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Capt. Arthur William Scrivener MC.
British Army 1/10th Btn. London Regiment
from:Sidcup
(d.2nd November 1917)
Arthur Scrivener was born in 1894 and attended Dartford Grammar School and some of his deeds were recorded in the school magazine, the Dartfordian. He wrote to the magazine in 1916 to describe the fighting in Gallipoli and his subsequent evacuation to Egypt, and then again in 1917 to describe his experiences in Egypt describing his work alongside Indian camel cavalry and the Bedouin. He was awarded the MC in 1917 and the following description of his achievement was published in the Summer 1917 Dartfordian:
"Capt. Scrivener was at Dartford Grammar School from January 1908 to December 1910, and was a keen member of the OTC. Shortly after leaving school he became interested in a newly raised batt. of the London (Territorial) Regt. and even designed its regimental badge. He was gazetted captain prior to the war and we believe, we are right in saying, that at that time he was the youngest captain in the Imperial Forces. In July 1915 Capt. Scrivener's regiment proceeded to Gallipoli and on withdrawal of the troops from the peninsula went to Egypt and was for a time on the Western Frontier. It again went into action with the Egyptian Expeditionary Force in Palestine and at the battle of Gaza where he won the MC Capt. Scrivener was wounded. We are glad to state that he has now fully recovered and has rejoined his regiment."
Scrivener was killed at Gaza on the 2nd of November, and the following obituary appeared in the Winter 1917 Dartfordian:
"Scrivener was at Dartford Grammar School from January 1908 to December 1910, and was an enterprising member of the OTC. He joined his regiment, a London territorial one, on leaving school, and gained his captaincy before war broke out, when he was only 19 years old. In July 1915, the regiment went to Gallipoli where they suffered heavily. On the withdrawal of the troops from the peninsula, Capt. Scrivener served for a time on the Western Frontier of Egypt, during which period he learnt to speak and write Arabic fluently. From Egypt he went to Palestine and won the MC and was wounded in front of Gaza last April. After a brief spell in hospital he returned to the Battle of The Gate (Gaza) and was killed in action on November, 3rd, four days prior to the fall of the city for which he had fought so long, a fortnight after his 23rd birthday."
The CWGC records show that he was the son of Edith Mary Scrivener of Sidcup, Kent. To this day the prize for the yearly house competition at the school is the Scrivener Shield, a trophy presented to the school by his mother and which has the badge from his cap set into it.
The letters written by Scrivener are as follows:
Spring 1916 Dartfordian:
A copy of the magazine came from Dines this morning, and I read it; it was absolutely refreshing to hear of the old school again, although there are so many strange names.
We left England on the 29th of July, and arrived at Mudros on the 3rd of August. We came out on the Aquitania, and had a very good voyage. The Battalion went up to the Peninsula on the 10th of August, but I was left at Mudros with 200 men until the 16th, when I joined them at Suvla.
It was pretty tough going there, we lost 400 men in one afternoon, during an advance against the Anafarta Hills. After this we dug ourselves in as best we could, but it was nearly all rock where our line was, so we could only get down a couple of feet at the most, and we had to lie absolutely flat during the day, unable to move without a squall of shrapnel being turned on us. As we were enfiladed by snipers from the Kiretch Tipe Sirt, and could get no water at all till dark, and then only a bottleful, it was very unpleasant, especially as it was between 90 and 100 degrees in the shade during the day, and there we had no shade.
At the end of August we shifted to the Sari Bair at Anzac, and we were there till the 4th December. I got a dose of gastroenteritis, and did not rejoin until the 14th, so I missed the Anzac show.
They've sent us to Egypt now; we were at Sidi Bishi, near Alexandria, for a week or so, and are now somewhere on the Western Frontier, where there have been one or two raids, but nothing has come our way as yet.
We are close to the borders of the Libyan Desert, within a three hours march, in fact. The country is absolutely dead flat, and there is a strong salt deposit. Water has to come from Alexandria by rail to the nearest town, 20 miles away, and from there by a ramshackle light railway falling to bits with age and neglect.
The native villages are for the most part filthy beyond description; we've had very heavy rains, and when we march through them, we're over our boots in sewage and filth, and all the stinks known to science come to greet you. H2S is a fool to them! Of course, it is not known how long we shall be here, or where we shall go to next, but, as they say here, It is on our foreheads.
The fateful day on which 400 British soldiers are noted as being killed would be the 15th of August 1915, a day on which the CWGC lists 437 men as having died at Gallipoli, including 44 from the 1/10th London Regiment.
Spring 1917 Dartfordian, letter dated 12/01/1917:
I was jolly pleased to get a copy of the mag to-day, and to see the various changes. It seems a long time since I left, fellows who were in the First then are now in the Sixth! It must be nearly a year now since I wrote last: during the whole of which time we've been in the Desert of El Tib, in Sinai. It has been rather a rough time, particularly in May and June, when the daily temperature averaged 120degrees in the shade, and the Khamsim was blowing. The Khamsim is a strong south westerly wind, which invariably brings a sand storm with it, and the heat is like a blast from a furnace.
The monotony of the last ten months has been rather wretched, in endless succession of long camel patrols with the Bikanceri and desert marches, the only relief being an occasional raid on wells away in the hills. The only fellows we've been up against are the Bedouin, the more reckless of whom sided with the Turks. They seem to be pukka men too, and must have a pretty rotten existence, wandering from oasis to oasis, with nothing but this awful desert in between.
They're mostly of an exceptionally fine physique, and trek along with their scant herds and families. The hills our way were occupied by the Anhad Ali. Their agricultural implements are very primitive, and the only attempts at cultivation I've seen so far have been a few melon patches near the wells, and in a few of the Wadis.
The desert in our sub-section is very undulating, with vast areas of ever changing dunes, rising from sea level at the canal bank, to about 1400 feet, thirty miles or so to the east, then comes to an abrupt ridge of limestone hills, well over 2000 feet high, and extending in a tangled mass half way to Kalaat-En-Nakhe. We've been down in the extreme southern end of the desert posts the whole time, and so missed the scrap at Romani. The Bedouin are first-class fellows when on their own ground, and don't give a hang for anyone. They sometimes have unpleasant methods with captured wounded though.
It is rather hard to appreciate the tremendous difference between the operations in France and out here. Here, the distances are so vast, and the desert so immense, and in France, we seem right on top of each other. Our fellows are in first-class trim, and if pushed can cover their thirty miles in a day over loose sand, in fighting order.
We had a very interesting trek last September, when we went out to Bir El Tawaal, and took the wells from the Bedouin. We covered rather over ninety miles during the week we were out, dislodging the enemy from his positions and followed him over a range of hills well over 2000 feet high for some miles. At one time we were down at Ayan Musa (Moses Wells), which is the place the Israelites first halted at after the trek from Egypt. We got a pretty big job coming off very soon, and we may with luck go to another fighting front further south. Gallipoli, Sinai, and who knows?
With kindest regards to you all.
Scrivener was one of more than 270 pupils from Dartford Grammar School who served in the First World War, 46 of whom were killed.
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