Vimy Ridge War Memorial

Monday 31 May 1999. Ah well, all good things have to come to an end, but we are not totally finished with this holiday yet! We are leaving Paris certainly, but now there is a few hours travelling through the French countryside and a stop at Vimy Ridge, scene of terrible fighting during the First World War.

The storming and capture of the Vimy Ridge by the four Canadian Divisions in April 1917 was thought a turning point at the time and brought Canada new status in the eyes of the world. 3,600 Canadian soldiers died on the first day alone - 9 April, 1917. Their sacrifice and hard-won achievement was overturned in the stalemates, advances and retreats of the Somme, later in the war. The area was left devastated by shelling and mining. Not a blade of grass lived. This crater, more than 80 years on, shows something of the ferocity that the men lived and died through. 80 years of wind and erosion have levelled it out somewhat, but also consider that approximately two thirds of the material blown out of the ground goes straight up and therefore falls back into the crater it created.

Whilst elsewhere throughout northern France, the ground has been levelled and returned to farmland, here at Vimy it has been left as a reminder of those days and as a tribute and memorial to the victors of Vimy.

Tons of unexploded material is still under the mounds and shell holes of the area and most of it has been fenced off. The grass and trees were all grown from seed sent from Canada, as France gave the land to the Canadians in gratitude and recognition of their bravery and achievement. A small building houses displays, maps, artifacts and a story. The story of the entire army of a country, 100,000 men, working together in a single action to capture the highest ridge of land in the area.

Between April 1917 and the end of the war, 19,000 Canadians gave their lives for their country and their allies. Their bodies lay buried in the fields and villages near Vimy. This is a place for reflection and remembrance. But also a place to gain understanding and respect. The Memorial signifies also the soaring hopes for future peace. Whatever one's feeling about war are, unless there are those who are willing to risk and sacrifice all for their beliefs, then those who care nothing for the rights of others, their life, or ownership, will have their way unopposed.

The Memorial has a number of sculptures, carved where they now stand from huge blocks of stone. The monument took 11 years to build and was deigned by Canadian sculptor and architect, Walter Seymour Allward. Six thousand tons of limestone brought from a Roman quarry in the Adriatic, stand on a bed of concrete. The massive figure represents Canada, a nation mourning her dead. Carved on the monument are the names of the 11,285 Canadians who died in France and whose final resting place had not been found.

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Edgar Pedley: Postcards from World War One

This series of articles features postcards sent by Edgar Pedley, serving in the Signals Corps during World War One. The postcards were sent from both the theatre of war and from stations in England whilst training or on leave. They were sent home to his friend Arthur Storr and Arthur's wife, Fanny, with whom Edgar lived as a lodger.

Click each of the photographs below to read the articles.

World War One Era Autograph Book, Part 3

Another look at the autograph book from 1915-1919 bought at a book fair in February 2017. There are more blank pages than used ones and it contains both photographs and pencil sketches besides autographs. The autographs it does contain are of friends and family of whoever owned it rather than of famous people.

We start off this time with a couple of photographs. I've no idea who they are of course, but here are two ladies sitting on a jumble of rocks at the bottom of a sloping field, seen through the gate behind them. The lady on the right is smiling for the camera whilst the lady on the left seems lost in the reverie of a moment as she enjoys the view before her.

A simple sketch of flowers (pansies?) by E.H., some of whose work I've featured from the album before.

This looks like a snapshot taken on a day's outing. I don't know where this is, but whatever the building is, there are several benches for people to sit on outside and under the canopy there is a deck chair and further to the left, almost merging with the row of bushes and trees lining the road where the cameraman is standing, a further group of people are sitting at the very edge of what we can see of the building.

A little bit of World War I humour! A list of "hymns" from the front line.

6:30am - Reveille - Christians Awake
6:45am - Rouse Parade - Art Thou Weary
7:00am - Breakfast - Meekly Wait and Murmer Not
8:15am - Company Officer's Parade - When He Cometh
8:45am - Manouvres - Fight The Good Fight
11:45am - Swedish Drill - Here We Suffer Grief and Pain
1:00pm - Dinner - Come Ye Thankful People, Come
2:15pm - Rifle Drill - Go Labour On
3:15pm - Lecture by Officer - Tell Me The Old-Old Story
4:30pm - Dismiss - Praise God From Whom All Blessings Flow
5:00pm - Tea - What Means This Eager Anxious Throng
6:00pm - Free For The Night - Oh Lord, How Happy We Should Be
10:00pm - Last Post - All Are Safely Gathered In
10:15pm - Lights Out - Peace, Perfect Peace
10:30pm - Inspection of Guards - Sleep On Beloved

Initialled N.M. and dated March 16, 1918

A Tail of Woe! A charming little pencil sketch by E.P. and drawn 21 April 1918.

