Day Sixty Seven on the Somme

5th September 1916: From our Correspondent in the Field

The adjutant of 1st Bedfords tells me that things are now quiet around Falfemont Farm which was finally captured in the early hours of this morning. A great triumph. Tersely he told me: “We buried all our dead”. These amounted to 17 officers and men on 3rd September and 45 yesterday. Local fatalities came from Biggleswade, Bletsoe, Clifton, Houghton Regis, Luton, Maulden, Toddington, Woburn Sands and Wootton.

Lieutenant Addison Howard

The name most recognised will be that of Lieutenant Addison James Howard, of Kempston Grange, who only joined the battalion a few days ago. He was just 23. I was told that his cousin, Second Lieutenant Douglas Howard, who was alongside him, reported that he was killed instantaneously by one of our own shells yesterday morning(1). Second Lieutenant Douglas Howard himself was wounded a few hours later by a bullet to the chest and two more in a shoulder and is now in hospital at Abbeville.

Second Lieutenant Douglas Howard

Lieutenant Addison Howard was born in April 1893 at Kempston Grange. He was educated at Bedford Grammar School, 1901-1911, where he was in the Officer's Training Corps. Subsequently he went to King's College, Cambridge and there took a Second Class Honours degree in the Mechanical Science Tripos in 1914. Immediately before the close of the term at Cambridge he was seized with illness and had to undergo a serious operation. During his convalescence he was in charge of munition work in his father's works and showed great skill as a mechanician and engineer. He was named after his two grandfathers Mr James Howard MP and Colonel Addison Potter CB and we can only lament that a career which was commenced under such distinguished auspices has been abruptly terminated. His colonel told me: "He was temporarily commanding a company. No one could have handled the men better during an attack the Battalion made on September 3rd, over 1,000 yards under machine gun and shell fire. He had them well together, consolidated, pushed out patrols, took a German prisoner and sent in a series of model reports. He was a first-rate officer and is a very great loss to the Battalion. I need hardly say he was very popular among all ranks".

Second Lieutenant Douglas Howard of the 3rd Battalion, Bedfordshire Regiment, is the only son of Mr and Mrs John Howard Howard of Clapham Park. He was given his commission in October 1915 after leaving Harrow in the previous July. He was a member of the Harrow School OTC for about four years. Mr Douglas Howard did all his training at Landguard Camp, Felixstowe and went to the Front about a fortnight before he was wounded.

Today more attacks have been launched at Devil’s Wood under covering fire from field artillery at fairly close quarters. We understand that two companies have managed to dig-in on the eastern edge.

This afternoon 5th Division, though not 1st Bedfords, have launched an attack on Leuze Wood (generally known as Lousy Wood by Tommy Atkins) and the high ground south and east of Ginchy, particularly around the Ginchy Telegraph, on the highest point of the ridge. There seem to be no Germans in the wood so this attack may do well.

Source: X550/2/5; Bedfordshire Times

(1) He is buried in Guillemont Road Cemetery.

Tommy’s Four Legged Foes

Sunday 30th April 1916: A rather blood-curdling account has been sent home by Corporal J Partridge, the ex-secretary of the Toddington Social Club, who is now serving in the Signal Section of the 7th Beds Regiment, of alarming, if amusing, experiences in the trenches with swarms of wretched rats, which, he says, “run all over your body at nights”. “The other night” he writes, “I got the fair pip and creeps with them running about me, so I covered my head up with my only blanket. I couldn’t bear the ugly brutes on my face. I looked like a frightened nipper hiding from ghosts, I guess. Anyhow, to breathe, I left my nose exposed and I’m blessed if in the middle of the night one of the saucy bounders didn’t pin my nose. I woke up with a start you can guess and then flew all rods round the dug-out and out of it. I put my hand to my nose and it was covered with blood. I didn’t get into bed again that night (I said bed, but ‘tis only wire-netting and a blanket). In the morning I saw a doctor to see if it was likely to be poisoned. He put some stuff on and it is nearly better now except for a small cut-like scar, which will disappear in a month. My officer ordered wire netting (very small mesh) to be put all round the dug-out to keep them out, so things will not be so bad. I can tell you they were beginning to get on my nerves”.

Source: Biggleswade Chronicle 28th April 1916

Soldier’s Opinion of the Conscientious Objector

Tuesday 14th March 1916: Now that men are being conscripted into the armed forces some of those called up are refusing to serve, siting a conscientious objection to taking human life. Lance Corporal William Arthur Barker of 1st Battalion, Bedfordshire Regiment has sent us his opinion of such a stance(1).

“May I say a few words about conscientious objectors. I have just returned from the Front for seven days’ leave, after fighting out there all the time with the 1st Bedfordshire Regiment. We have a paper to read in the trenches now and then and we are disgusted to see columns about men who refuse to fight. Do these people realise we are fighting to protect the women and children of this country against the outrage and ill-treatment received by the people of France and Belgium? What do the conscientious objectors think when they read of the terrible German poison gas and the liquid fire they use against us? I am speaking for my comrades and myself, and we say that the conscientious objector who would see our fair country overrun by Germans without raising a hand to help it should not live another minute under the protection of the British Flag. Other nations look upon us as a great and powerful nation, fighting for the rights of the smaller peoples, and yet we have men afraid to fight. I say with a chorus of approval from my brother Tommies in the trenches that we are fighting for the right, that God is with us, and that victory will come to us, although it appears to come but slowly. I feel angry about these reports of conscientious objectors and I am glad I am fighting for my country. I would not leave the boys in the trenches for long if I could”. “

Just one more word – single men first and married men after. Why tear the married man from home and children whilst the single man remains behind?”(2)

Source: 20th April 1916

(1) Lance Corporal Barker, from Toddington, would be killed in action on 25th September 1916 during the Battle of the Somme. He has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial.

(2) This is, indeed, how conscription worked, with single men and childless widowers between 18 and 41 the first to be called up, in March, though in May the call was extended to married men. The upper limit was raised to 50 and even 56 in 1918. The measure was not popular. By July 1916 about 30% of those called up had failed to show. Around 2% of those refusing to serve were conscientious objectors, of whom 7,000 were allowed non-combatant duties, 3,000 were sent to work camps and 6,000 were imprisoned.