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Nothing concentrates the military mind so much as the discovery that you have walked into an ambush. -- Thomas Packenham |
 War Stories: World War IWar Stories published under this topic are as follows:
September 20, 1916
Dear-,
In answer to your kind letter dated Aug. 27th. I was very pleased to hear you are keeping well through these war times. I came to this Hospital about a month ago and it is a far better place than Camberwell. It seems to take a long time for my wound to heal up and as I still have to walk around with a tube in it. I won't be sorry when it does. The doctor here thinks there is still a piece of something in there yet. Very deep down, and as they can't trace it he won't take a chance of operating. When it does get better I expect to be sent back to France, by the way they are sending some of the poor fellows back. Some are not really better yet.
I had a letter from Harry a few days ago and he says he is quite well. Yes, I am very much alive and I sure did think my time had come when I was buried for twenty minutes or more, for it seemed like hours. I am pleased the boys are keeping well and I hope they have good luck too. It must make your mother feel a lot better when she hears from them often. I hope she is well, also the rest of the family. We are getting some cold, windy weather here now. I hope you are getting it good out in St. Marys. How are things there now? They are not very good in London at present-everything is so dear.
It is over two years since I was in St. Marys. My! how the time flies. I go home two or three times a week as it takes half an hour to get there. My Brother George is still out in France and was quite well the last I heard. I think this is all, so will close with best wishes to all.
Your Friend
Billy
Serg't W. Hobson,
Military Hospital,
Brondesbury, N. W., England
September 20, 1916
2577 Reads
Hut 11, Frensham Military Hosp.,
Nr. Farnham, Surrey,
England
September 15, 1916
Dear Lallie:-
You will see by the above address that I am back again in England and in hospital. But am thankful to say I have no open wounds. Just a severely sprained back and my nerves are badly shaken up. I was buried in the trenches, and you may be sure I thought my last moment had come. My chum next to me was killed - instantly killed. Something seemed to tell me the day before that I was going to get it.
I have been in the hospital two weeks now, counting the time I was in the Australian Hospital before I came to England. Yesterday was the first time I was out of bed for an hour or two. I am to shaky to walk yet, but am getting along nicely. On Wednesday who should visit me but Johnnie. I was so pleased to see him. He is near us at Whitley. We are 31 miles past London-rather a long way from home. I told dear Ettie not to come so far, as I may soon be moved to a Canadian hospital.
The doctor in France also saw my toe, and he said I should not have been passed. One overlaps the other, the same as Johnnie got his discharge for. The doctor there was going to operate on them, but they won't allow him to. So I do not think I will have to go back to France. We were in the same place as Harold got his arm off. It was awful. Perhaps you read the report in the paper-the bombardment of Sunday the 3rd. I thank God he spared me to dear Ettie.
This morning I had a letter from Harold, also one from Johnnie. Harold writes very good indeed with his left hand, and he is getting along fine, waiting for his new arm. Now Lallie, I hope you are quite well, and I think you had better come back to England and be with us all here. You know there is always a home waiting here for you with dear Ettie and I. Well, I have no news. When you write to me send it to Ettie and she will forward it on to me, unless I am home by then. Remember me to Mrs. Booty, also, Mrs. Northgraves when you see them. Take every care of your dear self. Heaps of love. God bless you.
Your Loving Brother
Fred
2695 Reads
ON May 31st, 1916, the Grand Fleet and the High Sea Fleet fought the action which has become known as the Battle of Jutland. The despatch describing the battle, as published some weeks later, was not quite in its original form as written by me. After a conference held at the Admiralty, early in June, modifications were made : some of them because it was considered that certain passages might convey useful information to the enemy, and others because it was thought to be undesirable to draw attention to certain features of British design.
Note: by Admiral John Rushworth Jellicoe 8849 Reads
As the War had to be, I shall always be glad I was able to play even a negligible part in it, or I should never have known with such certainty the madness of it. During training I was aware only of the glamour of War. I prepared myself for it with enthusiasm, and bayoneted and clubbed the stuffed sacks representing the enemy with a sort of exalted ferocity. I was as jealous of my regiment as I used to be of my school.
Note: by Private Harold Saunders 11563 Reads
6th May, 1916, signed the enlistment papers after having been previously rejected in 1915. 20th June, left Byron Bay by train to Lismore for the medical examination. This time, Dr Bignell passed me, without even examining me, because he could see that I was eager to enlist and men were badly needed.
Note: by Private Verdi George Schwinghammer 20882 Reads
In November 1915 I was one of those accepted by Colonel Lord Feversham to be enlisted in the Yeoman Rifles being formed at Helmsley Park. In January 1916 the battalion was transferred to Aldershot, where we became fit for our great adventure. Runners were asked for, and I volunteered for the job.
Note: by Corporal Robert William Iley, 41st Battalion Machine Gun Corps 8002 Reads
It was Thursday evening, April 22nd, 1915. In a meadow off the Poperinghe-Ypres road, the men of the Queen Victoria Rifles were taking their ease. We had just fought our first big action in the fight for Hill 60. We had had a gruelling time, and had left many of our comrades on its slopes. We survivors were utterly spent and weary; but we felt in good heart, for only an hour ago we had been personally congratulated by Sir John French, also the Army Commander, General Smith-Dorrien.