And here the ladies, in best hats and gloves, take their seats in the charabanc - an open-air early motor coach - perhaps for the return journey from the house we saw earlier. They look well pleased with themselves - I suspect a measure of brown ale or milk stout has been involved somewhere along the line...

We will return one last time to this album sometime soon.

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World War One Era Autograph Book, Part 2

A second look inside the old autograph book, picked up at a book fair recently.

I mentioned the last time that I thought this book had been carried through the war. All dated entries fall between 1915 and 1919 but there are far more blank pages than used ones. A few have a military theme and here is one of those...

I suspect now that the book was in use during the war, but not actually taken to the front. It's in far too clean and undamaged a state. There are no mud - or blood - stains and no torn or scuffed pages. Perhaps the references to the war were completed during periods of leave or just after demobilisation?

This pencil sketch is titled Directing The Way At The Front and shows one soldier saying "Yer knows the dead 'orse 'cross the road? Well keep straight on till yer comes to a p'rambulation 'longside a Johnson ole."

A Johnson hole was a particularly large shell crater. Named for its size and referring to the World Heavyweight Boxing Champion to 1915, Jack Johnson.

Here's a small photograph print gummed into the book.

I'm no motorbike expert I'm afraid. The closest model to this that I've been able to find going through Google images is of a Sunbeam - see advert below.

This advert dates from 1915 so is the right era. Seventy guineas is £73.50, a considerable sum in those days. You would have to spend roughly £106 in 2017 to buy something that cost £1 in 1915. So today such a motorcycle would cost £7,791 give or take a groat... On the other hand, what would that same 1915 motorcycle be worth now in working condition?

Ah... hang on - a message has flooded in! The motorcycle in your photo is a 1915 AJS D1 750cc 2cyl side valve. You can just make out the AJS logo on the side of the tank. They usually had a rear pillion but this one looks to have a luggage rack instead. All the very best Chris Hartley. Many thanks Chris!

Agh! This photograph has been gummed over some existing writing on the page. The bottom of the page is signed A Waring, May 30th 1918. I was despairing of ever being able to remove the photo safely without damaging what was under it when I had an idea. I took out a bright LED torch and shone it through the page from the other side. A word at a time, moving the LED along the lines I eventually made out this:

I slept and dreamt that life was beauty
I woke and found that life was duty
Never say die
Up man and try

The first two lines come from a poem by Ellen Sturgis Hooper. I've had less success identifying the origin of the, perhaps more familiar, last two lines. They seem to go back to proverb and idiom. If anyone knows better, please let me know!

Along similar poetic lines here's my closing look at the old autograph book for this time.

When it comes your wedding day
A new broom I will send
In sunshine use the bushy end
In storm the other end

Margaret Salt, 12 June 1919

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World War One Era Autograph Book

Yesterday we had a motor up to Hornby, north Lancashire to a book fair that was being held in the Hornby Institute. A lovely place Hornby, I'm going to have to go back in summer with the camera I think! Small village, old buildings, tea rooms, and a bridge over the River Lune at the side of which is a small weir.

Anyway I didn't buy any books but we enjoyed a good rummage round. I didn't come away empty handed though...

This autograph book was lying on one of the stalls and I had a quick flick through it, noting that the vast majority of pages remained untroubled by ink. But of the ones that had been used there was a mix of signatures, old photographs pasted in or shoved between pages, many of them fragments of a group, some poetry, humour and pencil sketches.

This charming little cartoon was on the first page. Signed J.H. it is entitled Mischief. Whether that's the cat's name or just a description of what it's up to I'm not sure!

A group photo gummed onto a page. There's no names or date I'm afraid but leafing through the book shows that dated entries fall between 1915 and 1919. This book was carried through the First World War. Possibly into war, for as we shall see in articles to come, some have a distinctly military flavour.

The facing page has a small photograph and the signature of ... well the bits I can make out... Percy M Knowles(?) Perhaps Lieutenant Colonel(?) or is the second line Pvt CC (or CE)?

A closer and edited version of the photograph of a party enjoying a walk in the woods.

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107-Year-Old Sad Note Postcard

A postcard from my own collection this time. Cliftonville is an area of Margate in Kent. We stayed in a hotel on the seafront several times when I was around 14-17 and I remember it well if only for the rather lovely memory of being 15 and a girl rushing up to me in the street and flinging her arms round me and planting a smacker of a kiss on my cheek. I'm easily pleased like that...

