Thanks Private Norfolk

 Dear Reader,

 

The destruction on all the First World War battlefields was total.  Every account spoke of the sea of mud and the elimination of any distinguishing feature of the landscape.  For troops in the trenches the only other living things they would encounter, apart from fellow soldiers, were rats, mice or lice.

But one miracle did survive.   The conditions perfectly suited an annual herb called papaver rhoas, whose seeds can lie dormant in the soil for more than 80 years before germinating.  The process is usually triggered by disturbance of the soil, which is why the plant better known as the 'common poppy' is often found beside ploughed fields.  Now the so-called " war to end all wars" had served the same purpose.

This had been apparent since the unusually warm spring and early summer of 1915, when poppies had begun to grown in clusters on and around the battle zones.

This is from a poem by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae.

"In Flanders fields, the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row".

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The 11th of November seems to come round very quickly and as usual my thoughts are with my dear father, Harold Huth, who was a soldier in this terrible war.  He served as a major with The Royal Army Service Corps and was mentioned in Dispatches on three occasions.  I have a letter written in January 1916 congratulating my grandparents, from a Colonel Harrison and his other officers, on their son's distinguished conduct and gallantry.  So today, Remembrance Sunday, I am thinking of you, Dad, and thanking you for the part you played to give us all the freedoms we now enjoy, and am sending you my love.

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From Thomas Hardy  1877 November 12th in Dorset

'A flooded river after the incessant rains of  yesterday.  Lumps of froth float down like swans in fron of our house.  At the arches of the large stone bridge the froth has accumulated and lies like hillocks of salt against the bridge; then the arch chokes, and after a silence coughs out the air and froth, and gurgles on.'

         

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Thanks, Private Norfolk

 

 

You left, singing, with your pals,

marching for good and glory.

You hadn’t yet dug a trench,

killed an unknown soldier,

seen dead bodies, smelt their stench,

heard comrades’ last sickening cries.

 

You gave your life with generous heart,

believed the lies

dispatched by loftier ranks.

And so to you, dear Private Norfolk,

I give salute,

and my deepest thanks

 

for swapping your mauve rain-skies,

your white-breast beaches, and beckoning sea,

your level fields of ripening corn,

to fight in foreign fields, for us,

for me.

 

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With very best wishes, Patricia