Description
Object description
British stretcher bearer served with 94th Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps in GB, Egypt and Western Front, 1915-1918; worked as sales representative for Daily Mail in GB, ca 1930-1945
Content description
REEL 1 Recollections of background in Battersea, London, 1896-1915: family circumstances; education; part-time jobs; recreations; work in various jobs including periods as actor 'Captain of the School' Gaiety Theatre, 1911 and as clerk in hardware store; first aid course at night school; Church Lads Brigade activities including drill, summer camp and uniform; reactions to outbreak of war, 4/8/1914; initial rejection on attempt to enlist, 5/1915; work as travelling representative for hardware firm.
REEL 2 Continues: work as travelling representative for hardware firm. Background to recruitment into Royal Army Medical Corps at Recruitment Office, Whitehall, London, 9/1915: reasons; medical; reactions. Recollections of periods with 94th Field Ambulance at Aldershot, Tweezledown Camp and Salisbury Plain, ca 9/1915-12/1915: kitting out; nature of training and value of previous training; relationship with recruits and NCOs; composition of unit; health problems and assignment as ambulance orderly; relationship with officers; lectures and medical exercises; pay; teetotalism; question of promotion; issue of pit helmets. Journey aboard Nestor to Alexandria, Egypt, 20/12/1915-1/1/1916: seasickness and subsequent hunger; submarine alarm.
REEL 3 Continues: disembarkation. Recollections of conditions of service, lifestyle and daily routine during period at El Kantara, 1/1916-3/1916: first impressions during initial period at Port Said; effects of end of Gallipoli campaign; nearby Sweetwater Canal; tent accommodation; food rations; kit inspections; question of lice problem; orders to grow moustaches; recreations including swimming in Suez Canal; relationship with Egyptian civilians; latrines duty. Recollections of period at Bus-les-Artois Somme area, France, 3/1916-7/1916: train journey; billets; nature of field dressing station and hut wards; duties and initial lack of experience on posting as ward orderly.
REEL 4 Continues: stories of soldiers avoiding return to duty; method of evacuation and treatment of casualties including role of regimental stretcher bearers and medical officer, role of RAMC stretcher bearer relay posts, medical examination at advanced dressing station, ambulance journey to field dressing station and treatment of non-serious cases; tours of duty; routine duties as ward orderly; medicines available from pharmacy; medical inspection by orderly officer; lice problem; story of soldier dying on being moved; reactions to severely wounded; night duty as ward orderly; hut accommodation; food rations; visits to estaminets; rum ration.
REEL 5 Continues: tours of duty as stretcher bearer at relay posts including Le Sucre Factory, Colincamps, including dugout, rat problem, use of wheeled stretchers to collect casualties from ADS, story of problems with narrow communication trenches whilst carrying casualty, method of carrying stretchers, question of German shellfire, casualty from German rifle fire, story of crossing battlefield sector at night, daily routine and food rations; impressions of preliminary bombardment in Euston Dump sector; role as stretcher bearer carrying wounded, 1/7/1916; effects of German tear gas shell bombardment; role as stretcher bearer carrying wounded, 1/7/1916; state of patients; question of effects of casualties amongst 'Pals' battalions on communities.
REEL 6 Continues: role as second stretcher bearer relay team; ignorance of progress of offensive; German dugouts; story of burial of corpse during relief by division and question of burial arrangements. Recollections of period on Western Front, 7/1916-4/1917: breastwork trenches and German machine gun fire in quiet sector of Festubert, Bethuene area; period running Corps Rest Station at Couin; role during attack in Hebuterne sector, Somme area, 13/11/1916, including muddy conditions, question of award of MM and use of light railway trucks to evacuate casualties; circumstances of stretcher bearer casualty; state of morale and justification of Somme offensive, 1916; question of reputation of RAMC personnel amongst troops; role of Corps Rest Station; story of dispute over Christmas celebrations, 25/12/1916; trench feet problem.
REEL 7 Continues: treatment of trench feet; personal injuries to foot and knee; scabies problem; lice problem and baths; performances with concert party at Calonne Sur La Lys and Couin; stories illustrating relationship and opinions of various ORs, NCOs and officers; GB leave, 1916.
REEL 8 Continues: parcels and letter contact with GB. Account of period in Gavrelle sector, Arras area, 4/1917-5/1917: initial movements in reserve role; moving over Vimy Ridge; German shellfire; occupying former German concrete gunpit; corpses from prior 63rd Div attack; dysentery; Red Cross markings on gunpit dressing station; work of relays of stretcher bearer teams in evacuating wounded from Gavrelle and back over Vimy Ridge at night; question of behaviour of wounded; shell dressings; reactions to German shellfire; nature of shell shock and question of feigned cases.
REEL 9 Continues: production of engraved copper memorial plate for 31st and 63rd Divs action at Gavrelle, 1990; story of discovering French corpses whilst hunting for souvenirs; personal morale and question of 'Blighty wounds'; 21st birthday. Aspects of service 5/1917-4/1918: gambling amongst troops; physical incapacity of replacement stretcher bearers; story of carrying attempted suicide and close escape from German shell, 25/12/1917; physical incapacity of replacement stretcher bearers; food rations; cold weather conditions; moving up to occupy abandoned casualty clearing station on opening of German Lys Offensive, 4/1918; retreat; effects of direct hit by German shell on unit headquarters; disorganised nature of retreat and question of party remaining behind with wounded.
REEL 10 Continues: French refugees; reactions to death of friend and colonel; continued retreat and interrogation by staff officers; occupying abandoned CCS; reports of soldiers poisoned by excess rum; iron rations; question of signs of panic amongst troops; relief by Australian troops; personal morale. Aspects of operations, ca 8/1918-11/1918: stories illustrating confused nature of advance in Armentieres sector; advance into Belgium; amputation case; first news of Armistice and celebrations, 11/11/1918. Recollections of periods at Armentieres and Merville, 11/1918-4/1919: initial hospital duties; Christmas celebration, 25/12/1918; question of promotion; minimal duties; question of demobilisation. Return to GB and demobilisation, 4/1919. Post-war career: holiday with army friends; decision not to return to work at hardware store; application to apply for educational grant.
REEL 11 Continues: initial studying; taking work selling electrical display map of Western Front; reactions to unemployment; work in wood moulding works, ca 1921; work making aeroplane propellers clock cases; periods of work and interim of unemployment erecting tents for showings of travelling educational film illustrating production process of 'Daily Mail'; work with advertising department of 'Daily Mail' including flying kites, sandcastle competitions and speciality balloons; work as area sales representative for Daily Mail in Kent.
REEL 12 Continues: work as area sales representative for Daily Mail in Kent, Birmingham, Scotland and Devon; question of effects of disruption of rail transport of paper by German bombing, 1939-1945; question of enlistment on outbreak of war, 3/9/1939; role in plotting room with anti-aircraft rocket battery of Home Guard in Plymouth; effects of German air raids on Plymouth; stories illustrating duties as fire watcher; building air raid sheltar.