SMILING IN THE FACE OF DEATH
A poignant portrait of camaraderie and courage, remarkable unpublished photographs show Seaforth Highlanders at ease... just months before 1,000 of the regiment were slaughtered on the Somme, 100 years ago this summer
IT was the bloodiest and deadliest encounter in our nation’s military history. On July 1, 1916, more than 20,000 British soldiers died and 40,000 were wounded as the rattle of machine gun fire hailed the beginning of the Battle of the Somme.
As Britain prepares to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the five-month battle, new pictures have emerged which show – in stark contrast to the well-known horrors – the surprising calm before the storm.
In the months before the battle, thousands of British soldiers, including many from Scottish regiments, gathered in the quiet villages and fields of rural France.
A new book shows never before published pictures of the Seaforth Highlanders enjoying the gently rolling countryside of Picardy. At the Somme, 1,000 of them would be killed and 2,500 would be wounded.
The Highlanders bunked down in local farms and barns, bought fresh food from local families, relaxed in the fields and swam in the rivers.
Pictures show the Seaforth Highlanders, part of the 51st Highland Division – all of whom were volunteers, members of territorial units, probably travelling away from their homes for the first time in their lives.
One plays a violin improvised from an old sweet box, another enjoys a leisurely shave; others read the newspapers or lounge in a pile of hay. Their unconcerned expressions show no hint of the devastation to come.
Until 1915, the French had borne the brunt of the fighting on the Western Front. But they put pressure on the British to show a greater commitment by occupying more of the front line that ran for 400 miles from the Swiss Alps to the Belgian coast.
At first, the British found little to trouble them. A diary by Private James Racine, 1/5th Seaforth Highlanders – also published in the new book – says: ‘We were the first division to relieve the French on the Somme. The French troops had evidently believed in comfort, for they had constructed beds which were very comfortable, also rustic tables and chairs. In an old house I found a piano and accompanied a mixture of French and British troops in a sing-song.
‘At dawn on the first day, we found on our barbed wire entanglements a piece of paper requesting that two or three of our men proceed across no-man’s-land to exchange periodicals and souvenirs, as the French had been accustomed to do. Our interpreter and two men agreed and at noon met the enemy halfway; the heads of the troops on each side were above the parapets and no firing took place.
‘Later we were paraded before the CO and severely reprimanded. He stated “it was impossible to fight a man with one hand and give him chocolates with the other”.’
But in the summer of 1916, the carnage began.
Historian Richard van Emden, whose book The Somme: The Epic Battle in the Soldiers’ Own Words and Photographs (right) is published later this month, said: ‘The images here reveal a remarkably unseen aspect of the Great War, showing soldiers in an easygoing mood in a land that was lush and green – before it was turned into a moonscape by the horrific conflict that was to follow.’