A personal way to remember the Great War ..... and the mystery of Harry Dale

The Great War has long passed out of living memory.

Receiving the message, 1915

The politicians who took Europe into that conflict and then prosecuted it, had pretty much all died by the end of the Second World, and now so have the men and women who were actively engaged on the battlefields, in the hospitals, and on the Home Front, as are those who were children during those four years.

They have left a vast set of memories, photographs, and heaps of other memorabilia which together with official documents help contribute to our understanding of the event and how people coped with it.

Tip-Top Tipperary Mary, date unknown

And today I am looking at a photograph album of picture postcards from the period.

They were acquired “blind” by my  friend David Harrop, and as well as offering up a snapshot of what the troops were sending home, give an insight on the person who collected them and placed them in the album.

We will never now know who that person was, but as many of them have a religious aspect I think we can begin to get an understanding of their character.

Some of the cards are sentimental, some a tad mawkish, and others express feelings shaped by the fighting. 

So, Tip-Top Tipperary Mary, features a ghostly figure of Mary looking down on a dying Irish soldier, while the Rosary likens the object to a “string of pearls” which are counted over and over again “everyone a part”.

Others are more direct like the Chaplain tending British War Graves, while two soldiers look on lost in their own personal reflections.

And then there is the posted message to a Mrs. Tavernor of 1 St Mary’s Road, Moston.

From Harry Dale, 1915

It was sent by Harry Dale and is dated July 14th 1915.  The card was one of those issued by the British Army consisting of a series sentences about the postee, from “I am quite well” to “Letter follows at first opportunity” to “I have received no letter from you {lately, for a long time}”

Leaving the servicemen to delete the sentences which were not applicable,  and add only a date and signature, with card instructing the sender that “Nothing is to be written on this side except the date and signature of the sender. Sentences not required may be erased.  If anything else is added the postcard will be destroyed”.

17th Battalion Manchester Regiment, circa 1914-15

As it happens we know a bit more about Harry Dale, who was killed at Gallipoli in July 24th 1915, aged just 18.

Four years earlier he had been living with his parents and siblings at number 9 St Mary’s Road, and described himself as a clerk, which may mean he was the Charles Dale, who is recorded on the Manchester Pal’s Roll of Honour as serving in Platoon XI of the 17th Battalion of the Manchester Regiment.

I can’t be entirely sure because Mr. Dale appears to have favoured different variations of his given name.

The album, date unknown

On the census returns and at his baptism at the Methodist Chapel in Newton Heath, he is listed as Charles Harrison Dale, while the military records at his death have him as Harry Dale, and he enlisted as Charles.

But I will just have to check the deployment of the 17th Battalion, just to check it was at Gallipoli in 1915.

But I can't think Charles had enlisted before 1914, as he was only 14 in 1911. 

So, not perhaps the biggest mystery of the Great War, but none the less one of those little intriguing ones from that long forgotten picture postcard album.

Chaplain tending British War Graves, date unknown

Location the Great War

Pictures; picture postcards from a photograph album, date unknown, from the collection of David Harrop, and Platoon XI, 17th Battalion of the Manchester Regiment, Manchester City Battalions Book of Honour, 1916

"Dear Miss J".............. a message from the 8th Manchester’s at Garstang Camp to the City Hotel on Cooper Street ...... June 1911

Now there is a lot going on in this picture.

Church parade with the 8th Manchester's circa 1911

We are at Garstang camp with the 8th Battalion of the Manchester’s which was a Territorial unit based at Ardwick and so I am guessing this must be their annual camp.

According to the notes that a collector has added on the back some of the cap badges belong to the 5th Ardwick Volunteer Battalion of the Manchester Regiment which became the 8th Manchester’s in 1908.

At Garstang

All of which may or may not help with dating the photograph, I know that it was sent as a picture postcard in June 1911 but the picture may have been taken much earlier.

So for now I am more intrigued by the message on the back which was sent to a Miss Johnson at the City Hotel on Cooper Street.

