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'Tonight my men and I have been through hell and back again, but the look on your faces when we let you out of the hall - we'd do it all again tomorrow.' Major Chris Keeble's words to Goose Green villagers on 29th May 1982 - 2 PARA
The attack at the end is pretty clearly a training scene, but if the caption about a sniper and 70 yards from the German front line was true, one can see how losses due to snipers were so high.
The graves immediately behind the front line are rather striking too: soon to be blown to fragments in subsequent bombardments.
Last edited by Surpmil; 07-01-2022 at 01:41 PM.
“There are invisible rulers who control the destinies of millions. It is not generally realized to what extent the words and actions of our most influential public men are dictated by shrewd persons operating behind the scenes.”
The film is interesting to me personally because of the Battle of Aubers Ridge, the previous May, close to where the film is shot apparently. The 13th London Rgt, The Kensingtons, took part which were territorials and included a 20 year distant relative. All her life my late gran said that her cousin had died in action in WW1 and was shot by a sniper. After my gran's passing when I researched it and found his service record and other records I discovered that the soldier had been shot through his chest and taken prisoner of war. After writing home to say that he was alive, he died of his wounds, around 2 months later, in captivity.
Sad indeed.......but perhaps better than the millions who died injured with horrendous wounds and to be finished off with Spanish Flu as well, unable to breath!!
RIP
'Tonight my men and I have been through hell and back again, but the look on your faces when we let you out of the hall - we'd do it all again tomorrow.' Major Chris Keeble's words to Goose Green villagers on 29th May 1982 - 2 PARA
Until the brits learned a bit from their adversary the German snipers had a bit of a lunchtime with killing the British especially the way they made their trench line nice and orderly stacked sand bags etc where as the German trench was a rather haphazard affair with well concealed loop holes.
After suffering at their hands it did not take to long before the tables were turned but it was a pretty dire thing as the Germans were very adept at concealment.
I mean with the off set scope on the 303 firing through a loophole required a rather large opening so there was a FOV for the sniper to fire out of these were easily picked out with the resultant loss of life, the Brits also use to have a double opening covered with 2 sheets to stop the silhouetting when the outer cover was drawn back to enter the hide.
It is contained in many books I have on WWI that it was 19th century tactics against 20th century weapons, who in their right mind nowdays would climb out of a trench and in an extended line gleefully march against entrenched troops with a copious supply of machine guns of interlocking fire zones!!!! Sad but true and artillery shells by the million.
Sometimes when I read the stories I have to put the book down to try and rationalise what was happening to them no wonder that so many of them when they came home lived relatively short lives as the soul is not geared to sustain those horrors and experiences for any length of time. God bless them all then & now.
The chap was a sergeant, at the age of 20, and my gran use to say that the German sniper shot him because of this as they "picked out NCO's and Officers".
Later edit: He was shot in open ground, having left his trench, advancing towards his objective. The Kensingtons did reach their objective at the beginning of the Battle of Aubers Ridge in May of 1915 but had to withdraw to their starting point because they were low on ammunition and suffered high casualties.
Last edited by Flying10uk; 07-05-2022 at 08:27 PM.
So they did, and all through the war too. If he was shot in the chest while in the trench that would tell you how far up above the parapet he was. The sort of thing people used to do on both sides if they wanted a quick exit stage left, not that I'm suggesting that was the case.
The film reminds me a quote from Hesketh Prichard when writing to his wife along the lines of far too many officers and men were taking foolish and unnecessary risks and getting killed "out of a kind of unthinking optimism" and that "one wishes for a little less wooden-headed bravery so-called, and a little more finesse."
Still, nothing compared to the war in Ukraine where after seven or eight years they still hadn't built proper OHP or even dug down past six feet. The Germans would have built the _____ Hindenburg and the Siegfried Lines in that time. The complete lack of barbed wire is striking too. Not planning to stay where they were I suppose?
Last edited by Surpmil; 07-04-2022 at 10:22 PM.
“There are invisible rulers who control the destinies of millions. It is not generally realized to what extent the words and actions of our most influential public men are dictated by shrewd persons operating behind the scenes.”