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Pte. William H. Barlow
British Army 8th Battalion Norfolk Regiment
from:1 The Avenue, Helsby, Cheshire
(d.1st July 1916)
A story published in the Sunday Mirror on 11th May 20149 reports on William and how via letters home he persuaded his brother John to not follow in his footsteps, thus probably saving his life. Ironically his great grand nephew Jonny Clarke in 2014 was an actor in the UK and Ireland tour of the play "Birdsong", playing the part of a young soldier who dies on the first day of The Somme.
"These letters from the front at the height of the Great War were more than just friendly exchanges between a soldier and his brother back home. Despite the missives being heavily censored by the authorities, infantryman William Barlow managed to convey the horror of the trenches - and ultimately saved young Johns life when he enlisted at the tender age of 15. Hero William advised his younger brother to join the Royal Engineers as there is more money and less work than in infantry. And in April 1916, William wrote: If I were you I would learn straight away now the Morse and Semaphore alphabets and attest in the Royal Engineers Signal Section which is better still for you. Then you will have a pretty soft time generally. Less than two months later William was dead - one of 20,000 men slaughtered on the first day of the Battle of the Somme on July 1st. It was advice which John took on board when he lied about his age and signed up just a few months later. Although he witnessed some action, John worked mostly behind the front lines delivering post on a bike, and survived the war. Restricted by Government censors, William could only hint at how terrible life was in the trenches, but he was determined to spare his young brother the same ordeal.
Today Williams legacy is Âremembered down the generations, Âespecially by Johns great-great-grandson, the actor Jonny Clarke, who is best known for playing Bart McQueen in ÂHollyoaks. Jonny knows he probably owes his very existence to his distant uncle William, an emotion he draws on in his latest role as Private Tipper in the stage version of Sebastian Faulks ÂBirdsong, the best-selling book about life in the trenches. Like Jonnys great-great-grandfather, Tipper lied about his age to join the war at 16. And like Jonnys distant uncle, Tipper also dies on the first day of the Battle of the Somme, but at his own hand after choosing to shoot himself rather than face the horror of going over the top. Jonny, from Chester, said: Had it not been for the letter sent by my great-great-uncle to his brother it is more than likely my great-great-grandfather would have been killed and his descendants, including myself, would never have been born. The letters have been handed down through the three generations and Ill no doubt pass them on to my family. Playing Tipper has compounded how important my heritage is. In one scene Tipper writes home to his family and I cant help but think of the letters William wrote home to his parents and brother. Knowing his family background made Jonny want the role of Tipper even more. When my agent told me about it I knew I needed to get the part, he said. Reading the letters from William helps me picture what life during the war was like and helps me visualise it for the role of Tipper.
William Barlow joined the 8th Battalion of the Norfolk Regiment on September 17, 1914, aged 25. At home he had been a draughtsman and was heavily involved with his community in Helsby, Cheshire, as a scoutmaster. Sleepy village life would have seemed a million miles away once William faced the trenches, where men were at the mercy of the weather, diseases like dysentery and for many the only barriers between life and death were sand bags and barbed wire. Allied and enemy lines could be as little as 50 feet apart and a near-miss from an artillery shell could destroy a trench or cause a dugout to collapse, burying those inside. In one letter to John, William tells how the enemy blew up a nearby mine, killing six men in a neighbouring battalion. He wrote: We had a lot of excitement in the early hours of this morning at 2am. Our company was holding that part of the line which is only a few yards from the Germans. It is a maze of trenches, craters, and piles of sandbags and a horrible place to get through in the dark. On this our extreme left where our batt (battalion) joins the next, the Germans blew up a mine. About six men in the next batt were buried and killed, one or two wounded and about 8 engineers were buried... and killed or suffocated. Despite the sense of fear, William often displays the black humour common among soldiers facing their own mortality. In the last letter home to his parents, William and Annie, in May 1916 he tells how his unit caused mischief for a pals battalion.He wrote: That Battalion are a very quiet peaceful lot and in the winter their opponents were the same. When we took over from them and our sentries and our gunmen (started) hitting at them and making the beggars sit up and take notice - they were horrified at the idea of shooting the poor harmless Boche, and now the Boche has vented their fury on them instead of ourselves who were the cause of the mischief. This is only one of the many funny things we see in this job.
