Eating rats and lice?

 

Ratting: The New Sport in the Trenches. This image shows Canadian troops engaged in a rat hunt at Ploegsteert Wood near Ypres during March 1916.  Image credit:  http://www.rentokil.co.uk

Much has been written about soldiers’ food during the Great War. It seems that troops were fed better in 1914 than by the end of the conflict. Meat rations were steadily reduced and by 1916 flour was so scarce that bread was made from dried ground turnips.   

 

 A canned broth containing sliced turnips, carrots and potatoes, made by the Aberdeen-based Maconochie Company and used as a ration in the field was generally detested.

 

British troops receiving dinner rations from field kitchens in the Ancre area of the Somme, 1916. Hot food was not supplied to front line soldiers until late 1915 and even then was by no means a regular occurrence. Photo from the collection of the Imperial War Museums, © IWM, Q 1582  

Inevitably the food was cold by the time that it reached men in the trenches. No doubt in many cases it did not reach them for days when the lines of communication and supply were disrupted by enemy shelling.  

 

 

Private Joseph Marker came from Budleigh Salterton. He enlisted at Exeter on 10 December 1915 and joined the Devonshire Regiment.  His remarkable story is told in detail in ‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ exhibition.  Image credit: Celia Marker  

Occasionally, the question has arisen as to whether famished British soldiers were reduced to eating rats. 

This must surely have been a rare occurrence, but one piece of testimony worth noting comes from Celia Marker, whose grandfather joined the Devonshire Regiment. "When I was a little girl he mentioned eating rats whilst he was serving in France!" she recalled on the   Wartime Memories Project website

It is true that rat infestation was widespread as a result of the unhygienic environment in the trenches, and the rats were often larger than usual.  But it was known that rats were in the habit of feeding on dead or even wounded bodies, making them unlikely to tempt even the hungriest man. 

   
Lice infestation was equally common, and was a frequent cause of an infectious disease known as trench fever.  George Watson, in his memoirs kept at Fairlynch Museum, described his return home on leave, his clothing “wet and lousy, full of lice and their eggs” much to the horror of his mother. “The lice were killed by crushing between the thumb nails.  Even when the clothing had been washed the lice grew again from the eggs still in the clothing.”

Black humour was often found to be the only way of coping with the miseries of trench life.  Even the lice could raise a smile.  “One  chap  saw  the  Quartermaster  Sergeant,” recalled George Watson. ‘Can I  'ave a new shirt  Quarters?’  he asked.  ‘What's wrong  with  your  other  one?’ asked  Q.  ‘There's eggs all t'way up t'seams,’  the man replied. ‘Well  go and  get a collop o' bacon and 'ave a good do’, the Quartermaster joked.”


‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!! 

 

An army doctor’s memories: the Christmas Truce of 1914

Budleigh Salterton solicitor Patrick Langrishe, pictured above, kindly showed me extracts from a diary kept  by his grandfather, an army doctor who served on the Western Front.  The entries for Christmas Day and Boxing Day 1914 make fascinating reading

We’re further into December. The prospect of an Anglo-German football match in 2014 between the clubs of Budleigh Salterton and Betheln is receding further into the distance.

Yet I keep thinking about the remarkable events of the Christmas truce just over a century ago, following on from what I wrote at http://fairlynchgreatwar.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/chatting-with-enemy.html

I was reminded of that bizarre episode in the Great War after reading Rose Wild’s Feedback column in The Times of 14 December. It mentions the “slightly surreal” tone of letters from serving soldiers sent to their families and forwarded for publication in the newspaper. One of them was from a piper in the Scots Guards.

“One German gave our officer a letter to post to a lady he knows in Essex,” he wrote. “I must say some of them are very nice fellows, and did not show any hatred, which makes me think they are forced to fight. I wrote you a letter telling you we made a bayonet attack. I wonder if you got it. We lost a few men. The Germans helped us to bury them on Christmas Day.”  

I’d started reading the Feedback column having spotted Rose Wild’s mention of Budleigh solicitor Patrick Langrishe, a partner with Devon law firm Gilbert Stephens.

Mr Langrishe has some equally remarkable stories to tell, based on extracts from the diary kept by his grandfather, Lieutenant-Colonel John du Plessis Langrishe DSO, an officer serving as an army doctor with the RAMC.  

 

This personal photograph was taken by Robert Cotton Money on 7 December 1914.  It shows the crew of an 18-pounder Field Gun in a gun emplacement on the Armentières sector of the front line, in France.

