My father joined the regular Army at the age of 14 in 1904. He had left school, was an orphan and saw his future in his local regiment. He enlisted in the Wiltshire Regiment as a “Band Boy”, joined the 1st Battalion where incidentally he remained throughout his 25 years of pensionable service. He followed his three elder brothers. Foreign travel, three meals a day, somewhere to get your head down. pocket money, and plenty of sport. He learned to play the oboe and the violin during his early service in the regimental band. Shortly after joining at the barracks in Wiltshire he was off to join the regiment in India where he saw action even in those days in Afghanistan. After several years in India the regiment moved to South Africa returning to the UK in 1913. The regiment had spent a total of eighteen years abroad. Some foreign commission that one, my father spent nine continuous years abroad.
Back to barracks in Tidworth, Wiltshire where they prepared ultimately for the 1914/1918 conflict. During his time in India and South Africa my father achieved much success on the sports field with his regiment winning the football Army Cup in two successive years. By now he was a Corporal. On a rather sombre note he was also the regimental bayonet fighting champion which stood him in good stead at the Battle of the Somme. The regiment took part in several bayonet fighting assaults on the enemy. His battalion were renowned for their success fighting with the bayonet it having been a keen regimental sport during the peaceful years. He was by now a Company Sergeant Major. At the Battle of the Somme the regiment were fairly devastated and lost a great deal of men The officers faired particularly badly resulting in quick promotions all round, senior ranks were commissioned to replace the officers whilst other ranks moved quickly forward.
In 1914 ten days after leaving England he and his battalion were with the B.E.F. at Mons. The retreat to the Marne, with stands at Solemes and Le Cateau followed. Again it is said the discipline and fire control of long serving British regulars overcame the confusion and exhaustion of the great withdrawal before the German hosts. I have always believed that my father’s survival was down to the fact that he was a regular soldier, good at it, and fit. Also he appeared to know when to duck!!
He was wounded in December, 1914, was hospitalised for three months in the UK but returned immediately he was fit and remained for the duration of the war. At the end of the war he was Acting RSM. Most of the officers had been killed and the RSM at the time was commissioned. On returning to the UK the regiment was sent to Ireland to deal with the problems that were beginning to arise in Ireland.
Like many returning from France after the war my father never spoke a word of what he had experienced, most of what I learned was from books and several visits to the Regimental Museum in Salisbury. Two of his brothers died in the conflict and his sister’s husband was a Japanese POW in World War II and did not survive. My mother’s sister’s husband died when the Submarine HMS M2 sank with all hands off Portland in 1931. Understandably my father was reluctant to sign my entry into the Royal Navy as a boy and I had to wait until I was able join without it.
Unfortunately, as with many proud county regiments The Wiltshires were merged with other regiments and are all but forgotten but we will remember them.
