#delville woods

[bookloversofbath]

The Road to St. Julien: Letters of a Stretcher-bearer from the Great War :: William St. Clair

[captain-price-unofficially]

The blasted remains of a German trench at Delville Wood, near Longueval, the Somme, 1916. Today this makes up part of the zone rouge.

[the-greatwar]

Monument uit de Eerste Wereldoorlog.

Dit monument staat ter nagedachtenis aan Norman Cains Robertson, kapitein van de 2e bataljon Hampshire Regiment. Hij sneuvelde op 20 juni 1917 in Hannover, Duitsland. Het monument herinnert ook Laurance Grant, 2e luitenant van het 2e bataljon King’s Own Scottish Borderes. Hij sneuvelde op 30 juli 1917 in Frankrijk, tijdens de slag om de Somme, in of vlakbij Delville Wood.

World War I Monument.

This memorial stands in memory of Norman Cains Robertson, captain of the 2nd battalion Hampshire Regiment. He was killed in action on June 20, 1917 in Hannover, Germany. The memorial also commemorates Laurance Grant, 2nd Lieutenant of the 2nd Battalion King's Own Scottish Borderes. He was killed in France on 30 July 1917, during the Battle of the Somme, in or near Delville Wood.

[apocalypticavolition]

Let's Play Book of Hours! Landing

ספרים הם הזיכרון שלא מת. Τα βιβλία είναι η μνήμη που δεν πεθαίνει. Librorum memoria non moritur. Les livres sont la mémoire qui ne meurt pas. Books are the memory which does not die.

Thursday, March 19, 1936

My last substantial entry in this journal, recorded on the 7th of March 1936, explains that I was sent from Great Britain to the remote island of Brancrug. My employers said - with almost suspicious foresight - "There has been no Librarian at Hush House since the fire - seven years ago now. Suitable candidates are very difficult to find, but perhaps we have found one in you. Take care on your journey - the seas around Brancrug are treacherous..."

Their words are one of the few memories I still have before the night of March 19th. I presume I remembered more once; it would be strange if I didn't. Sadly, of the time between that entry and my recollections here I kept no entries besides perfunctory notes about weather and travel arrangements, claiming I was both busy and tired. While I hope never to be afflicted with amnesia again, I shall endeavor to always be thorough in my note-taking henceforth, just in case. Thus, though I write almost two weeks late, these entries are recorded.

The shock of the salt water had been immense. I can picture myself floating in a gray and murky void, no idea what was up or down and surrounded by sea and jetsam. Washing up at St. Brandan's Cove seems to be almost a miracle, though considering my intents I cannot imagine what forces would have intervened on my behalf.

I came to with almost nothing physically, mentally or spiritually. I was only barely aware and almost less alive than that, coughing and gasping, unable to stand and feeling that horrible chill of Winter upon me. The lightning storm that had assaulted the ship still burned in my eyes and rang in my ears. The clothing I wore was so soaked that it was more of a hindrance to me than any protection from the elements. If my ruined sweater had not kept a single wrapped in its folds, it would have been entirely useless. I did not know what it was but I knew it was the most important thing.

Clutching tightly to the sodden package helped me gather my thoughts. Brancrug was where I wanted to be, though it was hard to remember why. What else had I lost in the storm? What was I going to do? The cliffs leading up to the village were dark and perilous, the tidal flats a quick path to nowhere.

I tried desperately to think of what I could do. My instincts had vanished, my throat grew rougher with every cough. I couldn't get my thoughts straight - but as I forced myself to my feet my earliest remaining memory formed in my head. I had done this before. Every night for seven years I had dreamed of washing up on this very shore.

I tried desperately to make sense of some other part of myself. Had I cared before preservation? I thought it a useless concept now that everything had gone. Whatever passions I had known before the storm were gone too, except the will to live. And I felt no attachment to the Glory even then - the loss of my memory was no price to pay for survival. All that mattered then was that I had survived and what I did with the opportunity - though a horrible fear made me certain that I would fail. I knew I had before, somehow.

I had an old friend Denzil and in my dreams I always recited his address first. According to this journal, he and I had met long before either one of us had heard of Brancrug, twenty years ago in the chaos of Delville Wood. We both left the armed forces as soon as the peace began, but continued to exchange letters for some time. He had grown up in a Cornish village and after everything had felt all the more that the industry that had infested Britain would be its downfall, so he had taken up traditional smithing and wound up at Brancrug to help the mining community. The last reference to his letters in this journal is 1924, though in recent entries I'd expressed hope of reconnecting.

There was nothing else to do. In the dreams I half-remembered, I had staggered forward, taking uncertain half-steps until I tripped over a log. From there, once the pain all the dreams had skipped subsided, I staggered to the right, following the wall until I stepped in a miserably moist patch of something. Then I could turn some sixty degrees and proceed forward, cresting a dune and finding a fisherman at his boat, barely visible in the dim light of his lantern and his curses about house keys almost swallowed by the waves.

