Month: February 2015

by

Shelled out

Sunday Feb 14 1915

Caught tail end of 7 and best part of 9 o’clock Mass. Received L(aura)’s fine parcel; also letter from J. W.

Raining hard all day. Very busy night on wire*. 27th Div shelled out of four trenches.

Prisoners report general attack to take place on 15th or 16th. (Got the) wind up. Witnessed quaint auction sale.

*Wilf worked on the installation of telephone lines between headquarters and the trenches. The picture below is from The Illustrated War News Feb 17, 1915:

Wireless OperatorWith the officer, in his telephone dug-out, receiving a message: A British gun-position at night – a sketch from the Front

The drawing shows a British gun-position, on a moonlit night, far in rear of the infantry trenches, with which it is connected by telephone. The battery is concealed, but not protected by earthworks, and the officer’s “dug-out” is made to resemble a heap of sugar beet. There is a small store of ammunition. The officer’s only light is a bicycle-lamp, by which he is reading a cipher message and orders that have just reached him. Such are the practical details that lie behind the frequent reports of British artillery successes, as when “Eye-Witness” wrote the other day, after mentioning a German night-attack: “When it was light, however, our artillery opened so accurate a fire on the enemy that their position became untenable.” – (from a sketch by a British Officer at the Front)

by

Raining all morning

Saturday Feb 13 1915

Raining all morning, fine after dinner. Walk up Mt des Cats with Tony. Received Doctor’s shop* from Ma.

*doctor’s shop. The no.9 (cf. Number Nine, q.v.) in the game of House: military: C.20 F. & G (or doctor’s orders: the inevitable “no. 9 pill”  Ex number nine, the standard purgative pill, given to all and sundry (from Eric Partridge, Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English)

Ramcore No 9 Pill

contemporary advert for the “no. 9 pill” from:

The Soldiers’ Press: Trench Journals in the First World War
By Graham Seal