(Continued from previous post located HERE)…

TO REDEEM THE PAST:

Glimpses of the Great War based on the letters of Eric Standring

©2014 All Rights Reserved

  Becoming an Officer

The big achievement for Eric is that in August 1916 he finally receives word that he is recalled to England to undertake officer training. He is able to write from England with less censorship so provides a summary of what he has been up to.

17 August 1916

Dear Dad and Mother

The NZ mail leaves here tomorrow so I am writing to you tonight.  By this he then you will see that I am once more in England.  I can tell you a lot in this letter that won’t be censored. We left Egypt beginning of April.  Sailed from Port Said.  Called at Valetta, Malta and passed a good many of the Mediterranean islands whose names I forget.  We arrived safely in Marseilles, which is a lovely place, specially the harbour.  We journeyed through the heart of beautiful France stopping at Lyons, Fontainebleau, Versailles (just out of Paris), Rouen and at Havre on the coast. We stayed there about a week getting new guns (18 pounders) and horses etc.  Then we entrained for Hazebrouck, a big town of about 30 miles from the firing line.

From there the whole Artillery division trekked to two a little village called Blaringhem.

Here we rested for a week, us gunners going back to the Hazebrouck intense by train to Calais where we did some shooting before the artillery generals.  I was laying our gun and we passed in five shots which was very good.  We had leave for a day and a half and I spent it seeing old Calais, the ramparts etc.  When we got back to Blaringhem we trekked on to Armentieres, taking about a week, stopping in various billets.  It was a miserable journey as it rained all the time and was bitterly cold.

At last we reached Armentieres.  We pulled in in the dead of night, luckily it was a quiet night but the pop, pop, pop of our machine guns and the occasional crash of a shell or bomb made it seem very real to us.  We went into the gun lines, the limbers and horses and drivers going to billets about a mile out of the town.  We took over four guns in their pits from some Tommies.

We had our baptism of fire on the Western front that night.  The gun pits in France are as comfortable as a steamer cabin.  Ours was as big as the room.  Tiled floor and spring mattress bunks.  I described them in a previous letter.

We were in this position for weeks.  We fired an awful lot, both day and night and got very little sleep.  Experienced gas attacks, though mild.  There was a lovely church next to us and one morning the Huns took it into their heads to destroy it.  They shelled it severely and then back set fire to it with incendiary shells and in a few hours only a smoldering only a few stones marked the site of an ancient and beautiful edifice.  That same morning they spread a shell or two round and got a couple of women who were watching the church burn, and a few kiddies who were playing in the streets near so they had a most successful morning viz one church, two women, and a few kiddies.

Indications soon appeared they had located our battery so one night we flitted from our old chateau to the brickyard where Paddy O’Leary won the VC and the battle of that brickyards last year. Our new position was most unlovely and exposed to much shell fire, and occasional machine gun, so I was not sorry when the news came three weeks ago I was selected for a commission.  I said goodbye to all the boys own, went to the billet where I stayed on my weeks spell off the gun and seat goodbye to Madame and her daughters and husband, who cried and kissed me goodbye on both cheeks as usual.

Next morning I rode the 8 miles to the rail head and was in Boulogne for dinner.  From there I went to a place called Etaples, a little Breton fishing town on the coast some score miles south of Boulogne.  It is a NZ base. Here I did nothing for three weeks but wonder round the country which is awfully pretty round here.  It last the order to move came and we soon crossed the channel to Folkestone, reaching London the same night. Spent next day on business at headquarters, and left for Salisbury plains next night. 

Am at present undergoing a course the physical instruction and a place called Codford.  We have a special army instructor, but have to work very hard.  Do not know which army I am going into yet, but I rather hope it is the imperial.  We have to undergo four months training here.  The are 17 of us and we have a pretty good time and it will be better when we get out of here, as there are great number of NZ chaps here who have been skulking in England dodging France, and they are somewhat jealous of us chaps getting commissions I hope I have pleased you and proved in a slight manner that I am trying to get on and to redeem the past. It is chiefly on account of the past that I prefer the imperial army as there is no possibility of anyone knowing my past there.

I have not seen Doris yet, but I hope to go out for this coming weekend and I guess she hopes so too.  Mrs M is very ill and Aunt Anne Darbyshire who lives near and who is very nice, has just received word today accused some Harry was killed in action in July, a few days after arriving in France.  She only has two boys and the other is in action in France too.

I hope you are all well. I am pretty good. If Ernie joins up and comes over here I will be from under me.  Very much love to all.  Please do not publish any of this letter, not that it is worth it, but it contains a lot of information I would be punished for giving. 

I am, your loving son,

Eric

Being back in England also allowed Eric to see Doris again after eight months. Initially he had a weekend train pass and went up to Salford. Several weeks later he is looking forward to three weeks leave with Doris. He travels up to Manchester. He and Doris have a day together and then his brother Vic arrives. So the two of them have lunch with Tom Mansergh and Mr James Brierly (a Standring relative) then went to one of the biggest hotels in Manchester.

When Eric gets back to “Sunny Lea” there are orders for him to return to Codford immediately so he missed his holiday. Eric now continues his training at Lichfield.

By December 1916, Eric has finished his officer training and is a Lieutenant. He manages to see Vic again and has two weeks leave with Doris.

Eric had some time in the Otago Regiment and then went back to the NZFA. The final letter he wrote to his parents was on 22 May 1917.

My dear Dad and Mum

I have left all the writing lately to Doris.  I have got an off day to day so here goes.

I am getting on well in the artillery as I had just been given command of a battery and another star.  I have two second lieutenants under me, so I am getting to be some pea.  One is away wounded just now though, so I have plenty to do.  I was promoted the day before yesterday.  I hardly know where to begin as I don’t know what Doris has told you.  I came out of France again the end of January, and was put in the Otago infantry for about a month under Colonel Chartres.  Then the general of artillery sent for me and I was sent back to artillery as second in command of our trench howitzer battery.  I was given command of a battery for a few days on account of casualties and pleased the heads, so that accounts for my present appointment.  Colonel Chartres gave me a good report of my work in the infantry so you will see I am trying by hard work and perseverance to be a credit to you.