Photo credit: Imperial War Museum   Q51542

The Battle of Armentières had been fought by German and Franco-British forces in northern France from 13 October to 2 November 1914, during reciprocal attempts by the opposing armies to envelop the northern flank of their opponent. It was part of what been called the Race to the Sea, which I mention elsewhere

There is a detailed account of encounters on Christmas Day between men of the Queens Westminster Rifles and those of the 107th Saxon Regiment.  

The 25 December was, the diary records,  “a really  peaceful day.”  After a church service in the morning, followed by lunch, the young officer went for a   walk with a veterinary officer, returning by Armentières.

He wrote as follows about the unusual Christmas Day events: “The Saxons (107th) came out & talked to our men of Q.W.R., had a sing-song & a game of football which the Saxons won 3-2!  They even sang "God save the King"!! & gave our men some wine in which to drink his health.  Some came into our trenches, a few  remaining, saying they preferred to go to England!” 

It was not just the other ranks involved with this fraternisation with the enemy. The diary records that the Saxons’ Colonel and Adjutant “also came out & chatted.”   

The truce was by no means universally observed. Things were “very  different” on the south of Rue du Bac, to the west of Armentières, where the Germans “fired on the Leicesters & refused to have any truck with them.”

According to Colonel Langrishe’s diary the truce lasted only until the following morning of Boxing Day. “Lovely bright frosty morning, clouding over later,” he wrote. “After lunch snow, turning to a thaw & rain in the evening. C. Atkin  joined me at 10 o’c & after the sick went round "egg farmers", returning to his chateau where I showed him positions on the map. Stayed in after lunch on  account of weather. Bath after tea. Heard that a Saxon officer came across to  our trenches at 11 a.m. & said that he was sorry but they had orders to  resume hostilities at once. Germans have been stuffed with all sorts of yarns about invasion of England, & bombardment of London.  In their last attack on Rue du Bois on Oct. 28th the  l07th Saxon Regt. lost all  their officers & were   fired into by  their own artillery!”

 

Happier days: the photo shows Colonel Langrishe beside the River Liffey, during his time at Trinity College Dublin.  Known to friends and family as Jack,  he captained the University Boat Club in 1906.    Image credit: www.tcdlife.ie

Colonel Langrishe was not a Devon man but the account of his wartime experience will fascinate anyone with an interest in the human side of the Great War.

His eleven handwritten diaries, consisting in total of 482 pages, are kept at the Imperial War Museum.  They were written between 8 September 1914 and 23 March 1919, during his service with the Royal Army Medical Corps in multiple appointments. 

He was Medical Officer of the 38th Brigade RFA (6th Division) from August 1914 to January 1915; to 16th Field Ambulance (16th Infantry Brigade, 6th Division) between January and November 1915; to the staff of the ADMS (14th Division) between November 1915 and June 1916; and was finally commander of the 12th Field Ambulance (12th Infantry Brigade, 4th Division) between June 1916 and April 1919.

The diaries describe his experiences on the Western Front, including his inspection duties of brigade field ambulances, casualty clearing stations, camp huts, baths and sanitation, as well as his personal experiences during the Somme ‘push’ of 1916 in handling the wounded and the dead on the battlefields.  

Maybe some friendly Saxon from Betheln will read my online scribblings about the Great War Christmas Truce, and get in touch with their own positive WW1 stories. 

That would be a cheering thing to do in this traditional season of peace and goodwill, when an awfully large part of the world seems to be locked in stupid conflict. 

‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!! 

The first of three brothers to fall: Ralph Hewett 18 December 1914

 

Image credit: Commonwealth War Graves Commission

http://www.cwgc.org

“To lose one child is bad enough. It’s hard to imagine the suffering experienced by families who lost two sons. The news that all the sons from one family had perished would have been, horrifying...  unbearable.” That was a typical comment from a visitor to Fairlynch’s Great War exhibition, shocked by the discoveries brought to light by museum researchers.

Lance Corporal Ralph Hewett, aged only 19, was killed in action on 18 December 1914 while serving with the Second Battalion of the Devonshire Regiment. His grave is unknown, although he is commemorated on the Le Touret Memorial, pictured above, in the Pas de Calais region of France.

Ralph Hewett’s name is listed locally as ‘R.Hewitt’ only on the Exmouth Memorial, even though he was born in Budleigh Salterton in 1895. His parents Alfred and Ada Hewett, originally from Cornwall, were living in Fore Street, Budleigh Salterton, according to the 1901 census. By 1911 they had moved to Manchester Street in the parish of Littleham, actually in Exmouth.

