Thursday 30 October 2014

Mells: Lutyens and Sassoon

One of the benefits of setting up the blog has been encouraging me to visit places that had been on the to-do list for some time. Visiting St Andrews church in Mells was near the top of the list, for too long it had been somewhere I drove through on the way to Frome and the home town of Formula 1 World Champion Jenson Button (Button being a very common name in the area)

The best place to start is the Talbot Inn, not least because it is close to the church - there is plenty to see here, as a man in the village shop said, Mells packs a lot of Great War into  a very small area.

The immaculate churchyard houses many graves of the great and the good of the last 100 years, I was here to visit Siegfried Sassoon - who didn't die here but wanted to be buried close to his friend Mgr Robert Knox.

The grave of Siegfried Sassoon, Mells


Moving into the church, there is the impressive Horner memorial, dedicated to Edward Horner, who died in 1917 at Noyelles.


The Horner Memorial - St Andrews church Mells


 The base was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and the statue by Sir Alfred Mannings, one of the most interesting features, one often missed, is the original grave marker from France which is attached to the back of the plinth. I only spotted it as I was taking a (poor) photo of the brass plaque that records the men of the village who fell in the Great War, several of whom were in the Somerset Light Infantry
Memorial to local men who fell in the Great War
The original grave marker, the back of the Lutyens plinth
Horner Memorial - Mells


Walking away from the Talbot but towards the excellent shop and café is a second example of Lutyens architecture, the town war memorial with a beautiful inscription. There are many other points of interest in Mells and the surrounding area and I will post on this area again

Mells War Memorial
Inscription on the Mells War Memorial

Update - 22/12/14

Another visit to Mells and a chance to add a little more to the post - Mells really punches above it's weight when it comes to major WW1 memorials - The first 2 photos relate to Raymond Asquith - son on Liberal PM Herbert Asquith who was killed on 16th Sept - the memorial wreath was designed by Lutyens and the inscription by Eric Gill - it used to include the original battlefield cross and his sword, which have been removed - I think to the IWM - so would have been spectacular. When you consider the church houses the Horner Memorial it is an impressive collection for what is basically a small parish church
Asquith memorial and inscription


Asquith memorial, Mells - designed by Lutyens

The BBC World War One at home featured Raymond Asquith:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p022ng7h


There are also 2 memorials to men who died on the same day - 15th May 1915 at Hooge - both were members of the North Somerset Yeomanry




A neat summary here of what happened at Hooge on that day:

http://www.webmatters.net/monuments/ww1_bowlby_skrine.htm

Outside is the grave of Ronald Knox - a friend of Siegfried Sassoon and the reason he wished to be buried in Mells


 

Wednesday 29 October 2014

The road to Ploegsteert

Almost exactly 100 years ago the men of the Somerset Light Infantry were involved in intense fighting just north of the town of Ploegsteert, known to most British soldiers as Plug Street, on the Franco-Belgian border - I will post more on that in the next few days, but how did they get there in the first place?

Mobilised on the day war was declared the Battalion spent a few days training and then headed out the France, arriving just in time for the battle of Le Cateau, they suffered heavy casualties and, along with the rest of the BEF embarked on a long retreat through northern France. Food supplies were scarce and they often had to buy food from the locals, although the officers had a pleasant breakfast with Baron de Rothschild on the way. They frequently had to sleep in the open and move at short notice to avoid the pursuing German forces. These events were the focus of this recent episode of Lives of WW1:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03thb8x

You can follow the story day by day on my twitter feed:

https://twitter.com/thesomersets

In early October the BEF moved north - allowing French units to focus on defending France and leaving the British with shorter supply and communication roots and defending the parts of Belgium not occupied by Germany. The Schlieffen Plan was failing and the race to the sea was about to turn into the First Battle of Ypres.

The Somersets captured the village of Le Gheer on 21st October 1914, they dug in, as shown by the following trench map, drawn by Lt KGG Dennys, the scene was set for the events on 30-31 October in the area that later became known as Prowse Point
Trench map showing the position held by C Company Somerset Light Infantry, October 24 1914

Monkton Combe

Last summer I visited Monkton Combe Church- the most famous burial here is Harry Patch, local resident who served with the DCLI. He gets a lot of visitors for reasons I don't need to go into here, instead a link to a recent article which some people may not have seen:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/guides/zpmthyc

Less visited is the grave of E.S. Hiscock - it is only a few yards away but I was struck by the incredible difference in how long they lived.

