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BETTERIDGE (Arthur H.)
Combat in & Over Delville Wood.
1st Ed., [ii]+229pp., dup. ts (rectos only), 4to (258x200mm), several photos. & maps. Privately published at Pretoria.
1974
#70616
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![[HLMainPic]](booksThumbs/70616.jpg "Click on the left or right of the image for more images")
Rare & interesting Great War memoirs privately published by the author. At the outbreak of war Arthur Betteridge was 18 years old & employed as a clerk/telegraphist at the railway station at Bloemhof. Initially his employers refused him permission to leave his work & enlist, but was finally allowed to do so & joined the 4th Regt. (SA Scottish) in the 1st South African Brigade. Sailed in October 1915 to Southampton & there posted to his battalion's Signal Section (attached to "C" Coy. when in action). Re-embarked for Egypt on 28th Dec. 1915 & participated in the Senussi Campaign, then to France, arriving in April 1916 & serving on the Somme until wounded at Delville Wood on 18th July 1916. His Western Front experiences in the ranks are described in 90 pages, & include an account of aircraft co-operation (due to being a signaller). In Sept. 1917 he was posted to the RFC at Farnborough for flying training, & after a course at an OTC in Oxford was commissioned, completed training as a fighter pilot (around 30 pages describe this period of his career). He was posted to France & joined No. 3 Sqdrn. RAF in August 1918. Although his period with the Squadron, prior to the armistice, was of just three months duration, it is full of interest & incident, including aerial combat (on one occasion a wheel of his aircraft was shot off & his CO congratulated him on an excellent "splitarse" landing). By he end of the war he was leading "C" Flight in aerial patrols & balloon strafeing sorties. He returned home to South Africa in 1919 with two wound stripes & a bride, having married in England after the armistice. Orig. stiff grained card wraps., gilt title to front, VG throughout & inscribed by the author: "To dear Penny & family from Oom Arthur/1975."
£225
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