On one of the first few days of November 1918, when other duties didn’t interfere, B Flight of 42 Squadron had a group photograph taken. If it wasn’t taken on this day, then for various reasons it can’t have been more then four days earlier or five days later.
B Flight, 42 Squadron RAF. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection.
Faces of B Flight
Some of the faces are recognisable, but many are not. Of those that are:
Lt. John Macmillan is second from the left of the front row. (Thanks to Douglas Macmillan, John Macmillan’s grandson, for identifying him.) More on Lt. Macmillan here:
Next to Capt. Gordon is Lt Edward Ives (fourth from right), who had evidently returned to the squadron after his posting to the home establishment on 28 June 1918. Thanks to Julian and Les Ives for confirming their grandfather’s identity. More about Lt Ives here:
Today’s photograph looks like a more or less complete grouping of the officers and men of B Flight, 42 Squadron. The photos taken at Rely and recorded in the post for 25 August 1918 were apparently just of the officers of the flight:
No flying for Greg today, for unrecorded reasons. But others in the squadron had been busy taking reconnaissance photographs either side of the River Scheldt (Escaut), along which the front line ran. Here are the three, taken today, that Greg brought home after the war. The first is west of the Scheldt, showing Ferme Cazeau/Prade (today, Ferme Hurette), Pont-à-Chin, Tournai. The second and third are east of the river, at Kain, north of Tournai, where German trenches are in evidence.
The first photograph is behind the British front line, to the west of the River Scheldt. The open land in the top right of the photo is part of the former German aerodrome at Ramegnies-Chin (thanks to Dominique Van den Broucke for noting this). Shell holes pock-mark the airfield.
This vertical aerial view was taken from 4,000 ft at 11:00 am half a mile (800 m) or so southwest of Pont-à-Chin, and about 3 miles (5 km) northwest of Tournai.
The pentagonal building towards the bottom of the centre of the image are the farm buildings of what today is la Ferme Hurette but was then marked on contemporary British Army trench maps as la FermeCazeau. However, this does not seem to be what it was called locally:
During WW1, the Hurette farm on rue Hurette belonged to the parents of Mr. Joseph Prade. It was the Prade farm.I interviewed Mr. Joseph Prade in the early 80s for my article (Nord Eclair newspaper) about the Ramegnies-Chin aerodrome.At the time, all the bunkers and refuge cellars still existed.Next to the Prade farm was the rue d’Allain.This rue d’Allain was an umade road that the Germans modified to make a paved road.The aerodrome was very large in area and ran along the woods and the railway line.There was a flight school and a building for aerial photography.The airmen were lodged in two castles and a large villa.Nowadays you can still see a bunker at the edge of the wood.
Dominique Van den Broucke
These days la Ferme Hurette offers group accommodation and reception rooms as part of the non-profit organisation Le Haras de Cazeau.
Vertical aerial view of Ferme Cazeau/Ferme Prade (now Ferme Hurette, Pont-à-Chin, Tournai, taken 4 November 1918. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection
And in the corresponding view today from Google maps, not much has changed – apart from the welcome absence of shell holes.
The corresponding view today. Click to go to a larger view in Google maps.
On the ground, the view from just off the upper left of the aerial view, looking towards and along the railway line, is this:
The view looking north to the woods by the railway line in June 2018. If you tap or click to see a larger image, you should be able to make out the masts of the railway’s present day catenary system in front of the trees.
This ground photograph was first published in the post for 18 October 1918. This was because, coincidentally, the woods along the railway in the top left of the aerial photos are where Greg reported large fires during a reconnaissance patrol on that day:
Meanwhile, moving 1¼ miles (2 km) due east across the River Scheldt, we come to territory that was probably still in German hands. If it wasn’t, it would have been no-man’s land. And if that, it evidently hadn’t suffered nearly as much as land further west that had the dubious distinction of being between the opposing front lines for much longer. Just a few shell holes are seen in the top half of the image, particularly in the centre, and something of a trench system in the bottom right. This photograph was again taken at 4,000 ft at 11:00 am. It shows the Rue d’Ormont, in Kain, about 5 miles (8 km) NNW of the centre of Tournai.
