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Key dates over November 1916

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Lives lost on this day: 2

24th November 1916 - German prisoners to work in the Vale of Evesham

Rolling casualty count: 5002

2nd Batt: Coys practised assault on trenches by night.

3rd Batt: Working parties provided to supply the front line.

4th batt: Parties worked on laying duck-boards. Batt marched to Bernafay Camp, vacated by the Royal Dublin Fusiliers.

10th batt; batt moved to billets at Montralet.

Home Front:

The Military desire it to be known that they fully recognise the sacrifice that has been made in the depletion of labour by enlistment, they are most desirous to do all in their power to provide labour by enabling the German prisoners now interned in this country to be employed on the land. Many of these prisoners are highly skilled men in every trade and industry, including agriculture and market gardening…It is proposed, in the first place, to send to Evesham about 80 of such men, who are skilled in land work, and a few in basket making. They will be, of course, under guard (a guard of 25 to 100 prisoners) and Evesham will be the centre from which they will be sent out to work. It is proposed that the ordinary rate for skilled labour on the land shall be paid. From this the Government will receive the cost of the prisoners’ maintenance, and administration of the scheme will be paid, the prisoners having a small allowance for pocket money. The Government will pay the expenses of guarding the prisoners.

Two soldiers, each of whom thought the other had died in the desert, discovered each other in a Lancashire hospital. Sapper J.C. Cloughley, Lowland Engineers, who had read the remarkable experience in the desert of S.-Sergt. Joseph Vernon Pratt, of the Worcestershire Yeomanry, wrote to his mother. The Sapper says: “I got a big surprise in the paper the other morning. The Sergeant who was found along with me is in hospital at Manchester, and I thought him dead! He has been giving his experiences, and he believes me to be dead! The ‘Scot’ mentioned is myself.” Sapper Cloughley is an inmate of Infirmary (Miltary Ward) at Rochdale. He was wounded at the Dardanelles, after which he was sent to Egypt. On the eventful Easter described in S.-Sergt. Pratt’s interview, Sapper Cloughley was badly wounded. He has now lost the use of his left eye, and is to undergo another operation to have a piece of bone taken out of his shoulder.

Licensed Trade Suspended: An order has been received today from the Board of Control closing the Bull’s Head Inn, High Street, Worcester, from the 4th December till the 5th April for the sale of all intoxicating liquors. A couple of months ago the licensee of the inn was summoned for selling intoxicants during restricted hours.

Mrs. Bower, the portress of the Worcester Workhouse, received information this morning that her husband, Pte. Herbert Bower, of the Cyclists’ Battalion, attached Sussex Regiment was killed in action on the 20th ult. He was a porter at the Workhouse, and, at the last meeting of the Board of Guardians, it was reported by the Master (Mr. Roberts) that he was missing. He served through the Boer War with the R.A.M.C. He came from Huddersfield to Worcester. He leaves three children. [See 16th November]

Pianos for the Infirmary: The Matron of the Infirmary has received a quick and generous response to her appeal for a piano for use by wounded soldiers. She has had three lent her for the period of the war: one from Mrs. Turley, Malvern Road; one from Miss Wood, Barbourne Road; and another through the kindness of Major H.F. Williams. Each soldiers’ ward is now furnished with a piano, and the Matron and soldiers are most grateful.

Information researched by The Worcestershire World War 100 team