The work is rather risky, for although the trench howitzers throw a tremendous shell they had a very short range, so we have to work very near Fritz.  He doesn’t like us, so we get a lot of shifting about from one place to another.

I am sitting just now at the open window of an upstairs room overlooking a wide and beautiful green valley.  All the trees are in leaf and blossom, and dotted among the trees are a little white farmhouses with red tiled roofs.  In spite of the fact that todays of visibility is low I can see puffs of white smoke here and there, and an occasional dark burst.  Of course I can hear plenty, but these are the only indications that this pleasant and beautiful valley is really a veritable valley of death.  Yet the birds are singing away and sparrows are chirping away under the caves of my house. The white and dark clouds and puffs of smoke of high explosive and shrapnel.

This house is exposed a bit and has received more than one crack, but it has a deep and well protected cellar.  On dull days it is quite safe to sit upstairs, but we have to sleep down below.

I do not know of much news.  Doris is not too well as the long strain is telling on her.  Ma is still very ill and has to stay in bed most of the time.  Tom is all right as far as health.  But things are so dear money doesn’t go far.  His horses are just about finished as one is not allowed to feed horses on grain.  Syd Whitney is home on leave just at present.  His unit is in France now.  I have had a letter or two from Margaret Brierly.  She is a decent sort.

Also one from Mrs. Jessop which is enclosed.  She writes every time in answer to mine and as a jolly good sort.

One of Doris’ uncles I know it has the young son named Fred.  He is only a bit of a boy, but is a real English kid with plenty of heart in him.  He writes every now and then and his letters are always funny.  He thinks I am the personification of bravery and beauty.

The said enclosed is a sample.

Now dear Dad and Mum I must ring off.  This is my address should you desire to write to me through the military but I shouldn’t advise it Lieut H.E.S. O.C.( Z).M.T.M. Battery N.Z.F.A. France c/o G.P.O. Wellington.

I hope you are both quite well.  There is a rumour that Main Body men will it get home in August, but I don’t suppose it applies to officers.  In any case I will not be home yet a while. I am well, but fed up a bit with the war.  Next time I get to Blighty I will have a decent photo taken.  I was angry with Doris for sending over those atrocities she did.  I expect to go over for a few days soon. 

Much love to all, I am, your loving son,

Eric

A month later he wrote to his sister Gladys.

My dear sister Biddy

It is with great delight that I take up my seldom used pencil to write you a few lines.  It is due to the above date, cause tomorrow will be your birthday.

I wish you many happy returns of the day, and hope to see you and give you the case of brotherly affection and regard that I would love to give you now, before another birthday comes around.

Well my dear little sister I hope you are alive and well and blooming like the rose, like you used to anyway.  And that you haven’t forgotten me, for although I’ve awfully slow at writing, I never forget you all.

I’m still the same Eric, though a lot wiser and steady, and perhaps a little better than I used to be.  Any way there is one of fluffy headed piece of goods who seems to think I am the noblest and kindest creature alive, and that is Doris.

I’m happy to write that I am now a full blown battery commander, and my noble shoulders I graced by two sparkling stars on each.  Such is fame oh sister, but joking apart, I am getting on the real well and will be a credit to you yet.  I suppose you’ll be pleased then Biddy.

Doris’ mother died a few days ago, we all expected it, nevertheless it has come as a shock somehow.  I am going home on leave 10 days on July 3, so I will be with her soon to cheer her up a bit.

You will like her fine I know you will, for first and foremost she is a sport.  But she is a bit unconventional in her style and dress, and I doubt she will please some of Daddy’s staid old parishioners as she possesses a fair amount of the Old Nick too.  But she is very tenderhearted too and is real good to everyone, especially to her Mother, who used to be a bit cantankerous while she was so ill.

I hope you haven’t got the idea she is not good.  She is, but is not a saint, and just suits me down to the sole of her foot, bless her.

And that she really is pretty, some people reckon beautiful, but I shouldn’t say it, being her husband.

I know Gladys you will be very proud and delighted with her and she with you.  We get on awfully well together all the time, not that we have had much time together.  I reckon I did one of the best acts of my life when we ran away and got married.  We really were scared once we made up our minds, and when the day came and Doris was half dead with a sore throat, and it poured and poured with rain and Ma wasn’t going to let us go out, and we had to be at the registry office by 2.00, well our spirits were just about down to zero mark.

Then we had to find a couple of witnesses and got two wounded soldiers.  We were all as shy as anything but it was soon over.  Then we were beginning to buck up a bit when it was all over as the rain had stopped, so we felt hungry.  We looked around and spied a Café, so reckoned we would have a feed.  I suppose we didn’t look about much as it was a vegetarian show we struck, consequently the waitress went crook when I asked for steak.

When we were coming home, we meet Doris’ cousin Winnie Darbyshire and Doris told her the great news.  Her eyes stuck out of her head and all she could say was “oh, oh” and giggle. We did not break the news to anyone until Boxing Day, well that tore things.  That is the history of our wedding day, sister mine.  Now all are as pleased as they should be, though I can’t say they were dying of joy at the time.

Poor Ma was proud as anything of me when I got a commission and couldn’t do enough for me.

So I guess we will all be happy and have a good time when we come home after this war.

How are Dad and Mother?  I am writing by this mail.  I have been very busy, but will try and write oftener.  How is Gordon getting on?  Hope he’s doing all right.  Now I send you lots of love, dear kiddy, and hope to see you soon.

Suppose you will be getting married soon and then I will have to look out.  Much love to all and cheerio,

Your loving brother, Eric

Lt H E Standring
O.C. (Z) M.T.M Battery,
N.Z.F.A.

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TO REDEEM THE PAST:

Glimpses of the Great War based on the letters of Eric Standring

©2014 All Rights Reserved

  

Malta

The initial wounds that Eric had received did not seem too significant. However they became infected and he was sent to on the hospital ship “Maheno” to Mudros and then later to Malta. He wrote to his parents.