Vertical aerial view of Kain, near Tournai, taken 4 November 1918. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection
Today, the area has become more built up, and the railway line has disappeared.
The corresponding view today. Note that the railway line has gone. Click to go to a larger view in Google maps.
Some of the original buildings remain:
Detail of vertical aerial view of Kain, near Tournai, taken 4 November 1918. Click for larger image.
The farm building in the red square is today a house, and looks like this:
Former farm building on the Rue d’Ormont, Kain, Tournai, June 2018. Click for larger image.
And the part of the building in the red circle at the road junction that remains today looks like this:
House at the road junction on the Rue d’Ormont, Kain, Tournai, June 2018. Click for larger image.
3. Trenches North of Kain, Tournai
Finally, we move northeast from the Rue d’Ormont, to the western slopes of the Mont St. Aubin. Here, about 3 miles (5 km) north of the centre of Tournai, there was an extensive system of trenches. Greg had captioned this vertical aerial photo “Trenches”, as a particular example of an elaborate defensive system. Shadows cast by the low November sun equally defines the trenches and shell holes quite sharply.
Trenches North of Kain, Tournai. Click for larger image. Credit: Greg’s War Collection.
As it turned out, this was one of the trickiest photos to locate on Google maps today. The reason was not because the land had been built over; there still isn’t a building on it today. Rather, it was that the pattern of woodland and open farmland has changed so much in the intervening years. Here’s how it now looks:
The corresponding view today. Click to go to a larger view in Google maps.
What these two aerial views – ancient and modern – don’t give is a sense of the gentle upward slope. The track up the middle of each aerial photograph ascends a shallow valley, overlooked by low slopes on both sides. The following view was taken in June 2018 and looks north from a point below the bottom of the aerial photographs.
View looking north of Kain, up the valley towards where the trenches were. The house on the right is just below the field of the aerial photographs. June 2018. Click for larger image.
Even a non-expert can imagine how eminently defensible the upper slopes of the valley would be. But they weren’t held for long.
In a quieter day than yesterday, Greg was down to do a counter-battery patrol. But the weather was dud, as confirmed on a brief test flight with Capt. Gordon (and his dog, Waso). This evening saw the opening under allied auspices of the Nouveau Théâtre Lille with a performance by Leslie Henson’s Gaieties entertainment troupe.
Log Book
Date: 3.11.18
Time Out: 15.20
Rounds Fired – Lewis: -
Rounds Fired – Vickers: -
Bombs: -
Time on RE8s: 187 hrs 15 mins
RE8: 2517
Observer: Cpt. Gordon
War Flying: 0 hrs 10 mins
Height: 500
Course/Remarks: Weather test. C.B.P. Dud.
Weather Test
Aircraft serial no. 2517 was back in service for the test at 3:20pm, thereby demonstrating that it took no more than a day to repair or replace an RE8’s petrol tank.
The weather test flight was mentioned in Capt. Gordon’s letter home to his mother today. In the letter he says kind words about Greg, who he reports wasn’t well*. Is it possible that these emollient words belied some sort of anxiety, following yesterday‘s brave/reckless (delete according to taste) adventure, in which they both could easilyhave died? Perhaps that is to read in too much.
3 November, letter to darlingest Mother from 42 Squadron, RAF, BEF, France
All goes well, but the weather alas has taken a turn for the worse. I am getting on quite well & am less lonely than I was before Waso’s return. I am beginning to get to know some of the people here. Waso went up today for a 10 mins joy ride. She didn’t enjoy it much!
I have moved downstairs in my billet & have got a very nice room. The people are very nice. The old lady thought the stairs were too much for me! & so they moved out themselves, which was extraordinarily good of them.
Leslie Henson (K. will know who he is, he was in Theodore & Co) is giving a show somewhere near here tomorrow evening. I hope to go & see him.
