About Greg’s War

Greg’s War is a blog that recounts, 100 years on, the day-to-day activities of 2nd Lt C. E. Gregory RFC/RAF (‘Greg’) in the closing months of the First World War.  I’m Andrew Sheard, Greg’s grandson, and I maintain and administer this site and the blog.  You can reach me either by email or via the form on the Contact page.

How the blog came about

The inspiration for this blog came from a combination of two things.  First, a year or so ago, I started to look more closely at some of the family archive material that my late mother had collected and organised over the years.  Among the papers was a collection of diaries, photographs and memorabilia relating to her father’s time as a pilot in the First World War.  I found it riveting, and some of the material brought to life and supplied new colour to the war stories that I remember eagerly hearing as a young boy.

The second source of inspiration was a newspaper.  Since the 2014 centenary of the outbreak of the war, The Times of London (thetimes.co.uk) has been running an ‘on this day’ column chosen from the day’s newspaper 100 years ago.  Reading this each day gives a vividness and immediacy to the war that is hard to match in distilled and more reflective accounts written later.

Coupled with the opportunity provided by the centenary of the events covered in the log book and diary, the idea of Greg’s War was born.

What’s in the Greg’s War Collection

The narrative thread of the collection is provided Greg’s Pilot’s Flying Log Book, which ran from his first day of flying training, on 14 March 1918, to what was apparently his last flight in an RE8 on 1 January 1919.

In addition to his Log Book, Greg also kept a more detailed Diary of Active Service. The Diary begins on 29 May 1918, just before he was posted to France, and somewhat peters out on 21 August 1918.

I’m not sure why he didn’t keep up the diary beyond August 1918.  It may have been that life had got more stressful after the start of what we now know as the Allies’ Final Offensive or ‘Hundred Days’ on 8 August.  Or it may simply be that what was initially unfamiliar had become routine.  Perhaps writing a daily account that was more detailed than what was required for the log book just became too much of a chore.

The photographs in the collection fall mostly into two distinct categories.  First, there are the wallet-sized snapshots, typically of people or aircraft, some of which may well have been taken with Greg’s own Vest Pocket Kodak camera (the VPK, known as ‘the soldier’s camera‘), which I still have today:

And then there are the military grade photographs, both aerial and terrestrial, which are typically 8½” x 6½” (21 cm x 16 cm)  prints of impressively high definition.  Some were evidently taken by Greg or by his observer on the day in question, but some could not have been:  for instance, there are several aerial photographs of events on the Somme that took place before Greg was posted to France, and he had never apparently flown that far south.  Anything from the collection that looks interesting, whether snapshot or military and whether taken by Greg or not, is woven into the blog.

Completing the collection is a variety of printed and written memorabilia including certificates, menus of significant dinners, daily flight orders around Armistice Day, and even a playbill – which marked a particular moment in the Allies’ Final Offensive.  

So what’s the point?

Of course, a blog based on a personal collection such as this cannot amount to a comprehensive account of events on the Western Front in the closing months of the war,  and it is not trying to be.  But what the blog offers is an illustration: the personal and more or less complete story of one young man from the beginning of his flying training with the RFC in March 1918 to coming home in January 1919, still aged 19 but no doubt feeling much older, to resume his life as an undergraduate chemistry student at the University College of North Wales in Bangor.  And the internet, which Greg would have loved, practically allows him to tell his own story as it happened 100 years after the event, even if modesty would have prevented him from doing so if he were still alive.

Greg’s service on the Western Front flying RE8s with 42 Squadron, one of the ‘corps’ squadrons of the RFC and then the RAF, illustrates the core duties of the early air service, in artillery co-operation, reconnaissance, photography and the occasional offensive sortie.  His life did not routinely involve the sort of high-profile heroics of the fighter pilots (the ‘scouts’) that the authorities back home liked to publicise to keep up morale, but it was infused with everyday danger and bravery to a level that most of us are far removed from today.  He was by no means the only one in this position, and if this blog makes us better appreciate the risks that he and his fellow airmen in the corps squadrons repeatedly took for the benefit of their comrades, compatriots, allies and those of us who came after them, then I will consider that a worthwhile aim has been achieved.

And finally…

I am grateful to my stepfather, Rob Parsons, for his research and input, including his recollection of Greg’s telling of some of the events in the blog; to my good friend Michael Seymour (a real historian) for his advice and substantial contributions; to my daughter Lizzie for social media and content advice; and to my wife Barbara, who has both encouraged me in this endeavour and kindly put up with my wittering on about Greg’s War for some time.  I am sorry that Greg never met either his granddaughter-in-law or his great-granddaughter.

I remember Greg with affection and admiration.

© Andrew Gregory Sheard 2018-2020