The remains of Frise Church
The former town hall at Sailly Saillisel
Visit to the Anzacs from King George V Ernest’s descriptions of trench warfare make
especially uncomfortable reading. “We had a very rough time going in mud and
water up to our knees, dead men and horses laying everywhere,” he wrote of his first meeting with the enemy in September 1916. “At 3.15pm on October 1 we went over the top
for the first time to meet the Germans. “We had a very rough time of it. I shall never
forget that day. It was on a Sunday. “My comrades fell all round me. Talk about
hell, well this must be hell. There was only a few of us left to face the Huns when we got to close quarters, but luckily there was not many of the enemy left to do much harm.” Towards the end of the war his horror and
despair were all too apparent. “I am just now tired, sore and heartbroken of
this hellish life, just one continual roar of guns and shells, and bullets flying all round,” he wrote in his diary. “I have not had my clothes off for two months
or more; no blankets, only a great coat, and I am as lousy as a cuckoo. “God knows when this hellish work will end. It
is awful. The air is just humming with airplanes and shells. “It is bad enough to put up with the German
guns, God knows what they have got to put up with over their side as I should think we are sure to send over about 10 shells to their one. “It is a terrible thing, this war. It is a pity that
things cannot be settled without wars.” As well as describing some of the fighting in
which he was involved, Ernest also noted the ruined towns and villages he encountered, some of which appeared on the postcards he sent. On a postcard sent from Messine he wrote:
“These windmills are very plentiful in France. They have been found to be used by spies for signals. We have destroyed a few of them. It does seem a shame to see all these fine little townships blown to buttons.”
Inspiring life in the Cotswolds 55 On another he marvelled over how the French
would grow their crops close to the firing line. “They all look splendid, it’s great weather for
the crops,” wrote the young farmer. In one of his postcards, Ernest recorded a visit
to the Anzacs by King George V. “We had to be spick and span,” he told Alice,
although he began this particular postcard by asking if she had got him a pipe, saying “that is the best friend a fellow has got out here in this hell of a place.” Ernest, who was granted just two short periods
of leave to visit England in 1916 and 1917, frequently urged the folks back home to stay cheerful for the men fighting abroad, once sending a postcard printed with the motto, ‘If we die tomorrow, we’re living today, so let’s be merry and bright’ and himself writing “take note of this card, I think this is how everyone should try to be these days.” Looking forward to the future, he wrote to
Alice, “Well my dear, once I get settled down after the war I don’t think I will want to travel
Soldiers dancing
very far. I think I have had a fair share of travelling don’t you?” Ernest and Alice went on to
be married for 25 years and had two sons, Ronald and Toby, who both followed their father into farming in Wroughton. Ernest died in 1945 at the age of 62, shortly after his older son returned to Belgium to fight in the Second World War.
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