Description
Object description
Photocopied documents relating to his service as the Medical Officer to the 2nd Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders (19th Infantry Brigade, 6th Division until 31 May 1915; then 27th Division) from August 1914 - June 1915, including ts transcriptions of 7 letters (28pp) sent to his sisters between 19 September 1914 and 28 May 1915 giving good descriptions of tending the wounded at Le Havre, his first experiences serving with a field ambulance, the shelling of the hospital billets, the Christmas Truce of 1914, trench duties which became 'too boring to talk about', and occasional moments of camaraderie with the Germans; extracts from 2 original ms letters (7pp) and ts transcribed extracts (7pp) from 16 letters to his future wife between 5 August 1914 and 13 August 1917, again covering the Christmas Truce and also trench conditions in the first winter of the war; together with two ms accounts (28pp) entitled 'Civilians in the Firing Line' and 'German Atrocities'; a ts account (7pp) entitled 'Billets at La Ferme des Trois Portes'; a transcribed ts diary (30pp) kept between 1 August and 10 December 1917 covering his service with the 111th Field Ambulance up to late September and then with the 48th Casualty Clearing Station describing his travels through Ypres and the Ypres Salient, the devastation of the countryside, the huge numbers of human and animal corpses along the road, tending gas cases, wounded soldiers, the bravery of the stretcher bearers, his disbelief at the incessant vilification of Germans whom he regarded with esteem, exchanges of learning with American medical officers and his experience after the 'Great Push' at Cambrai when at one point his advanced dressing station accepted 1,800 casualties in a 24 hour period; an official report (4pp) on the gas shell bombardment of Ypres on 12 - 13 July 1917 and a few other documents relating to his service with the Field Ambulance and the Casualty Clearing Station up to March 1918. The collection also contains two original concert and sports programmes from No 14 Convalescent Depot at Deauville, dated April and May 1918.
Content description
Photocopied documents relating to his service as the Medical Officer to the 2nd Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders (19th Infantry Brigade, 6th Division until 31 May 1915; then 27th Division) from August 1914 - June 1915, including ts transcriptions of 7 letters (28pp) sent to his sisters between 19 September 1914 and 28 May 1915 giving good descriptions of tending the wounded at Le Havre, his first experiences serving with a field ambulance, the shelling of the hospital billets, the Christmas Truce of 1914, trench duties which became 'too boring to talk about', and occasional moments of camaraderie with the Germans; extracts from 2 original ms letters (7pp) and ts transcribed extracts (7pp) from 16 letters to his future wife between 5 August 1914 and 13 August 1917, again covering the Christmas Truce and also trench conditions in the first winter of the war; together with two ms accounts (28pp) entitled 'Civilians in the Firing Line' and 'German Atrocities'; a ts account (7pp) entitled 'Billets at La Ferme des Trois Portes'; a transcribed ts diary (30pp) kept between 1 August and 10 December 1917 covering his service with the 111th Field Ambulance up to late September and then with the 48th Casualty Clearing Station describing his travels through Ypres and the Ypres Salient, the devastation of the countryside, the huge numbers of human and animal corpses along the road, tending gas cases, wounded soldiers, the bravery of the stretcher bearers, his disbelief at the incessant vilification of Germans whom he regarded with esteem, exchanges of learning with American medical officers and his experience after the 'Great Push' at Cambrai when at one point his advanced dressing station accepted 1,800 casualties in a 24 hour period; an official report (4pp) on the gas shell bombardment of Ypres on 12 - 13 July 1917 and a few other documents relating to his service with the Field Ambulance and the Casualty Clearing Station up to March 1918. The collection also contains two original concert and sports programmes from No 14 Convalescent Depot at Deauville, dated April and May 1918.
History note
Cataloguer RWAS
History note
Catalogue date 2007-06-22