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British Army Manuals (1914-18) British Army Manuals, Text Books and Handbooks (1914-1918)   88 Books
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Captain Harvey Blease, 15th Battalion the King's Liverpool Regiment, attached 1/7th Lancs. Fusiliers. Killed in Action in Gallipoli, August 7th, 1915. 1st Ed., 67pp., 200x143mm, portrait frontis. No imprint or date [c.1916]  #66584
[HLMainPic] Harvey Blease was the son of Walter and Mary Blease, of Sefton Drive, Liverpool; husband of Helen Dorothy Stanley Blease, of Rostherne, Blundellsands, Liverpool, and was educated at Sedbergh School. He was killed in action at Gallipoli on 7th August 1915, aged thirty-two, has no known grave and is commemorated on the Helles Memorial. Contains his diary from 25th May 1915, embarking for the East, then on the Gallipoli peninsula from the beginning of July, where he was posted to the 1st/7th Battalion Lancashire Fusiliers. Includes descriptions of the line, the incessant firing of artillery and snipers and so forth. After two weeks he went to Imbros for a short rest then returned to Gallipoli. The diary continues to 3rd August with interesting daily entries. Orig. grey card wrappers, titled to front "Diary of Captain Harvey Blease." VG & rare. See illustrations on our website.   £220
Corps Extracts. "A" and "Q" Branch Headquarters, Cavalry Corps. January, 1916. 2nd Ed., orig. buff printed card wraps., 40pp. + blank interleaves. Printed by Harrison & Sons for HMSO. 1916  #61040
[HLMainPic] These 'extracts' from Cavalry Corps standing orders relate to Commissions & Cadet School (with details of how candidates may become eligible for commissions in various branches of the service; how the commissions should be applied for & details of the establishment of the officer Cadet School in France ["Classes are received fortnightly, & the duration of the course is about one month..."] &c). Also contains details re promotions, reporting of casualties, guidance on courts martial, billeting, civilian claims against damages to billets &c. Much of interest on these various non-operational yet essential matters. Very nice condition, this copy with around 20 signatures of members of Cavalry Corps HQ, ranging from the GOC, Lt.-Gen. Sir Cecil Edward Bingham [who relinquished command of the Corps in March 1916, which neatly dates these inscriptions to early 1916, soon after this issue was published], Brig. Home (BGGS), Brig. Longmore (DA&QMG) & various lesser functionaries. VG & rare. See illustration on our website.   £145
A Scholar's Letters from the Front: Written by Stephen H. Hewett, 2nd Lieut. in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment. With an Intro. by F.F. Urquhart, Fellow of Balliol College. 1st Ed., xviii+114pp., portrait frontis. Longmans, Green & Co. 1918  #67103
[HLMainPic] Stephen Henry Philip Hewett was born in India in 1893 (his father was in the Indian Telegraph Service), educated at Downside & Balliol College, Oxford: completing his third year in 1914 he went to Savoy for the summer where he witnessed the French mobilization and made his way home, commissioned in 11th (S) Bn. Warwickshire Regiment, but kept back when the Battalion went overseas, he eventually joined the 14th Battalion – the First Birmingham City Battalion – at the Front in February 1916 & was KiA leading his platoon in an attack between High Wood and Delville Wood on 22nd July 1916. He was twenty-three & is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial. The book consists of lengthy 'diary letters' to his mother together with those to his sisters and various friends, containing, inter alia, affectionate descriptions of characters such as one Latham, the company officers' cook, and his horror at the first casualty he encountered: "his young freckled face was horribly smashed in by a bullet… I was severely shaken; but one has to get callous both in mind and body, and one does: and an hour's sleep revived me." Orig. paper covd. boards & cloth backstrip with paper label, eps rather browned, somewhat rubbed/worn, generally VG. See illustration on our website.   £145
Manual of Physical Training. (Reprint 1908 with Amendments published in Army Orders to 1st December, 1914.). 275pp., sketches & diagrams. Printed by Harrison & Sons for HMSO. 1914  #66225
[HLMainPic] Orig. brown cloth, titled in black to sp., somewhat serviceworn, generally VG. See illustration on our website.   £25
Kenneth Gordon Garnett MC, RFA, 30 July 1892-22 August 1917. 1st Ed., 62pp., portrait frontis., 11 plates. Privately printed at the Chiswick Press. 1917  #67100
[HLMainPic] A memoir by his Mother with selections from his letters from the Front followed by customary extracts from obituaries & letters of condolence. Garnett was born in 1892, Ed. at St. Paul's School & Trinity College Cambridge (rowed in the triumphant boat in the 1914 boat race). He was commissioned in the Royal Field Artillery in Jan. 1915 & proceeded to France the following month, only to be accidentally wounded in March. He returned to the Front in Oct. 1915 & spent the winter in the Ypres Salient then, on 24th August 1916, during a bombardment of Delville Wood, he was shot in the neck & paralysed. He was convalescent in England for a year before his death from a relapse of his spinal wound & is buried in Wandsworth (Putney Vale) Cemetery. Orig. brown paper covd. boards with wheat cloth backstrip, titled in black to front & spine, ink stain at foot of front board, o/w VG. See illustration on our website..   £125