I will never know what she made of it, but the sender wrote, “You will be surprised to receive this.  Hearing you say your Yeomanry friend had disappointed you, I thought I would endeavour to rectify it.”

The romantic in me wonders whether this was the start of a bid for Miss Johnston’s interest.
Sadly I couldn’t find her in the 1911 census and so far the landlord of the City Hotel who was a Bertie Holroyd and has also proved elusive.

Not so the hotel which occupied a fine stone building almost on the corner of Cooper Street where it runs into Princess Street.

The City Hotel, Cooper Street, circa 1900

It is still there and the City Hotel was at number 9 sharing the block with the Free Masons Club and Hall.

Back in 1909 the landlord was a Mr Millard who was there six years earlier but beyond that date I have yet to go.

All of which just leaves me to reflect on the picture postcard and the fascination they offer up for visiting their lives of those from the past.

The messages and the choice of card were a very personal thing and were not meant for anyone other than the person who received it.

I doubt that the postman would have bothered lingering over each one.  On any one round he would have had plenty to deliver.

But of course a century or so later there is a privilege in sharing the sentiments offered up partly because they can reveal so much but also because so many have survived.

Cooper Street, 1911

In most cases we only have the one, but just occasionally there will be a full collection like that of the set of picture postcards sent by the young May Winifred Wareham to her family which include cards sent from across Britain and as far away as Monte Carlo and some which were originally taken as family snaps.

But that as they is for another time.

Picture; picture postcard of the 8th Manchester’s at Garstang camp, circa 1911, from the collection of David Harrop and detail of Cooper Street from Goad's Fire Insurance amps circa 1900, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

*The Wareham Women, a church in Oldham and a unique set of picture postcards sent home to Heaton Mersey, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/the-wareham-women-church-in-oldham-and.html

Remembering Private John Edmund Shepherd who died aged 19 at Gallipoli

Private Shepherd

This was John Edmund Shepherd who was born in 1896 in Manchester and lived in Moss Side.

He had been a Territorial with the Manchester Regiment and with the outbreak of war in 1914 he was sent with the regiment to Egypt landing at Alexandria on September 25th and in the May of the following year went on to Gallipoli.

The Gallipoli Campaign was seen by some as a way of breaking the deadlock on the Western Front by an assault in the Dardanelles against the Ottoman Empire.

Redoubt Cemetery

This second front if successful would it was hoped draw Bulgaria and Greece into the war on the allied side, stop the Ottoman offensive against Russia and lead to the capture of Constantinople and the exit of the Ottoman Empire from the war.

The campaign began with an allied naval bombardment in February and continued with the landing of British, Empire and French troops in April.

Most historians today view the operation as flawed and shot through with missed opportunities while some argue that it had little chance of success from the outset.

The Manchester's buried at Redoubt Cemetery

The Ottoman forces were prepared for the landing and were not the walk over some had thought and the fighting quickly  settled down to trench warfare with both sides mounting costly attacks which gained little ground.

And it was here that young John Edmund Shepherd died aged just 19 on May 30th.

The Allies had mounted a number of attacks through May and in to July but despite some gains did not achieve the breakthrough that was needed and in December they were withdrawn.

The Lodge

Private Shepherd was buried at the Reboubt Cemetery at Helles along with over 600 other allied war dead drawn from units of the Australian, New Zealand and Indian armies as well as the London Regiment, the East Lancs, the Royal Scots, the Argyll and Sutherlands, the Cameronians and Lancashire Fusiliers.

Of the 602 men who lie there 135 came from the Manchester Regiment.

I doubt that Private Shepherds’s family ever visited the cemetery but they remembered him with the card containing his picture and the flags of the Allies.

And now the card, his medals along with that of his brother's are now on display at the Remembrance Lodge in Southern Cemetery just a short distance from where he grew up in Moss Side.

The Lodge

They form part of the collection of medals and letters collected by David Harrop who who has mounted major exhibitions across the country as well as an acclaimed one at Central Ref.