It took some convincing, but through desperate coughs I managed to spit out Denzil's address. The fisherman was no kinder even when he knew I had friends in the village, but he at least put down the harpoon before setting out to the cliffs. The stairs he led me up were narrow and twisting, nearly invisible in the darkness. He climbed them without care while I slipped repeatedly and desperately wished for a hand rail.

Brancrug was a tiny village, but electrical power had reached it. Sadly, the street lights were still torches or candles and the storm had slain all of them. A few of the houses had lights by their doors, providing just enough illumination to see that all the windows were shuttered. I could just barely make out a sign reading, "The Sweet Bones" as we entered the town, but we turned away from it quickly and the fisherman pointed me down a smaller avenue, not so much as saying goodbye.

Denzil's home was on the outskirts of the village, nearly directly against the trees. When I knocked it was some time before he answered, but just as I thought I was going to die on his doorstep, the door swung open. Though twenty years had passed, we knew each other at once. Denzil's eyes were wide and he let me in at once, quickly filling a bowl of hot stew for me and fetching dry clothing. I told him everything, which with the amnesia was almost nothing at all, and he got a dark and sad look when I asked him about how we knew each other. Reading my journal now, I understand why.

That night, early this morning really, he laid out a straw mattress for me in the smithy. He'd been working late that night, so it was still smoky but quite warm. I slept well enough, though my dreams were haunted by a forest I recognized at once as being dangerous to be caught in. Only his words - the promise of the Second Dawn - kept me wary in those dangerous woods. I awoke with his words burning within me, promising to light the way.

Friday, March 20th

Ironically enough, this day - and the following weekend - were spent in recovery and thus there is very little to say about them. I had a nasty cough and shivers, but Denzil was kind enough to offer me stew and shelter, plus access to his own bed in the day as he worked in the smithy. My dreams were haunted and perhaps hunted.

(A/N: In the game proper, time proceeds through four 6 day seasons, plus the occasional leap day. As a 24 or 25 day year is clearly an abstraction, I am stretching out the calendar.)

Monday, March 23rd

I felt marginally more improved and thus worked my way to the public house, The Sweet Bones, for my midday meal. The villagers were not at all happy to see a stranger, but I stood strong. My coin - admittedly Denzil's, since I lost everything in the shipwreck, but that's not the point - is as good as anyone else's. As the new librarian, I'm going to be here a long time and they'd best get used to it. The meat pie was quite tasty at least; it reminds me of something, though I no longer know what. Sadly, I was much too worn out after the walk there and back to do anything else that day.

Tuesday, March 24th

I finally felt better. I turned my attention to my journal, which we had hoped would dry out well enough on its own. Unfortunately, this was not the case. I spent most of the day over the fire in the forge, guiding page after page back into a flat and readable form. Many had been stuck together, which is not at all the behavior I expected, but Denzil said that the seas around Brancrug are filled with strange things. When my work was done, the journal was at last clear: a codex bound in gunmetal. How I didn't sink to the bottom of the sea with this cannonball in my sweater, I will never know.

Wednesday, March 25th

Denzil pointed me to the post office today. Brancrug's too small for a mail carrier and he was busy with a big project for the mines. While I was getting his mail, I presented my own journal as proof that I was the new librarian for Hush House. She didn't seem all that impressed but said that mail had indeed arrived to me from Wales. St. Rhonwen's Trust had sent a letter confirming that I would be receiving virtually no help while I was out here, instructing me to write back and begrudgingly bequeathing a ten shilling note.

I spent the afternoon on the walk to Cucurbit Bridge, but when I reached it, I found that it was in much too poor a condition to be safely crossed. The sea is constantly surging in these parts and every century or so the bridge has to be replaced. Thankfully, as it has only been seven years since the library was abandoned, the damage was relatively minimal. Again that night I dreamed of the Wood, again I only barely escaped pursuers. Somehow, someway, I fear that my plans have been discovered.

Thursday, March 26th

I went back to The Sweet Bones with my own money. Rather than waste it on further drinks or pies, I spoke to the miners who were visiting the town for the spring holidays. Most were uninterested in working, but a younger lad whose wife had given him twins last winter was happy to make a little extra cash. Sadly, he said it would take him a week to finish the job, but I had no reason for urgency. Denzil and I spent the weekend discussing Hush House; sadly he could tell me little of the fire that had caused it to be abandoned.

Friday, March 27th

I had hoped to find a man to help quicken the bridge project, but I there were no new faces in the pub. However, someone who had seen my ten shilling note was willing to offer me a different opportunity. The miners had been discussing the lonely feeling that assaults us all, that sense that the sun doesn't quite shine like it used to, and as I'd had a pint and very little to eat I found myself discussing the Second Dawn to them. One of the miners said that the Rector, Reverend Timothy, enjoyed such odd theologies and offered to make an introduction.

