The bereaved
Letters of condolence
Notification of the death of Private Percy Ottley 1/14th Battalion, The London Regiment, 1917. NAM 2004-11-115-6
‘Fallen’, ‘Passed out of the sight of man’ and ‘bought it’, are all terms commonly used to hide the fact that a soldier has been killed or mortally wounded in battle. Whether death was caused by shells, bullets or bayonet the reality was often brutal and bloody. Families were officially notified by the War Office that their loved ones had been killed.
Commanding officers and friends frequently wrote to give them more detail about a soldier’s death and offer their consolation to a bereaved wife or parents. Phrases such as ‘he died instantly’ or ‘he couldn’t have felt much’ or that his dying word was ‘mother’ occur in many letters.
In some cases this might have been true, but the horrific reality of warfare with artillery fire, machine guns, grenades and gas suggest that all too often these phrases were gentle lies, intended to give comfort.
Letter of condolence sent to Mrs Gordon from Lieutenant A H Snow, 106th Battery, 6th Brigade, 1 September 1918
NAM 2003-09-33-1
In the letter shown here, Lieutenant A H Snow, 106th Battery, 6th Brigade, writes to Mrs Gordon in September 1918, explaining the circumstances of her husband’s death, stating that Corporal Gordon ‘suffered no pain’ and that his death was 'instantaneous’.
Parcels of personal items sometimes accompanied letters of condolence. The museum has a selection of what are clearly pocket contents removed from a body; chequebooks, letters, photographs, money and a diary. Sometimes even identification discs were sent home. In a strange way such families might be considered fortunate; their loved ones were, at least, found, identified and buried.
Temporary burials
Temporary wooden cross erected to mark the grave of Corporal T. Gordon, 106th Battery, 6th Brigade. NAM 2003-09-33
Many soldiers who died remained where they fell. It was often impossible to remove or even bury their bodies for months because of the state of the battle or the weather. As a result their comrades, or enemies, hastily buried them close to the trenches.
Many of these wartime burials were located after the armistice, but many thousands were lost forever. Their resting place is still unknown to the families they left behind.
Reality of death
Technological advances in weapons and their production brought death to soldiers on an unprecedented scale. For the first time in the history of the British Army more men died of injury than disease.
The most common cause of death, especially when men were in the front line, was shellfire. Wounded soldiers were treated and quickly evacuated from the battlefield. Some soon died from blood loss, shock or infection, but most lived.
Archaeology of death
A soldier killed during the German assault on St. Quentin in March 1918. His body was probably not recovered due to the intensity of the fighting there. NAM 2000-07-19-84
Excavation within trench systems can lead to the discovery of the remains of soldiers who were killed immediately or who died from their wounds a short time later.
Bodies are found buried in makeshift graves, singly or in groups. Soldiers were also killed and buried by shellfire and collapsing trenches or dugouts. Sometimes archaeologists find only fragments of bodies, men who were blown apart by shells or whose remains were disturbed by later trench digging.
Loos excavation
A makeshift grave uncovered during the dig at Loos. © NML
One of the most traumatic finds for the team was of a wartime burial in the trenches near Loos. A mass grave was discovered by chance from which four sets of remains were excavated. All proved to be German, two of them Bavarians. They were stacked one on top of the other in a trench or dugout entrance. The top body was a man about 1.6 m (5ft 3in) tall (Body 10). It was not possible to tell the cause of death although two bones in his left leg had been broken. He was not wearing boots or a tunic although his death was likely to have been towards the end of the Battle of Loos, 1915, when the weather was cold and wet.
Remains and artefacts belonging to Bavarian troops emerge from a makeshift grave at Loos. © NML
The second man down (Body 11) had a broken left arm, was wearing jackboots and had a fragment of identification disc still in place on his chest. Third down in the grave, was a Bavarian soldier (Body 12) - identifiable from his buttons.
Unlike the others he had been placed in the grave in a manner suggestive of a formal burial. Visible in his skull was a hole that, according to the pathologist’s report, was caused before death.
In the area below Body 12 and above Body 13 – the second Bavarian body - a song book, paybook, and note book with pencil were recovered together with the remains of a uniform on which was the ribbon of the German Iron Cross Second Class. He had no visible injuries although a shrapnel ball was lodged against the lower bones of his left leg. Cause of death was not clear from the remains. The full story of Body 13 was only discovered after the excavation had finished.