Pictures; from the collection of David Harrop and data drawn from the list of men buried at Reboubt Cemetery from the Commonwealth War Graves, http://www.cwgc.org/

Lives revealed from the Great War ........... Cyril and Mabel Bowman of Atwood Road Didsbury

The Victory Medal of Mr Bowman

I am looking at the Victory Medal which was awarded to Cyril Hopwood Bowman, who enlisted on September 3rd 1914 and came through the Great War.

Now there is nothing exceptional about that, many did including five of my immediate family.

But the thing about those who went off to fight is that all too often we never delve too deep into their lives before or after that conflict.

In part that is because the media and many historians have focused on those who never came back, whose lives were cut tragically short and became the Lost Generation.

And yet many more did return, settled down, lived long and productive lives and while they may never have forgotten the war put it behind them.

I don’t know how far Cyril Hopwood Bowman managed to readjust to civilian life.

After all until yesterday I knew nothing of him, his wife or his life before the Great War.

It was the news that my friend David Harrop had acquired Mr Bowman’s Victory Medal that set me off looking for the story of this one man.

Cyril Hopwood Bowman was born in Pendleton in 1885 and when war broke out in 1914 he was working as a bank clerk for the Lancashire and Yorkshire Bank.

C Company, 17th Manchester Regiment, date unknown but circa 1914-16

He enlisted on September 3rd 1914 and joined the 2nd City Battalion of the Manchester Regiment.

The 2nd City Battalion or the 17th Manchester’s was one of those new units made up from the hundreds of white collar workers who joined the Colours at the outbreak of war.

In November 1915 he was posted to France and apart from a short break two years later he remained on the Western Front where he was wounded and was finally demobbed in March 1919.

War Memorial, Didsbury, circa 1959

And there is much more for he was one of the 40% of First World War soldiers whose military records survived the Blitz of 1940-41.

And so we know he was 5 feet 7 inches tall, weighed 114 lbs, had brown eyes black hair, and had a ruddy complexion.

Laid bare in the same documents are his full medical history, a letter from his mother asking that he be considered for clerical duties after he had been wounded and undergone a serious operation for a recurrent health problem and his service on the Western Front.

In 1917 he had married Mabel Frost also from Pendleton and also born in 1885, and as you do I became intrigued by their courtship.

He lived in Pine Road Didsbury and she on Atwood Road and after  the war they settled down in what had been her family home.

So had they known each other for a long time, were they members of the same church, or debating society or had they met on the way to work?

And there for the moment their lives become vague. Mr Bowman died in 1954 and Mrs Bowman four years later.

I thought they may been buried in Southern Cemetery but there are no records of their internment or cremation in any of the city’s cemeteries and at present I have no idea whether they had children or whether he returned his old occupation of bank clerk.

Roll of Honour, the Lancashire & Yorkshire Bank

That said he can be found on the Roll of Honour of the Lancashire and Yorkshire bank which lists him as having worked at the Portland Street branch.

And we also have a photograph of C Company but as yet I cannot identify Mr Bowman so while I have gone looking for a man who will be 35 when the picture was taken I have so far drawn a blank.

The Lancashire & Yorkshire Bank, 133 Portland Street, circa 1900

But then just maybe someone who remembers him from when he lived in Atwood Road may be able to help and in the meantime I think I will venture down to those two houses in Didsbury, and check out 133 Potland Street where he worked in 1914 which was just on the corner with Oxford Road.

All of which just leaves me to thank David who set me off on the search and to wait for when Mr Bowman’s medal goes on display in his permanent exhibition of Great War memorabilia at the Memorial Hall in Southern Cemetery.

It is a wonderful collection of material including photographs, medals, postcards and letters along with official documents and the many other items.

