World War 1 - PPCLI - Not quite Canadian - Christmas in France

While the First Contingent of the CEF settled down for a tough winter in the mud of Salisbury Plain. The PPLCI got ready for an immediate move to France. They were not a bunch of recruits but hard men who had all been regulars at one time. Their war was to begin earlier than the rest of the "Canadians" and they were to be treated very differently. This post is all about this difference.

Much of the information comes from an excellent blog called PPLCI 100th Anniversary

 On the left of this picture is Talbot Papineau. In 1917, he will give up his safe job on the staff to rejoin the men for Passchendale where he will be killed, On the right is my "Uncle" Hamilton Gault, the Founder of the PPCLI or the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry - named after the Governor General, The Duke of Connaught's daughter.

In this picture, they are on board ship on their way to England with the Canadian First Contingent. Most of the men had been born in Britain and nearly all had military service before. It was the only unit that could be ready to fight right away. As a result they had been separated from the rest of the First Contingent even in Canada.

Here is their camp in Levis Quebec - across the river from Valcartier. They joined the rest of the Canadians for a few weeks on Salisbury Plain but on November 16 they left for a new camp at Morn Hill near Winchester that was to become the rear HQ for the Canadians and eventually for the Americans.

"Aunt" Marguerite - sister in law to my Aunt Frances's mother - who was married to Gault had come over on the same ship as he and the men.  No doubt when the PPCLI were at Camp Bustard on Salisbury Plain, she may have stayed with Aunt Frances in their rented house at Westbury. She certainly could have seen her brother, Chattan Stephens, but it is unlikely that she could have seen her husband, Hamiliton, For the PPCLI seemed to have been on alert for a move at any time.

The older man on the far left is Agar Adamson. he was a veteran of the Boer War - his story there is here. In 1914, he was 53 and blind in one eye. But a great adventurer whose daily letters to his wife Mabel are the finest source of what life was like in the front line that we can find. I suspect that the woman in the centre is "Aunt" Marguerite. They are on the Great George on their way to the UK.

Mabel, Agar's wife, also came over immediately England on a fast ship. (the letters are here)

Bustard Camp, Salisbury Plains.
24 October 1914.

My dear Mabel,

I can not make out from your cable whether it is you alone or your mother and the children who are coming from Canada. I wired you from Plymouth "What are you coming over about" have received no answer. By your last letter the 9th of Oct. you say Mrs. Cawthra is leaving at the end of this month.

We are scattered all over Salisbury Plains under canvas. Weather wet and cold, troops cheerful under most trying conditions. Most of the Canadian contingent will be here (by order) till middle of January. We were warned two days ago to be ready to leave in 10 days. I was in ton last week for a night looking after Mess affairs. We are pretty hard worked, but some leave is coming to us before we go. I have all your letters, some written to Levis.

If you really want me to go and see you in London, telegraph or write to me and I will try and manage leave, the more notice you give me the better, as all officers have to take their turns so as not to, too much interfere with ordinary regimental training.

I am fit and well,

Agar Adamson.

Written just after landing, this, I think, is the first of his many wartime letters to Mabel. She arrived just after he did and, like the Stephens family, Agar found Mabel a place to live near him.

Salisbury Plain,

Thursday, 10th November 1914

My dear Mabel,

 

I wired you today and have engaged a room in a cottage in Salisbury. We take our meals in an old 14th Century pub where Mrs. bell is laid up. I wired to bring a chain for one hind wheel which can be put on if you find the car will not get over the downs – all cars carry one.

 

Thine Agar.

 

Here is the Bustard Inn today.

 

They had a brief night-time visit when he arrived to see her at 11pm after a long day. Mabel though had seen how appalling the conditions were.

 

"There is simply no place for the men to get dry. They route-march through the pouring rain, and come back to leaky tents, twelve to fifteen men in each....The cooking is done out in the open, with a blanket hung up on the windward side of the stove. The men have no messy nets, a big black pot of food is deposited in front of each ten, out of which they dig their respective portions....(The horses) are most miserable, tethered in the awful wind and rain with no protection whatsoever. They are said to be dying at the rate of thirty a day."

 

On November 16, the PPCLI took three trains to Winchester where they camped at Morn Hill. From then on they were on no more than 8 hours notice for a move to France. 

 

On November 20th, PPCLI jojned the British Army formally and were put into the 27th Division and the 80th Brigade. Later in the war, when they were transferred back to the CEF, Agar was very upset. He thought the Canadians to be an utter shambles and missed the professionalism of his British comrades.

 

On December the 16th, they were inspected by the King and on Sunday the 20th of December they began their epic journey to France. Everything that could have gone wrong did. The trip began well enough with a short march by foot to the docks at Southampton that took only 7 hours. But then the trip took another 4 days and nights ending in farce when their guide in France got lost. The men arrived in their village at 3am on Christmas day. Only to find that he had still got it wrong and they all had to march back another 2 miles to their billets that they had missed in the dark and in the rain. The Diarist noted:

 

"A very trying night after a very trying day!"

 

Christmas day 1914 for the PPCLI was spent unpacking their gear.

 

"No Christmas comforts" was the diarist's laconic note for the day.

 

Later in this, our own Christmas season in 2014, I will look at the great Christmas truce of 1914 and also look at how the first contingent was accompanied by an invasion of more than 30,000 wives, family members and female adventurers. I love this note from the PPLCI 100 Anniversay site:

 

Although it seems very unusual by today's standards, every army wife who could afford it joined their husband's on their journey overseas, many, like Marguerite, intending to work with the Red Cross. By 1917, according to the Canadian Annual Review, "about thirty thousand Canadian wives and sweethearts, accompanied by a good many others whose standing was more questionable, had drifted to England mainly for social reasons."

 

"Much to Agar's surprise, Mabel would soon follow, but with far more serious aspirations in mind."

We will see over the years how Mabel's obession with her own role - a charity involving barges for Belgiums - closed her off from the suffering and strain of Agar's life in the front lines and would lead eventually to a breach that hurt him so badly, that their marriage never recovered. 

The War diaries of the PPCLI have been transcribed and can be found here - they are a gold mine!

Birth of a Regiment is another treasure trove

 

 

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