Monday 20th March 1916

Front line trenches west of Angres

‘Stand to’ for this tour was set for 4.30am and 6.15pm and special attention was required at all times as the proximity of the enemy lines meant the Battalion was exposed to a constant threat from rifle grenades. Indeed, it was noted that, “the chief feature of the warfare at this period was the incessant duel carried out between the trench mortars and the rifle grenades in the opposing lines”.  The day soon became “very hot and muggy”.

In the afternoon a rifle grenade was fired into one of the bays manned by ‘A’ Company. The explosion wounded three men and killed Pte. Ernest Varley.  Varley was a 34 year-old former regular soldier who was originally from Armley, near Leeds, but had been working as a window cleaner in Keighley when war broke out. By the outbreak of war both Ernest’s parents were dead. He was one of the Keighley contingent who had been added to Tunstill’s original recruits. He was buried at what had originally been a French military cemetery named Tranchee de Mecknes, near Aix Noulette.  There was then an intensification of German artillery fire, beginning around dusk and continuing for around fifteen minutes before being quelled by retaliatory fire from the British artillery. There were further casualties from another detonation of a rifle grenade overnight, with three more men (not from ‘A’ Company) wounded. These exchanges were commented on in the Diary of the Brigade Trench Mortar Battery: “Fired from left hand gun ten rounds at 3pm by request C.O. 8^th Yorkshires to silence hostile rifle grenades and whizz bangs – obtained silence. From 7pm to 7.30 pm Germans strafed our trenches with light stuff, possibly in retaliation for our afternoon shoot”. One of the men wounded during the day was Pte. John Beckwith (see 22^nd May 1915). Also wounded was Pte. Herbert Ridley (see 2^nd November 1915) who suffered injuries to his right side and hip; he would be evacuated to 4^th General Hospital at Camiers. Pte. Matthew Woodward (see 22^nd July 1915) suffered wounds to his left leg, including a fractured fibia; he would be evacuated to 26^th General Hospital at Etaples. Pte. George Albert Wright suffered wounds to his left shoulder; he would be evacuated via 100^th Field Ambulance and 23^rd Casualty Clearing Station to 4^th General Hospital at Camiers. He was an original member of the Battalion having enlisted aged 36 and working as a ‘silk boiler’ in Bradford; he was married with two children.

It was also reported that there was a concern that the Germans were tunnelling under the left section of the Battalion front and 23^rd Tunnelling Company, Royal Engineers were ordered to investigate.

It is curious that Varley’s headstone and the Commonwealth War Graves records record him as having been aged 28 when he was killed, when he was in fact born in 1882, and thus at least five years older.