INTRODUCTION TO THE COMPILATION OF THE STAFFORDSHIRE REGIMENTS
Vol II: 'THE SCRAPBOOK'It will be 300 years in 2005 since Colonel Luke Lillington formed his Regiment of Foot at the Kings Head public house in Bird Street, Lichfield, the regiment which went on to become the 38th Foot (1st Staffordshire Regiment).
Following on from the success of my initial publication in 2003; The Staffordshire
Regiment: Imperial, Regular & Volunteer, 1705-1919 'Knotted Together', and due to
the great number of photographs and other material at my disposal, it was decided to
commemorate the coming tercentenary of the First Staffordshire Regiment with a
second volume, The Staffordshire Regiments 'The Scrapbook', a predominantly visual celebration of the Staffordshire Regiments, Imperial, Regular & Volunteer,
1705-1919.
Through the illustrations, the pride of the Georgian and
Victorian soldier comes to life;
an insight, admittedly black and white, into the Staffordshire soldier's Boer War reveals itself; images of pre-Great War uniform, camps and pomp and ceremony are revealed, pride along with a very real sense of comradeship clearly evident.
In the initial months of the Great War the group photographs convey the relaxed feeling of the officers and men of the Staffordshire regiments, confident in the fact that "it will all be over by Christmas 1914", and totally oblivious to the ordeal, death and destruction to come! Photographs, recording the initial bravado and enthusiasm
of Staffordshire soldiers going to the front, melt into photographs illustrating the stark
realization that the Great War was to be a long, drawn out and savage reality. The mounting
casualties, funerals and war-weary survivors of decimated Staffordshire regiments, are in stark contrast to the fresh-faced raw conscripts and recruits yet to be initiated by a baptism of shot and shell on the Western Front.
The Staffords served in many other theatres of War, the 2nd North Staffs on the North West
Frontier of India, the 7th Battalions of both the North and South Staffords in the Middle East for some of their Great War service, and the Staffordshire Yeomanry in Mesopotamia fighting the Turks. The 1st and 9th Battalions of the South Staffords
were eventually ordered to the Italion front and some unique photos show the stark difference between Italian Alps and the desolate shell-torn morass that was often the Staffordshire soldier's home and tomb on the Western Front and in Flanders.
The book is rounded off by some ephemera including a soldier's Discharge Certificate and a Buckingham Palace condolance slip sent to the next of kin of all
servicemen and servicewomen who had perished during the Great War, when Britain began to try to recognise their supreme sacrifice in 1919.
I would like to hear from anybody with Imperial Staffordshire regimental items for sale.
DAVE COOPER
Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire
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Published by Churnet Valley Books
ISBN 1 904546 10 2
244 x 170mm Paperback
168 pages (8 in full colour)
Price £12.95 (plus postage & packing).
Available From DAVE COOPER from 21st December 2004.
Tel: 01538 702738 Fax: 01538 702662
Evenings: 01538 703354
Mobile: 07971 277995
E-Mail: davercooper@antique-armoury.freeserve.co.uk
Postage:
UK add £2.75
Europe add £5.75
US and rest of world add £6.25