The Reverend was quite friendly and I might not have needed an introduction at all except for his housekeeper, Terrence. She was by far the most suspicious of the villagers I've met, demanding to know where I was from and more. I could barely answer, but the miner assured her that I was a good sort and so we spent luncheon discussing the Sun-in-Rags and some of the more heretical perspectives on him (Terrence looked like she wanted to poison my food just in case I was going to cause trouble). When the Rector ran out of things to talk about there, he filled my head with gossip about the village, most of which I found rather uninteresting as I know almost no one in town. He did mention that a rather interesting couple at least.

Saturday, March 28th

Today was much more mundane. As I have been staying so long, I helped Denzil with the housekeeping and shopping. We played cards long into the night, but there was no hint of the occult in our conversations. My dreams continued to be fitful, though I had taken to drinking a pint right before bed to dull them.

Sunday, March 29th

The miner from Friday, Morgan, met me at the pub today and we discussed the Killes, who Reverand Timothy had mentioned two days prior. While the gossip the Rector shared about Mrs Kille's alleged noble roots did not come up, we did discuss the delightful nature of her dinners and so once again I found myself paying for an introduction.

The Killes are a very odd couple indeed. Mr Kille is a wry undertaker, Mrs Kille a gloomy midwife. Their house is "Cradles and Coffins", which is perhaps the sort of lesser occultism that one should expect in the proximity of the Hush House. Both were good hosts at least, and I left with quite a good amount of satisfaction at the quality of the fish. Sadly, as we were leaving Morgan noted that despite their being some of the most friendly people in the village, it was unlikely I'd ever be close enough to call on them for favors - both they and the Rector may be helpful going forward, but I will be paying them for their time.

Wednesday, April 1st

I wish I had anything of interest to report for the two days before this entry - I hope as my library project continues I will have better things to report. Denzil was a good host and we spoke a little about the war on Tuesday, but he was growing tired of my company and I was growing anxious to cross the bridge. Late Wednesday evening, the work was finished and the miner I'd hired, Owain, agreed to escort me across the bridge and help me gain access to the Keeper's Lodge. He'd seen me the week before refuse to leave the pub and knew I was far too determined to argue with.

The Lodge was overgrown with vines, but we cleared them away quickly and at last I had access to the House. Well, the Lodge. A single room building outside of the House proper, it wasn't much, but it was somewhere to stay without infringing on Denzil's privacy any longer. The bed was unwelcoming though, as if it knew it was not mine. Well, that's alright. This place has stood five hundred years and it lasted the last seven well enough. I do not intend to hire a Keeper - there is no point in maintaining a place whose legacy ends with me - but I will take care of this place as best I can while I repair the House.

Thursday, April 2nd

I spent the day exploring the house and getting comfortable, for I had had an utterly mundane dream that confirmed I was within the safety of the House at last. As I mentioned, it had a bed that was not mine. There was a decent chair by the fireplace and a full, if simple, tea set. I found good supplies for baking bread and made some, and tea, coffee, and wine. There was a nightswax candle, two mirrors that did not seem cursed, and some linens I was able to wash. I brought in some plants from the garden, strange specimens from faraway lands.

But the true treasure was unquestionably the bookshelf. Two books I recognized right away: both volumes of Christopher Illopoly's Traveling at Night. These were his annotated dream-journals, and he is an incredible writer. Some call him "the only readable occultist". His books are well-written, quite entertaining for their genre, and rather bizarre. I spent far too much time trying to read them, but occult books are not at all like my journal. You cannot possibly understand them simply by proceeding cover to cover.

Friday, April 3rd

I awoke that day and saw a key I had not noticed before sitting upon the mantle. It was surprisingly large and heavy, and I knew at once that it had but one purpose: opening the Great Gate of the House. Alas, whatever wonderment I had expected was quashed immediately. The entry hall was not its fabled welcoming self, nor was it the charred remains one might have expected from fire. Much was covered, in dust or in sheets, and I spent the day simply clearing out the room enough to make it presentable, a task barely half-finished by sunset. Hardly the glorious arrival I had begun to hope for.

Saturday, April 4th

As I had spent the last two days entirely in isolation, I went to The Sweet Bones to announce that Hush House was reopened at last. No one was much impressed - they made it clear they had hardly visited when it was open and were even less welcome at the time - but the proprietor, Rhys, said that I might as well be considered a villager now. He noted I must be running low on funds, and when I admitted this was so he offered to hire me for the day. Sixpence for manual labor was not how I'd hoped to spend my time - and I surely felt wearied from the experience, not helped at all by the work I'd done before - but I do need the money.

Sunday, April 5th

I have a monumental task ahead of me. Hush House seems to stretch on forever, and even counting the Lodge I have cleared out a mere two rooms. The Gatehouse - the whole of the Watchman's Tower - dates to the eleventh century, when Hush House was an abbey. In recent years it had been used as a place to keep guests waiting while the librarian decided whether or not to help them.