I am now in camp hospital called Ghain Tuffiegha. It is a beautiful place in the country by the seaside. All is nice and green now and the climate is just all right. I am hungry as a horse. It is a great sensation to feel no bullets whizzing past or to be dodging into dug-outs when shells come. It is just exactly like rabbits. You may get out and begin cooking your evening meal when you hear. “Get into your dugouts!” Everyone bolts like fury, and then “whizbang” and the place where you were may be cut up with shrapnel. You get so used to the noise that you don’t notice it. I had a dug out in the centre of a clump of bushes like blue gums. I slept soundly all night and in the morning the Major, whose dug-out is just above mine said “Did you get hit?” I said no. He said a shell case had landed in my bushes from one that burst just over me. I never heard it. If a shell case hits you it is goodbye as it cuts you in half if it strikes your body.

I am going to Valetta tomorrow probably, as I can hobble around alright. Just three miles from here is St. Paul’s Bay, where Paul is supposed to have landed.  This is a great place for churches and monks.  The principle industry and seems to be lace making.  Well I must close now as I want to get this posted.  We’re getting pretty well treated and being sergeant makes a difference as there is a good sergeants Mess. 

With best love to all,

Your loving son,

Eric

I do not think I will be able to go to Gallipoli for some weeks yet when, but will look after myself there.

It is impossible to write from Gallipoli as we are a long way from the sea and can only sneak down at night there. 

While Eric’s physical injuries were healing he seems not to have been well.

13 October 1915

Ghain Tuffiegha

Malta

Dear Mum and Dad

As I am sorry to tell you how I am not getting on too well and have been today put down to be invalided home, whether to NZ or England I can’t say yet.  I feel pretty weak and ill just now and will be glad to get a complete rest.  It is just exhaustion with me and it is proving a common cause of invaliding here.

I would like to get home for a spell, but would like to arrive in NZ fat and well so I am what I think after such a sea voyage.  Well I will write again as soon as I know if it is England or New Zealand.  I am in no danger you understand but just need a change of life.  I hope all is well with you all.  Love from

Your son

Eric

9/481 Sergt H. E. Standring

O.M.R. (N.Z.)

He was described in his Army records as having “Neurasthenia (slight)”.  We would probably describe it now as a form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Recuperation in England

On 23 October, Eric embarked on the “HS Oxfordshire” bound for England. He had a bunk with sheets on it but was also suffering from jaundice.

We reached Southampton at about 9:30 am.  We berthed in the hospital ships wharf.  There were three hospital ships from France, the “Aquitania” from the peninsula and us.  The “Aquitania” is absolutely it for size and looks very well as a hospital ship.  There was a long hospital train beside us and we got aboard in decent steam heated carriages, very comfortable.  We left about 2:00 pm and were off for London.  We went very fast and not in the regular line but a good way out of our way.  You may be sure we remained glued to the windows.  The English country is very beautiful just now as all the many trees are all colors of the autumn.  I can say I was very pleased with the whole country we passed.

Well, we only stopped once and what place do you think it was.  You will hardly guess.  Well it was Staines*.  I guess you know that place well.  We wouldn’t have stopped there only something happened to the engine.  We crossed the Thames just before we got to Staines and again after.  I had a good look out of the window and a woman came along and gave me a large bag of apples and pears.  I saved the bag and am sending it to you as memento of Staines as it was the only one I could get as we were locked in.

(Editor’s note: *Staines is the ancestral home for many of our Dexters since the 17th Century…)

In London he was taken to the Fulham Military Hospital.

It is jolly comfortable and a great improvement on Colonial Military Hospital, which are rough to say the least of them.  We NZ and Australians are all together.  The place is good and the tucker and doctors excellent.  I get fish and boiled eggs for breakfast, a big pint of hot milk in the morning at 11.00 am.  A boiled chicken and milk pudding for dinner and boiled eggs or a little fried sole for tea and cocoa for supper with the bread and butter.  I am very troubled with insomnia and usually have another pint of milk about midnight and a cup of Bovril about 4:00 am so I might get fat again.

Clearly in London wounded soldiers were being well treated.

I stayed in hospital all last Monday but on Tuesday I went to the Lord Mayors Show.  An invitation came before or New Zealand and Australians in this hospital to be the guests of the union bank of Australia Ltd for the shower.  So we all dinked up in our lovely blue hospital uniforms and were marshalled by two or three fair ones to a motor-bus waiting outside. Pouring with rain.  We got inside and outside on top and buzzed off.  When we got down to the centre of London who we found the way blocked and crowds and crowds lining the streets.  Never saw such crowds.  Well, we had secured a special dispensation the crowds opened and our bus passed into the closed streets to get to our destination.  You should have heard the cheers.  I think our lone bus got more share of attention then the Lord Mayors Show coming on behind.  We got to the Union Bank in Cornhill St and took seats in the window.  The program of the procession is enclosed.  It was very imposing, and the Lord Mayor’s carriage is most wonderful.  Just like Cinderella’s coach as we used to imagine it.

There was a lot of funny old jossers in fur coats and three cornered hats in different carriages. Well after the show which took about 2 hours to pass, we went upstairs and sat down to a most sumptuous luncheon.  Then we got into our motor-bus again and sailed off home amidst the plaudits of the populace as we were all hakaing and cooeeing in the pouring rain and got pretty damp but they soon hustled us off to change when we got inside again.

Next day, Wednesday, a young lady named Miss Lessing whose people are big bugs here, came in a whopping motor to show four of us Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament.  She came about 9:00 am and we drove through all the principal places, Hyde Park, Rotten Row, Piccadilly etc. landed at the Parliament.  Her uncle is in Parliament and she is well known so we saw more than anyone else would get a chance to.  In a main door on the right hand side is a huge hall under repairs.  On the floor is a brass plate where Clive stood while he was impeached and on the step above is where Charles II stood.  We got right onto the floor of the House of Commons and took our seats on the benches.  I sat on the government benches to say I had sat in the British House of Commons.  The house is rather small and is all paneled in black timber, oak I suppose, but it looks pretty dingy….