Pictures; Victory Medal from the collection of David Harrop, C Company, 17th Manchester Regiment, date unknown, Manchester Regiment City Battalions, 1914-16, and Lancashire & Yorkshire Bank, Roll of Honour courtesy of The Manchester and Lancashire Family History Society, War Memorial and Library from the series, Didsbury, Lilywhite, issued by Tuck & Sons, 1959, courtesy of TuckDB http://tuckdb.org/history and detail of Portland street showing 133 Portland Street, from Goad's Fire Insurance Maps, circa 1900, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

Signaller Thomas Roberts of the 17th Manchester’s and a postcard from Heaton Mersey

I never tire of those old picture postcards which ask “can you pick out our house?”

Didsbury Road, 1915

I just think that in one sentence they bring you a little closer to the people who sent and received the card, even if it is difficult to know which house is referred to.

All of which is fine but as Heaton Mersey is pretty much unknown territory to me I won’t even go to the census record and try to track Mr Henshall and match it with the picture.

Instead I shall ponder on “Signaller Thomas Roberts no 8818, 17 Batt Manchester Regiment” who in the December of 1915 was in France with the British Expeditionary Force.

"Best wishes .... and a victorious, safe  and speedy return" 1915

Now finding him in the historical records has been difficult and there are a number of possible candidates who fit the bill.

But I travel in hope because I know he will have enlisted in the September of 1914 when the 17th Battalion was raised from men working in the city’s offices and warehouses.

The 17th was the second of the City’s Pals Battalions and was recruited in just two days on September 2nd and 3rd 1914, spent time in training at Heaton Park and by early November of the following year were in France.

And that is where Signaller Roberts was when his postcard arrived from Heaton Mersey although at present there is not much more on him.

Men of  A & B Company, 17th Manchester's 1914

He  appears in the list of men serving in the Pals Battalions which records that he was in Company A, Platoon 1 of the regiment and there is a photograph of men who did not make it into their respective company pictures but I doubt we will ever be able to identify him from the group.

That said he does appear also in the Manchester Employers Roll of Honour for 1914-16.

There is a Thomas Roberts who had been employed by the Manchester Ship Canal Company and another at Charles Macintosh and Co Ltd.

But as there are a total of twenty-six men listed as either Thomas Roberts or T Roberts the Ship Canal and Charles Macintosh can only be a guess.

But it is a start

Location; Heaton Mersey, Manchester

Pictures postcard Heaton Mersey 1915 and details from Manchester City Battalions Book of Honour, 1914-16 courtesy of David Harrop

The Manchester Pals .............. lives from the Great War revealed

Men of the First City Battalion, the 176h Manchester's in Heaton Park, 1914

I have wondered about the fate of these eight men sitting in Heaton Park in the September of 1914.

They were part of the First City Battalion which was the 16th Manchester’s and was the first of the Manchester Pals’ battalions formed at the outbreak of the Great War.

In all there were eight such battalions which were created during August and November of 1914 and which  had already been preceded by three service battalions raised at the Regimental Dept at Ladysmith Barracks in Ashton-Under-Lyne.*

Now much has been written about the rush to enlist at the beginning of the war and the sheer speed and enthusiasm is reflected in the completion of the first four city battalions by mid September.

Lord Derby had reiterated his call for the formation of a “Pals Battalion” in Liverpool on August 27th and the following day leading Manchester industrialists and local figures met in the city’s Town Hall and resolved to raise a battalion of men drawn from the clerks and warehousemen of the city and to carry the name of the Manchester Clerks and Warehousemen’s Battalion.

Embroidered postcard, date unknown

The rest can be read in that excellent account of the Manchester Pal’s Regiments by Michael Stedman along with a brief summary in  The Manchester Regiment, at the Long Long Trail**

Suffice to say that 10,000 men enlisted in the Manchester Pals of whom 4,776 were killed.

And so instead I want to return to two who survived.

One of these was 36 years old Cyril Hopwood Bowman who enlisted on September 3rd and was a bank clerk with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Bank at their Portland Street branch.