The decorations are not much to my liking - the horns of strange beasts from bygone days are mounted on the walls, a donkey painting signed by a librarian with even less taste than one might expect from someone who paints portraits of donkeys, and the uncomfortable bust of one of my more recent predecessors, Serena Blackwood. Perhaps I'm merely being uncharitable because I only found the umbrella stand in a closet today now that the rain has started.

There are no books here, but then, why would there be?

Monday, April 6th

With the rain continuing to pour down, as if perhaps the Hours have noticed that I didn't drown and so they're giving things another shot, I spent today reading my journal. Before the shipwreck, I had written them in a code, using the events of dreams (perhaps my true dreams, for they have that strange, narrativeless quality of slumber, perhaps fake ones cunningly made - I'll never know now) to mask my true self. I wandered these dreams to understand myself.

As best as I can determine, my life had always been connected to the occult. My parents were hardly noteworthy figures - certainly not Hours, Longs, or anything like that. But they taught me enough of the true order of the world, though as a young man I swore I'd have nothing to do with my parents' cruel and often felonious work or their efforts to ascend. I was happily drafted into the Great War and quietly left when it was over, horrified by what I saw.

I did take up the family business then, wandering the White City of Vienna and stealing what books I could (including Illopoly's, which I clearly revered heavily, explaining my recognition of them) before engaging in voyages further afield. I gained access to the Mansus whose walls (which it does not have) are surrounded by the Wood in sleep. I learned much of the shape of the Five Histories, both the contentious past and the horrifying future that all converge upon. Knowing of the sacrificial flames to come - and the millions who will feed them - made me change course yet again.

There is a way to write another History, there is a future without the pain the Hours will unleash upon us. I will write it, I will undo the law that defines the Crime of the Sky, and I will make it so that the Sun-in-Splendor was never divided. Neither the War that broke men like Denzil, nor the one yet to come, nor all the ones meant to follow it, will be in this history. Reading my journal and rediscovering my purpose only strengthened my Mettle, the part of my soul which finds the right thing to do.

To make this History, I will have to grow a Tree of Wisdoms. The journal as it was will be the center of it, all the occult lore I learned, all the history of Hush House I memorized to be sure that this place where Winter and silence reign would be the right place to go. Only here, in this library of the nine of the Watchmen's Tree, will I be able to put an end to a bad ending. I will dedicate myself to all of the Wisdoms, and all that I learn will fill out the branches of this tree. I long to change the world, and as the twelfth and final librarian of Hush House I will do exactly that.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 7.14 (after 1900)

1900 – Armies of the Eight-Nation Alliance capture Tientsin during the Boxer Rebellion. 1902 – Peruvian explorer and farmer Agustín Lizárraga discovers Machu Picchu, the "Lost City of the Incas". 1902 – The Campanile in St Mark's Square, Venice collapses, also demolishing the loggetta. 1911 – Harry Atwood, an exhibition pilot for the Wright brothers, is greeted by President Taft after he lands his aeroplane on the South Lawn of the White House, having flown from Boston. 1915 – Beginning of the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence between Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca and the British official Henry McMahon concerning the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire. 1916 – Battle of Delville Wood begins as an action within the Battle of the Somme, lasting until 3 September 1916. 1933 – In a decree called the Gleichschaltung, Adolf Hitler abolishes all German political parties except the Nazis. 1933 – Nazi eugenics programme begins with the proclamation of the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring requiring the compulsory sterilization of any citizen who suffers from alleged genetic disorders. 1942 – In the Wardha session of Congress, the "Quit India" resolution is approved, authorising Mahatma Gandhi to campaign for India's independence from Britain. 1943 – In Diamond, Missouri, the George Washington Carver National Monument becomes the first United States National Monument in honor of an African American. 1948 – Palmiro Togliatti, leader of the Italian Communist Party, is shot and wounded near the Italian Parliament. 1950 – Korean War: beginning of the Battle of Taejon. 1951 – Ferrari take their first Formula One grand prix victory at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. 1957 – Rawya Ateya takes her seat in the National Assembly of Egypt, thereby becoming the first female parliamentarian in the Arab world. 1958 – In the 14 July Revolution in Iraq, the monarchy is overthrown by popular forces led by Abd al-Karim Qasim, who becomes the nation's new leader. 1960 – Jane Goodall arrives at the Gombe Stream Reserve in present-day Tanzania to begin her study of chimpanzees in the wild. 1960 – Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 1-11 ditches off Polillo Island in the Philippines, killing one person and injuring 44. 1965 – Mariner 4 flyby of Mars takes the first close-up photos of another planet. The photographs take approximately six hours to be transmitted back to Earth. 1983 – Mario Bros. is released in Japan, beginning the popular Super Mario Bros franchise. 2002 – French president Jacques Chirac escapes an assassination attempt from Maxime Brunerie during a Bastille Day parade at Champs-Élysées. 2013 – Dedication of statue of Rachel Carson, a sculpture named for the environmentalist, in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. 2015 – NASA's New Horizons probe performs the first flyby of Pluto, and thus completes the initial survey of the Solar System. 2016 – A man ploughs a truck into a Bastille Day celebration in Nice, France, killing 86 people and injuring another 434 before being shot by police.