This is not a rare card. On searching online for information about the Newgate Capway, all I managed to find were adverts for similar postcards. They were variously dated from 1905 onwards. Searching for Newgate Gap led to a little more information. The gap was a cutting through the cliffs, made by farmers who collected seaweed off the beach for rotting down as fertiliser. The bridge dates from 1861 and had a framework of iron with wooden decking. It was replaced in 1907 by one with steel and concrete with sides encased in decorative marble. This in turn was refurbished in 2005 with the marble smashed off and replaced with bricks and concrete - very classy...

The message side of the card is a trifle hard to read... Even the postal franking is a bit hit and miss. You can make out "10AM OC 1 09" so I would hazard that it was posted in October either on the first or between the 10-19th in 1909. Hence it showed a bridge no longer in existence at the time of posting! The written message has fared even less well, having faded just about to nothing. Most of the address though is readable: It was sent to a ship - SS Dartmoor or perhaps Dartmouth (?) care of the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company at Victoria Dock, Canning Town.

The cargo ship SS Dartmoor was built at South Shields in 1892 and was sunk during the First World War by U-Boat UC50 en-route from Gibralter to Garston (Liverpool) with a cargo of ore. A search for SS Dartmouth failed to turn up any relevant information - possibly exacerbated by the fact that the town of Dartmouth has a lot to do with ships...

To try to read the message I used Adobe Photoshop to play with brightness and contrast, hue and density of colour, until most of the message could be deciphered. I'm missing the name of the person it refers to I'm afraid, but this was no "Wish You Were Here" message. It says:

"D.16 (or 46). P----- had an accident, call if able." It is signed I (or J) with a long surname beginning with H - Hunnisford, Houseman - it could almost be anything. The card raises more questions than it answers. Which is part of the appeal of postcard collecting. The photos are interesting, particularly those from the beginning of the 20th century, but just on a very few occasions, the message gives a brief, but not always complete, glimpse of events that affected the people involved. And without asking to plough through any old documents of ship departures from Victoria Dock (it would have been the Royal Victoria Dock by this date) this is where we must leave the unfortunate P-----.

World War One Era Postcard from Weston-Super-Mare

Today's entry shows a postcard from Weston-Super-Mare. It was posted at 10:30 in the morning on the 16th of July 1917.

The photo shows Weston's Grand Pier. The pier, which charges 2d admission (just less than one of our pence today), has few of today's shops and kiosks at the entrance. Just turnstiles at either side of the central ticket booth.

Signs boast of a Viennese Band - they would no doubt play waltzes for dancing. Another sign advertises The Bioscope - silent movies. In 1917 they could have been showing the glamorous Theda Bara in an early version of Cleopatra, possibly with the new Charlie Chaplin movie Easy Street in which his policeman character has to get the better of a huge villain. Or perhaps they saw Fatty Arbuckle in Coney Island? The name "Cadets" is displayed also. That could be the name of the Viennese Band, the cinema or something totally different.

There are not very many people on the pier itself, the only one I'm sure of stands against the side about a third of the way down. A few people are on the beach (it looks as though the tide is not only just on the turn, but that it has come quite a bit further up the beach than it does these days!) To the left of the pier a line has formed on the beach, waiting to go for a boat ride. Right at the bottom of the photo two covered horse-drawn carriages wait for passengers.

The postcard was sent to a Miss "Rex" Perry, in Ledbury, Herefordshire. It reads:

Dear Rex, Just a P.C. to let you know I am still enjoying myself and still wishing you were here with me. Remember me to friends and to B and B's loving friend, Billie.

So was the sender "Billie"? Or was Billie the loving friend of the hard to identify "B." Ooh! Messages open to interpretation in the midst of war! Who was the mysterious Miss Rex? And after posting the card, did the sender swim back out to their U-Boat...???

Edgar Pedley in Germany at The End of World War One

I made a bit of a boo boo yesterday with my entry in the Edgar Pedley series. These two postcards featured here should have come first. So apologies to those of you following Edgar's time in the Signals Corps during World War One. This marks the last of my entries about Edgar unless Hayley Easthope, whose collection the postcards come from, can find any more.

I said in yesterday's entry that Edgar had had some leave at the end of the war, but it was obviously not for a while as these postcards prove that he was first sent into Germany as part of the occupying force. They were posted on the 19th January 1919 and postmarked by an anonymous Field Post Office, but both the postcards depict the German city of Köln or, as we would call it in English, Cologne. French actually - Cologne was what the French called it when it became part of the French Empire under Napoleon Bonaparte.