We saw all there was to be seen I think and then went Westminster Abbey.  It is a grand and wonderful building and is too great to describe.  A lot of the tombs and effigies are sand bagged for bombs but there are great things to be seen all the same…….

I have been well fitted out with warm underwear by the NZ Ladies War Contingent Association.  They are very good and kind to us NZ chaps.  We get plenty of tobacco etc. every week, and when I first got to hospital, I got a razor, strop, hair brushes and combs, toothbrush etc. baksheesh.

He later writes

London is very dark at night as no lights are allowed and all night powerful search lights play all over the sky looking for Zepps.

Eric does have time to reflect on his father on his thoughts of the war

I am afraid we are going to have all our work in the Dardanelles for nothing as they are talking of abandoning the whole place.  I have a few eye openers for you when I get back to tell you of the campaign there and the mad bungling.

He also strongly makes the point of trying to keep others of the family out of the war.

In view of the urgent calls they are making for recruits, be sure you don’t let Gordon or Vic volunteer.  One in a family is enough and I am sure that neither of them could stand the hardships and privations.  When I went I was as strong as anyone in the regiment and many as strong will be broken men for the rest of their naturals.

Marriage

On the 24th December 1915 Sergeant Hubert Eric Standring and Doris May Mansergh married in the registry office in Salford, Lancashire, under a special license.  Eric was 21, and while Doris claimed she was also a 21, but she was several years older. Eric also gave his occupation as Civil Engineer.

The two witnesses were wounded soldiers who were pulled in off the street.  Doris and Eric told no one they were getting married. Afterwards they ran into a cousin of Doris’ and told her. They waited until Boxing Day to tell Mr and Mrs Mansergh. There is no copy of the letter that must have come from Eric advising his parents that he was married. A later letter Gladys tells some details.

Eric had been discharged from Hospital on 21 November 1915 and even if he had gone directly to Manchester he would only have known Doris for a few weeks. New Zealand soldiers in England were given free train passes to visit friends and family in England. Thomas (Tom) Mansergh had been a childhood friend of the Rev James. Rev James, in his papers had a photo of Tom as a young man. However as late as 4 November 1915, Eric is telling his father that he has lost Mr Mansergh’s address.

Doris was the younger daughter of Tom and Grace Mansergh. An older sister, Ethel had married Sydney Whitney but Doris lived at home with her parents. The Mansergh home called “Sunny Lea” was in Northumberland Road, Higher Broughton, Salford (now part of Greater Manchester).

There are no photos of the wedding, no other photo of Doris and only one letter that she wrote to Gladys in 1917. Clearly though Eric was madly in love with her.

On 4 March 1916, a marriage notice appeared in the “Otago Daily Times”.

STANDRING —MANSERGH.— On December 24, 1915, in Manchester, England, Sergeant Hubert Eric Standring, 12th 0.M.R., Main Body N.Z.E.F., fourth son of the Rev. J. Standring, Middlemarch to Doris May, younger daughter of Thomas E. Mansergh, Esq.,“Sunny Lea”, Higher Broughton, Manchester.

 A fuller description of the event appeared in the “Dominion” on 23 March.

On December 24, by special license, a ‘khaki’ wedding of New Zealand interest was solemnised at Manchester; some who were not in khaki were wearing the blue hospital uniform. The bridegroom was Sergeant Eric H. Standring, third son of the Rev. James Standring, Presbyterian minister, of Middlemarch, Central Otago, and well-known in both the Oamaru and Dunedin districts. Previous to the war Sergeant Standring was on the engineering staff of the Public Works Department in New Zealand, but resigned to further his studies in his profession. He came from New Zealand with the Main Body, and went to Gallipoli. He was wounded, and then sent to Malta, but as the wounds in the knee (apparently slight at first) became septic later, he was invalided to England, arriving in November.  Mrs. Standring is the second daughter of Mr. Thomas E. Mansergh, a well-known chemical manufacturer at Salford and Clifton, Manchester. Since his wedding, Sergeant Standring has come up to the camp at Hornchurch, and he is expecting to leave for the front again, Egypt, very soon.

   France

Eric returned to active service in January 1916, and was sent back to Egypt. Following the loss of personnel in Gallipoli, the OMR was reduced to a squadron and there was no room for Eric.

Soldiers were given the option of joining the infantry or the artillery. Eric chose the New Zealand Field Artillery. (Seemingly the mounted troops were in demand here as horses were still used to pull the guns).

Eric lost his rank as a Sergeant and became a simple Gunner. This clearly upset the Rev James as there is a letter from the New Zealand High Commissioner to Rev James, in response to his query, explaining that the change in rank was because the skills in one branch of the military cannot be carried over to another.

Eric was busy in Egypt learning the artillery skills and by April had been promoted to Bombardier. He then went to France and writes:

Here I am again writing to you from still another country.  I can’t not to have you in the last letter that I wrote from Egypt, that we were going, as it would have been censored.  We sailed from Port Said and had a rough voyage to who (censored) where we landed last Thursday.  Then we had a 52 hour journey in the train to this place old.

My word France is a beautiful country.  It is just spring here now and everywhere the buds are coming out into blossom and leaf. In fact the south of France is just one garden of blossoms. 

We passed through some big towns but did not stop in any.  The weather here is awfully cold and it is raining and mud is everywhere, but the people here say it is just a cold snap is the weather is getting mild now.  It must be anyway as all daffodils, crocuses, violets and cowslips are out.

It seems a terrible long war this one and I am about full up of it.  Wish sometimes I had waited until the 14th reinforcements, but am always pretty glad to be able to say I came with the Main Body, as there are so few of us left now.

(Continued in Next Post…)

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TO REDEEM THE PAST:

Glimpses of the Great War based on the letters of Eric Standring

©2014 All Rights Reserved

   Training

The OMR used their time in camp to prepare for what they expected to come.