[rachaeljurassic]

Thanks @bobbie23 I need a kick up the arse for these lol

Camping

Post Revelation

The Butterfly Effect

The Devils of Delville Wood

I tag @galadriel1010 @glamorouspixels @spontaniousmusicalnumbers @tresapes

[random-racehorses]

Random Real Thoroughbred: KWATCHA

KWATCHA is a gelding born in 1956. By DELVILLE WOOD out of ERIN GO BRAGH. Link to their pedigreequery page: https://www.pedigreequery.com/kwatcha2

[bandnameserver]

Delville Wood

[squadron-goals]

Jagdstaffel Boelcke, 12 December 1916

Dear Miss Annamarie! Pangs of conscience put the pen in my hand. Really - I'm ashamed that I haven't thanked you for your splendid letter. I don't have an excuse - except for the state of hibernation in which we have sunk in the almost non-stop foggy weather, and which makes one all too drownsy. You wouldn't believe how much  aviators can sleep in winter! If you come for coffee before 9:30 on a rainy day, you're generally unpopular. Two hours ago, while I was writing the previous line, the news came that the Emperor made an offer of peace to our enemies. You can't guess anything about the success. But even if it is not accepted, it will make Germany's basic position on the world war even more unequivocal than before. It is extremely funny to observe the impression that the word "near peace" has on the individual. I must confess - unbelievable as it may sound - that not one of us let out an unconditional howl of joy at the news. You got used to the war. The imminent upheaval in the "way of life" actually makes each individual think first of what effect it will have on his personal circumstances - man is so much a creature of habit. First there is "Igel", our youngest, will soon be 20 years old, is called Hans Imelmann (with one m, so has nothing to do with Immelmann). First of all, he thinks with quiet horror of the school benches, from which he fled with joy when the war broke out - now he is shooting down English ministers, i.e. he recently shot down his sixth plane, in which a former English agriculture minister happened to be on an observation flight to the front. Another thinks of the hardships of the upcoming assessor exam; a third, active soldier, to the tedious peace time service; a fourth thinks of useless assets in Africa. However, everyone would be happy to put up with it once the time had come. Since Boelcke, we now have the second squadron leader, a Bavarian Lieutenant Walz, whom we asked for as commander. Unfortunately, we had to leave his predecessor Kirmaier (also a Bavarian), who took over the leadership of the squadron after Boelcke's death, on November 22nd over the lines. Our English customers is a bit shy - we have to go farther and farther over the lines to visit them. At that time there were five of us and we were attacked at the same time by two large squadrons over there - each of us had to deal with several opponents. I still saw Kirmaier chasing an already steaming Vickers two-seater, but had several behind him himself - something like that corresponded to his Bavarian taste. I was attacked by a Morane monoplane at that moment. The silly fellow came at me from the front in a clumsy manner - now he's lying near Longueval, where the Delville woods used to be. That was my seventh kill, which was recognized; because of the three Russian ones, only one was credited to me, since the "earth observation", i.e. confirmation by uninvolved people, was missing. They're very particular about it, but that's a good thing because it eliminates any attempts at boastful cheating.

Yesterday evening the new Air General Excellence von Hoeppner was our guest. He said a few flattering things to our squadron, which was a welcome starting point for us to express all sorts of wishes that usually get stuck in official channels. My brother Gerhard comes often and, fortunately, always has a horse brought for me. We then ride far through the area - that would be a difficult decision for me, whether being on horseback or in the albatross is nicer. In the next few days we want to visit our eldest brother Erich, who is not far from Lille. Brother Martin is somewhere in the east with his giant plane. Mother's collection of her sons' postcards probably looks quite colorful. You may have wondered about the location of this letter. Yesterday we received the following decree from the Ministry of War dated December 10th: "His Majesty the Kaiser approved that the Jagdstaffel, which was led by Hauptmann Boelcke, who died undefeated on October 28th, 1916, be given the name "Jagdstaffel Boelcke". This is a great encouragement to live up to our Master's name.

[thepastisalreadywritten]

Corporal Jackie was a baboon in the South African Army during World War I.

He was the official mascot of the 3rd Transvaal Regimen when his owner Albert Marr was drafted into war and would not leave Jackie at home.

He asked his superiors if Jackie, too, could join the army and they said yes.

So Jackie was given an official style uniform with a cap, a ration set, and his own pay book.

Jackie would salute to superior officers and light soldiers' cigarettes. He would even stand at ease in the style of a trained soldier.

Due to his heightened senses, Jackie was useful to sentries on duty at night.

The baboon would be the first to know when an attack was coming or enemy soldiers were moving around nearby.

