Communication across the miles. Remembrance 2018 Communication across the miles.

How would you chat with them? We all communicate with our families. By phone, by text, by email, we use facetime and many other video calling apps. Imagine you were in a different country and had no phone or computer. How would you chat with them?

In 1914 the world went to war. Hundreds and thousands of men and boys went away to many countries around the world. The ONLY way they could communicate with their families was by letter.   At the height of the First World War over 19,000 mailbags made the journey from Britain to France each day, carrying almost two million letters to men at the front.

This picture shows how the letters got from England to France. 12 This picture shows how the letters got from England to France. 12.5 MILLION letters left the UK every WEEK. The ships that took the mail across the channel were a target for German U boats. 134 ships were sunk with the loss of over 7000 lives.

It took only two days for a letter to reach the front It took only two days for a letter to reach the front. The journey began at a purpose-built sorting depot at Regent's Park. By the war’s end, two BILLION letters and 114 MILLION parcels had passed through it. From there, the mail was shipped to Le Havre, Boulogne or Calais in France, where the Royal Engineers Postal Section were tasked with getting it to the battlefields. Staffed by just 250 men in 1914, it grew to 4,000 by the end of the war.

Regimental post orderlies would sort the mail at the roadside and carts would be wheeled to the front line to deliver it to individual soldiers. The objective was to hand out letters from home with the evening meal. It's said that no matter how tired and hungry the soldiers were, they always read the letter before eating the food. Letters back home were collected from the men from field post offices. The mail was date-stamped with the field postmark and sent to the base post office for its journey home.

The letters the soldiers received from home were full of news The letters the soldiers received from home were full of news. Here is an extract from one of these letters. Dear Son, We miss you terribly and the family just isn’t the same without you. Do you remember Mary from the bottom of the street? Well her house was bombed flat on Saturday, but luckily she was out at the market at the time so is safe………….Well son, I hope to get a letter soon so I know you’re safe. Keep your head down and we are praying for you, Love from mum and dad.

A letter from a son to his mum. Dear Mum Things are getting a bit closer to the trenches now, we can’t sleep at night for fear of the rats biting us and the noise of the shells bombarding the trenches all around us. Tomorrow is the big push, they tell us that it will be he last big push before we can come home. The mud is up to our knees now and its cold mum, oh so cold. I long to be back in the kitchen by the fire keeping warm. 'So with all my love my darling Mum I now say goodbye, just in case. 'Try to forget my faults and to remember me only as your very loving son.‘ Charlie Dobbs. 17 year old Charlie Dobbs was killed the next day, he never got to be back in the kitchen keeping warm with his mum

We will now have a minutes silence to remember Charlie Dobbs and the millions like him past and present who all never got to go home to their families.

Remember those who served before. Remember those who are no more. Remember those who serve today. Think of them all on Remembrance Day.