Friday 20th August 1915

Exactly one year earlier, Gilbert and Geraldine Tunstill had returned to England from their trip to Russia which had such an impact on Gilbert’s plan to raise his own Company.

At 4pm the embarkation orders which had been issued to 23^rd Division the previous evening, were issued to 69^th Brigade and duly communicated to all Battalions the same evening, though without reference to any specific destination. Any officers still on leave were immediately recalled to duty.

Pte. Josias Bailey was promoted Lance Corporal. He had enlisted in Brighouse on 7^th September 1914, at which time he was working as a quarryman. He was 37 years old and had been married for almost 12 years to Laura Bray; the couple had no children. Josias Bailey had previously served eight years with the West Riding Territorials. He had initially been posted to 3DWR and there are a number of entries in his service record which refer to punishments recorded by the CO of that Battalion whilst Bailey was actually serving with 10DWR; I am, as yet, unable to explain these entries.

Pte. Arthur Walton (see 4^th August), who had been held in detention for the previous two weeks awaiting trial on a charge of desertion, appeared before a District Court Martial. He was found guilty and sentence to 24 weeks’ detention; however, with the Battalion shortly to embark for France, 20 weeks of the sentence were remitted, and he was to be detained for just four weeks.

The weekly edition of the West Yorkshire Pioneer published a letter written by three Earby men serving with 9^th Battalion Duke of Wellington’s (West Riding) Regiment. Among the three was Pte. Richard Wharton, who was the brother of Tunstill’s recruit, Pte. Allan Wharton (see 19^th October 1914)

THE "PIONEER" IN THE TRENCHES - Three Earby Privates Write

We have received the following communication from three Earby privates, which we print with pleasure:-

9th Batt. Duke of Wellington's, 'A' Company, B.E.F., France.

Dear Editor, - Having seen so many letters in your paper from the 6th Battalion West Ridings, with which we are very familiar, we thought some of our friends would like to hear from us through the 'Pioneer'. We have been here just a month, and have already had some exciting and trying times. We have been shelled something awful this last four days. This is our tenth successive day in these trenches. The Germans are only fifty yards away from where I am writing, and we have had one or two 'scraps' with them. We gave them rapid fire for about half an hour last night, until our rifles were almost red-hot. They are very fond of sending whizz-bangs over, and they make an awful noise. You can hear them coming and it gives us the signal to lie flat on our stomachs. It is like waiting for your death; but we are all in the best of spirits, and doing our bit as cheerful as we can. Just as we close, the fun has commenced, so we must get to business.

Wishing your paper every success, we are, yours truly, Privates F. W. Foster, F. Yerkiss, and R. Wharton, of Earby.

(9^th Battalion was at this point serving in the trenches in the Vierstraat-Dickebusch area, south of Ypres).