213527 Sgt. Samuel James Child British Army 236th Brigade Royal Field Artillery from:Penge Sam was in the 6th London Brigade RFA Territorial Force (TF) service no. 955169. He joined on 24/05/1909 at Brixton. War broke out in August 1914 and at the time he was on Salisbury Plain training. Many Brigades were transferred into other units, Sam’s being one of them, his Brigade became the 236th Brigade “A†Battery. This Brigade was within the 47th ( 2nd London) Division. His Brigade was moved to the St.Albans area and at some times to the Braintree area to train prior to entering the theatre of war in France. His Brigade was only the second to enter France in March 1915. They sailed from Southampton to Le Havre then to Bethune before entering the war.
Sam’s Military Record reveals that on 29th July 1917 he did receive a Gun Shot Wound (GSW) to his head leaving him with a scar on his left cheek. He was also reprimanded on 01/11/1917 for riding on the gun carriage with two other men, he was busted to Corporal but did get his stripe back to Sergeant again fairly quickly. When you think he had been in the thick of it from the beginning I believe it was a bit strong to lose a stripe. He was reported by a Corporal for the breach of Queens Regulations. I bet Sam had a word with him later.
Below are the battles he was involved in:-
- 1915
- The Battle of Aubers Ridge (9 May)
- The Battle of Festubert (15-25 May)
- The Battle of Loos (25 september - 1 October)
- The subsequent Actions of the Hohenzollern Redoubt (13-19 October)
- 1916
- The German attack at Vimy Ridge (21 May)
- The Battle of Flers-Courcelette in which the Division captured High Wood
- The Battle of the Transloy Ridges in which the Division captured Eaucourt l'Abbaye
- The attacks on the Butte de Warlencourt
- The Battle of Messines (7 - 13 June) including Hill 60
- The Battle of Pilkem Ridge (31 July - 2 August), a phase of the Third Battles of Ypres
- Other operations in the Third Battles of Ypres (18 August-2 September and 8 -17 September)
- The Cambrai Operations, in which the Division captured Bourlon Wood and fought the German counter attacks
- 1918
- The Battle of St Quentin
- The First Battle of Bapaume
- The Battle of the Ancre
- The Battle of Albert
- The Second Battle of Bapaume
It is strange reading the war diaries of the 236th RFA, nearly every single day they were under heavy fire, many horses killed and mentioned, many RFA killed, but they did have regular sporting events, boxing tournaments, concert nights put on by each Brigade, concert nights with entertainers from the UK, even cinema evenings. Regular church parades as well. One day they even found a French race course and held their own horse races both flat and hurdles.
One thing that I had never heard of was that an officer would go up in a barrage balloon when the artillery was firing to see if they are on target or they had planes up observing and then relaying the details back to the gunners.
To give you a flavour of the 236th Brigade War Diaries I recorded the first few days in the Diary, it starts on Monday 15th March 1915.
“Left Hemel Hempstead by section starting with 16th Battery at 20:45 riding for 2 hour stints to Southampton, arrived 20:00 16th March 1915 where two large troop ships and a small steamer are taking us to Le Havre, remarkably smooth crossing.,
22:00 drive to Berguette, now attached to different Army Corp to that intended now there is no place for billeting. Drive to Liere, then Foucquenhem, Ecquedcques at 15:30 on 19th March, then billet at Fontes at 22:00. Work of billeting officer who proceeded to France 9 days earlier entirely useless.
Brigade now attached to 6th Infantry. 22nd March Brigade inspected by Field Marshall, Commander-in-Chief at Chateau De Mazingham.
Moved to Lapugony 27th March.â€
"Can you imagine driving gun carriages at speed in the pitch dark, no street lamps, from Essex to Southampton on country lanes that were in poor repair."
Another entry says- 28th Jan 1917 Ypres, 236 shelled at Langkhof Farm.
Each man was issued with one blanket during the war so all they had were the uniform they stood in and a blanket, I’ve thought about this and I know there were times when it was extremely cold and wet, I reckon they slept with the horses to keep warm, that’s what I would have done.
I forgot to mention the Sam’s Brigade went down with something in the May 1918, all the Brigade were sick, it was later diagnosed as Influenza, I do remember seeing a programme a few years ago telling the tragedy of many hundreds of thousands of troops dying after the Armistice but before they were shipped home, perhaps this was the Spanish Flu that Sam’s Brigade was going through.
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