The Day’s Activities
I expect I ought to tell you what I have done today! Not very interesting but still, here goes. This morning I woke about 7.10am & read in bed. ‘A Knight on Wheels’, ‘till about 8am when I lightly leapt up & dressed etc. Breakfast, bacon & fried bread, then down to the aerodrome, pausing en route for the odd word with one or two fellows, on arrival at the aerodrome I found the weather was dud., so I went & looked at the workshops & got the SM (that stands for Sergeant Major) to explain engines & bits of engines. I then went & played about with a Lewis gun. I can’t remember what I did then until lunch time.
After lunch I hung about as I was meant to be flying, but the machine wasn’t ready & the weather was dud. I & Waso & the pilot went up for a test of a few mins. Waso didn’t care much about it. My pilot was a fellow called Gregory, a very nice fellow, about 19 years old. He isn’t very well having a touch of flu. After that I went & tidied up my room & had tea & read a paper, & here I am now writing to the dearest old mater in the world. I fear all this is dull to you.
And to End..
I wonder if Karf could very kindly buy & borrow the things on the attached list & send them out to me soonish. I lost a good bit while I was on leave! I am sending a quid along for expenses. I hope you all are flourishing. I wish often that I was back with you again. I did have a deuc’d fine leave.
The old war will soon be over really. It’s good all these other countries having come out of it. Very best love darlingest. God bless you. This would have been Donald’s birthday. Your v v loving Cedric
[Letter reproduced by kind permission of Keith Gordon, Capt. Gordon’s nephew.]
* Note added on 11 November 2018 at10:30pm: I was rather taken with Rob’s initial suggestion that Greg’s ‘touch of flu’ was actually a hangover resulting from too many snifters (a very Greg word) the previous evening after his harrowing afternoon!
However, Rob subsequently revised his theory on learning that Greg didn’t fly for the next five days: maybe it actually was flu. The post for 21 June 1918 recounted the time when Greg had flu at Rely (‘Merville fever’, he called it then). And from the brief discourse on the epidemiology of Spanish Flu in that post, it can be seen that it had a second wave in early November 1918. So Spanish Flu is a good candidate to explain Capt. Gordon’s reference to Greg being unwell, and why he didn’t fly for the next few days.
Capt. Gordon says that “Leslie Henson…is giving a show somewhere near here tomorrow evening”. In fact, that was to be the second of two performances opening the Nouveau Théâtre Lille, which is now the Opéra de Lille, under Allied auspices. The first was this evening. We don’t know on which night Greg travelled the 5 miles (8 km) from Ascq into Lille to see the show, but he seems to have gone to one of them as the programme is among his papers:
Programme
Programme cover page for the reopening of the Nouveau Théâtre Lille. Click for larger image.Programme middle pages for the reopening of the Nouveau Théâtre Lille. Click for larger image.
This must have been a hot-ticket occasion. In a fascinating article entitled ‘Lille under German Rule‘ on the Remembrance Trails – Northern France website, Claudine Wallart, the Head Curator of Heritage at the Archives Départementales du Nord, tells the story of the theatre during the First World War:
Destroyed in the fire of 1903, Lille theatre (now the Opera) was in the process of being rebuilt when war broke out. The occupiers completed the job and named it the “German Theatre”, opening with much pomp and ceremony at Christmas 1915 in the presence of Crown Prince Rupert of Bavaria and Lille’s governor General Heinrich. Artists from Berlin performed Iphigenia in Tauris by Goethe, a symphonic prelude and Liszt’s Festklange. On subsequent occasions the Ring of the Nibelungen and various light operas were also performed there but, although invited, the civilian population of Lille kept away. The German artists remained at the Opera until the end of September 1918 when they destroyed the sets and stage machinery and left.
In the intervening weeks since the Germans left, repairs had evidently made the theatre ready enough for tonight’s performance. No doubt General Heinrich and the German high command would have been aghast at the cultural plummet from Goethe, Liszt and Wagner to a singalong with Louis J. Seymour and crowd. And equally, no doubt tonight’s audience wouldn’t have given a toss. But how they would have relished William Ewart Noble’s ‘Advice to Another William’!