 

 

We have had a 36 hour engagement the other day, about 40,000 troops taking part in it. You want to see that number to realise what a mob of there must be at the front.  All the artillery have live shell practice.  We have been getting the horses used to it by having them just behind the guns.  Then the guns fire over our heads from about 2 miles distance, then we go up to about 300 yards of where they are bursting.  And guns make a great bang and the flame shoots out about a chain.  Then there is a most awful whining, tearing sound like a giant going who-o.  When you are near the bursting point you can plainly see the shell coming, but you can’t see it near the gun.  The instant the shell hits the ground it explodes with a great roar.  The shrapnel shells burst in the air and cut up the ground all round. 

The horses were a bit mad at first but now they only prick up their ears and snort a bit.  It is marvelous how sagacious they are.  We can get off and they know what to do at once. We always start by whistles.  I was sort of daydreaming the other day when the whistle went to advance at the trot.  My horse heard the whistle and was off like a shot, nearly emptying me out of the saddle.  They hardly need any guide now in wheeling and will walk quickly and quietly along on the march.  They seemed quite a different lot to the savages as we had in Tahuna.

   Illnesses

Eric had a number of hospital admissions. Quite early on he was in an isolation hospital for two weeks with scabies. He had to wait in hospital for some new clothes. He was released from hospital and complained that he got boils.

Eric is pleased to get NZ papers but notes that many of the chaps hear of deaths of relatives from the NZ papers rather than official sources. The chaps were amused to see a mention in the papers including a fulsome article in the “Otago Daily Times” that Eric is injured.

The article in the Otago Daily Times read:

TROOPER STANDRING. Advice has been received that Trooper Hubert Eric Standring is amongst the sick and wounded in the Victoria College Hospital, Alexandria. He is the fourth son of the Rev. J. Standring, of Middlemarch, and was born in Invercargill in November,1894. Until he was 17 he resided with his parents at the Waiareka Manse, Enfield, Oamaru.

He was educated at the Teaneraki School, from which he passed by proficiency to the Waitaki Boys’ High School. There he was an officer in the school cadets; and, after passing with credit the civil service examination, was offered a post in the Public Works Department, which he accepted. On the outbreak of hostilities he joined the Main Body of the Expeditionary Force as a member of the 12th (Otago Mounted) Regiment. His genial disposition has gained him many friends, and numerous expressions of sympathy have been received by his parents.

He was in the Victoria College Hospital. In this instance though the army records show he was hospitalized for phimosis defined in the dictionary as “constriction or non-retractability of the foreskin”.

   Sidi Bishr

By May, 1915 most of the OMR had been sent to Gallipoli, with a skeleton force of 114, including Eric, being left behind to manage the horses. On 23 May the OMR moved to Sidi Bishr on the eastern side of Alexandria, near the coast.

Eric advises that he has been learning Arabic.

I will have a great lot to tell you when I come back as this is truly an ancient and wonderful country.

He writes to Gladys that she would be enchanted with scene with white sand, sea blue and date palms everywhere. Swimming is good. The Arab and Egyptian kids do not wear much. Flies swarm over them. It is so warm, Eric sleeps on the sand in the open on an oil sheet with just a blanket on top. He complains about the food.

An Indian regiment, the Mule Cart Transport is camped next door and is a great fascination to Eric. He describes the Indians killing sheep with a kukri. He is impressed at how well they look after their mules, and have already served in Belgium. Eric visits the Indian camp some time and is given curry and chapattis.

By July 1915, Eric is mentioning the Dardanelles. Most of the regiment had gone to Gallipoli.

Officers are coming back and saying we are only holding on to the Peninsula by the “skin of our teeth”. Our men at the Dardanelles have had a big lot of casualties.

Every fit man is being sent to Gallipoli.

The Major does not want me to leave and I have been promised sergeant’s stripes if I stay but I reckon it is my duty to go.

He got his sergeants stripes and, according to his service record he left Alexandria for the Dardanelles on 17 August 1915.

Gallipoli

When he initially landed in Gallipoli, Eric was chosen to go with the Major to General Headquarters. The OMR commanding officer Lieutenant Colonel Arthur Bauchop had been killed and the Major was taking over.

Eric sent one letter from Gallipoli, written in pencil on pages torn out of a notebook.

I have been over here for the last month and have been under fire nearly all the time. I am well and in good spirits but am wishing for the war to close as it is not what it is cracked up to be.  The day is very hot and I am squatting in my home which is simply a hole in the ground with a bit of the sheet on the top.  I sleep and live in it, although this place is pretty safe. 

We get some shrapnel in the early morning and evening, during the day it is quiet. You would not think it quiet but we do, easy to not notice machine guns and rifles firing after the first week.

I was in charge the other day and was one of the very few who came out alive.  About 12 of us got into the new trench past the one we should have got into and three of us got out alive. My luck was absolutely in as I got my haversack cut away by a piece of shell, a bullet grazed through my left forearm, a piece of bomb just an inch below my eye and a cut in the jaw from a splinter.  None of them were serious enough to be sent away with but they are sore.

I dare not write more about this place as the whole letter will be condemned by censors. There are millions and millions of flies here.  There’s no chance of burying the dead so that is why.

The wounds he received became infected and he was taken off Gallipoli on 8 September. Over the next weeks several of his letters contained glimpses of the horrors he had encountered.

On 13 September, by which time he was in Malta, he wrote a more detailed account of the charge. He was involved in the fighting at Hill 60. This was the last major offensive on Gallipoli and capped a horrendous period for the OMR. The description he gives appears to support it being in the second attack on 27 August 1915. When fighting ended after two days the hill was still very much in control of the Turks. The following letter, with slight omissions was published in the “Oamaru Mail” and part of it also appears in the history of the OMR.

There were twelve of us, mostly Wellington Mounted Rifles, and one or two Australians advancing along one of the captured trenches or rather one of the trenches being captured. We got too far, and the rest got killed behind.

