Sunday 9th June 1918

Front line trenches north-west of Mount Kaberlaba.

A further increase was noted in artillery activity from both sides.

Cpl. Harry Wood (see 21^st March), L.Cpl. Harold Bray (18231) (see 30^th May 1917) and Ptes. John Charles Clarke (see 29^th October 1917), George Dunkin (see 29^th October 1917), Albert Edward Victor Harris (see 3^rd December 1917), John Walter Jennings (see 29^th October 1917) and William Percy Smith (see 3^rd December 1917) departed on two weeks’ leave to England.


Pte. Fred Clayton (see 30^th April) was admitted via 21^st Field Ambulance to 9^th Casualty Clearing Station; he would be discharged after five days and posted to XIV Corps Reinforcement Camp at Arquata Scrivia.
Sgt. Lionel Vickers (see 22^nd May), who was stationed at the Base Depot at Arquata Scrivia, following treatment for the injury to his knee suffered whilst playing football in February, was reported as having been, “out of billet area without a pass and drinking on licensed premises during prohibited hours”; he would be severely reprimanded, but face no further sanction.

Pte. Charles William Hird (see 22^nd February), serving in France with 2DWR, was reported as wounded, suffering from the effects of gas. The details of his treatment are unknown, but he would remain with his Battalion.

Sgt. Harry Singleton (see 5^th April), who had been taken prisoner in France two months’ previously while serving with 50^th Field Ambulance, escaped from his prison camp, but would be recaptured a week later. He was the brother of Robert Singleton (see 14^th December 1917).Sgt. Joseph Patrick Melvin (see 9^th March), serving in England at 90^th Territorial Force Depot, was posted to 6^th (Reserve) Battalion DWR.

An incident occurred at the home of Pte. James Moran (see 12^th April), serving with 3DWR. The circumstances are described in subsequent newspaper reports:

“On June 8^th a corporal and he (Pte. Moran) went to North Shields to bring in a deserter, and it was arranged that the petitioner should pay a visit to his wife at Brighouse on the way. He arrived at Brighouse at 2am and found the house locked up. He knocked three times before he could get a reply and when his wife opened the bedroom window and saw him she said, “Oh dear!”. She did not admit him until he had knocked again and waited another 10 or 15 minutes. She came down in her night-dress. Going upstairs he found George Taylor Birkhead under the bed in the children’s bedroom. Birkhead had no stockings on. The men had some words and, on getting downstairs quarrelled, and Moarn, after calling his thirteen year-old son up, and sending for his wife’s father, hit the deceased with a bayonet, cutting the jugular vein, and then telling the man to clear out. The man did so and fell dead in the yard adjoining the house”.

Pte. Moran was arrested and detained.