IWM Liveliness on the British Front

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IWM Liveliness on the British Front (7.46)

Note: " showing interest in the camera is Captain the Honourable H R L Alexander (the future Field Marshal Earl Alexander). "


Object description

The Guards Division in the line in front of , Western Front, early 1916.
Full description

A New Army battalion of Royal Welch Fusiliers, 38th (Welsh) Division (attached to the Guards Division for training) arrives by bus and gets out in the Guards area. Grenadier Guards in the rubble of Epinette Château filling sandbags and clearing debris. A wooden tramway on the La Bassée road is used to move corrugated iron for strongpoints. At Rouge Croix crossroads, about three kilometres from the front, soldiers race across to avoid German shells. A first aid post in the front lines with canvas screens and a water pump. 2nd Battalion, Irish Guards, at "Southerland Avenue" (sic) trench with the flag they carried in the Battle of Loos. Men of the battalion work on the drainage system in the trenches: showing interest in the camera is Captain the Honourable H R L Alexander (the future Field Marshal Earl Alexander). Wooden crosses mark graves just by the second line trenches. A Grenadier sniper in a front line trench. Men of a tunnelling company enter and leave a trench minehead. II. A final sequence, almost certainly a training exercise, of New Army troops throwing smoke grenades forward from their trenches and then rushing forward into the smoke (note the caps rather than helmets and lack of equipment).
Physical description

35mm

Mike