Sue Williamson, Chief Executive SSAT, writes …
The First World War started just over 100 years ago, and it is vital that we maintain the memory and the legacy of that conflict. The widespread publicity for commemoration of the event is very welcome – particularly as a means of enabling the next generation to understand its significance, both as a seminal though horrific event in our countries’ history and as a warning of the need to protect ourselves against the awful possibilities of ‘man’s inhumanity to man’, as Robert Burns put it.
In addition to the social and cultural significance of WW1, it has huge educational potential. As history teacher Victoria Stevens of Ridgeway School and Sixth Form College told the SSAT Achievement Show in June, relevance to the individual (teacher and student) is a key element in developing passionate historians. She pointed out that students are naturally interested in any historical event linked to a local place or person, for example. The week after the Achievement Show she was due to take 61 year 9 students to visit the WW1 battlefields. Each of them had already researched a local soldier’s story from that conflict. She even uses her own family history, telling the story of a great-uncle who was killed when his Halifax bomber crashed in the Pyrenees: ‘Students really like that connection with you – especially if it has grim content like death!’
In addition to the social and cultural significance of WW1, it has huge educational potential
Every school will have staff members and students with family memories of that war. As we do at SSAT: colleagues treasure family memories of ancestors, such as Cyril, who was killed at the battle of Vimy Ridge at the age of 22, and subsequently awarded the Croix de Guerre.
Many people are aware of the horrors of trench warfare, and the fortitude and courage it took to withstand them. But the war also called upon such qualities in many other contexts and moral as well as physical courage. Another colleague’s family history includes the case of his grandfather, a young officer who refused a direct order to use faulty ammunition that was injuring his men. The officer was subsequently ‘invalided’ out (a court martial being undesirable to the authorities as it would have drawn attention to the problem, according to the family history), and after the war became a secondary teacher in Hampshire.
Sometimes what war demands of people is simply stoicism and commitment in the face of a relentless threat and hardship which would be hard for most of us to comprehend today. Such was the case of my partner’s uncle, Corporal Frank Nesfield, a regular soldier in the 2nd Battalion The King’s Royal Rifle Corps. The battalion’s war diaries give great detail of the privations he and his fellow soldiers endured, even before encountering the enemy. On the way to the front 40 men, in soaking wet clothing after a route march in heavy rain, were packed into a railway wagon, without room for them all to sit or lie at the same time. On disembarkation in France they immediately endured a ‘very hot and trying march,’ starting at 6.15am, on roads paved with cobblestones, and for the last half of the way up a steep, long hill. The next day they had a six-hour route march on empty stomachs; followed by some food and another route march, of five hours. The following day again they were roused at 3.15am with orders to move on at once.
Sometimes what war demands of people is simply stoicism and commitment in the face of a relentless threat and hardship which would be hard for most of us to comprehend today
Subsequently during the retreat from Mons the battalion marched 181 miles, while from 6 September, moving forward rather than retreating, they marched another 88. On 14 September, during what is described as a skirmish, Frank was killed. On his death certificate it states that he died of wounds, probably in a German Field Hospital.
Frank was just 25 years old when he was killed. Some might argue that he was a regular soldier, so perhaps he should have been prepared for all this. But (leaving aside the point that education’s job is not to prepare cannon fodder) he was also an ordinary young man from Yorkshire, who had never left England until the outbreak of war. He never returned home. On the hundredth anniversary of his death, we remember this ordinary young man who gave his life for his country. Read the story of Frank’s war.
The Tower of London ceramic poppy campaign emphasises the dreadful loss of life. Leading up to the anniversary, we have been hearing about the ‘ordinary’ men, who signed up for war – the Pals regiments, the footballer. Many of them did not return. It has been a big reminder that history is not just about events but about people.
Emphasising the importance of the WW1 centenary and how vital it is for young people to be aware of their past and the sacrifices of others, ‘Why remember’ is part of the campaign. I encourage you to watch the animation and share your answers to the three poignant questions about remembrance on Twitter.