Letters of an English Boy, Being the Letters of Richard Byrd Levett, King's Royal Rifle Corps, who Died for England, at the Age of Nineteen, in the Great War. March 10, 1917. [Compiled by his Mother, Mrs. Maud Sophia Levett.] xii+194pp., 9 plates (including portraits and facsimile bookplate). Eton College: Spottiswoode, Ballantyne & Co. Ltd. 1917  #67099
[HLMainPic] Richard William Byrd Levett was born in 1898 & educated at St Peter's Court Preparatory School, Eton from 1911-15, then Sandhurst from November 1915 until he received his commission in July 1916. Posted initially to the 6th (SR) Battalion King's Royal Rifle Corps at Sheerness then to the 1st Battalion (2nd Division) on the Somme Front in France in December 1916. He was appointed to command No. 8 Platoon in "B" Company, then briefly posted to command the 2nd Divisional Company, consisting of shoemakers, carpenters etc., but rejoined his platoon in time to take part in the attack at Irles on 10th March 1917. He was killed near Grevillers Trench by the British barrage, behind which the attack was following closely. He was nineteen and is buried in Albert Communal Cemetery Extension. Contains interesting, observant & atmospheric letters from the Front, recording his duties & surroundings including attendance at Anti-Gas School. For example, a letter dated 13th Jan. 1917, from "The Abomination of Desolation," describes the environs of Contalmaison at that time: "What I think it is most like is the most depressing view in the 'Black Country' that you can find. Take away all buildings and for cinders put brown earth all churned up into millions of shell holes & smashed up trenches. Cover the whole with thick mud – fill all depressions with water, scatter round thousands of empty beef tins, broken rifles, braziers, cart limbers, etc., pieces of men's clothing, boots and equipment & add a continuous roar of guns – there mustn't be a tree, a house or a bird in the scene, but just as far as you can see all round rolling mud covered with débris – well, you can't imagine now what it is like, but I can tell you it is horrible." Concludes with letters of condolence from brother officers, chaplain, his servant etc., an account of "The 'Bapaume Ridge' and the Taking of Irles" reproduced from the Morning Post and finally a letter to be given to his parents in the event of his death. Orig. olive cloth, gilt title to spine & front, corners dec. with enamelled bands in the colours of Eton College and the KRRC, book review to front paste-down, little rubbed & bumped, VG & rare. See illustration on our website.   £165
Regulations for Engineer Services-Peace. 1910. Reprinted with amendments published up to 1st May 1915. Part I. vi+193pp., 15 tables. Printed for HMSO by Mackie & Co. Ltd. 1915  #65407
[HLMainPic] Organisation of the Engineer services, Personnel, Administration, Stores, Tools & Works, Control of Expenditure, &c. Orig. red cloth, gilt, VG with contemp. ink ownership inscrip. of A.R. Gibbs. See illustration on our website.   £45
General Regulations & Orders for the Army. Adjutant General's Office, Horse Guards, 12th August 1811. To Which Are Added such Regulations as have been issued to the 1st January 1816. Facsimile reprint, xxiv+441pp. VG in dw. Muller. 1970  #64168
[HLMainPic] Rexine binding, VG in sl. chipped dw. See illustration on our website.   £15
Dan: A Memorial. 1st Ed., 283pp., 202x150mm, portrait frontis., 21 photos. & sketches. Printed for Private Circulation by R. & R. Clark Ltd., Edinburgh. 1918  #67357
[HLMainPic] Daniel Edward Bradby, born at Rugby in 1896, the son of a Rugby School housemaster (H.C. Bradby, compiler of the volume) & educated there, was commissioned in the Rifle Brigade in 1914 & joined the 9th (S) Bn. in France in Dec. 1915; became O.C. "B" Coy. in September 1916 (after the Battle of Flers-Courcelette) & was KiA near the Harp Redoubt during the Battle of Arras on 9th May 1917. He was twenty years old & is buried in Tilloy British Cemetery. Contains around 175pp. letters from the front, also lengthy extracts from various letters of condolence etc. Interestingly contains a (fairly indistinct) photograph of Bradby and another officer near the Harp Redoubt taken on the day of his death. In his final letter to his Mother, written on 8th April 1917 and left with a colleague ("I am giving this letter to some one or other who is staying behind to post if I get knocked out, so I hope you will never read it!") he wrote: "If I am killed you will at any rate know that I died trying to do my duty, and thinking always of you at home who I love so dearly." Orig. grey paper covered boards with wheat cloth backstrip & paper sp. label, VG with contemp. owenership inscrip. of "C. Polgreen Lt." (Note: Lt. J.C.V. Polgreen was a brother officer in the 9th Rifgle Brigade.) Rare. See illustration on our website.   £225
James Lusk, BA (Cantab).; Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur; Captain & Adjutant 6th Battalion The Cameronians (Scottish Rifles). Letters & Memories. 1st Ed., [vii]+151pp., portrait frontis., col. plate (of Legion d'Honneur). Oxford: Printed for B.H. Blackwell. 1916  #66642
[HLMainPic] James Lusk was commissioned in the 6th Cameronians in 1908, mobilised & served in France March-Dec. 1915. Memoir followed by extensive & interesting letters from training and the Front: wounded by a trench mortar on Christmas Day 1915 whilst going round his trenches & DoW 28/12/15. He was awarded the Legion d'Honneur at Festubert in June when he was Bn. Transport Officer & the bn. having lost heavily in officers he made his way up the line & helped reorganise. He was appointed adjutant after this battle. Orig. grey paper covd. boards with purple cloth backstrip, VG. See illustrations on our website.   £145

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