Written in Coventry 1989 when Gunner Jones was 95 years old. This extract is copyright the heirs of William Jones.
From there I joined the Coventry Howitzer Brigade. (21st. April 1915) The war was on and we were transferred to the Royal Artillery. We were down in Essex for a time and then the Sailsbury Plains to get hardened off for abroad. Afterwards we set off from Southampton. But it was an old German ship and they were waiting for us so the first night we had to turn back. We were in Southampton again but we managed to get across the second with luck. Of course if we had been hit nobody would have been saved. Horses as well, it would have been awful. Thank God we got through.
So we went to Belgium & France. The first place we went to was nice and quiet. We built our own gun pits but that didn’t last long. The battle started we lost one or two men. Our Major Field he came from Leamington he was wounded and one or two was buried in an old house. Me and another fellow was sent to fetch the Major back but an Officer told us to get for our lives and we didn’t want telling twice.
After that we went to Ypres. We went up in the daytime and that was not too good I think the Germans must have saw us somehow for they started shelling us at night and also the next day. One came over not far from me it shook the ground and the blast blowed me over. I took my hat and I don’t think I ever run so fast in my life to get to a dressing station. I was trembling all over at first I thought I had shell shock but I sat there until I came round.
I then went back to the guns and one had been blown up. The shell had burst in the gun killing two men and what they were was gas shells. So what was left from that gun I had to fire off not a very nice job I can tell you but I was lucky they were all right. I had a good spell up there being in the thick of it but as I was Senior Gunner I was sent to a rest camp for a week. That picked me up and I felt better again.
We was on the Somme in 1917 it was a very bad winter frost and snow. The trenches all caved in on top of you so you can see what it was like.
After going on to Arras twice we went on to the Cambrai Front. That was another rough spot. We went into what they called Avincourt Wood the fighting was on they drove the Guards back so they had to send in the Scots up to hold the line.
Then our trouble came we had a shell burst on top of the gun. We had dug a trench at the side of the gun. We jumped in that so I was the one who got it out of the three of us.
So on I went to hospital and down the line so I had a month to five weeks down at the base after coming out of hospital.
While I was there I wrote to the Commanding Officer asking to get me back to my old Battery but I did not hear anything for sometime. So come Christmas Day four of us was sent back up the line. We got into an old house in a village and there was two Canadians there. They had some sausages so we lit a fire to cook them the best we could but we set fire to the surround as well. So the next day I went to find my new Battery. It was the 24th Division mostly Yorkshire fellows. I went there on my own as I was the only 4 point 5 gunner. I reported in at the office he said go and find yourself a bed which I did but nobody seemed to bother about me for two days. At last a Sergeant came in the hut and said who are you. I said I am Gunner Jones I have reported in. So he said will you do a stable orderly job I said anything to pass the time away. I wasn’t on that long and he came to me again he said will you do an Officer job. I told him I have not done that before but I will have a go. So I dropped into a nice little job there was four servants in the mess it was alright.
But we had shelling one night and we were asked to go out and help so the gun I went to I looked at the dial sight I noticed it was all wrong. I said to the one in charge you’re firing at our own men so he said can you do it. I said I think so, I have been a gun layer for 2 years so I took over the gun and finished the night with them. But I did wrong for myself the Officer said you are too good to be a servant. I could have been promoted but that did not worry me. I had a nice safe little job so why worry about promotion.
But after a while we came close to my Battery and they got to know where I was as I had written to get back. They sent a man to exchange so the Captain said as I had written I would have to go so I went back to my hut to get my kit. Meanwhile the Officer I was with came up to me he said what are you doing Jones I am packing my kit the Officer says I have to go back to my old Battery as I had wrote before and they have sent a man in exchange. So he went off the deep end and said put your bloody kit down you are going nowhere. So that settled that but it turned out alright for me as I heard afterwards that the fellow they sent over got killed that might have been me. So what’s the good being a dead Sergeant so I stayed where I was.
As we were moving farther up the line I was in a bad state of flu. That’s when I had a wire that my brother Harry had died but the MO would not let me travel as I should have been home when it finished. Instead I was in hospital any way it finished Thank God.
From there I was sent to the base to get ready for demob. And we had a suit of clothes and 40 pound after having a shilling a day and if we wanted our overcoat that was a pound.