We have his full military records, a photograph of him with C Company of the 17th Manchester’s and much more.  But despite knowing that he settled down in Didsbury after the war where he died in 1954 followed by his wife four years later I have drawn a blank with finding his family.

Not so young James Callaghan of the 8th City Battalion who also survived the war and was the father of one of my friends.  His son Joe has eight photographs of Mr Callaghan in uniform and a collection of stories his father told him of active service during and after the war.

Mr Callaghan of the 8th City Battalion, date unknown

Together the stories of these two men not only provide a vivid account of their experiences but also personalise a conflict which with the passage of time often just becomes focused on those who died on the battlefields.

Perhaps in time I might yet get to discover the identities of the eight in Heaton Park and and their stories but in the meantime I shall return to Mr Bowman and Mr Callaghan.

And not long after I posted the story Tim contacted me with this, "Hi Andrew, The camping party isn't 16th Bttn in Heaton Park. Shoulder tab may be 7th. Also dress uniform wrong and they had navy uniforms in Sept 14.  Cheers Tim."
.

Which is one in the eye for the chap who put the caption on the orginal postcard.

Pictures; First City Battalion, the 16th Manchester’s in Heaton Park, from the collection of Bob Potts, embroidered postcard of the Manchester Regiment from the collection of David Harrop, and Mr Callaghan courtesy of Joe Callaghan

* The First City Battalion, the 16th Manchester Regiment, the 2nd City Battalion, 17th Manchester Regiment, the 3rd City Battalion, 18th Manchester Regiment, the 4th City Battalion, 19th Manchester Regiment, the 5th City Battalion, 20th Manchester Regiment, the 6th City Battalion, 21st Manchester Regiment, the 7th City Battalion, 22nd Manchester Regiment, the 8th City Battalion, 23rd Manchester Regiment, the 11th 12th, 13th Manchester’s

**Manchester Pals, 16th, 17th, 18th,30th, 21st, 22nd & 23rd Battalions of the Manchester Regiment A History of the Two Manchester Brigades, Michael Stedman, 2004,  The Manchester Regiment at the Long, Long, Trail, http://www.1914-1918.net/mancs.htm

***Manchester Pals, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Manchester%20Pals

William Bates soldier of the Great War ............. died on the Western Front aged 17

The popular image of the young men who lied about their age and went off to fight in the Great War is a powerful one, more so when they died before they reached the official age of enlistment.

Historians will tell you that the number was not that large but it happened and William Bates was one of them.

He was just 17 when he died on the Western Front in the August of 1916, and we have David Harrop and some of his friends to thank for bringing Mr Bates out of the shadows.

David recently bought one of the medals awarded to William Bates who served in the Manchester’s and lived on Great Egerton Street in Stockport.

And that began a search for the young man’s story which David and his friends have pieced together.

David then created a facebook page dedicated to the memory of this young soldier and over the course of the next few weeks with David’s help I will tell that story.

Location; Stockport, Manchester and the Western Front

Picture; medal of William Bates, courtesy of David Harrop

*The William BATES in Memorium PAGE compiled by David Harrop Oct 2016

Rediscovering one young man from the Great War

I think this will be the last of the stories about the young officer who died in 1916 during the Battle of the Somme.

Unknown young soldier, date unknown

And it has brought together both the centenary of that battle which began in July and ended in October but is very close to that date which marks the end of the conflict in November 1918.

It began as a request from my friend Tricia to help put a name and a story to a picture of an unknown young soldier.

His photograph was on a picture post card which on the back carried the comment, "16th Manchester, (30th Division.) Missing Reported 'Wounded and Missing” from 26th July 1916, probably taking Deville Wood.' ”

It wasn’t much to go on but we agreed to run a story on the blog in the hope someone might be able to identify him.

And within a day Michael Gorman came back with a carefully researched set of comments and the suggestions that our young man might be George Horace Plested, who was a “Second Lieutenant Manchester Regiment 4th Bn. attd. 16th Bn” who died on July 30th 1916.  He was just 19 and came from Putney."

