Arras Caves

[BigT]

On a recent visit to Arras we visited the caves under the Place des Heros which were used by the British Army for variuos purposes during the Great War. There were photographs, one of which was of a switch board ( I think) operated by men wearing a two coloured arm band, possibly blue and white.?

[FROGSMILE]

On a recent visit to Arras we visited the caves under the Place des Heros which were used by the British Army for variuos purposes during the Great War. There were photographs, one of which was of a switch board ( I think) operated by men wearing a two coloured arm band, possibly blue and white.?

The arm band was indeed blue and white and used to identify men of the Royal Engineers 'Signal Service' who at that time were responsible for communcations from and between formation headquarters.

The colours were later adopted by the Royal Corps of Signals when it was formed (effectively detached from the RE) as a separate entity after WW1.

You can read a lot more about this if you use the forum search facility and the image is courtesy of forum member Grovetown..