Britain kept an occupying force in the city from the end of the war until 1926 and Edgar seems to have been a part of the British Army of the Rhine. I don't have his full message this time. He is once again writing home to his friends Arthur and Fanny Storr in Shropshire with whom he lodged. He sent the message in three parts, each on a separate postcard, numbering the parts in the corner. I have only parts two and three.

Edgar congratulates Arthur on his own homecoming. We know that Arthur had been wounded and he must have been demobilised from the army at the end of 1918. Edgar's own circumstances are telling on him a little as can be gleaned from the tone of his message.

2/ ...you've no idea what a treat it is to get such nice things to eat. Well Arthur I'm very pleased to hear that you are safely back at home, whatever does it feel like to be a free man again? I wonder how much...

3/ ...longer I have to do. I'm afraid now that I am in this quarter I shall be some time eh, what do you think? I'm more fed up now than ever I've been. Do you think troops in Germany will be released with the others(?) Well I suppose I must grin and bear it, but it's hard lines, one leave in 2 years isn't it? Well Cheerio Arthur, must close now, will let you have a letter soon. Hope you are all keeping quite well. Kindest Regards to all at 22 (the house number) Yours etc. Ped

Post Script

Alfred Edgar Pedley was born in 1892. As we have already seen due to my mistake with the order of these entries, he must have been sent home on leave temporarily sometime between January and April 1919 as the last postcard in my possession has him about to board ship in Folkestone on May 19, 1919 heading back to Germany.

The postcards have come from the collection of Hayley Easthope, a friend I met through a common interest in the singer Billy Fury. Fanny Storr was her great aunt, being the sister of Hayley's grandmother. Arthur Storr died in the early 1950s and at some point afterwards Edgar and Fanny were married together. Without any more information I'm not making any assumptions about this fact other than to point out the following:

In the 1950s a single man lodging with a single woman would be bound to cause gossip and a little scandal. The likelihood is that their marriage was one primarily of convenience to avoid scandal and to allow Edgar to carry on living at what he would obviously regard as home, but it was also a marriage between two people who had been long-standing friends. Yet in Edgar's postcards he addresses them to Arthur and Mrs Storr and never takes the liberty of using Fanny's given name.

Edgar would by then have been in his sixties. Being sixty in 1950 was not quite like being sixty in 2015. Life expectancy was not as long as it is now and in photographs of the time, people of middle age in the 1950s can look a lot older to our modern eyes. Edgar died in 1966 aged 74. He was one of those brave men who risked everything to keep their country safe and as such I salute him.

Rest In Peace, Edgar Pedley.

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Edgar Pedley Sent Back To Germany Following World War One

I mentioned that it was a while since we caught up with the exploits of Edgar Pedley who served in the Signals Corps through the First World War.

Edgar's missives home, or at least those that are still in existence because it's quite likely some were lost or went to other branches of the family, are few. From the time he left for war in 1916 there is a single postcard from 1916, one from 1917 and then right up to May 1918 which is the last we heard from him (in this entry published on the blog in November 2014).

Edgar survived the war and enjoyed a spot of leave from the Army back home in Shropshire where he lodged with Arthur and Fanny Storr. It is now the 19th of May 1919 and Edgar has been mobilised again as we can read in his postcard, posted from Folkestone.

Folkestone, Saturday.

Dear A & Mrs Storr
Arrived here 10:30am, beautiful day, sea front crowded, orchestra playing (what a nice send off!) Had to wait at Crewe last night from 7:15pm to 11:40pm, just what I'd expected, Expect to sail about 2:30 this afternoon. Cheerio

Date unknown: Edgar Pedley (right) enjoying a picnic with Fanny and Arthur Storr.

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French Postcards of World War One Damage

Regular readers may remember my series on this blog following the exploits of Edgar Pedley who served in the Signals Corps in World War One. We last heard from him way back in November 2014 when I featured a postcard that he sent back home to his friends Arthur and Mrs Storr, whom he lodged with.

There's a gap in his messages, or at least in the ones I have, but he will return as, whilst he survived the war, the army has not yet finished with him, and after a spot of leave he will be returning to mainland Europe.

In the meantime, here are a few postcards from the First World War that some other soldier brought back as souvenirs. These haven't been written on apart from some brief comments in pencil. I bought these from a stall in an antiques warehouse.