Michael with the help of another researcher followed this up with the discovery that he “he died of wounds in the casualty station at Corbie.”

Meanwhile both Michael and Tricia had made contact with relatives on ancestry and another photograph of the George Horace Plested seemed to confirm that this was our young man.

George Horace Plested

And today Michael added this, “the Plested family sent me a photograph of an unidentified young soldier (attached) who bears a remarkable resemblance to the subaltern of the Manchester Regiment in the original photograph. Comparing the photographs I feel that they are one and the same person.

Horace attended Wandsworth Grammar School, in London, and enlisted in the 28th Battalion of the London Regiment in 1915. 

This was the famous Artist Rifles battalion, a unit trained potential officers, at Hare Hall in Romford, who were then assigned to serving regiments. 

In Horace’s case this was the 4th Battalion (another training battalion) of the Manchester Regiment – which he joined in June 1915 at Larkhill.

He was then “attached" to the 16th (1st City) Battalion of the Manchester’s – a “pals” unit which was about to embark for France. – and took part in the Battle of the Somme in July 1916.

Cap badge of the Manchester's

Taking an almost identical route was the famous war poet Wilfred Owen. 

He also enlisted in the Artists Rifles and was also sent to Hare Hall – assigned to the 5th Battalion of the Manchester Regiment – being commissioned just a week later than Horace. Owen was to be killed in action in November 1918 – the last week of the War.”

I am pleased that through the efforts of Tricia and Michael we have that name and the story.

What I think is also important is the way the story has been uncovered, partly through the use of social media and online historical sources but more because Tricia and Michael and others were determined to honour the memory of this young man.

Leaving me only to than the Plested family for providing their photograph.

Pictures; Unknown Soldier, date unknown, from the collection of Tricia Leslie, and cap badge of the Manchester Regiment courtesy of Paul Wright, and photograph of George Horace Plested from the collection of the Plested family

Discovering a lost soldier of the Great War .......... with a nod of thanks to facebook

Now it is easy to deride social networks and write them off as the preserve of the trivial and the vain but that is to ignore their potential for allowing people to showcase their talents in a whole range of artistic endeavours from photography to painting and much else.

Added to which there are a growing number of sites and individuals who share their research and are willing to offer advice, and encouragement to those writing about their family history as well as those wanting to tell the story of their community.

All of which is why my friend Tricia and I decided to make an appeal for help in finding out more about this young man who as far as she knew was an officer in the 16th Battalion of the Manchester’s and disappeared in July 1916.

There was a photograph, and a comment on the back and nothing else.

Given the date Tricia began with the Somme war memorials but drew a blank and so that was when we made the appeal through a blog story and posted across a selection of facebook sites.

And within a day Michael Gorman came back with a carefully researched set of comments and the suggestions that our young man might be George Hoarce Plested, who was a “Second Lieutenant Manchester Regiment 4th Bn. attd. 16th Bn” who died on July 30th 1916.  He was just 19 and came from Putney.

Now what marks Mr Gorman’s contribution off as special is that he didn’t claim the credit, quoted his source and carefully presented alternatives which I think makes my point about just how useful social media can be in advancing our general knowledge.

Tricia I know is pleased and has now got engaged in searching for our young man to put an identity and a story to the photograph.

Location; London & France

Picture; Unknown Soldier, date unknown, from the collection of Tricia Leslie, and cap badge of the Manchester Regiment courtesy of Paul Wright

Who was this young man?

I wonder who this young man was.

This question has been preoccupying the thoughts of my friend Tricia from Bexley who sent me the picture with the comment

“Would you do me a favour and walk the streets of Manchester and pin the attached picture of the mysterious Manchester Soldier to every lamp post in the hope that someone may recognize him.

I am getting no nearer to identifying the young man the only info I have is on the postcard with the exception of the fact that underneath the photo it stated he was a 2nd Lieutenant I assume they came to that conclusion through the evidence of his one pip shown in the photo. 

