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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

Rules for Servants


PhilB

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Phil, I think that you have a rose tinted view of those battalions. The other ranks might have been pals together, but not between the ranks. And in their work lives before the war there would have been strict demarcation (that lasted well into the last 30 years) and hierarchies. It is reflected even in early PG Wodehouse books! In Something Fresh (1915) he gives his most detailed account of “below stairs” and Psmith in the City hint at the layers of rank within banks. Both the working class and more particularly the middle classes of the period were very conscious of and maintained strata. George Grossmith Diary of a Nobody, is another example. As for professional men being egalitarian, try telling that to physicians and surgeons!

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I think some members have written books or done research on Pals` Battalions. I`d be interested in their views on this - were officer/men relations different in Pals and regular battalions?

If what you say is right, PAPMPT, it would make for some strained situations in the messes of the late war years when the commissioned rankers arrived in numbers.

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Any lad who could fight like that should not have been an officer's batman.

Kipling's Epitaphs of War:

A SERVANT

We were together since the War began.

He was my servant—and the better man.

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Kipling's Epitaphs of War:

A SERVANT

We were together since the War began.

He was my servant—and the better man.

The exception or the rule? -_-

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