Leslie Henson’s ‘Gaieties’
The Nouveau Théâtre Lille was not the first venue at which Greg had seen Leslie Henson’s ‘Gaieties’ Army Entertainers. Exactly three months earlier, a few days before the beginning of what would be the Allies’ final offensive, The Gaieties had put on a show for 42 Squadron in the hangar at Rely:
The names mentioned in August are still there. Bert Errol, the ‘noted female impersonator’ had pieces in both halves of the Lille show. (You have to wonder what the ‘camouflage’ was in ‘Camouflage & Cacophony’!) Teddie Holton was there, as of course was Leslie Henson. A little over a month later, The Gaieties were still performing at Lille, as this Imperial War Museum photograph shows:
In a day that came close to ending in disaster, Greg and Capt. Gordon were down to do a shoot – the last time in the war that Greg was down to do one. But it was unsuccessful, presumably because of poor weather. In a subsequent adventure behind enemy lines, a rifle shot from a German soldier at an occupied chateau nearly did for both of them. Unsurprisingly, they found that strafing an occupied chateau is dangerous.
Log Book
Date: 2.11.18
Time Out: 13.00
Rounds Fired – Lewis: 400
Rounds Fired – Vickers: 100
Bombs: 4
Time on RE8s: 187 hrs 5 mins
RE8: 2517
Observer: Cpt. Gordon
War Flying: 1 hrs 55 mins
Height: 3500
Course/Remarks: Shoot 6” How (99). Unsucc. Pet. tank shot.
Unsuccessful Shoot
We have no further details of the shoot, other than it was with 99 Siege Battery RGA, who were firing 6-inch howitzers, and that it was unsuccessful. (Greg had shot with 99 Siege Battery previously, on 22 August 1918 and 24 August 1918.) The intended target must have been something east of the River Scheldt/Escaut, as that was where the British front line was only yesterday. Given what we know from the rest of the day’s event, it seems likely that it was the weather that washed out the shoot.
Petrol Tank Shot
The laconic, three last words of the log book entry cover are a very sparse indication of what Greg and Capt. Gordon got up to next. It became something of a Gregory family story. It’s worth bearing in mind that Capt. Gordon was not only Greg’s observer this day, but was also his senior officer.
Rob Parsons, Greg’s son-in-law and my stepfather, recalls Greg recounting the events of that murky afternoon like this:
Gordon had decided that flying conditions were still good enough to go and annoy the Hun, even if it was only a spot of defenestration. So off they went, with a very reluctant pilot, in search of a little sport. Just as Greg was hoping he could say the fuel state meant they must turn for home, out of the murk appeared the perfect target in the form of a German-occupied Chateau. So he obediently descended to the level of the upper floor, through the windows of which Gordon emptied the drum of his Lewis gun. Meanwhile, as Greg climbed away and turned for home, Gordon had changed the drum and ordered him to go back because he “hadn’t done downstairs!”
It was during this second pass that, not surprisingly, the Huns started to shoot back. As he began to climb away, Greg recalled seeing a German on one knee, in classic toy soldier pose with rifle, shooting at him from the corner of the Chateau. That’s when a shot punctured the fuel tank and he began to be drenched with fuel. Fortunately, the aircraft didn’t catch fire. Anyway, he instinctively opened the throttle as far as it would go and began to climb as hard as he could. There the throttle stayed until he ran out of fuel.
Until then of course, he was being sprayed with fuel and he said he was close to getting frostbite. The fact that he returned safely is proof that he gained enough height to cross the enemy lines without being potted at by otherwise unoccupied Huns in the trenches. They made it back, and the aircraft was back in service the next day.
So, eight days before the war was over, it nearly ended very badly.
Sidelights
The log book and family recollection are all we have to go on for these events (oh that the Squadron Record Book were available!) Nonetheless, there are a few interesting sidelights that illuminate what went on.