The grave of E.S. Hiscock - Monkton Combe
Monkton Combe - the grave of Harry Patch



The Tobacco Screen

Update 1st Dec 2014

I was watching the interview with Henry Williamson recorded in the 1960s this evening to prepare a lesson on the 1914 Truce - I like to use his interview as you can allow students to comment on his vivid account and then add in the extra details about his life after the war - author of Tarka the Otter and his later links with Oswald Mosley - and see how their view changes.

When describing the events of 24th December he mentions that he was part of a working group sent out into no-man's land to erect a series of posts that would become part of a screen to allow men in the trenches to have a little more cover - sniping is frequently mentioned in the war diary of the Somersets at this time and seems to have caused more problems than shelling at the end of 1914.

This is a well-known story and although some aspects of his interview have been questioned I have little reason to doubt it took place - but if anyone has further evidence then let me know. He then mentions that the posts were to be covered in dried tobacco leaves that he states the Belgians had been drying on hurdles in the Autumn and then abandoned- I think it can be concluded that the Tobacco Screen referred to in the trench map is just that - a protective screen covering a trench or other important position made of tobacco leaves on  picket fence. The Germans were therefore using one in October 1914and that is what Lt Braithwaite marks on his map, the British decided to put one on place later that year. Williamson states that it was to be used to provide cover if his regiment needed to re-occupy a trench that had been abandoned due to flooding, this something the Somerset diary mentions happening in early December

I suppose to prove this we would need other accounts of these screens being erected and maybe the view of an expert in Belgian tobacco production in the early 20th Century. Here are a couple of images I found of the sort of devices used to dry tobacco and I think it is possible to imagine them being mounted on a wooden frame to provide some sort of cover, I can't imagine they would last too long though
Tobacco drying rack
Drying cabinet


There are a few accounts of improvised defences at this time - the diary of Private Coward mentions the use of tins on wire to warn of enemy attacks in the time before the mass use of barbed wire - Williamson also refers to these in his account - which can be found here (UK only I think) the section on the Truce and the 24th December starts at about 20 minutes

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p01tcyg5/the-great-war-interviews-3-henry-williamson



Original Post - 29/10/14

The image here is a trench map, taken from the War Diary of the Somerset Light Infantry (Crown Copyright)
It was drawn by Lt Valentine Braithwaite on 24th October 1914 and shows the position held by A Company on this date. Valentine is worthy of a few postings in his own right - he had already won the MC at Mons, so
more on him later

The map shows an area just north of Ploegsteert on the Franco-Belgian border and was created just after the Somersets had taken the town of Le Gheer - an action that lead to the GOC writing a note of congratulations that contained the phrase "Good Old Somersets" and gave the blog a name.

It is unusual because of one label - a German defensive point labelled B (in the middle of the map) is described as a "Tobacco Screen". If anyone has seen this used anywhere else or can explain what it is meant to denote then please get in touch


Trench map by Lt Valentine Braithwaite

The CWGC App

The new app from the CWGC is free and was launched last week - a key feature is that it allows you to seek out CWGC sites near your current location - very handy in an area that has a large number of scattered graves that are easy to miss. In Cirencester last weekend I came across an unusual memorial to a member of the 1st Battalion, Somerset Light Infantry. It would have saved me a bit of time if the app had a feature that mentioned it was different in size and shape to other CWGC headstones, but that might be asking too much.

Sgt Harry Waters died of wounds on 25 Oct 1914 - most likely he was a casualty of the successful assault on Le Gheer that the Somersets carried out that week, but it is possible he was injured earlier - I will post again if I can find out more. Likewise if I get time I will find out more L/Cpl Jack Waters. It is in good condition but the area around could do with some TLC

Cirencester Cemetery Sgt Harry Waters


Welcome to the blog

Welcome to the blog - I will be doing a couple of things here - the primary aim is to tell the story of the 1st Battalion, The Somerset Light Infantry during the First World War - if you want to follow the story day by day then I'm on twitter - follow @thesomersets

I'll also be adding general posts about Somerset and WW1 - basically anything I find while I'm out and about in the area.

This is my first attempt at blogging - hopefully it will look more professional as the weeks progress