We came to a corner and behind that, about ten yards off there were hundreds of Turks blazing away. The sergeant who put his head round first was shot through the head instantly. The Abduls then began blazing in bombs. They were percussion bombs and most of them landed in the traverse and did little damage to us crouched in the trench.

A young chap of the WMR stood in the corner of the traverse and I knelt beside him handing up the bombs as soon as I could light them. Poor chap, he did not last long! He did not take one bomb I had lit immediately so I looked up, and he was standing up straight with all his head blown off bar a bit of the back. I threw the bomb and took his place; threw two or three more, and then shot a Turk right off the muzzle of my rifle. He had sneaked up to the corner and was going to drop a whole swag of bombs over. One or two landed over me and killed several of the chaps, then one burst right beside me, and that was all I knew till a good while after. One of the chaps, afterwards killed, dragged me back to the next corner. I soon realised where I was again. I hardly dared feel my face and jaw in case they were blown off. However, they were just scratches on my eye and jaw, but a fair hole in my arm and knee, and a scratch on my shoulder.

There were only five of us left then. We had to get out as best way we could as the Turks came on to every corner as we left it and we had no more bombs. They were absolutely game to death. Well we got back and came to a place and found Turks barring the way, but fortunately for us, as soon as they saw us they bolted like rabbits down a side trench and we got clear.

Our own shells began to come perilously near as they were firing at the advancing Turks. Two of us got a little bit behind, one of our own shells burst on the parapet and blew one to pieces, and the other’s arms off. He came on but soon sank and, I suppose, died.

We came up then to about twenty of the Tommies and determined to hold about the last fifty yards, built a barricade. It was now nearly dark. The Turks rained in dozens of bombs in. We threw some back, put a coat over some as they lay before bursting, which stops the pieces flying pieces to a great extent. Others blew some of the chaps to little pieces.

I got a scratch on the back of the shoulder from rifle fire. The bullet landed in the middle of my haversack on my shoulder and drove the buckle in. It was nothing alarming. We then decided to make a rush back to a trench captured by our men in the early afternoon. We had to cross about thirty yards under a furious fire, and it was every man for himself. Two of us got up together and made a rush. Half way was a trench half filled with dead Turks—dead a fortnight.

The other chap fell just as we got to it, so I jumped in and sat on the dead for a while. That is how I got my knee poisoned, I think, as they were nearly liquid. I could stand it no longer, so got up and made another rush and got safely to our trench. We had very heavy fire all right but it slackened off about daylight. I found two of the twelve who were with me at the start. We were absolutely yellow from the proximity of our own lyddite shells, and the Turks’ bombs, which are filled with picric acid.

I came down to the dressing station, got my wounds dressed and went back to the trenches but we were all sent down to the bivouacs about an hour after. I had to have a big tot of rum or I wouldn’t have walked there.

In the trench we were driven out of you could not possibly put your foot down for dead Turks, and in places they almost filled the trench, piled one on top of the other. Some were blown into just heaps of flesh, and all were terribly shattered. Our boats shelled these trenches for just one hour before the assault, but in that time they fired 500 shots from 4 and 6-inch guns.

As we lay under the shelter of a little bank and they went whining overhead and bursting about 300 yards off in the case of high explosives, and just overhead with shrapnel the noise was absolutely awful. It made a man realise how small he is. The big shells come, soughing along at a very slow rate, but the noise and ground they kick up is stupendous. They come along like someone saying “Phew-w-w”, then “Bang whiz”! The smaller shells make a great whiz but don’t make much of a bang.

In another letter Eric detailed his arrival on Gallipoli which included the following.

One place we passed a dressing station.  It was full of groaning men and in one row was about to nine or 10 stretchers with their burden covered up but still with the blood oozing out in drops and running down the hill.  On an operating table was a man, the young doctor was trying to fix him up a little.  Both legs appeared to be shattered and one arm and all the lower part of his chin from the lower lip to the point move was shot away.  They were doing the best but he was even able to moan for water but could not swallow it.  The doctor and his orderly just went on quietly sponging and splinting his legs though there was no hope of him pulling through. That scene made me realise it was war we had come to.

(Continued in Next Post…)

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TO REDEEM THE PAST:

Glimpses of the Great War based on the letters of Eric Standring

©2014 All Rights Reserved

Time came for the regiment to depart. Eric had now been appointed the regimental trumpeter and as such he left the Tahuna camp before the main body of men. They had a busy day loading the horses. There was a great crowd on the wharf at Port Chalmers but he managed to see his brother Vic before setting sail on the “Hawkes Bay”.

 

Eric wrote a touching letter to his sister Gladys.

Dear Gladys,

I am writing to you separately to say goodbye to you once more as you are my only sister and I am most proud of you.

Well goodbye till I see you next time and I will try to get a VC for you to wear for a brooch when you go for a spree on great occasions.

 Be a good girl and don’t forget me

 With greatest love

 Your Brother and playmate

 Eric

 If I should get killed don’t go into mourning for my sake Gladys

The “Hawkes Bay” was met at Wellington on 23 September with ships from other ports and they then sailed into Wellington Harbour one after another. The ship tied up at the wharf in the pouring rain. Only a “farmerly-looking man and his three daughters were on the wharf” and MP’s Thompson and Scott.

When they disembarked they walked the horses to their camp in Miramar. Eric, as the trumpeter had no fatigue work or horse picket guard at night. He had an infected cut in his neck. He was pleased that there is not nearly so much drinking in this camp “as it is only the mounted chaps and they are a decent crowd”.

The Prime Minister, William Massey was concerned about the safety of the convoy and held them back for three weeks until extra naval protection arrived in the form of the armoured cruiser HMS Minotaur and the Japanese battleship IJN Ibuki.

 

The OMR struck camp on Tuesday but had a night bivouacking and left for the boat on Wednesday. They went on board about noon and pulled into the stream at 5.00 pm on 16 October 1914. The ships sailed out of Wellington Harbour. Eric wrote to his father “so I suppose I will not set foot on New Zealand for some time”. He was not yet 20 years old and he would never see New Zealand again.