It may be the person who wrote on the postcard knew the young man perhaps a relative.

I have been through all the cemetery records at Deville Wood where he fell and am halfway through the Thiepval Memorial but have had no luck. 

I have also tried Ancestry but the outcome was the same.”

Now the reverse of the card simply says, "16th Manchester, (30th Division.) Missing
Reported “Wounded and Missing” from 26th July 1916, probably taking Deville Wood.”

It is not much to go on but if Tricia has the names of those officers killed at Deville Wood or in the July of 1916 we may be able to move forward.

My old friend David Harrop has lent me the huge volume containing the Roll of Honour of the Manchester Pals and between the two we might be able to identify him.

And this is an appropriate moment to try and find him given that next month marks the end of that battle a century ago and of course will also be dominated by the acts of Remembrance across the country.

Here in Manchester as elsewhere there will be ceremonies for the anniversary of the Armistice as well as Remembrance services.

David will be participating in a “remembrance walk and talk” in Southern Cemetery with Emma Fox and has also added to his permanent exhibition in the Remembrance Lodge in Southern Cemetery, of which more later.

But for now it may just be that someone recognises the picture and can help us.
Location; Manchester

Picture; Unknown Soldier from the Manchester Regiment, date unknown from the collection of Tricia Leslie

Remembering them ...... 100 years after the Battle of the Somme part 2 Heaton Park, living history groups and a concert

Now I like the way that seemingly unrelated bits of history come together.

Cap badge of Manchester Regiment

So here is a cap badge of the Manchester Regiment which I have chosen to sit beside the centenary events linked to the Battle of the Somme which will be going off in Heaton Park.

These are part of a bigger set of events across the city.*

Not that there is anything odd in that. Some of the City or Pals’ Battalions of the Manchester’s were based at Heaton Park during 1914 and 1915 and there was also a hospital there.

Added to which all eight participated in the Somme with some taking very heavy casualties.

But what marks the cap badge off as a little different is that it was sent to me by Paul Wright from New Zealand.

Paul is one of a growing number of historians and collectors who I am coming to know from around the world.

In the case of Paul it was after I had posted a series of stories about the men of the Canadian and ANZAC forces who are buried in Southern Cemetery.

1st City Battalion of the Manchester Regiment, Heaton Park, 1914

And as part of my own personal connection to the Somme I want to track all 26 of the men of the CEF and their Australian and New Zealand comrades.

Not all died during the Somme offensive but it will be chime in with the events in Southern Cemetery linked to that battle.

But Southern Cemetery is not the only place where events are occurring.

According to the official programme from the City Council there will be a “series of events ranging from drop in activities, exhibitions, scheduled talks and mini performances.

These will include performances from folk trio Harp and A Monkey, Threadbare Theatre, A Soldier’s Tale and the West Yorkshire Playhouse. “

The ‘talks in the tents’ will offer the opportunity to listen to  the “importance of animals, the development of artificial limbs, the Salford and Barnsley Pals, conscientious objectors, how the Commonwealth War Graves
Commission came into being and the ‘wild women’ of the First World War.

In addition to all this there will be “living history groups running a field kitchen, a Salvation Army unit and recreations of basic training with Manchester’s inside Heaton Hospital and life for nurses working at Casualty Clearing Stations.” The events stretch out over July 1 and 2.

Thomas Chorlton, died in 1916

There will also be a concert “Starting at 7.30pm in the evening, the concert features soldier’s songs from the time performed by a national children's choir, interwoven with archive film.

A dance piece inspired by the Pals Battalions will then be followed at approx. 8.30pm by the Hallé Orchestra, who will play several well known pieces linked to the First World War, including a piece by George Butterworth, a young English composer who died at the Somme.

The concert will also feature a range of letters, poems and diary entries depicting the lives of those affected by the Somme, including a specially commissioned poem read by author and broadcaster Lemn Sissay. It will finish at sundown at 9.45pm.