Rounds Fired
First, note the number of rounds fired, as recorded in the log book. 100 rounds were fired from the Vickers gun, which was pilot-operated and forward facing. And Capt. Gordon fired 400 rounds from the Scarff ring-mounted Lewis gun in the rear compartment. Greg never recorded more rounds fired in from the Lewis gun a single patrol. This was certainly consistent with a major shoot up, at least in small arms terms.
The Petrol Tank
Secondly, consider the position of the petrol tank. The tank was an elliptical-sectioned cylinder running fore-and-aft, and mounted immediately behind the dashboard. In this photo of the front cockpit of replica RE8 A3930 at the RAF Museum, London, the pale grey bottom of the tank is just visible below the bottom lip of the dashboard. And the fuel filler cap is further forward on the top.
Front cockpit of replica RE8 A3930 at the RAF Museum, London. The bottom of the grey fuel tank is visible below the dashboard. Fuel filler cap on top. Click for larger image.
The position of the tank can also be seen in the top left drawing from The Vintage Aviator Limited’s RE8 Gallery collection here.
So the tank was essentially above the pilot’s legs. It was therefore no surprise that petrol from the punctured tank drenched Greg with fuel. He was extraordinarily lucky that a fire didn’t break out. He was also lucky that the bullet didn’t hit him.
An Extraordinarily Safe Job?
Thirdly, it may not be accidental that Capt. Gordon did not apparently write to his mother about the events of today. One wonders whether he recalled that only yesterday he had written to her:
This is an extraordinary safe job & no one gets hurt at it. So don’t you worry, dear old bird.
Given that he had himself been hit in the (wooden) leg on an earlier flight, and only one week ago today Greg’s propeller had been split by shrapnel, it is clear that a good deal of luck was involved in ‘not getting hurt’ – or worse. Today’s events underlined that. But no doubt Capt. Gordon was writing more to reassure his mother than to be candid.
A Mere Bagatelle
Where was the chateau that they shot up? The log book doesn’t record it; Greg was no longer writing his diary; and of course we don’t have the SRB entry for the day. However, with a bit of deduction and a liberal amount of conjecture, it may have been the deliciously named Château Bagatelle at Wattripont on the road running northeast from Tournai towards Renaix (Ronse).
The evidence is this. Wattripont is a plausible distance from Ascq – 19 miles (30.5 km). It’s about the same distance beyond the British front line as the line was from Ascq. And it’s in a plausible location, in fact almost familiar territory. Greg’s recent reconnaissance and counter-battery patrols had been reporting on locations north and northeast of Tournai. Only two days ago on 31 October 1918, he had reported fires and explosions in DB zone. Wattripont is in EB zone, 6,000 yards to the east, as can be seen on this map:
Wattripont, and its location in relation to Ascq, showing the relationship between zones DB and EB. Adapted from a map accompanying General Haig’s despatches on the final British offensive. Click for larger image. Map credit: IWM/TNA/Great War Digital.
And Wattripont has a good candidate chateau with two floors: the now comfortable looking Château Bagatelle:
Château Bagatelle, now a comfortable looking hotel and spa. Click to visit their website and see more present day photographs. Photo credit: Château Bagatelle.
So just maybe this was the chateau in question.
Another Near Disaster
Today’s near disaster was just days before the armistice. It bookends another near disaster five months ago, when Greg crashed on his first day on the Western Front on 4 June 1918. Though that time he couldn’t blame the enemy.
In what would turn out to be Greg’s last successful shoot of the war, Capt. Cedric Foskett Gordon was Greg’s observer for the first time today. Captain Gordon was one of the senior officers of B Flight, 42 Squadron and was evidently a remarkable character.
Log Book
Date: 1.11.18
Time Out: 13.15
Rounds Fired – Lewis: -
Rounds Fired – Vickers: -
Bombs: -
Time on RE8s: 185 hrs 10 mins
RE8: 2407
Observer: Cpt. Gordon
War Flying: 2 hrs 15 mins
Height: 7000
Course/Remarks: Shoot Portuguese. Successful.
