Man's Inhumanity to Man
A skylark in the clear blue yonder gave the lie to where we were - in the middle of the Great War battlefield of the Somme.
Although taking prior delivery of the coach had proved a nightmare, the journey to France of a dozen or so Rotarians had been quick and efficient. Jim Nicholson, an inspired and monumentally knowledgeable guide was talking us through its first unforgettable day, July 1st, 1916. "Bleed France white" had led to Verdun and the British were being pressed to relieve the pressure by attacking along sixteen miles from Gommecourt to Montauban. The rigid tactics of human attrition aimed to drain the German army of manpower and reserves rather than territorial gain.
Move the arrow over any of the the thumbnail pictures to a see a larger image displayed.
Connaught Cemetery
German Cemetery
Lochnagar Memorial
Site of Poziers Windmill
Mill Road Cemetery
Sere Road Cemetery
Thiepval Memorial
Railway Hollow Cemetery
Le Tommy
Dinner at Hotel
Jim pointed out the incredibly short distances between opposing trenches and told innumerable stories of personal suffering, always adept at putting a human face on brutal carnage. We saw where foot soldiers walked slowly with heavy baggage into machine gun crossfire, believing wrongly that enemy trenches had been shelled out of existence, and heard of a first day slaughter still a record for one-day casualties. Jim spoke of the two brothers interred together, of the grave of the oldest victim, over sixty, whose three sons survived him on the same front line. Humour preserved sanity, as in the tale of the Cockney cricketer, Spider Webb, legs removed by a stray shell with two pals dead alongside saying "one over, two bowled and one stumped" before he fainted. Animals were not forgotten; we saw photographs of primitive gas masks on horses, of dogs pulling machine guns.
There are indelible impressions of beautifully manicured cemeteries, one with thousands of French crosses bearing the single message "Inconnu", others English, Commonwealth even German with their own personal tributes. Jim's knowledge of battlefield logistics was only matched by Alan Maxwell's equally detailed mechanical engineering know-how.
As a precursor to a graveside reading of Wilfred Owen's " The Sentry" Jim quoted the anti- war poet thus "My subject is ever the pity of war. The poetry is the pity"
