An Ecstasy of Fumbling

Yes, what did YOU do at the weekend? I bet you spent your weekend on your fat can shovelling jelly babies into your gaping maw. I bet you lay like a sloth ensconced on your sofa drooling at the latest idiots to parade across the screen in X Factor. I, on the other hand, spent last weekend in a replica First World War trench dressed in the Service Dress of a Great War soldier.

Now, I have made my opinion on re-enactors quite clear at this stage, I think, and you could level the accusation that I spent the weekend re-enacting, but this was certainly NOT re-enactment. Re-enactment involves a bunch of fat men dressing up like nineteen year old soldiers fielding questions from the public at stately homes before pretending to advance as a six man pike block and finally getting pissed up on mead at the campsite. Re-enactment is basically camping in period costume. This, on the other hand, was a tough challenge that was an attempt to understand a little of what the men of the Great War went through. TV's Andy Robertshaw is the luckiest man alive in that he has a patch of ground that he has constructed a Great War trench system in, complete with two fire bays, officers dugout, other ranks dugout, kitchen area (before it collapsed) and latrine.

Yes, that's me...

Andy was writing a book based on our experiences of being in a front line trench for 24 hours carrying out the trench duties that a soldier would have done in 1917. OK, so we weren't under the threat of death from artillery or snipers, but we certainly lived in the trenches pretty much as they would have been in 1917.

It was good fun, but beyond this there was a lot to be learnt. For instance, just the shear weight of Service Dress makes doing even the simplest job a drudging chore. even passing one another in the trench was a bloody hard job and led to argument and fighting:

The plan was to stay in the trench the entire night and although I almost made it, I knew I had a four hour drive back home the next day so made sure I got a few hours sleep at least. The problem was, in the firebay we were posted in the water had risen and taken away any space to sleep so by 4.00am the exhaustion was really kicking in:

Justin managed to stay out for the entire night however and sat on guard in our firebay:

The next morning after breakfast we got to write letters home, these were then passed on to the Lieutenant to censor. For some reason, mine passed censorship:

What we did get out of the experience was how much comradeship and laughter counted to keep us going through the night. The good humour of the British Tommy is famous and we were no exception. All in all, it was a great experience and I'm not going to relate everything that went on in that 24 hour period, you'll have to wait for the book to come out.

All photos by Dr David Kenyon and Martin Stiles.