“Shoot Portuguese”
This is nothing to do with shooting Britain’s Portuguese allies, of course. Rather, it is everything to do with observing a shoot involving Portuguese artillery.
For reasons explained in yesterday’s post, no Squadron Record Book entry is available for today:
Because of that, we don’t know much about the shoot. The battery, though, was evidently one of the few remaining Portuguese artillery units. The Portuguese Expeditionary Corps had suffered badly on the first day of the Battle of the Lys, on 9 April 1918. As a result of this, by the end of the war Portugal had only nine artillery pieces left, according to the Passion and Compassion 1914-1918 website. Two of them were heavy howitzers: a British 6″ siege piece, and a similarly sized Franco-Portuguese 15 cm T.R. Schneider-Canet-du-Bocage. Given that Greg’s shoots tended to be with heavy (siege) artillery batteries, it was possibly that it was with these howitzers that he was observing and directing artillery fire today.
What might the target have been? We don’t know. Maybe it was one of the usual suspects: a hostile battery (Greg’s most frequent target), an ammunition dump, trenches, or a strategically important crossroads. Or it might have been something unusual, thrown up by the unprecedented circumstances in these last, heady days of the war. In any event, the target must have been east of the River Scheldt/Escaut, along which the British front line still ran in Greg’s sector. Some miles both to the north and and to the south of Tournai, though, further eastward progress had been made:
The British Front on the morning of 1 November 1918. Adapted from a map accompanying General Haig’s despatches on the final British offensive. Click for larger image. Map credit: IWM/TNA/Great War Digital.
Captain Cedric Foskett Gordon MC, CdG
Greg’s observer today was Captain Gordon. Capt. Gordon was one of the two commanding officers of B Flight of 42 Squadron. He was evidently quite a character.
The following brief distillate of Capt. Gordon’s life comes, with permission, from Matt Ball’s informative Sevenoaks WW1 blog (see main link below or here):
Early Life and Wartime
Cedric Gordon was educated at Lancing College, were he excelled in sports. In 1910, he was commissioned into the North Staffordshire Regiment. He was sent to France on the outbreak of war and was wounded twice. In 1915 he was awarded the Military Cross for leading an attack on a village.
His second injury was the most serious and resulted in his losing a leg. You might be forgiven for thinking that this would be the end of his war service but Cedric joined the Royal Flying Corps and continued his wartime service as an observer and air gunner on the Western Front. He was subsequently awarded the Croix de Guerre in 1917, was mentioned in dispatches four times and awarded the military class of the OBE in 1919.
According to a nephew, quoted in his obituary, Cedric was shot at during one flight with the bullet shattering his wooden leg. On landing, he was said to have found the stray bullet in his pocket and was confined to bed until the camp carpenter had made him a new leg.
Post War
After the war, and having gained his pilot’s licence despite his wooden leg, Cedric was sent to Russia with British forces to aid the White Russians in the Crimea in their fight against the Bolsheviks. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and received the Order of St Ann and the Order of St Stanislas from the Russians. After leaving Russia, he flew in Palestine, where during one flight for reconnaissance work, he was forced to land in the desert and was, according to his obituary ‘picked up by a band of friendly Arabs’.
Cedric later worked for British intelligence in mainland China, before returning to England and taking command of the RAF Bloom Centre. During the Second World War, he was eventually put in charge of the South East Air Training Corps and was also a member of the Home Guard.
Retirement
On his retirement, he returned to Lancing College, where his brother Edward was a Master, to become Bursar. Later in life he became well known in Sevenoaks for his involvement in the local scouting movement.
No doubt it was Capt. Gordon’s unusual circumstances that meant he was one of two officers in B Flight to hold the rank of Captain. The other was Capt. Bill Ledlie (of whom more here).
