Italian Medal

[liverpool annie]

The Machine Gun Corps used horses ..... the horses were used to haul cannons ammunition and so on and a horse doesn't get stuck the same way as a truck does in the mud 

But the officers used horses to get from A to B and your man was an officer !!

I have pictures of my officers and they nearly all seem to have a horse !!

Annie 

PS You were asking about the use of pencil Chrissie ... that was all they had in the trenches ... war diaries were also mostly written in pencil !!

PPS ... wonder if he knew my Robert Stead ?? 

[forester]

This is the link to the catalogue. You won't find the record itself online.
 It's the best fit searching Redford that I can find. It looks like he served from 1914 to 1920. The 1939 entry could be to do with the RAF.

http://www.rootschat.com/links/03o9/

Officers files vary widely over how much they contain. I have one file of an officer with many years service which is only 25 pages and another who served a couple of years which has 150 pages (after a good 25% was destroyed by the War Office).

Phil

[c-side]

There are times, Annie, when what I say and what I mean to say are two different things - something to do with engaging the brain before trying to use it.     I knew about the pencils - I have a few postcards written in pencil.  What I meant to say was that the word PIAVE is written on both cards in exactly the same place and could even be the same handwriting which seemed to be too much of a coincidence so I wondered whether it had been added to all the cards before they were issued.

I wonder if he did know your Robert Stead - all I know about my grandfather's service record is what appears on these pages but if your Robert was having Christmas dinner in 1918 with B Company in Gambellara......

Phil - I've checked out that link to the service records and I think it could well be him.  When I finally absorb all of this I will follow up on it.

C

[liverpool annie]

I'd be thrilled if I knew "Our Robert " spent Christmas with your Granddad C !!!   

But we'll never know as we don't know what he looks like !! 

I wonder if it was the censor that wrote "PIAVE" ..... ?? that's a possibility too !

Glad you feel like you're getting somewhere !! 

Gets exciting after the first little bit of information .... just have to keep going !!

Annie 

[liverpool annie]

And just to be a bit silly ......... this has to be my most favourite mounted picture !! 

On Martyn Smith 's terrific site !

http://www.huntscycles.co.uk/index.html

[c-side]

Why should Britain tremble when we have the seaside donkey 

[scrimnet]

As for Annies suggestion of the censor writing in Piave...In my experience of military letters...The censor normally blocks out words...I have never seen them put in! 

I would suggest though, that the penciled in bit is because they had a job lot done before Piave; so to keep them all up to date, the battle was put in apres the fighting (or during it!)

Have been digging though my library...have found a marvelous account of Piave in my mate Martin Marix Evans (another Northamptonshire lad...well adopted!) book...

"Forgotten Battlefronts of The First World War" published by Sutton in 2003 ISBN 0-7509-3004-7

[c-side]

The Christmas cards must have taken some organisation - to have huge numbers printed, distributed to the troops, collected back in and censored and still have them arriving home before Christmas.  They were probably printed well in advance but someone decided that Piave shouldn't be overlooked and had it added.

The other thing I noticed that my card has in common with the other post is that there is no message on either - just a signature - whereas the 1917 card had a personal message.  Could it be that it took so long to write PIAVE on all the cards that the guys had no time to do anything but scribble their name??

I also have another 1918 MGC Christmas card - like a four page booklet containing message from the king and drawings of machine gunners.  Why would they have two cards for the same event?

C

[liverpool annie]

At 11 a.m. on November 11, 1918 - the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month - a ceasefire came into effect !

Maybe because the war was over by Christmas 1918 - so that was a special card !!

Annie