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Bristol2014
Brislington and the Great War
In 1915 a large recruiting meeting was held in Hollywood Road School, chaired by local landowner and J.P, Joseph Cooke – Hurle of Brislington Hill House, who himself served as a Captain in the Somerset Light Infantry and West Somerset Yeomanry. He hoped ‘the young men of Somerset would not be backward in the time of […]
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Bristol2014
St James Parish War Memorial
The church took part in Bristol Doors Open Day 2011 and made an appeal for volunteers to help research the monuments. One group set out to undertake research into the monuments to individuals who were buried in or connected to the church. A second group of volunteers decided to concentrate on investigating the names on […]
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Bristol2014
My Father's Story
He signed up under age for service in the First World War and served in the Machine Gun Corps, later transferring to the Royal Flying Corps (Royal Air Force). He was awarded the Military Cross at Passchendaele Ridge. For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. He took his four guns to the final objective, dug […]
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Bristol2014
'Over the Top'
The whistle blows,Final for some,And the men mountLadders out ofTrampled trenches;As to the gallows,Silently pleadingFor reprieve An officer leadsBrandishing a revolver,Out of range of the enemyAnd good onlyFor the encouragementOf stragglers,Momentarily scepticalAbout the grand plan The Germans had swappedIndustrial efficiencyFor chivalry,And aligned their MaximsIn the optimum X-formation;So that the spinningEviscerating roundsNever missed Men fall,Muscle and […]
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Bristol2014
Seeing the World Grandad Alfred Woodworth
As a youngster he had joined the 6th Battalion Gloucester Territorials and was at summer camp in Swanage in 1910. At 17 he joined the Merchant Navy, firstly sailing on the SS Clio, a Dutch Freighter out of Rotterdam, and then on the SS Mary Anne. A story he later told to his daughter was of the […]
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Bristol2014
Injured in Battle Uncle William “Woody” Woodworth
At the age of four, Woody and his family moved to Bristol and settled in No 16 Stacey Street, Southville. The 1911 census reports Woody’s trade as an errand boy. With the threat of the First World War, Woody would follow in the military footsteps of his brothers Arthur and Alfred and enlist to fight […]
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Bristol2014
An Unfortunate Call of Nature Uncle Arthur Woodworth
Arthur Woodworth was born in Shepton Mallet, Somerset on 16 November 1884. He moved to Hotwells, Bristol with his family before the turn of the century as his father William had a job as a Steam Cane driver at Bristol Docks. Unfortunately at 14 years of age Arthur and his father William got into some […]
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Bristol2014
The Complete Blackadder Goes Forth Debate
In an article in the Daily Mail in January 2014, Education Secretary Michael Gove wrote: The war was, of course, an unspeakable tragedy, which robbed this nation of our bravest and best. But it’s important that we don’t succumb to some of the myths which have grown up about the conflict in the last 70 or so […]
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Bristol2014
Bertha Von Suttner and Lay Down Your Arms
In those days there was no email or internet. Research was conducted by post. I got in touch with the Danish Film Museum which had a remarkable archive. I remember still the package that arrived with a letter in English and copies of brochure materials, publicity and most of all the news that a print […]
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Bristol2014
The Blimps Anti-Submarine Airships with Engines from Bristol
The ruthlessness of this new form of warfare was confirmed in May when the liner Lusitania was torpedoed and sunk by submarine U-20; 1,198 people died, nearly all civilians. By the end of the war almost 5,000 ships would have gone to the bottom. One immediate response of the First Sea Lord, Admiral ‘Jackie’ Fisher, had been […]
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Bristol2014
Why Paint War? Art, British Artists and the First World War
It had in fact been the Scottish painter’s second trip to the Balkans. His first – in June 1993 – had been so traumatic that he asked to be allowed home without producing much work for his sponsor, the Imperial War Museum in London. A BBC documentary about his truncated visit captures the moment when Howson, a […]
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Bristol2014
Bristol Area First World War Prisoner of War Camps
Suspicions of potential ‘enemies in our midst’ had been aroused by some novels, published a few years earlier, featuring foreign spies. Any aliens, after questioning, considered a threat to British security, even if they had lived in Britain for years, or had a British-born wife or a son in the British army, were interned – […]