First Day Back
As it turns out, 1 November 1918 was Capt. Gordon’s first day back at the squadron at Ascq. For part of October he had been on leave in the UK. When he returned, he found that his dog (who rejoiced in the name of Waso) was missing. His own account of the day and the latter part of his journey back is preserved in a letter to his mother. This letter is one of a number kindly made available by Cedric Gordon’s nephew, Keith Gordon. As Matt Ball notes in another post on the Sevenoaks WW1 blog (see below, but also linked here):
What emerges from these letters is a strong sense of a close, spirited family, each with at least one nickname (Cedric’s was ‘beast’ owing to his general strength), and a spirit of adventure embodied by Cedric himself. No doubt some of his insouciance is designed to reassure his worried mother, to whom all of these letters are addressed…
With that as background, here is the text of Cedric Gordon’s letter of 1 November 1918:
All Saints Day (1 November) letter to darlingest Mother from 42 Squadron, RAF, BEF
I have arrived at last.
To go on where I left off. O’Keefe & I went & lunched at an estaminet where we had an excellent fish, some veal & a bottle of red wine, all of which made me far more contented with the world at large. This done, we returned to our vigil at the Town Mayor’s office & at about 3pm our Tender finally arrived. After a long & uneventful journey we arrived at the Squadron about 7pm.
Waso was reported missing, believed to have been stolen by a general belonging to the Corps. This was rather depressing, but the major who commanded 42 Sqn promised to take me round to the Corps with a view to returning my hound. I had dinner with HQ Mess & then went round to my Flight Mess (B Flight) & found them full of good cheer & beer. We had quite an amusing evening. I have got a very nice billet. There are quite a number (at present unknown) of French people living here. They have provided me with a very nice room upstairs & a large bed, sheets etc & a very small basin! The natives speak very bad French & I can’t make a great deal of headway with them, however they are very friendly.
This morning…
…I rose about 7.30am & sorted out my hut, such of it as hasn’t been lost during my absence. I spent the morning playing about with a Lewis gun & this afternoon I went up for a short time. This is an extraordinary safe job & no one gets hurt at it. So don’t you worry, dear old bird.
This evening…
…I went down with Hunter (the OC) to the Corps to interview this General man who had acquired Waso. I looked through the glass door & saw old Waz inside, so softly I opened the door & Waso came bounding out. She was awfully pleased to see me, almost as pleased as I was to see her. After a bit I got hold of the General who was a very nice fellow. He said he found her many miles away & had adopted her. I expect someone had picked her up in a lorry or some vehicle & dropped her off after a bit.
He was very loath to part with her & said he was very fond of her, which is not surprising. However, he gave her up & I promised him a puppy when the next instalment arrives, & we parted friends. Normally people go to bed here about 8.30pm, which is rather dull. They are, on the whole, a very comic crowd, but there are several very nice fellows.
I have missed you…
…most awfully. It is rotten leaving you, however before very long now the war will be over & Waso & I will return to the family. No more news at present. Very fondest love darlingest. Best love to Karf who, together with my old Mother, made my leave absolutely splendid. I hope Am is well. God bless you darlingest.
Photos
Greg had a few photos of Capt. Gordon in his collection. The two of them must have been in touch after the war, as that is evidently when at least a couple of the photos were taken. I’m grateful to Keith Gordon for his help with identifying the locations of the last two.
Captain Cedric Foskett Gordon. Credit: Greg’s War Collection. Click for larger image.Captain Cedric Foskett Gordon. Credit: Greg’s War Collection. Click for larger image.Captain Cedric Foskett Gordon. This was a post-war photograph from the time he was a member of the Mission to South Russia (1919 – 1920). Credit: Greg’s War Collection. Click for larger image.Captain Cedric Foskett Gordon. This was a post-war photograph, taken during his return to UK from South Russia. Credit: Greg’s War Collection. Click for larger image.
A Telling Tale
To get a further flavour of Cedric Gordon’s character, here is a link to Matt Ball’s second post on Cedric Gordon, which contains the text of several more letters. The last of the letters, dated 24 September, is worth reading in particular. It is about a scouting excursion on the ground beyond the lines.
Sevenoaks WW1 