Eric soon “tossed the trumpeter job” at the promise of the next Corporal’s vacancy which did not appear to come for some time.

The “Hawkes Bay” sailed to Hobart where they had twelve hours off the ship and did a route march. Then on to Albany in Western Australia where they met up with 28 ships carrying the Australian Imperial Force. They stopped at Colombo in what is now Sri Lanka where they stayed for two days and were allowed off for a few hours. Eric sent some postcards to his family.

The convoy reached the Red Sea.

We anchored about 3 miles off opposite the town and near the African Coast.  The place Aden is a very precipitous mountain, rising almost straight out from the sea in very steep buffs to about 3000 or 4000 feet high.  On the highest peak there is a little white signal station.  On the African side, there is nothing but red and yellow desert with sharp chains of mountains.  Some of them most curiously shaped.  A lot of tramps and merchant ships kept passing us here.  The Red Sea is called red, I reckon, on account of the very red sunsets they have here.  Everything is blood red at sunset.

The regiment was pleased that it lost less than 1% of the horses transported.

It was most intensely hot and you can imagine what it was like working between decks among 300 horses packed as tight as sardines; at least you can’t imagine.  We got so used to the smell that we hardly noticed it.  We just wore a pair of dungaree trousers and they were ringing with sweat in no time.  We were nearly blinded by the sweat running in our eyes.

The convoy arrived at Suez on 30 November. The “Hawkes Bay” went on to Suez overnight and entered the Suez Canal about 3.00 pm.  Streets along the canal were crowded with people cheering.

The Canal is only about two chains wide with a high banks on both sides in most places.  At other places the Canal is higher than the surrounding country.  It was full moon the night we went through and I happened to be on horse picket duty from 10.00 pm until 2.00 am so I had a good view.  The Canal just now is lined all the way by Indian troops, about 45,000 of them on account of the Turks.  Kennedy had to make an attack on the canal in one place for two days before we went through, but it came to nothing.  We passed several camel caravans going along the desert and saw a few Arabs in their picturesque rags watching the ships go past.  We all had two search lights fitted up in the bows although it was nearly as bright as day.

After halfway house a railway runs along the bank and also a fresh water canal.  It was a wonderful trip.  Once after 2:00 am I was awakened by my mate to see a big P and O boat which was tied up while we passed.  I could have jumped on board from where I was sleeping on the main deck.  Most of the passengers were asleep but a few flung books and papers on board as we passed.  We anchored at Port Said about 4:00 in the morning. We were near the end of the Canal so all the Australian boats passed us.  Some of them were real snorters for size.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Life in Egypt

The ship stopped at Alexandria:

We unloaded the horses the first day and took them through the streets to some huge stables in the town.  It was an exciting job leading them three at a time, as they were mad to gallop on and stretch their legs after the long stand in the boat.  Also the strange sights and colours and camels and donkeys nearly scared them out of their wits.

The OMR camped at Zeitoun. It was about 3 minutes from the station and half hourly trains ran into Cairo. Eric was very impressed by the trains.

The first period class carriages are beautiful.  They have all fitted out with pictures, beveled mirrors, and cushions.  The gauge is half is wide again as New Zealand Railways.  It takes about half an hour to get to Cairo main station as there are about seven or eight stops between.

It is rather rotten camped in the desert.  We have just had a two day sand storm.  All you can do is to close out what your tent and to lie and suffocate.  It is deadly out in the storm.  The air is full of sand and the wind is awfully hot.

Eric was fascinated by Egypt; the heat, the sand, the fruit, the history and the diversity of people. He enthusiastically wrote about it to his father and sent a number of postcards of the sights.

The rest of Cairo is nearly all native quarter.  You can go through streets so narrow they are like tunnels.  They are full of natives of all races, Arabs, Bedouins, Negros, Greeks, Italians, Romanians and every kind.

 All along the streets are shops. Most of the goods are outside and all around the shop and only the owners are inside.  Every now and then there is an opening off the street.  These lead into bazaars.  They are good shows.  If you want to buy anything you have to haggle for it as they ask at least three or four times what they expect to get.  In a bazaar you can get nearly anything you want.  If the men you are on to, hasn’t it, he says his brother on or father has it and leads you to it if you will go.  The natives are pretty scared of soldiers, but it is not wise to go anywhere near the quarters by yourself. 

 The day after Egypt was proclaimed British, all the NZ troops had a march through the quarters, the very worst, to overawe the natives.  We Mounteds had a great squeeze to get through some of the streets four abreast. I believe trouble was anticipated as we all had rifles loaded and ammunition, but all was safely accomplished.

There are a very few English and Cairo.  All the Egyptians are French, French hotels, ships, and restaurants. I have not seen a dinkum English shop it all.  You can go into a shop and a man as dark as a Maori says, “me English sure I come from ze England”. You just say “liar”, and he confesses he is Greek, or something but says the English are good.  Every one of the hawkers who come around you in their hundreds calls the things “goooooood”.  They say oranges are very “goooooood”.

He comments in his letters several times about the little children in poverty with flies around their eyes.

  Meeting the Jessops

The Americans supported the YMCA in Cairo and it was headed by the Secretary William Jessop. The Jessops worked with British troops trying to provide activities that kept them away from the temptations of Cairo.

Shortly after his arrival in Egypt, Eric was approached by the Jessops:

He (Mr Jessop) invited me to his house and Cairo but I could not go at once, as we were the regiment on duty.  I got leave for 48 hours on New Year’s Eve to go and spend New Year with them.  I landed down at their flat as soon as I got off duty on New Year’s Eve at about 10:00 pm. They were having an evening and I go out in just in time for supper.  They were nearly all Americans, from the American mission and the Vacuum oil company, as Mrs Jessop is an American, and, I fancy, used to be in the American mission.  Anyway I had a jolly decent time and went to the church at mid night with Mr and Mrs Jessop.  And I stayed there all night.  It was lovely to sleep in a bed and have a decent bath.  They have a flat in a big building.  They have no children.  It was a funny coincidence while I was there are that Mr. Jessop got a letter from British Columbia telling him that Mr Standring had written to tell that his son Eric was away to the war. 

