer numbers of volunteers, let alone conscripts. Conscription was some way off in the UK.

Frank mentions his ex-girlfriend Dolly and also Edie, who appears in a letter from Frank back in June. Perhaps Dolly and Edie were sisters? We found out in the last letter that Mabel was going to meet them on Sunday, which would have been the 12th January 1915.

And now we have the letter Frank promised to write to his Aunt.

PC to Mrs (could be Miss) Webster, 29 Strathleven Rd etc, franked 11 January 15 – dated 09.01.14

Dear Aunt

I expect you are thinking that Bid has forgotten you, for not writing to you before now. Well Aunt I haven’t forgotten you and never will but have not had time to write you a letter lately which I have been going to do. Glad to hear that you had a good time Xmas and also hope you get rid of your cold. I am getting on as well as can be expected and still in the pink.

Tom is getting plenty of leave, I wish I was able to. Remember me to old Tango, tell her I hope to give her the Glad Eye before long and also Old Uncle. How is E Jim, has he started yet or is he still on the retired list? Glad to hear Uncle Mattie is still on the old knocker.

Now I think this is all the news for now Aunt, hoping this finds you in the best of health and still merry and bright. The weather out here is wicked, it’s pouring in torrance.

Love to all, Bid.

This letter is similar to many letters I wrote home from school when I had nothing to say. The first paragraph describes the act of writing a letter while writing a letter.

Frank then asks after Tango, Old Uncle, E Jim and Uncle Mattie. I only know who Uncle Mattie is out of this roll call. E Jim must have been ex-forces and old enough not to have to re-enlist but other than that I am no nearer identifying him.

Frank ends the letter with a creative bit of spelling but a sentence that sums up conditions for Frank and the rest of the Dorsets.

The Dorsets spent another day in Dranoutre in billets making up sandbags and hurdles and delivering them to the trenches, according to the 15th Brigade’s diary.

Cat amongst the turkeys

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27th December 1914

The Dorset patrols came back from their night time assignations and reported that everything was very quiet.

Later on that day, at 5.25pm the Dorsets submitted their daily report to the 15th Brigade HQ, saying that the situation as unchanged but they had experienced fairly heavy shellfire during the day. There were no casualties.

The 5th Division diary confirms enemy shellfire landing in Sector B and also in Neuve Église.

At home the nation’s ability to be distracted from the war was epitomised by the lead story in page 3 of the Telegraph where the photo is that of a woman dressed as a cat who is collecting money for the Belgian refugee fund. Pauline Prim is “the first lady who has ever impersonated a cat or any other animal upon the stage”. The Telegraph attributes her feline performance to her husband’s acting abilities and explains that “it was probably though watching her husband’s rehearsals that she was, in a very short time, able to represent a cat in the most lifelike manner.” Thank goodness for men says the Telegraph. Roll on votes for women I say. We also learn that posting amusing cat pictures is not just an internet phenomena.

Another phenomena we think is just a modern one, is that of shopping madness at Christmas, especially when it came to buying turkeys. Here women did rule the (poultry) roost. If they weren’t driving hard bargains in London’s street market (“where the poor buy”), they were accompanying their loved ones on leave to Smithfield, Billingsgate and Leadenhall markets, to choose a bird for the Christmas table. Turkeys were very expensive when compared to beef and pork at this time; over double the price per pound, especially French ones  – Italian ones being in “far inferior condition”. Turkeys, then as now, were being gobbled up.