I survived the Somme: the secret diary of a Tommy

[Chris_Baker]

I survived the Somme: the secret diary of a Tommy

by Charles Meeres, edited by Frank Meeres

published by Amberley Publishing, January 2013

ISBN 978 1 4456 0618 7

cover price - £16.99

Hardback, 189pp plus a list of acronyms. Illustrated. No index

Charles Meeres was already in training as an officer of the Royal Field Artillery of the regular army when Britain declared war in August 1914. He was soon posted into one of the formations of Kitchener's Second New Army - 21st Division - and served for much of the rest of the war with "C" Battery of 96 Brigade RFA. This book, produced by Charles' son Frank, is an edited version of what is described as his secret diary. It is a lively account of his war and will be of interest to many people, not least those concerned with the artillery and the 21st Division. Charles' war ends when he is wounded at Poix du Nord in October 1918, so it covers all of the division's key engagements from Loos in September 1915 onwards - an exception being Third Ypres which Charles missed as he suffered lengthy treatment for trench fever.

But it is clearly not a diary as we would normally understand it. Many passages are written with the benefit of hindsight and in particular Charles writes about October 1916 and Ypres in 1917 during a section about trench warfare in 1915-16. We are not told in the book's introduction about whether what we are reading is a transcription or has in some way been manipulated either by Charles himself or at a later date.

The same is true of the many mis-spellings of place names: it is not possible to tell whether these are Charles' own rendering of names he has perhaps only heard; or whether they are transcription errors or even typesetting errors that were not spotted in editing the book. For example we have Eeche instead of Eecke (p108): that could easily be an original error. But what about Metereu (for Meteren) on the same page? Charles would not have heard it pronounced as such. As an officer he would also have been within sight of maps that spell these places properly. On p108 and p109 we are also treated to no fewer than three different spellings of Strazeele.

The book contains a number of useful maps, mainly copies of those in the British Official History, and a large number of Charles's own sketches and watercolours depicting scenes from the battlefield, some of which are reproduced in colour. Among them is a sketch of a tank: he witnessed this before they went into first action on 15 September 1916. There are also a few photographs including two of Charles himself and his sketches of the workings of the 18-pounder gun and its shell.

I am not sure why the book was titled "I survived the Somme": it is clearly so, but the author saw much more than that. Neither am I sure why the dust jacket is of an infantryman! Both strike me as being marketing-driven rather than a reflection of content.

Overall this is not a bad read and will be of interest, but more explanation of whether we are reading a diary or something post-produced would have been of value, as would some good attention to detail in (or at least an explanation of) the place name spellings.