Another one of my periodic looks at what my Grandfathers were doing 100 years ago via regimental war dairies.
G2104 L/Cpl Alfred Gower 2nd Bn, The Middlesex Regiment, (my Mum's Dad) had been invalided out of the army in March 1918 and awarded the Silver War Badge, a badge to wear on civvies so he could prove he'd 'done his bit.'
Documents available today state he was invalided out due to 'illness.' Though what this was is not specified, this is strange as he actually told me he'd been invalided out because of a wound. A bullet entered his left wrist and exited through his left elbow! His battalion noted on the Silver War Badge record states the 6th, not the 2nd. The 6/Middlesex was a training battalion, one theory is that he could have been retraining after being wounded and then succumbed to illness, Spanish Flu even which killed millions and could have laid him very low. It's a question I'll never get an answer to .
D1901 Pte William Morgan 1st (Kings) Dragoon Guards.
My Dad's Dad of course has a complicated story. In August 1917 his regiment was ordered back to India, the North West Passage in Afghanistan infact to quell an uprising but my Grandad did not go with them. He too had been wounded and could have been convalescing or it could have been that he'd signed on for 9 years with the colours and these were up ( he joined in 1908 though I thought war time would have negated 9 years with the colours & 5 with the reserve) . Another question I'll never have satisfactorily answered, whatever the case he was compulsorily transferred to the 15th Bn The Royal Warwickshire Regiment. From the cavalry to the infantry seems a very strange move, surely his nine years of horsemanship could have been better used! In November 1917 his battalion part of the 13th Brigade, 5th Division was ordered to the Italian front (along with five other British divisions and seven French) as an Austo-German attack had pushed the Italians back some eighty miles only stopping at the River Piave. Conditions were considerably better than on the Western Front and considerably quieter, the three battalions of Royal Warwick's in Italy from November 1917 to March 1918 only suffered six killed in action between them. The regimental war diary for this period has not been digitised yet so I have been unable to view it and gleaned this information from the excellent book 'Birmingham Pals' by Terry Carter. The battalion had been raised as the 2nd Birmingham Pals in 1914
though by the time my Grandad joined them there was very few of the original Pals left. They had started to be trained in mountain warfare but then sent to the plains of the River Piave on the front line.
No doubt they would have stayed on the Italian front but for Operation Michel launched by the Germans on the Western front on 21st March 1918, a huge assault that pushed and pushed the British back to were they'd started in 1914. The divisions on Italy were rushed back on trains though this took some six days, the battalion arrived back on the Western front with the rest of the 5th Division on 7th April 1918. More of that later!
G2104 L/Cpl Alfred Gower 2nd Bn, The Middlesex Regiment, (my Mum's Dad) had been invalided out of the army in March 1918 and awarded the Silver War Badge, a badge to wear on civvies so he could prove he'd 'done his bit.'
Documents available today state he was invalided out due to 'illness.' Though what this was is not specified, this is strange as he actually told me he'd been invalided out because of a wound. A bullet entered his left wrist and exited through his left elbow! His battalion noted on the Silver War Badge record states the 6th, not the 2nd. The 6/Middlesex was a training battalion, one theory is that he could have been retraining after being wounded and then succumbed to illness, Spanish Flu even which killed millions and could have laid him very low. It's a question I'll never get an answer to .
D1901 Pte William Morgan 1st (Kings) Dragoon Guards.
My Dad's Dad of course has a complicated story. In August 1917 his regiment was ordered back to India, the North West Passage in Afghanistan infact to quell an uprising but my Grandad did not go with them. He too had been wounded and could have been convalescing or it could have been that he'd signed on for 9 years with the colours and these were up ( he joined in 1908 though I thought war time would have negated 9 years with the colours & 5 with the reserve) . Another question I'll never have satisfactorily answered, whatever the case he was compulsorily transferred to the 15th Bn The Royal Warwickshire Regiment. From the cavalry to the infantry seems a very strange move, surely his nine years of horsemanship could have been better used! In November 1917 his battalion part of the 13th Brigade, 5th Division was ordered to the Italian front (along with five other British divisions and seven French) as an Austo-German attack had pushed the Italians back some eighty miles only stopping at the River Piave. Conditions were considerably better than on the Western Front and considerably quieter, the three battalions of Royal Warwick's in Italy from November 1917 to March 1918 only suffered six killed in action between them. The regimental war diary for this period has not been digitised yet so I have been unable to view it and gleaned this information from the excellent book 'Birmingham Pals' by Terry Carter. The battalion had been raised as the 2nd Birmingham Pals in 1914
No doubt they would have stayed on the Italian front but for Operation Michel launched by the Germans on the Western front on 21st March 1918, a huge assault that pushed and pushed the British back to were they'd started in 1914. The divisions on Italy were rushed back on trains though this took some six days, the battalion arrived back on the Western front with the rest of the 5th Division on 7th April 1918. More of that later!
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