The first three are part of a French series, presumably a large one as this is number 304 in the series. It show the ruined church of Pervyse in Belgium where the Germans reached at the end of October 1914 at the close of the two-month long Battle of the Yser. The Belgians had put up a strong resistance and the land behind the German advance was deliberately flooded. Two sluiceworkers, Karel Cogge and Hendrik Geeraert became national heroes of Belgium for the part they played in the flooding. Once the Germans realised that water was rising behind them they withdrew south, leaving a sliver of unoccupied Belgium.

Written on the back of the postcard in faded pencil is the laconic comment: "This was once a decent church".

The gap left following the destruction of a group of houses at Pargny-sur-Saulx during the First Battle of the Marne in 1914. The Germans had been pushed back from the brink of initial success. After the Battle of Mons the British and French armies had retreated almost to Paris before the tide was turned and for the first time motorised units, in the form of 600 taxi cabs transported 5 soldiers each from Paris to the battle front. To comply with city regulations their meters were running and the French Treasury paid a total of 70,012 francs... The battle ended with both armies trying to push back the northern flank of their opponents, starting what is now called the "Race for the Sea" and effectively forming hundreds of miles of opposing armies and setting the scene for the ensuing trench warfare.

Written in pencil on the back of the postcard is: "Another decent mess (somebody's home)"

From the same battle, this postcard shows the village of Heiltz-le-Maurupt. The card is labelled "Boche Kulture - Magasin pillé et incendié" ("Hun Culture - a store pillaged and burned") Both Boche and Hun were terms for German. On the rear in pencil is written "Good work by Germhun artillery" (underlining as per the original writer's pencil work).

This postcard is from a different series, probably produced for sale to British soldiers as both the caption on the front and longer description on the rear are printed in english. On the front: "Arras. The Cathedral Interior, showing the Bishop's Throne." On the rear: "Arras. - The interior of the cathedral, renowned for the beauty of its architecture, now reduced to a heap of ruins by German artillery."

From Field Post Office D49, WWI

A short postcard from Private Edgar Pedley of the 59th Signal Corps. Stamped "Active Service" he writes back home to his landlady (Edgar was lodging with Arthur and Fanny Storr when he left for the war).

The postcard is a picture view of St Omer's church of St Denis, the martyr of Paris, who had his head chopped off in Montmarte, picked it up and walked six miles before dying, preaching all the way. He is (perhaps unsurprisingly) the patron saint of headaches...

Anyway, I digress. Edgar has made it through to May 1918 and writes perhaps a little hastily: "I am quite well, letter follows at first opportunity."

A. Edgar Pedley, proudly wearing his medal ribbons in later life. Postcard and photo from the Hayley Easthope Collection.

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WWI Postcard From The Front

The last we heard from Edgar Pedley of the 59th Signal Corps, it was 1916 and he was about to leave for France.

It's now 18 March 1917. Edgar is on Active Service and the postcard he sends is simply postmarked "Field Post Office". A crimson stamp mark attests that his comments have been passed by the Field Censor.

The postcard is one of a French series "La Grand Guerre Européene" ("The Great European War") - even at this stage it was becoming known as "The Great War"... We don't know where the postcard was sent from - the postcard looks as though it once gave the location away, but this has been rubbed or scraped until the name has been obliterated so that if it came into the hands of the enemy they would not be able to tell where Allied troops were stationed.

The remaining caption reads: Intériur de la Sncrerie (sic) - Interior of the Sugar house

Either the U of "sucrerie" was placed upside down by mistake or every U had been lost to war damage and the N inserted as most people (French speakers at least...) would know what was meant. Edgar filled every available space on the back of the postcard yet without giving away any secrets - no mention of his unit or place names, or his rank. In a short sentence right at the top of the postcard he writes: "Read page 3, column 4 Mail Mar 17th" Obviously significant in some way, but I've not been able to find a copy to see. It's possible that this message could have been added later. I can't imagine that Edgar would have managed to read the paper from France only the day after it was published.

There is another postscript added towards the top of the card but in the order that I suspect Edgar wrote his card, he says:

Mar 18th 17

Just a pc to say still going on alright. Parcel not yet to hand, I wonder if somebody's doing it on me, they will have a good time but expect it will turn up eventually, will let you know on receipt. A pal and I have just come a cycle ride to a small village about 4 miles, a terrible place now, but nevertheless possesses a YMCA (in an old barn). Thank you for papers received last night, 17th. Kindest regards to all AEP.

The postscript at the top reads: Thanks for letters of Sunday just received, sorry to hear of Arthur's condition, shall be glad to hear how he's going on.

Postcard from the Hayley Easthope Collection.

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