Jackie and Marr survived a battle where the casualty rate was 80%, in Delville Wood, early in the Somme Campaign.

When Marr was serving in Egypt, he was shot in the shoulder at the Battle of Agagia, 26 February 1916, while Jackie was with him, licking the wound as they awaited help.

Jackie was given his own rations while with the army and ate them with his own knife and fork, as well as his own washing basin.

When the regiment was drilled and marched, Jackie would be with them.

Jackie spent time in the trenches in France where he tried to build a wall around himself during extreme enemy fire.

However, a piece of shrapnel from an explosion flew over the wall hitting Jackie in the leg and arm.

When stretcher bearers tried to take Jackie away, he refused, desperate to finish his wall and hide.

Doctors treated Jackie's wounds, but they decided his leg had to be amputated and were surprised that he even survived.

Jackie was awarded a Medal of Valor for the event of his injuries and promoted from private to corporal.

After the war was over, Jackie was discharged with papers and went back to South Africa. He tragically died in a house fire in 1921.

[overland-defender]

05/05/2019 - Day 2 (Part 2)

As we finish our cliche French lunch of cheese, bread, ham and cheese puffs we walk over to the cemetery over the road from the South African Memorial. Delville Wood Known as Devil’s Wood, as the fighting here was particularly ferocious. The majority of the wood was eventually taken by South African soldiers on the 15th July 1916, and they held it even after numerous German counterattacks for six days, until they were relieved.

High Wood During the war ion some maps it was labelled as Bois des Foureaux french for “Wood of the Forks”. High Wood was of tremendous significance during the Battle of the Somme and were first attacked on 14th July 1916, but like many attacks in ww1 the British were unable to take it.  It was only until 15th September 1916 the woods were finally taken, On the 19th of September, the 47th Division which had lost more than 4,500 men was relieved by the 1st Division. Major-General Barter who commanded the 47th Division, was dismissed or wastage of men ironically though he was later knighted.

Pozières Memorial Relates to the period between March and April 1918 when the Allied Army was driven back across the former battlefields, and months that followed before the victory. The memorial is now home over 14,000 casualties of the UK and 300 of the SA Forces who died on the Somme from 21/03/18 to 7/08/18. Once we had finished at the Pozières memorial our day had finally finished and we headed back to the accommodation for food and rest.

[thisdayinwwi]

Sep 14 1916 German prisoners are carrying an officer of the Grenadier Guards. 

Scene on a road near Guillemont, 14th September 1916. An armoured car and wounded on stretchers waiting to be evacuated; they are being collected by an ambulance of the Guards Division. XIV Corps Front. Scene on the outskirts of Delville Wood

IWM Q 1222, IWM Q 1219, IWM Q 1224

September 14 1916-09-14

[theworldofwars]

A South African nurse places a wreath on her brother's grave at Delville Wood, on the Somme battlefield, 17 February 1918.

[sophiechoir]

Artists I Like

(Listmaking is totally a creative exercise, right? Right? If that’s true then this is the longest running creative exercise I’ve ever indulged in lol)

Gerda Wegener - fashion & lesbian art nouveau/deco

Harry Watrous - enigmatic paintings of sophisticated women

Helen Frankenthaler - abstract expressionist paintings

Sergio Toppi - italian illustrations & comics

Dan Hillier - contemporary spooky angelic ink/print/collage

Mike Binge - 70s sci fi art

Gustave Dore - highly detailed wood-engravings prints, dante

Paul César Helleu - numerous portraits of beautiful society women

Roberto Ferri - making the old masters cool again

Gustav Vigeland - weird figure sculptures

NC Wyeth - one of america’s greatest illustrators

Andrew Wyeth - melancholy realism painter

Frank Frazetta - best fantasy & pulp artist

John Buscema - conan comics artist

Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez - wonder woman comics artist

Parker Hagarty - landscapes & figures

Henry Patrick Raleigh - star of golden age of illustration, high society drawings

Paul Lehr - 70s future-fantasy pulp illustrations

Stanley Meltzoff - 50s scifi/pulp cover illustrations

Alphonse Mucha - art nouveau

Kawase Hasui - japanese woodblock prints

Edmund Dulac - delicate detailed book illustrations

Makoto Takahashi - vintage shoujo manga

Harry Clarke - super detailed & dark art nouveau/deco illustrations

Sophie Lecuyer - contemporary spooky illustrations

Wassily Kandinsky - abstract geometry

George F. Kerr - book illustrations

Beatrix Potter - book illustrations

Mary Bauermeister - eclectic sculptures & drawings - geomancy

John William Waterhouse - Pre-Raphaelite paintings

Alexandre de Riquer - gorgeous mucha-esque posters & illustrations

Gianpaolo Pagni - patterned graphic designs

Giovanni Boldini - dynamic paintings/portraits, “Master of Swish”

Erté - art deco fashion ladies (new orleans!)