William, who concludes every letter to John with the words your affectionate brother Bill, also gives a glimpse into the lives of ordinary French civilians on the fringes of the battle. In a long letter in October 1915, he wrote to say he was billeted near a town he was not allowed to name. Records show his battalion was based near the city of Amiens. Describing how he and fellow soldiers refused to sleep on old hay in case it was live (with lice) he described his lodgings as the most comfortable yet, revealing how simply being dry and warm was a luxury in comparison to the trenches. William told how the nearby French town was devastated when it was bombed by the Germans, then suffered at the hands of the advancing enemy. These letters from the front at the height of the Great War were more than just friendly exchanges between a soldier and his brother back home. Despite the missives being heavily censored by the authorities, infantryman William Barlow managed to convey the horror of the trenches - and ultimately saved young Johns life when he enlisted at the tender age of 15. Hero William advised his younger brother to join the Royal Engineers as there is more money and less work than in infantry. And in April 1916, William wrote: If I were you I would learn straight away now the Morse and Semaphore alphabets and attest in the Royal Engineers Signal Section which is better still for you. Then you will have a pretty soft time generally. Less than two months later William was dead - one of 20,000 men slaughtered on the first day of the Battle of the Somme on July 1st. It was advice which John took on board when he lied about his age and signed up just a few months later. Although he witnessed some action, John worked mostly behind the front lines delivering post on a bike, and survived the war. Restricted by Government censors, William could only hint at how terrible life was in the trenches, but he was determined to spare his young brother the same ordeal. Today Williams legacy is Âremembered down the generations, Âespecially by Johns great-great-grandson, the actor Jonny Clarke, who is best known for playing Bart McQueen in ÂHollyoaks. Jonny knows he probably owes his very existence to his distant uncle William, an emotion he draws on in his latest role as Private Tipper in the stage version of Sebastian Faulks ÂBirdsong, the best-selling book about life in the trenches. Like Jonnys great-great-grandfather, Tipper lied about his age to join the war at 16. And like Jonnys distant uncle, Tipper also dies on the first day of the Battle of the Somme, but at his own hand after choosing to shoot himself rather than face the horror of going over the top. Jonny, from Chester, said: Had it not been for the letter sent by my great-great-uncle to his brother it is more than likely my great-great-grandfather would have been killed and his descendants, including myself, would never have been born. The letters have been handed down through the three generations and Ill no doubt pass them on to my family. Playing Tipper has compounded how important my heritage is. In one scene Tipper writes home to his family and I cant help but think of the letters William wrote home to his parents and brother. Knowing his family background made Jonny want the role of Tipper even more. When my agent told me about it I knew I needed to get the part, he said. Reading the letters from William helps me picture what life during the war was like and helps me visualise it for the role of Tipper.
William Barlow joined the 8th Battalion of the Norfolk Regiment on September 17, 1914, aged 25. At home he had been a draughtsman and was heavily involved with his community in Helsby, Cheshire, as a scoutmaster. Sleepy village life would have seemed a million miles away once William faced the trenches, where men were at the mercy of the weather, diseases like dysentery and for many the only barriers between life and death were sand bags and barbed wire. Allied and enemy lines could be as little as 50 feet apart and a near-miss from an artillery shell could destroy a trench or cause a dugout to collapse, burying those inside. In one letter to John, William tells how the enemy blew up a nearby mine, killing six men in a neighbouring battalion.
He wrote: We had a lot of excitement in the early hours of this morning at 2am. Our company was holding that part of the line which is only a few yards from the Germans. It is a maze of trenches, craters, and piles of sandbags and a horrible place to get through in the dark. On this our extreme left where our batt (battalion) joins the next, the Germans blew up a mine. About six men in the next batt were buried and killed, one or two wounded and about 8 engineers were buried... and killed or suffocated. Despite the sense of fear, William often displays the black humour common among soldiers facing their own mortality. In the last letter home to his parents, William and Annie, in May 1916 he tells how his unit caused mischief for a pals battalion.He wrote: That Battalion are a very quiet peaceful lot and in the winter their opponents were the same. When we took over from them and our sentries and our gunmen (started) hitting at them and making the beggars sit up and take notice - they were horrified at the idea of shooting the poor harmless Boche, and now the Boche has vented their fury on them instead of ourselves who were the cause of the mischief. This is only one of the many funny things we see in this job.
William, who concludes every letter to John with the words your affectionate brother Bill, also gives a glimpse into the lives of ordinary French civilians on the fringes of the battle. In a long letter in October 1915, he wrote to say he was billeted near a town he was not allowed to name. Records show his battalion was based near the city of Amiens. Describing how he and fellow soldiers refused to sleep on old hay in case it was live (with lice) he described his lodgings as the most comfortable yet, revealing how simply being dry and warm was a luxury in comparison to the trenches. William told how the nearby French town was devastated when it was bombed by the Germans, then suffered at the hands of the advancing enemy.
He wrote: This was before the war a prosperous manufacturing town and there are many workshops in it, mostly in ruins. There is a motor mechanic who speaks English a little... he told some of our chaps his experiences at the beginning of the war. He said that during a lull in the firing he got out and walked about the town without seeing a soul and the sight was awful for sides of houses were blown clean away, showing all the furniture and the poor beggars who had been sent to their doom before they could get out. The same letter discusses a scandal which would eventually lead to the downfall of the Asquith Government. The Shell Crisis of 1915 highlighted a shortage of munitions on the front line and the scandal of competing firms who were producing dud shells. William begged John to make sure he did a good job if he was ever employed at a local ammunition works. Make them (the shells) good and accurate so that they will burst properly, he wrote. The duds make a bad impression on the Boches and often give them the range of our guns. Besides which it is only by a few well placed shells that we can stop them sending bombs. William was shot in the head after crossing the second line of the German trenches. He was buried on the battlefield and is Âremembered at the Thiepval Memorial, alongside the other soldiers of the Battle of the Somme. Distant nephew Jonny said: Its Âimportant we always remember the sacrifice.
William joined the 8th Battalion from Norfolk where he worked as a draughtsman, although he was originally from Helsby in Cheshire. There is a collection of his letters home describing conditions in training and at the front. He died from a bullet to the head as he went over the top on the first day of The Somme on 1st July 1916. His grave is unknown.
The Illustrated War News no 39 of 6th May 1915 includes a number of photographs of the 8th Norfolk in training near Ipswich. William is in one of these.