He would continue to catch up with the Jessops and as Mrs Jessop kept corresponding with him throughout the war.

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To Redeem the Past:

(Glimpses of the Great War Based on the Letters of Eric Standring) 

©2014 All Rights Reserved

 

Written and Edited by Sue Guest

Dedicated to the late Gladys Hull,

Loved Gran to her Grandsons.

She helped to keep Eric’s memory alive.

©2014 All Rights Reserved-Do not copy or re-use any material from this article, including but not limited to, photos, quotations, descriptions, etc.,  without express written consent from the author of this article.
For more information, please contact the website administrator at:  Request@dextergenealogy.com.

 

Introduction

Every year Gladys Hull (nee Standring) put another ANZAC poppy on the photograph of her brother, Lieutenant Eric Standring who died on active service in France in 1917. The photograph was mounted under glass in a brown oak frame, and there was just enough gap between glass and frame for the stems of the poppies to fit.  By the 1950’s there were nearly 30 of them, and the older ones were becoming faded and fragile, but she never removed any.

She kept a number of the letters and cards he wrote, filed in brown envelopes with the year marked on them. These provide a glimpse of Eric’s war as he reported it to his family.

Early Life

Hubert Eric Standring (always known as Eric) was born on 22 November 1894 in Invercargill. His father, the Rev. James Standring, was a minister in the Baptist church. Eric was the fourth of five sons – though his next oldest brother died, aged two, less than five months before Eric was born. There was one daughter, Gladys who was born two years after Eric.

James Standring was from Bury in Lancashire, England. He attended the East London Missionary Training Institute and came to New Zealand on the “Waipa” in 1882. In New Zealand he met Amelia Alice Stringer (known as Millie). She had been born in Staines in Middlesex, England and had arrived in New Zealand on the “Northumberland” in 1880.

Shortly after Eric was born his father transferred to the Presbyterian Church and in 1895 was called to be Minister of the Waiareka parish near Oamaru in North Otago. It was here that Eric spent his boyhood. The Standring children attended Teaneraki School (later called Enfield School).

Rev James clearly led a busy life. He was strongly involved in the community, church politics and was a great supporter of the temperance movement.

Eric got his secondary schooling at Waitaki Boys High School in Oamaru. He was successful at school and came 70th in New Zealand in the Junior Civil Service exam. In March 1912 he left for Wellington to take up a Civil Engineering cadetship with Public Works Department of the New Zealand Government.

Joining up

New Zealand received news of the outbreak of the war on 5 August, 1914. Three days later the Government began countrywide recruiting of volunteers for the main body of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF). Eric Standring signed up on 29 August. He was not yet 20, the minimum age for enlistment and his army records show he added a year to his birth date. He was in good health, quite tall at 5 foot 11 inches with dark hair and brown eyes.

Eric joined the 12th Otago Mounted Rifles (OMR) and went into Camp at Tahuna in Dunedin. Most of those who joined the regiment had some experience as a soldier or a territorial; Eric did not though he must have been used to riding horses from his boyhood in the country.

As the OMR was a mounted regiment, troopers were required to bring a horse and a saddle although they sold their horse to the Government and were allocated one.

Eric wrote to his parents about life in the OMR:

Saturday night

Dear Dad and Mother

I am writing now in reply to your letters.  I am very glad to get them I can tell you.  I am glad you all got home safely after coming down.  I felt very down-hearted after you all got away.  Things here are pointing to a move at last.  In the parade for inspection this morning, the Honorable James Allen said we would certainly go within a week from today.  I am going for sure unless sickness or accident intervenes.

My regimental number, as far as I know is 9/481.  We have been working very hard everyday at Mounted parades, riding tests etc.  I have got a jolly good horse but it is very hard in the mouth and is a terror to bolt, but I have got an enormous curb bit and can hold him in now, but he got away with me twice and ran into a rock yesterday and cut his leg but it is healing up nicely today.  We are going to the front and not to any other place, except England first so I will be the second of the family to see the old country. 

There is a hideous row in this tent just now and it takes ones thoughts off letter writing.  All this afternoon we went miles over cross country.  It came on to rain about 2:00 pm and we had a picnic riding home down some very steep grassy hills which were as slippery as glass. We got home without accident though.  Well they have been a good few accidents lately as we have to do more on the horses and they get very excited and restless.  This is one day’s work.

Get out 6.00 am

Stables at 6.15 Roll call before. Water and groom horses till 6.45. Mess orderlies go to the galley for the breakfast, which is back about 8.00. Have breakfast and wash up.

8.45 Have all gear on and cleaned up

8.55 Saddle up

9.00 Parade on parade ground mounted and go to the beach or country until 12 noon

12.00 noon till 12.45 groom, water and feed horses.

1.00 Go for day’s rations for tent and at 2.00 Parade mounted till 5.00pm. Stables again till 5.45 and then pickets, guards etc. are detailed off and leave granted and tea is got, which is generally a good feed.

If you are not on picket, which you are not nearly every alternate night out of you can go to bed to 9:00 pm and then turn out to stables and give your horse another feed and after that go to bed for the night and you generally sleep very soundly after that.  If you are on horse picket you go up and down the horse lines catching horses that break loose and generally looking after them. Lights out at 10.00pm. 

I am very well and healthy except for a bit of a cold which everyone has got here and am feeling a lot better than when I was working at the glass trade.

I ran into a Bill Battersby at the camp today and had a yarn with him.  He looks very altered and aged and wizened up.  I will write again before I go and say goodbye

Now with much love

Your son

Eric

C squadron No 2 troop
12th Otago Mounted Rifle Regiment
Tahuna Park
Dunedin

(Please continue with this article, next post, The Letters of Eric Standring).