Cicely Mary Barker - fairy illustrations

Dorothy P. Lathrop - beautiful childrens book black n white illustrations

Kay Nielsen - glittering golden age illustrations

Coles Phillips - “fadeaway girl” golden age illustrations

Gustav Klimt - gold 💋

Koloman Moser - patterned art nouveau

Konstantin Tarasov - contemporary colorful & detailed digital drawings

Carlo Dolci - soft & dramatic chiaroscuro baroque religious portraits

Trung Le Nguyen aka Trungles - deviantart digital artist, colorful golden age mixed with anime illustrations

John Everett Millais - Pre-Raphaelite paintings

Arthur Rackham - English golden age illustrations, muted colors

Syd Mead - industrial & sci fi concept art

Mario Garbuglia - Barbarella set design

Henri Patrice Dillon - dreamy fadeaway muted illustrations/paintings

Frantisek Kupka - later Czech painter who began in representational art and evolved into pure abstraction

John Bauer - classic nordic fairy tale/myth illustrations

Aya Takano - superflat/anime but make it fine art

John Singer Sargent - heavenly portraits

Winslow Homer - masculine largely marine landscapes

George Barbier - art deco illustrations

Edward Okuń - polish art nouveau & symbolist painter

Robert Anning Bell - paintings & illustrations

Thomas Cooper Gotch - sorta preraphaelite paintings, portraits of girls

Jules Chéret - colorful french posters

Kaarina Kaila - dreamy soft children’s illustrations (almost kitsch)

Helen Hyde - japanese woodblock prints but actually they’re american

Melchior Lechter - paintings and book designs. “His hieratic, symbolic, decorative style combined gothic elements with art nouveau”

Jan Mankes - gentle unlined dutch paintings

Amrita Sher-Gil - contemporary indian paintings, mostly of woc

Sydney Long - australian watercolor landscapes

Carlos Schwabe - freaky religious/mythological symbolist paintings

Bob Pepper - groovy 60s-80s pulp illustrations

Frank R. Paul - scifi illustrations

Chéri Hérouard - La Vie Parisienne french illustrations

John Berkey - scifi illustrations/concept art

Aubrey Beardsley - fin de siecle black and white illustrations

Charles Caryl Coleman - pretty still lifes & landscapes, flowers & capri

Erich Schutz - Austrian illustrator of children's books, Schutz was influenced by Art Nouveau, and specialised in painting fairies and mermaids

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec - French painter, printmaker, caricaturist and illustrator

Eleanor Fortescue-Brickdale - lush detailed paintings of richly dressed figures and scenes

Anne Claude de Caylus - not sure if he actually made them but print illustrations of peasantfolk

Friedrich König - Austrian prints & paintings, Klimt contemporary

Georges Barbier - french illustrations like erté

Betty Jiang - contemporary pretty pearly & dark digital art

Stephan Sinding - marble sculptures of lovers

Heikala - contemporary soft & sweet watercolor & ink illustrations anime inspired

Paul-Albert Besnard - french prints & paintings in between academic & impressionist

Henry Ossawa Tanner - biblical realism paintings

Norman Lindsay - etchings with lotsa great figures

Michael O’Toole - colorful landscapes

Caspar David Friedrich - moody Romantic paintings

Gian Lorenzo Bernini - iconic baroque marble sculptures

Francois Schuiten - french detailed architecture comic art

Adrienne Gaha - colorful contemporary half-abstract paintings

Tradd Moore - trippy silver surfer comic art

tono/rt0no (on tumblr) - super cute illustrations of victorian cats ;-;

Nanaco Yashiro - pretty colorful contemporary illustrations

Ramiro Sanchez - contemporary traditional painter, director of painting program at Florence Academy of Art

Isabella Fassler - contemporary colorful illustrations

Florence Harrison - art nouveau childrens book fairy tale illustrations

Shahzia Sikander - contemporary Pakistani-American visual artist

Atelier Heinrichs - trippy colorful collage covers for sci fi pulps

John Macallan Swan - pretty kitties

JC Leyendecker - our fave dapper gents

Frederick Sandys - pre raphaelite paintings

Stepan Kolesnikov - realist yet stylized russian paintings

Okumi Iyo - embroidered illustrations

William Henry Barribal - colorful art deco paintings

Ilya Glazunov - russian historical/orthodox paintings in the time of communism

Igor Karash - spooky illustrations

Daud Ahkriev - his drawings of fishermen

Seiichi Hayashi - pretty, contemporary japanese manga & illustrations ft women

Nola (nolawon.art) - pretty, detailed takashi murakami-esque illustrations

Harrison Fisher - classic american illustrator, pretty women

John Austen - gorgeous black n white detailed hamlet illustrations

Gustave Moreau - fantastical & aesthetic french paintings admired by proust

Ceri Richards - welsh abstract paintings of people indoors

Otto Mueller - highly textured angular colorful paintings with bold lines

Henri Privat-Livemont - Art Nouveau posters

Giovanni di Paolo - prolific painter and illustrator of manuscripts, including Dante's texts

