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Description: | British officer served with 8th and 1/4th Bns Seaforth Highlanders on Western Front, 1916-1917; served with 4th Bn Rajputs in India and Waziristan, 1919-1922
REEL 1:Background in Hartlepool, 1897-1914: family; education; apprenticeship; reaction to outbreak of war, 8/1914; story of attempting to join King's Own Scottish Borderers, 1914. Aspects of period as apprentice at Gray's Shipyard, Hartlepool, 1914-1915: description of role in building monitors; story of enlisting with Seaforth Highlanders in Dingwall, Scotland, 1915. Aspects of training with Seaforth Highlanders in GB, 1915-1916: posted to 3/4th Bn Seaforth Highlanders at Fort George and issued with uniform and kit; accommodation; memory of fellow recruits; cleaning latrines; parades; drill; promoted to lance-corporal; route marches; duties in charge of canteen; opinion of senior officers; story of applying for commission; trained as PT instructor and taught to box; reflections on period of training.
REEL 2 Continues: posted to Ripon, Yorks, 10/1915; accommodation; posted to Lichfield for officer cadet training, 4/1916; description of training; opinion of instructors; commissioned in Seaforth Highlanders and drafted to France, 1916; description of conditions and opinion of training regime at Etaples Bullring, France. Account of German shelling of Hartlepool, 16/Dec/1914. Recollections of operations as officer with 8th Bn Seaforth Highlanders on Western Front, 1916-1917: amusing story of Halloween, 1916; role in reconnaissance patrol at Beaumont Hamel, 11/1916.
REEL 3 Continues: description of attack at Beaumont Hamel, 13/Nov/1916: creeping barrage; role in attack on Y ravine; casualties; story of burying dead from Newfoundland Regt at Mailly Wood and question of identification of bodies; description of going over the top at Beaumont Hamel; story of wounded German POW and question of treatment of POWs; opinion of German troops; living conditions and problem of rats; weapons used in attack at Beaumont Hamel; responsibilities as officer and question of fear; question of consuming alcohol prior to attack.
REEL 4 Continues: role as officer's friend at court martial, 1917; attitude to executions for cowardice; question of officers wearing private's uniform in front line; opinion of wearing kilts in trenches; moved to rest area at Auchonvillers; story of being wounded in leg by shell splinter at Courcellette, 8/Dec/1916; nature of wound and medical treatment; evacuated to GB for further treatment, 1916; attitude of civilians to war; memory of Zeppelin raid on St Pancras Station, London; memory of war artist Otto Murray-Dixon.
REEL 5 Continues: Aspects of operations as officer with 1/4th Bn Seaforth Highlanders on Western Front, 1917: description of role in action at Roeux, Arras sector, France, 5/1917; attitude to Germans and question of fraternization; relations with Belgian and French civilians; description of training for Third Battle of Ypres, 1917; tactical exercises; story of being wounded by shell, 6/1917; description of medical treatment and convalescence in France and GB, 1917-1918; question of amputation of leg; reaction to German offensive, 3/1918; memory of playing rugby.
REEL 6 Continues: Aspects of period in GB, 1918-1919: description of training at Penicuk and Troon, Scotland including revolver, Mills bombs, gas drill and tactical exercises; memory of mustard gas casualties at Ypres, 1917; story of application for commission in Indian Army, 1918; reaction to Armistice, 11/11/1918; attitude to conduct and length of war; reads own poem about war; description of voyage to India via Port Said, Egypt, 1918-1919.
REEL 7 Continues: memory of Armenian refugee camp; story of Arab boy and shark; description of visit to Cleopatra's wells at Aden. Aspects of operations with 4th Bn Rajputs in India, 1919: arrival at Bombay and first impressions; accommodation in hotel, 1919; story of fortune-tellers; memory of bodies of influenza victims at Lucknow; posted to 4th Bn Rajputs at Lucknow, 1919; question of languages; drill; climate and uniform; ranks; description of camp and messing arrangements; attitude to membership bars in European clubs; recreational and sporting activities; story of contracting influenza and treatment, 1919; returned to GB aboard hospital ship SS Varola and problem of monsoon, 6/1919.
REEL 8 Continues: further comments on medical treatment and convalescence in GB. Aspects of operations with 4th Bn Rajputs in Waziristan region, North West Frontier, 1920-1922; description of journey to Bannu and memory of Pathans boarding train; nature of patrolling duties in Bannu; description of loading and firing Stokes gun; punitive raids on Wazir villages; method of advancing up valleys and picketing hill-tops; problem of Wazir sniping on 4th Bn tents at night; reaction to receiving Waziristan Bar to General Service Medal and question of medal for Somme battles; story of contracting fever and return to GB for convalescence, 1922; invalided out of Army and question of disability pension. | Publisher: | http://www.iwm.org.uk | Source: | Imperial War Museum | Creator: | Collins, Norman William | Identifier: | http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/o... | Go to resource |
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