Following the implementation of the Military Service Act almost all unmarried men between the ages of 18 and 41 were expected to join the military after 2nd March 1916. Many appealed and a series of tribunals were set up by local authorities to hear their cases. Due to the sensitivity of the subject very few […]
Guardsman Caleb Halfpenny of All Stretton died 26 October 1914 in Belgium, aged 25. Caleb Halfpenny was born in April 1889 in All Stretton. His family lived at The Overs in Batch valley. His mother was Mary Ann Halfpenny nee Huson, a member of the large Huson family living in the village. There is no […]
This Easter saw men from the 1st Battalion the Royal Warwicks 1914-1918 living history group move into the trenches at park Hall Countryside Experience near Oswestry. The first two who had travelled up from Portsmouth, arrived on Thursday afternoon and promptly bagged the underground HQ which had a pair of bunk beds already built in, […]
The HISTORY MAKERS PROJECT has created a digital archive of local people’s family connections to the First World War. We have been delighted by the response by participants and overwhelmed by the interest locally and nationally since the website went live. This project began in autumn 2014 with students from Mary Webb School filming interviews with […]
Big Wood, Castle Covert, Ditton Enclosure, Old Lodge Coppice, The Moat, and Woolers Wood … what might have hauled the timber from these woods in Burwarton, Shropshire into the Front Line of the First World War? In 1913 90% of the nation’s timber requirements were imported. Why was wood a strategic material? It literally propped […]
We usually associate rum with the Navy, but soldiers in the trenches also received a rum ration. Each man was given a ‘tot’ which was about a tablespoon, though Navy rum was stronger than rum sold in pubs now, so probably the equivalent of a small glass. Rum gave the men a little warmth and […]
The Shropshire Remembers project has produced an artefact box for primary schools. The box includes a variety of items which can help children explore what life was like during the First Word War. Among the objects included are scaled down uniforms for a soldier and nurse, replica food, (the bar of chocolate is cardboard!), a […]
From the outbreak of war in August 1914 and for its duration, knitting comforts for soldiers and sailors became a national pastime. It wasn’t just women involved either, men, children, German prisoners of war and recovering combatants in war hospitals were all encouraged to pick up knitting needles and a recipe (the name often used […]
In October 1917, the parish of Clee St Margaret asked children to collect horse chestnuts and bring them to the School. This was in response to a national appeal from the Ministry of Munitions. The purpose of this unusual request was kept secret, but in fact the conkers were to be used to make acetone […]
Shropshire composer, Michael Turner, has just put the final touches to the second of two new works that he has composed for a concert which will take place on 24 October in the Church of St John the Baptist, Bishops Castle. Given by the Bloomsbury Chamber Orchestra, the programme will feature music with strong links […]
