Description
Object description
British NCO served as Lewis Gun operator with 7th (Service) Bn Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, 78th Bde, 26th Div on Western Front, 9/1915-11/1915, Salonika, Greece and Bulgaria, 1915-1919
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Wolverton, GB, 1891-1914: family; memories of outbreak of First World War, 4/8/1914. Aspects of enlistment and training with Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry in GB, 1914-1915: enlistment and processing of volunteers in Oxford, 8/1914; posting to 7th (Service) Bn on Salisbury Plain; attitude to military life and discipline; reasons for volunteering; description of training; sporting activities; memories of Lieutenant Frank Debenham; opinion of instructors; uniform. Aspects of post-war life and employment: demobilisation, 1919; readjusting to civilian life; question of returning to pre-war employment; effects of the war on Wolverton. Aspects of operations as NCO with 7th (Service) Bn Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, 78th Bde, 26th Div on Western Front, 9/1915-11/1915: initial impressions of trench warfare at Fricourt, Somme, France; embarkation aboard HMS Terrible at Marseille, France, 11/1915.
REEL 2 Continues: voyage aboard HMS Terrible to Salonkia, Greece via Egypt, 11/1915; training aboard ship. Recollections of operations as NCO with 7th Bn Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, 78th Bde, 26th Div in Salonika, Greece and Bulgaria, 1915-1919: political and military situation in Salonika; water restrictions on route marches; composition of machine gun team; nature of operations, 1917; outpost duty; Bulgarian prisoners of war; occupation of Bulgaria, 1918; living conditions; story of Bulgarian family; opinion of war and situation in Balkans; political beliefs; effects of war on civilians; demobilisation and return to GB, 1919.
REEL 3 Continues: description of voyage on Black Sea; Russian prisoners of war; problem of food shortages; Christmas celebrations; tobacco smoking; opinion of officers; story of deserter; reaction to execution of deserter; morale and social background of battalion; effects of shell shock on Lieutenant Frank Debenham; question of relevance of shell shock in courts martial; story of witnessing Field Punishment No 1; gas attacks; giving first aid treatment to wounded; question of 'Blighty' wounds; description of field hospitals and treatment for malaria; opinion of British Red Cross Voluntary Aid Detachment personnel; conditions of service; varying attitudes to war among battalion members; lack of recreational facilities.
REEL 4 Continues: story of gap in barbed wire. Reflections on military service: opinion of war films; post-war Salonika veterans reunions; attitude to comradeship; story of friend's premonition of death; war souvenirs; question of censorship and communication with home; attitude to First World War and Salonika campaign.