Note: by Anthony R. Hossack, Queen Victoria Rifles 8709 Reads
July 11, 1918 Left Camp Custer July 21, 1918 Left Camp Mills Sunday morning, 4 o'clock, for depot. Took ferry boat up Hudson River to pier. Stayed in New York harbor until Monday morning 9 o'clock. Sailed with a fleet of 16 boats, some torpedo boats and a lot of submarine chasers. Saw 3 observation balloons out in the ocean anchored on ships. Had calm weather for 5 days - got a little stormy then. Was awful sick the entire trip. Note: by Paul Rademacher 10085 Reads
After nine months in France, I joined the East Lancs. at Gugunci, travelling overland from Cherbourg to Taranto, thence by steamer to Itea, and finally by motor and rail across wild Greece to Salonika. On disembarking at Dudulah, an enemy aeroplane greeted us with its heavy drone, but proceeded on its way to bomb an ammunition dump some distance away.
Note: by Private N. C. Powell, 3/5th East Lancs. Regt. 9554 Reads
It was a hot, sunny day, the tenth of June, the year Nineteen Eighteen, that I voluntarily answered the call of my country, which was then plunged into the greatest and most terrific war mankind has ever known. I enlisted at Camp Beauregard, and through the kindness and assistance of a friend of my sister's, Sergeant Whitmel Reed, was assigned to the Intelligence Section, Headquarters Company, 156th Infantry Regiment, 39th Division. A few days after my arrival I was equipped in olive drab, and soon made a full fledged soldier of "Uncle Sam".
Note: by Pvt. Mathew Chopin, 356th Inf., 89th Div. 11710 Reads
Front, Aug. 9, 1918Dear Uncle Clem: I know you must be waiting anxiously for a letter from me and wondering why I have not written before. Ever since July 15, the day of Clem's death, and the opening of the German offensive which we turned into defeat, we have been on the go night and day, and a good share of the time have been used as infantry. Note: W.A. Thompson, Jr served with the Rainbow Division of Engineers in France. 7838 Reads
I will endeavor to give you a fuller account of our experiences whilst landing. I dare say long ere this reaches you, you will have read all about it in the papers, but here is the part I saw and took part in. It was on Sunday, April 25th at 3 a.m., we disembarked from our transport ship, the "Galeka," our kit consisted of an extra change of clothing, 200 rounds of ammunition, as well as plenty of tobacco, the entire lot weighing just on 90 lbs., and with that weight we had to climb down over the side of the ship - per Jacob's ladder, which by the way, is made of rope, - into rowing boats, 50 men in each. We were towed by naval pinnaces as near as possible to the shore, being under very heavy fire made it a very difficult task.
Note: by Pte. H. J. Lynch writing from Victoria Hospital, Alexandria. 9029 Reads
I should have mentioned that it was Lieut. A.S.Miller whose company caught most of the bombs, and from what I learned later, Sandy Miller behaved like the little gentleman he was.
Note: by Robert Lindsay Mackay, 11th Battalion of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. 8981 Reads
Early in the spring of 1917 the 11th Northumberland Fusiliers, to which I belonged, were taking their share in the final preparations for the assault on the Messines Ridge. Our divisional front was in the Salient, and nightly working parties up to the Bund at Zillebeke, Jackson's Dump, or Sanctuary Wood were both hazardous and fatiguing.
Note: by Private E. N. Gladden 9323 Reads
May 20th 1917. Enlisted June 3rd 1917. Arrived Ft. Thomas Kentucky. Sworn in service. June 22nd 1917. Arrived Ft. Benjamin Harrison, Indiana. 1st class private. Co G 46 Indiana #17 September 6th 1917. Arrived Camp Sherman Ohio. 322 FA. Supply Co #11. Made corporal. Made sergeant. RO # 33. Oct 14-18 Note: by Sergeant Ross A. Buchman, Supply Company, 322 Field Artillery, AEF 11899 Reads
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1862:
President Lincoln issues General War Order No. 1, ordering all land and sea forces to advance on February 22, 1862.
1905: Russian General Kuropatkin takes the offensive in Manchuria. The Japanese under General Oyama suffer heavy casualties. 1939: President Franklin D. Roosevelt approves the sale of U.S. war planes to France. 1941: The United States and Great Britain begin high-level military talks in Washington. 1943: 8th Air Force bombers, dispatched from their bases in England, fly the first American bombing raid against the Germans, targeting the Wilhelmshaven port. 1944: Soviet forces permanently break the Leningrad siege line, ending the almost 900-day German-enforced containment of the city. 1951: From this period onward, the major strategic concern of the Chinese was to provide its armies with replacements and supplies. 1951: Forcefully marking the continued importance of the West in the development of nuclear weaponry, the government detonates the first of a series of nuclear bombs at its new Nevada test site. 1953: The Combat Cargo Command of the U.S. Air Force transported its 2,000,000th passenger to Korea after two years of operations as the Far Easts military airline. 1953: The Combat Cargo Command of the U.S. Air Force transported its 2,000,000th passenger to Korea after two years of operations as the Far Easts military airline. |