 

The war grave of Ernest Roye Hewett RN J/27300

Boy 1st Class of HMS Viknor.  Photo credit: Eric Jones

http://www.geograph.ie 

One month later, on 13 January 1915, Alfred and Ada Hewett lost their youngest son, Ernest Roye. Aged 17, he was serving on board HMS Viknor when the ship, a former vessel of the Blue Star Line passenger and cargo shipping company, sank with the loss of all hands off the Donegal Coast. The cause was unknown but the area had been recently mined by the Germans.  The bodies were washed ashore on the North Irish and Scottish coasts. Ernest Hewett’s grave, pictured above, can be found in the tiny and ancient cemetery of Tarbert on the Isle of Jura.

A third son, Leslie Dunstan Hewett, had also joined the Royal Navy and was serving on HMS M20 when he died of disease, aged 20, on 21 July 1916, in Salonika, Greece. He was buried in Mikra British cemetery, in the city of Thessaloniki. The cemetery contains 1,810 Commonwealth burials of the First World War, as well as 147 war graves of other nationalities. Leslie Hewett is listed as L.D. Hewitt on Exmouth’s war memorial. 

‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!! 

 

Chatting with the enemy

It's December, and I'm reminded that 100 years ago this month, the Great War is famous for a few days of humanity during Christmastime in No Man's Land.

An officially sanctioned way of communicating with the enemy.  The postcard, entitled ‘Our grand artillerymen’, shows a brief message addressed to Kaiser Wilhelm.  Photo credit: Jan Oke 

Paradoxically, the hell of the trenches, endured equally by both sides in the conflict, seems to have brought them closer. In many cases they were physically only yards apart: instances of banter between British and German soldiers were common.

In 2009, the wartime diary of Sapper John French, a tin-miner from Cornwall, was put on display at Redruth Old Cornwall Society Museum.  

An entry for 10 Aug 1916 reads:

“Heard laughing and saw German leaning over parapet and shouting to our men who were also leaning over. One of our men shouted ‘Come on over Fritz.’ Fritz shouted back in perfect English ‘No bloomin’ fear.’ This went on for half an hour and then heads were down and war went on the same as usual. Instant death for first to put his head above the parapet.

Aug 13 Orders today that any German looking over parapet is to be shot and any man found talking to them to be arrested.”

More familiar to people of the Lower Otter Valley will be the name of The Hon John Frederick Hepburn-Stuart-Forbes-Trefusis, the youngest British Brigadier General of his day. Known more affectionately as ‘Jack Tre’, he was the son of Charles, the 20^th Baron Clinton, and the Dowager Lady Clinton, Margaret. On 24 October 1915 he was killed in action in Northern France when  he was hit by a sniper in the trenches.  It is not widely known that he kept his own diary throughout a large part of the Great War.

On 19 January 1915 he wrote: “I hear there is rather a peculiar situation up the line, some Saxons (German soldiers serving in a regiment from Saxony) insist on sitting on the top of their trenches, and apparently our men do not like to shoot at them. It is also said they pointed further up and shouted: ‘There are the damned Prussians up there, who would shoot as soon as look at you’!” Click here to read more about 'Jack Tre.'

A similar comment about the special relationship enjoyed between soldiers from opposing sides is contained in the diaries kept by 2nd Lieutenant Frank Wollocombe, now in the Imperial War Museum archives (IWM ref: 95/33/1). Serving with the 9th Battalion of the Devonshire Regiment, he wrote in November 1915 of friendly exchanges with some Saxon troops.

In Fairlynch Museum’s archives, George Watson leaves us with his personal memory, and his reflection on the complex nature of the relationship between fighting men of different sides:

“Jerry was quite a sport in the days before offensives. One of our lads, Tommy X was rather deaf and his name was called rather loudly when it was his turn  for watch. The German would then yell  ‘Put Tommy X up.’ I'll bet they wouldn't have shot him.”

But as far as we know, nobody from the Lower Otter Valley took part in the famous Christmas truce of the early stages of the conflict. 

For many people, the celebrated football match (or matches) and exchanges of gifts between Allied and German soldiers represent a rare but bizarre moment of humanity during the grim years of the Great War. 

It's not widely known that Budleigh Salterton Football Club has had a special relationship with the Football Club of the village of Betheln, near Hildesheim in Lower Saxony.  



I've often wondered how the idea of a Christmas Day 2014 charity match between players from the two clubs would be greeted today. Naturally, any profits made by such a centenary event would be split between British and German armed forces charities.  

  
The Christmas Truce 1914 : German soldiers of the 134th Saxon Regiment photographed with men of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment on 26 December in No Man's Land on the Western Front.  Photo by Lt C.A.F. Drummond, Royal Field Artillery. 
Image credit: Photograph HU 35801 from the collections of the Imperial War Museums

‘The Great War at Fairlynch’ 2015 exhibition at Budleigh Salterton’s very special museum! Reviews included: “Wonderful display on WW1, informative, bright and relevant. Well done!!