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Chapter 19: Going
Lieutenant Brian Horrocks cheered off from Chatham: A Full Life, by Lieutenant General Sir Brian Horrocks, (1960), page 15.
Ambulance driver Albert Batty’s diary and reminisces: Gloucester, D3435.
Walter Bloem’s comment on broken down British lorries he passed: Vormarsch, by Walter Bloem, (1916), translated from the German by G C Wynne as The Advance from Mons 1914, page 102. Copy at RAF Museum, Hendon.
The fatal runaway wagon in Bristol: Bristol Times and Mirror, August 11, 1914. For Park Street shops, Kelly’s Bristol Directory (1914), page 223.
For the farewells and first marches by Territorials: Ashbourne Advertiser, August 7, 1914; Uttoxeter Advertiser, August 19 and 26, 1914.
Hinckley Territorials’ march to Loughborough, with female followers: Aubrey Moore, A Son of the Rectory, (1982), page 120.
Description by ‘An Old Newarker’ of troops leaving Derby: Newark Advertiser, August 19, 1914.
Oliver Lyttleton writing to his mother: Churchill archives, CHAN 1/8/2.
Kitchener’s outlook as reported in The Times of August 15, 1914, and much reported in the press in following days: The First World War Personal Experiences of Lieutenant Colonel C A Court Repington, volume one, (1920), pages 21-22.
Colonel G S Foljambe ‘ashamed’ of returned Territorials: Newark Advertiser, September 9, 1914.
Inquest of men killed in aeroplane crash at Netheravon: Bristol Times and Mirror, August 13, 1914.
Chapter 20: Forward
The uncensored letter by the Woodin brothers on their crossing to Rouen: Alfreton and Belper Journal, September 4, 1914.
Private John Harding’s story: Essex County Standard, September 12, 1914.
Charles Wallbank’s diary and notes: Wolverhampton archives, DX-714/1.
Private Dixon’s story: Pudsey and Stanningley News, September 11, 1914.
Mr and Mrs Taylor of Quievrain’s story: Loughborough Echo, August 28, 1914.
Private Thomas Cross’ story: Cannock Advertiser, September 19, 1914.
Private John Jennings’ story: Derby Advertiser, September 11, 1914.
Bombardier William Simpson’s story: Ashbourne Advertiser, September 11, 1914.
Private Harry Mason’s story: Walsall Observer, September 12, 1914.
Private Charles Broadhurst’s story: Walsall Observer, September 19, 1914.
Privates Charles Dudley Moore and JT Tait’s story: Burton Gazette, September 10, 1914.
Private Frederick Bruce’s story: Cambridge Daily News, September 15, 1914.
Private CE McLoughlin’s story: Burton Evening Gazette, September 16, 1914.
Sgt Crockett’s story: Burton Evening Gazette, September 9, 1914.
Private Shepherd’s story: Nottingham Guardian, September 25, 1914 (and lifted by the Newark Advertiser, September 30, 1914).
Chapter 21: Back
Lieutenant Macleod’s story: Cambridge Daily News, September 10, 1914.
Sgt Bird and Private Woolgar’s story: Newark Advertiser, September 30, 1914.
A bird’s eye view of the retreat: Recollections of an Airman, by Lieutenant Colonel LA Strange, (first published 1933; 1935 edition), page 41. Copy at RAF Museum, Hendon.
Unidentified sergeant in bayonet fight; and ‘searchlights’ described: Sheffield Daily Independent, September 4, 1914.
Bugler Tom Reeves’ story: Derby Advertiser, September 11, 1914.
Lance Corporal Ball’s story: Walsall Advertiser, September 26, 1914.
Sidney Clive’s diary: KCL, Clive II/1.
‘Lessons of the battle’: December 1933, Battle of Le Cateau August 26, 1914 tour of the battlefield, HMSO. Copy at KCL.
Motorcycle messenger J K Stevens’ story: Cambridge Daily News, September 15, 1914.
Asquith’s widely-reported deploring in the House of Commons on August 31 of The Times’ August 30 report on the ‘broken’ British army: for example, Bristol Times and Mirror, September 1, 1914. That offending Sunday edition of The Times is not among the digital editions available at some libraries and archives, but see We Thundered On: 200 years of The Times 1785-1985, by Philip Howard, (1985), pages 87-88; and the article by John Terraine, The Impact of Mons, August 1914, in History Today, August 1964.
Lady French’s appeal for socks: The Times, August 29, 1914, and widely reported the following week. Lord Dartmouth’s similar appeal in Staffordshire: for example, Burton Evening Gazette, September 4, 1914.
Navy wireless operator William Cash’s story: Wolverhampton Express & Star, August 15, 1914.
Chapter 22: An Outing to Ostend
Copy of George Aston’s account of his command of the expedition to Ostend: copy at KCL, Aston 1/8. Admiralty messages to Aston: Churchill archives, Char 13/36.
Chapter 23: To the End of the World
Letters of Gerald Legge to his parents from Gallipoli, and letters of condolence to Lord Dartmouth: Stafford, D 859/⅓/9. For the last days of Legge and hundreds of men in his battalion at Suvla Bay in August 1915, see The History of the Seventh South Staffordshire Regiment, edited by Major A H Ashcroft (1919), pages 11-15; copy in Wolverhampton archives.
Some Military Terms and Totals
Brigade = four battalions. Infantry division = 12 battalions, about 20,000 men.
(Source: The Times, August 29, 1914)
Battalion = eight companies, each of three officers, captain, lieutenant, and sub-lieutenant, five sergeants, two drummers and buglers, five corporals, 108 privates, and one driver with two horses for the general service wagon.
(Source: Chambers’s Encyclopaedia, 1895)
Approximate estimates of the peacetime military of the great powers of Europe (in thousands; war footing in brackets)
Austria 350 (1850), France 564 (2350), Germany 457 (3000), Great Britain 210 (717), Italy 280 (2000), Russia 870 (2900).
(Also: peace footing in thousands of Belgium - 52, and Servia, including reserves - 105.)
(Source: Chambers’s Encyclopaedia, 1895)
The BEF: ‘The British Expeditionary Force, composed of six divisions and a cavalry division, had a total strength of, roughly, 160,000 men, 60,000 horses, 490 guns, and 7000 vehicles. That part of it sent out in the first instance numbered only about 100,000 men, and consisted of a cavalry division and two army corps each of two divisions.’
From Private to Field-Marshal by Sir William Robertson (1921), page 203.
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