Friday 5th April 1918

Support trenches to the right Brigade near Malga Fassa on the forward slopes of Mount Kaberlaba.

The weather remained cold and wet, with showers of rain, sleet and snow.

Pte. John Eastwood (see 23^rd March) was injured when, in the words of his statement, “about 3.30pm I was in the reserve line when I picked up a detonator which exploded in my left hand”. He suffered what would be described as “multiple wounds, superficial, of both thighs and hands” and would be admitted via 71^st Field Ambulance to 9^th Casualty Clearing Station. Given the circumstances of his injury, an investigation was instigated and statements taken by 2Lt. Arthur Lilley (see 15^th June 1917). L.Cpl. William Henry Bower (see 6^th October 1916; it is not known when he had been promoted) reported that, “At about 3 o’clock on the afternoon of 5^th April I was startled by a loud report near by. I saw Pte. Eastwood bleeding rather profusely from a wound in the left hand. I rushed to him and bandged him with several field dressings. On asking him how it happened he told me he had been playing with a detonator”. Pte. Herbert Archer (see 22^nd February) stated that, “About 3 o’clock I was having a conversation with Pte. Stocks of my platoon. Pte. Eastwood came up to us with a small brass tube resembling a cartridge. It would be about three inches long and had a width of about half an inch. It seemed to be filled with a kind of reddish substance which I thought was explosive. He gave the tube to Pte. Stocks who asked me what I thought it was. I told him I thought it was dangerous to handle and so he handed it back to Pte. Eastwood. Eastwood went a few yards up the hill and Stocks and I continued our conversation. We were suddenly startled by a loud report. On looking round I saw Pte. Eastwood holding his hand out. The blood was running from his hand and so I immediately gave the call for the stretcher bearers”. Pte. Harold Stocks (see below) confirmed Archer’s account, “I was sitting near the dugout when Pte. Eastwood came to me. He showed me a small brass tube which he said he had taken from an Italian bomb. He went and sat down quite near. I saw him playing with it. He was trying to take out the wax from the detonator. Soon after I heard a loud report. I looked and saw that Pte. Eastwood’s hand was bleeding”. On the basis of the evidence reported Lt.Col. Francis Washington Lethbridge DSO (see 30^th March) would conclude that Eastwood should be be put before a Field General Court Martial and instructions were accordingly issued that Eastwood should be held in confinement whilst being treated, pending the trial..

Pte. Harold Stocks was a 21 year old farmer’s son from Kirkheaton; in the absence of a surviving service record I am unable to establish when he had joined the Battalion, though it had most likely been late in 1917.

Pte. Newton Dobson (see 17^th March), who had been under treatment for three weeks for jaundice,  was discharged from 11^th General Hospital in Genoa and posted to the Base Depot at Arquata Scrivia.

Cpl. Joseph Dunn (see 28^th January), serving with 2^nd/7^th DWR, was posted back to England from 4^th General Hospital at Camiers, travelling onboard the Hospital Ship Stad Antwerpen. It is unclear why or for how long he had been in hospital.

Sgt. Harry Singleton (see 29^th October 1915), serving in France with 50^th Field Ambulance was taken prisoner; he was the brother of Robert Singleton (see 14^th December 1917), who had been one of Tunstill’s original volunteers, but had been discharged as unfit in January 1915. Harry later described his capture and subsequent events, 

“I was captured on 5^th April 1918, in a trench between the villages of Bulquoy and Gommecourt. We had made an attack on the German trench system in front of us and had taken three lines of trenches and several hundred prisoners. Finding we were not strong enough to hold the position our boys had to retire, and during the retirement we were cut off in a short trench and soon found ‘Jerry’ on each side of us. We held them at bay for some hours until our stock of bombs ran out and they rushed us. We were marched to Bapaume that night, and were billeted in what used to be the Drury Lane Theatre in that place. Here we were kept three days without food and were marched off every day to unload our enemy’s ammunition at the railway station. We also worked at an engineer’s camp, carrying sleepers for a light railway. We did not stay long at Bapaume but were moved further on to Marquion and then to Demain, where we stayed another week in a camp, and were fed on mangold soup every day, and a very severe epidemic of dysentery set in, over 50 of our boys dying in a week. After a week of this I managed to get moved to a Veterinary Hospital where I had a good job looking after the sick of my company. The food here was very bad also and we lived for months on a very small quantity of black bread and imitation coffee, while our mid-day meal consisted of various soups. Sometimes it was ‘sauerkraut’ and at others, ‘sandstorm’, which was ground up mangolds and swedes, and it made a mixture something like sawdust and water in appearance. As the summer advanced we got fresh cabbage in the soup; more water than cabbage though. We used to get plenty of horse’s liver and lights whenever a horse died in hospital, but they always kept them too long and they were generally in a high state when we got them in soup”.

Pte. John Longmire (see 15^th March), who had been in England since having been wounded on 20^th September 1917, was formally discharged from the army as no longer physically fit for service. He was awarded a pension of 27s. 6d. for four weeks, reducing to 5s. 6d. and to be reviewed in one year.

Pte. Hugh Flanagan (see 16^th August 1917) was formally discharged from the Army on account of wounds to his right side and buttock suffered in action. In the absence of a surviving service record it has not been possible to establish the circumstances or date of his having been wounded. He was assessed as having a 50% disability and was awarded an Army pension of 20s. per week.

In the Northern Hospital, Liverpool, 10 year-old Nellie Charles died as a result of “appendicitis and general peritonitis”; she was the second of the five children of Pte. Josiah Charles (see 5^th October 1917).

A payment of £6 6s. 7d. was authorised, being the amount due in pay and allowances to the late L.Cpl. Willie Waggitt (see 3^rd August 1917), who had been killed at Le Sars in October 1916; the payment would go to his father, John. It is unclear why there had been such a protracted delay in settling Waggit’s account.

L.Cpl. Willie Waggitt

A pension award was made in the case of the late Pte. Clifford Orchard (see 8^th January) who had been killed in action in September 1917; his widow, Myrtle, was awarded 18s. 9d. per week.

A pension award was made in the case of the late Pte. Thomas Henry Swift (see 12^th February 1918) who had been killed in action in September 1917; his mother, Annie, was awarded 5s. per week.

A pension award was made in the case of the late Pte. Thomas Thompson MM (see 27^th February 1918), who had been killed in action in September 1917; his widow, Catherine, was awarded £1 11s. 3d. per week for herself and their five children.