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REMEMBER THIS: Looking back on the Battle of the Somme

'I’m afraid Dante’s Inferno is not a very good picture of hell compared to the Battle of the Somme,' a local soldier wrote in a letter back home

Each week, the Barrie Historical Archive provides BarrieToday readers with a glimpse of the city’s past. This unique column features photos and stories from years gone by and is sure to appeal to the historian in each of us.

“When I first went up the line and saw our artillery, I wondered what it must be like where our shells dropped. I was soon to know but I could not attempt to describe it. I’m afraid Dante’s Inferno is not a very good picture of hell compared to the Battle of the Somme.”

John Oakes, a landscape gardener at Simcoe Hall, wrote these words in a letter to his employer in November 1916. He was recovering in an English hospital from shrapnel injuries to his right arm. 

Ten years ago, I took a trip to the Somme region in the north of France. I went in search of places where my great uncle had fought and died.

What I found was a peaceful green landscape dotted with little farming villages. Planted fields, mature trees and well-tended gardens made it hard to believe that the entire region had been decimated some 90 years earlier.

These pastoral scenes gave no hint of burned-out buildings, thick mud, nor trees reduced to matchsticks. There are plenty of clues though as to what happened here. Some of them are obvious, but others must be sought out.

In many former battlefields here, like the one where my uncle fell, the earth is literally filled with bits and pieces of metal. If you dig your hand into the ground and pull out a handful of soil, you can shake the soil away until you are left with shrapnel, belt clips and lead balls. 

That is not half of it. In rural France and Belgium, there exists a terrifying addition to garbage disposal, which is known as the iron harvest. Farmers regularly find large unexploded shells while plowing their fields, and they pile them by the roadside for pickup. 

Many soldiers are still here, too. 

Two monuments fascinated me. The Thiepval Monument in the Somme region has the names of 72,000 men who went into battle and simply vanished. The Menin Gate in Belgium bears some 54,000 more names. These soldiers have no known graves.

“I have been on the point of writing to you for a fortnight now but couldn’t bring myself to do it till now.” So wrote Corporal McTaggart of the 13th Battalion on Oct. 6, 1916, in a letter to Mr. and Mrs. George Livingstone of Penetang Street, Barrie. For a month, the couple had heard no news of their eldest son, George.

McTaggart wrote that he, George Livingstone and two other soldiers, named Bergland and Bullock, had been “always together in our work and play.”

The foursome had a habit of tucking their home address into their Glengarry caps and then trading the hats between themselves. If one of them fell on the battlefield, it was hoped that their cap at least might be sent home to family.

On their first night at the Somme, McTaggart was wearing Livingstone’s cap.

“I had Levvy’s cap, as we called him, and I am sending it home to you, sir, at the request of your late son – one of the best, bravest and coolest that has paid the price.”

Corporal McTaggart reported on the circumstances the best he could, although military censors had cut pieces out of his letter. Bergland had survived with shrapnel wounds to the arms, Bullock had received head and face wounds, and McTaggart had been blown up and buried by a shell.

It would be six more months before official military notification of the death of George Livingstone arrived at his parents’ door. 

George Livingstone’s place of burial remains unknown, although he may have been laid to rest in the Mouquet Farm Cemetery near where he fell. Livingstone’s name is inscribed on the Vimy Memorial.

The young soldier, so well-liked by his comrades, is commemorated in the name of the Barrie city street that stretches across the north end of town, Livingstone Street.


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Mary Harris

About the Author: Mary Harris

Mary Harris is the Director of History and Research at the Barrie Historical Archive. The Barrie Historical Archive is a free, online archive that centralizes Barrie's historical content.
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