Away From the Western Front Conference

Away From the Western Front Conference

Michael Noble
(Q 24168) The 1/4th Hampshire Regiment make their ceremonial entry into Baghdad watched by natives lining the street. Baghdad fell on 11 March 1917. Copyright: © IWM

On the centenary of the Mudros Armistice, which marked the end of the First World War in the Middle East against the Ottoman Empire, the Heritage Lottery Funded Away From the Western Front project will be holding a conference to reflect on the often-overlooked campaigns which took place all over the world between 1914 and 1918.

Away from the Western Front has combined research into aspects of the global war with arts activities in which people from all over Britain have considered what the war means to us today. This conference will serve both as a commemoration of the centenary of the Mudros Armistice and an opportunity to take a fresh look at the war away from the Western Front.

Date and venue

The conference will take place on Tuesday 30th October 2018 at the Armada House Conference Centre, Telephone Avenue, Bristol BS1 4BQ. This is in the city centre, 15 minutes’ walk from Temple Meads station. The event will run from 10.00 to 16.00, with refreshments and lunch provided. A flyer for the event is available here.

Programme

  • Alan Wakefield will speak about the Salonika Campaign, followed by three presentations reflecting on personal stories – a Dartmoor stonemason, the artist Stanley Spencer and the composer Gustav Holst.
  • Stuart Hadaway will introduce the Palestine Campaign, followed by presentations about how a railway clerk won a VC, and how a churchgoer felt about visiting the Holy Land for the first time.
  • Nicholas Saunders will speak about the Arab Revolt, with particular reference to recent excavations of some of the places visited by T. E. Lawrence.
  • Soldiers from Lancashire and India fought in Mesopotamia, and some of their experiences will be presented.
  • Anne Samson will give an account of the huge African theatre of war.
  • There will also be presentations from our Creative Writing Competition, along with music created especially for the project.
  • In addition to the formal programme there will be exhibitions about the regional projects.
  • The full programme is available here.

Booking

There is no charge for attendance, but you must register. Click here to book your place. You will be taken to our Eventbrite page.  If you have any further questions please contact the National Coordinator (info@awayfromthewesternfront.org).

‘Salonika’ – a new short film has been commissioned by Away from the Western Front

‘Salonika’ – a new short film has been commissioned by Away from the Western Front

Michael Noble
Extract from Salonika battlefield footage (© Khaki Devil)

As part of its lottery-funded project ‘Away from the Western Front’ is delighted to announce the availability of a new film that it has commissioned about the Salonika campaign.  ‘Away from the Western Front’ has brought together a number of activities across the UK to raise awareness about the wider aspects of the war and to remember all those who served in campaigns such as the Balkans and elsewhere.

The Salonika campaign, sometimes referred to as the Macedonian Front, took place between 1915 and 1918 along the Greek borders with Albania, Serbia and Bulgaria. The port of Thessaloniki, then known as Salonika was the main Allied military base.

Project adviser Alan Wakefield from the Imperial War Museums tells us more: ‘In Britain the Salonika Campaign is very much a forgotten part of the First World War despite the involvement of over 200,000 British soldiers. Fighting as part of a multi-national army the British Salonika Force helped secure the first victory against the Central Powers in 1918 with the defeat of Bulgaria. We should remember that soldiers do not get to choose where they fight and just because these troops were not facing the German Army on the Western Front does not mean their story should be forgotten.’

Salonika Allied Comrades in Arms © IWM (Q 67857)

Alan Wakefield wrote and narrated the film, which was produced by the well-known military film-makers ‘Khaki Devil’. Director, Taff Gillingham said: ‘Khaki Devil was delighted to work with Away from the Western Front to bring the story of the Salonika Campaign to a wider audience.  It has been a privilege to work with Alan Wakefield, the leading expert on the campaign, and members of the Salonika Campaign Society, to make this film as historically accurate as possible’. As part of the film, Khaki Devil was able to make use of re-enactments filmed in various locations, including the battlefield itself.

The 14 minute film – available at https://awayfromthewesternfront.org/campaigns/balkans-gallipoli/salonika/ – is linked to four other regional projects based on Salonika as part of ‘Away from the Western Front’.

  • At the Sandham Memorial Chapel near Newbury a group of military veterans put together an exhibition comparing their own experience with those of soldiers who served in Salonika a century ago. The Salonika film is available for visitors to the Chapel.
  • At Castle Drogo in Devon, schoolchildren have developed a drama production based on the story of a mason who joined up in 1914 and was killed in Salonika in the final year of the war.
  • Two more Salonika-based projects are just starting. In Cheltenham local people are to sample the food the multi-national army enjoyed during the campaign, using the diaries of composer Gustav Holst, who was there. In Newton Abbot, Devon, schoolchildren are developing an exhibition and drama performance about a local man who was at Salonika with his horse, which was one of the fortunate few to return to Britain, where he was put out to grass in what are now the school playing fields.

This new film and the regional projects will all help to inform people that the First World War was not confined to the mud and trenches of France and Flanders, but was a truly global war, involving soldiers far away from the Western Front.

Shell Shock Stories & Beyond: Are you a Community Researcher Engaging with Trauma Narratives as part of your First World War Centenary Project?

Larissa Allwork
‘Shell Shock’: image from ‘The Fourth’: the magazine of the 4th London General Hospital, RAMC (T.F.), January 1917 (Wellcome Images available on Wikimedia Commons).

Professor Nigel Hunt and Dr Larissa Allwork at the University of Nottingham have been awarded AHRC funding to explore the extent to which the psychological condition of trauma has been integrated into community engagement with the First World War centenary. Trauma here is being incorporated broadly to encompass a range of responses to the 1914-1918 conflict. From shell shocked soldiers recovering in specialist hospitals to cases of ‘barbed wire disease’ in ‘enemy alien’ internment camps; and from post-1918 literary and poetic representations of trauma to the contemporary family historian dealing with issues of transferential trauma in the archive. As part of their project, Nigel and Larissa want to get in touch with any Heritage Lottery Funded and/or AHRC First World War Engagement Centre community history projects that are engaging with narratives of trauma as part of their research.

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