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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

Airline Signal Coy RE


PhilB

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The 1914 Army List shows that each command had territorial signal companies of three types - Wireless, Cable and Airline. What was an Airline Signal Company RE?

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Airline Coys put the line on poles, Cable Coys on or under the ground IIRC.

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Squirrel

That's correct, the lines themselves were referred to (at least in the Gunners) as either airline or Bury, depending on whether they were above or underground.

Phil

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There were airline and cable sections, rather than complete companies, with the BEF in France, forming parts of Corps and Army Signal Companies. Many of the airline sections were later motorised, presumably because lines above ground could be laid fairly quickly if out of the range of enemy shelling.

There was also "comic airline" where improvised wires were laid on anything available:, usually trees or hop poles.

Ron

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Thanks gents. I would have thought that a cable might have gone on, under or over ground in different parts of its track, so all three specializations might have been called for? Presumably the system was set up for conditions far different from the Western Front.

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Phil

The system was certainly designed with more mobile warfare in mind, and probably therefore longer and less permanent lines of communication. "The Signal Service (France)" by Major R E Priestley, published jointly in the 1920s by the RE Institution and its newly-created sister the Signals Institution, has much interesting information on the subject, and stresses how hard the Signal Service worked to stay mobile for the open warfare which finally came about in the Hundred Days.

It is also a very readable book for the non-specialist.

Ron

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Ron

Thanks for that, I'll try and get hold of a copy.

Phil

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Good footage of a WW1 cable cart racing along with a chap behind flicking cable over branches etc. - to be seen in the Royal Signals Museum, Blandford. If you are interested in signals, make a visit. Very helpful staff.

Edwin

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