My father Pte A Dove of the 8th Rifle Brigade took the King’s shilling in 1914; left his parents and siblings and went off to war. He was nineteen years old. I don’t remember my father talking about his time in the army, but fifty years ago a news paper asked for individual stories. He wrote a letter but never sent it! Many years later he gave me that letter: I re-wrote it in story form – this is his story! ‘I was wounded in Ypres on July 6th 1915. I have vivid memories of being ordered - with my fellow soldiers – to dig a trench fifty yards from the one we were occupying. We had to wait until 2300 hrs, before we could go over the top. To get to the site we had to crawl through long rye grass. We were under intense fire as we crawled and the barrage continued incessantly while we worked, digging under the glare of the stars until approximately 0500 hrs. We had nearly finished when we had orders to evacuate, because army intelligence had discovered that the site was about to be blown up. Under fire we returned to the original trench: many soldiers died that day. They died in vain. When we arrived back, our Officer told Pte Gaunt to go on sentry duty; unfortunately he lost his bayonet when he crawled back in the long grass. I stepped forward and offered to take his place. Ten minutes later a trench mortar landed right where I was standing, burying me up to my head; a fragment of shell severed my right temple. I shouted for stretcher bearers, it took an hour for them to dig me out: they were very brave because we were under constant fire. Although badly wounded I had to walk to the advanced dressing station in Ypres, because the only stretcher available carried the dead body of the postman, he had been shot in the head. No steel helmets in those days. When we arrived in Ypres it was under constant bombardment and the Clothiers’ Hall was damaged. We left the area as quickly as we could. Some time later a Belgian Officer stopped us, he saw that I was badly wounded and I was transferred to a hospital in Etafles. I wasn’t expected to live but thanks to the skill of a Canadian Surgeon – who was able to remove the shrapnel in my skull without further damage. I was later repatriated to a convalescent home in the U.K. John McCrae was Field Surgeon in the Canadian Artillery and was in charge of a field hospital in Ypres in 1915. I say a big thank you to him because - if dad had died - four generations of the Dove family would never have been born. A Google search revealed he was the only Canadian surgeon there – so my dad’s life was saved by the man who wrote: - ‘IN FLANDER’S FIELDS.’ Olive Day
My father Pte A Dove of the 8th Rifle Brigade took the King’s shilling in 1914; left his parents and siblings and went off to war. He was nineteen years old. I don’t remember my father talking about his time in the army, but fifty years ago a news paper asked for individual stories. He wrote a letter but never sent it! Many years letter he gave me that letter: I re-wrote it in story form – this is his story!