The events stretch out over July 1 and 2 and it suggested you allow 1-2 hours for your visit within the Experience Field. Food and drink will be available and you are welcome to bring a picnic. The park also has a café and other activities.

Tickets are available and details are online.**

Pictures; Manchester cap badge courtesy of Paul Wright, and 1st City Battalion in Heaton Park in 1914 and Thomas Chorlton killed in in 1916 from the collection of David Harrop

*Remembering them ...... 100 years after the Battle of the Somme, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/remembering-them-100-years-after-battle.html

** A National Commemoration of the Battle of the Somme Evening Concert, https://www.quaytickets.com/sommeheatonpark/Online/default.asp

One historic piece of sheet music and a special event tomorrow in Heaton Mersey

Looking at the score for the First Manchester March is to be reminded of how I wish I could read music and play an instrument because I have yet to come across a recording of this piece.

It was composed for the First Manchester Rifles Bazaar by Dan Godfrey whose father and son were also musical composers.

Now I can’t be sure of the date.

I know that Lieut-Colonel Bridgford was in command from 1867 to 1902 and a bazaar was held in  the April of 1904.

That said I bet there will be someone who knows.

The Manchester Rifles had been formed at a meeting in the Star Hotel on Deansgate in May 1859 and within a year had a compliment of 900 men.

Its headquarters were at Stretford Road and in 1888 under the “reorganisation scheme the battalion lost its distinctive title of the First Manchester Rifle Volunteers and became the 2nd Volunteer Battalion of the Manchester Regiment.”*

The 1904 bazaar had been  held to “clear off a debt on the headquarters in Stretford Road, extend the headquarters, to further equip the battalion, and improve the details of the mobilization scheme.”*

It’s odd now to think that a unit of the British army was reliant on voluntary contributions but the First Manchester’s were part of the Volunteer Force which was a citizen army of part time rifle, artillery and engineer corps created as a popular movement in 1859.**

The decision to authorise the creation of such units was published on May 12 of that year and First Manchester’s were formed just eight days later.

All of which makes the sheet music a fascinating item and one that with more research might reveal its date.

I suppose it could have been produced any time between 1862 and 1902 and might well have been the work of Dan Godfrey or his son Sir Dan Godfrey both of whom composed military music.

That said I am looking forward to seeing the original which will be on display as part of a special presentation at St John’s parish church in Heaton Mersey tomorrow at 2pm.

The event has been organised by old friend David Harrop who tells me that along with the sheet music there will a large number of items from his collection of memorabilia from both world wars and the history of the Post Office.

Pictures; sheet music for the First Manchester March, date unknown from the collection of David Harrop

*The 2nd V.B.M.R. BAZAAR, the Manchester Guardian April 12, 1904

** Volunteer Force, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volunteer_Force_(Great_Britain)

Snapshots of the Great War nu 3 ........... the Manchester Pals

Now I don’t have a date for the picture but it’s of a young James Callaghan of the 8th Battalion of the Manchester Regiment.

He was one of almost 10,000 men who enlisted in the eight Manchester Pals battalions which were formed in the first few months of the Great War.

The day after Lord Liverpool called for the formation of a Pal’s battalion in Liverpool, Manchester followed suit.

He had spoken of the need for "a battalion of pals, a battalion in which friends from the same office will fight shoulder to shoulder for the honour of Britain and the credit of Liverpool.“

In the early days the authorities couldn’t keep pace with the numbers wanting to join up.

Of the almost 10,000 who enlisted 4,776 were killed.

In recognition of the commitment and sacrifice made during the Great War the People’s History Museum has an exciting programme of events to accompany their changing exhibition A Land Fit for Heroes which runs till February 2015.*


Picture; James Callaghan, date unknown courtesy of Joe Callaghan and embroidered picture post card from the collection of David Harrop

*A Land Fit for Heroes, http://www.phm.org.uk/news/a-land-fit-for-heroes-events-programme/