WWI relatives and memories

[Albert Ross]

I thought this subject deserved a thread of it's own, so to kick off, here is what Zoe posted in the old thread:
Originally Posted by Zoe Brain
My Grandfather, was in the 9th Battalion Sherwood Foresters (Notts & Derby). 18668 David Brain, enlisted 9 November 1914.

After volunteering in 1914, and training and acclimatisation in Egypt, his first action was in the first wave at Gallipoli. He was a sniper, at a time when being a marksman in the British Army meant you could hit a dinner-plate sized target at 700 yards with every round in the magazine. Snipers covered both the initial landing, and the final evacuation.

After that, the battalion was sent to the Western Front, to take part in the Battle of the Somme, near Thiepval. Duelling in no-mans-land with German and Bavarian snipers. Picking off officers and dispatch runners when they could.

Some 6 months before he was gravely wounded and evacuated at Passchendaele , in 1917 he was caught in a shell crater in no-mans-land when the Germans achieved local air superiority. He watched the round-nosed aircraft as they machine-gunned along the trenches, killing dozens of his unit. Several of them turned their attention to him, including an all-red one that rather stood out from the rest - though many of them had large areas of red on them too.

He felt helpless, they moved too fast, and came from every direction. No cover, he just had to try to predict where the bullets would be and be a foot or two away. He fired back, but without apparent effect.

When I was 9, I built an Airfix 1/72 Albatross D.Va and showed it to him - he recognised it immediately. He didn't realise the possible significance of an all-red colour scheme though, just that that pilot was a very, very good shot. He hated them for massacring so many in the trenches - when he got back there were few of his platoon left.

I've made sure my son knows of the history my Grandad taught me.

[Albert Ross]

I have just learned that my Great Uncle was also at Gallipoli. He passed away long before I was born, but I remember my Dad saying uncle Bert had been a sea captain. Well I recently had an email from uncle Bert's grandson who has all the details. Bert had signed on as an Able Seaman and served on the paddle steamer Barryfield; because of their configuration, these vessels could work close inshore and were used for minesweeping and in the days before purpose built landing craft, troop transports. Barryfield served right through the invasion and subsequent evacuation too and was mentioned in dispatches, so it is very possible that Zoe's grandfather might have been aboard my great uncle's ship at some point! After the war uncle Bert did indeed apply for his master's certificate and became a captain, traveling all over the world. Here's a photo of Barryfield in 1915, her decks packed with soldiers

Barryfield returned to civilian life as a pleasure steamer, but was called up again in WWII. Re-named HMS Snaefell, she served in the Dunkirk evacuation, but was lost to a mine in 1941. Discovered recently off the coast of Sunderland, she is a now classified as a war grave.