Ben Reeves - contemporary painter, moody & blue-heavy collages of colors

Alex Niño - amazing abstracted comic artist

Ludovic Alleaume - dreamy french paintings

Yoshiko Fukushima - unsettling figures with strange colors, superflat paintings

Zinaida Serebriakova - kind realistic russian paintings of pretty women and children

Harold Robert Millar (H.R. Millar) - famous Scottish graphic artist and illustrator of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries

Alice Marshall - delicate illustrations of fairies on black background

Stanislaw Kamocki - colorful Polish landscape paintings

Bertha Lum - American version of Japanese woodblock prints

Raphael Kirchner - art deco fashion illustrations

Tamara de Lempicka - highly stylized art deco portraits of ladies, polish

Phil Greenwood - bright pop-y floral landscapes

Rose Cecil O'Neill - vintage illustrations & cartoons

John Rush - great use of color in figure drawings

Jean Delville - otherworldly paintings

Paul-albert Besnard - monochromatic prints

Helene Schjerfbeck - modernist subtle portraits

Heinrich Lefler - beautiful detailed narrative paintings/illustrations

Maximilian Liebenwein - art nouveau illustrations

Franklin Booth - detailed pen and ink drawings

Ulla Thynell - dreamy contemporary illustrations

Jun'ichi Nakahara - japanese graphic artist, early manga

K.F.E. von Freyhold - playful German book illustrations

Beth Billups - contemporary abstract painter

William McGregor Paxton - interior scenes of woman like Henry James depicts them

Ida Rentoul Outhwaite - Australian illustrator of children's books. Her work mostly depicted fairies

Ernest Biéler - Swiss painter, draughtsman and printmaker

Junko Ogawa (@junk_junk_junk on ig) - surreal anime style drawings

Marianne Stokes - Austrian painter, one of the leading women artists in Victorian England

Lee Mullican - abstract paintings

Rae Klein - creepy surreal paintings

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 7.14 (after 1900)

1902 – The Campanile in St Mark's Square, Venice collapses, also demolishing the loggetta. 1911 – Harry Atwood, an exhibition pilot for the Wright brothers, is greeted by President Taft after he lands his aeroplane on the South Lawn of the White House, having flown from Boston. 1915 – Beginning of the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence between Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca and the British official Henry McMahon concerning the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire. 1916 – Battle of Delville Wood begins as an action within the Battle of the Somme, lasting until 3 September 1916. 1933 – In a decree called the Gleichschaltung, Adolf Hitler abolishes all German political parties except the Nazis. 1933 – Nazi eugenics programme begins with the proclamation of the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring requiring the compulsory sterilization of any citizen who suffers from alleged genetic disorders. 1943 – In Diamond, Missouri, the George Washington Carver National Monument becomes the first United States National Monument in honor of an African American. 1948 – Palmiro Togliatti, leader of the Italian Communist Party, is shot and wounded near the Italian Parliament. 1950 – Korean War: beginning of the Battle of Taejon. 1951 – Ferrari take their first Formula One grand prix victory at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone. 1957 – Rawya Ateya takes her seat in the National Assembly of Egypt, thereby becoming the first female parliamentarian in the Arab world. 1958 – In the 14 July Revolution in Iraq, the monarchy is overthrown by popular forces led by Abd al-Karim Qasim, who becomes the nation's new leader. 1960 – Jane Goodall arrives at the Gombe Stream Reserve in present-day Tanzania to begin her study of chimpanzees in the wild. 1965 – Mariner 4 flyby of Mars takes the first close-up photos of another planet. The photographs take approximately six hours to be transmitted back to Earth. 1983 – Mario Bros. is released in Japan, beginning the popular Super Mario Bros franchise. 2002 – French president Jacques Chirac escapes an assassination attempt from Maxime Brunerie during a Bastille Day parade at Champs-Élysées. 2013 – Dedication of statue of Rachel Carson, a sculpture named for the environmentalist, in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. 2015 – NASA's New Horizons probe performs the first flyby of Pluto, and thus completes the initial survey of the Solar System. 2016 – A man ploughs a truck into a Bastille Day celebration in Nice, France, killing 86 people and injuring another 434 before being shot by police.

[contremineur]

Private Bertie Frith Dinelli G/12369, 8th Battalion, The Queen's (Royal West Surrey Regiment). Death: 6th September 1916.

Son of Paul and Ellen Dinelli, of 2 Marlborough Road, Colliers Wood, Merton in Surrey. Reported missing, believed killed in action, aged 38, at Delville Wood on 6th September 1916 during the Battle of the Somme. At the end of the war in November 1918, his parents were still awaiting confirmation of his death. His body was eventually located and he is now buried at the London Cemetery and Extension, Longueval.

my source: https://thisdayinwwi.tumblr.com/post/187536255634/sep-6-1916-in-wwi