AUGUST 1914: LOUGHBOROUGH AT WAR.
THE ECHO REPORTS
On 4th August 1914, Britain entered the First World War, the conflict whose dead from Loughborough are commemorated at the Carillon War Memorial and Museum. For this blog, I’ve taken as a snapshot the 21st August edition of the Loughborough Echo, headlined “Loughborough and the War”, to gauge what was in people’s hearts and minds during that first month.
No one at the time could have realised what carnage and destruction lay ahead during the next four years. Whilst not downplaying the dangers the country was facing, and the preparations being made for war, the Echo employed a tone of cheerful patriotism and the assumption that right would prevail.
£1,000 had been raised in twelve hours for war funds, and over one weekend, 92 troop trains had passed through Loughborough to destinations country-wide. There could be no doubt that the war was on.
Signing up for war
Loughborough’s ‘local’ military was the 1st/5th Leicesters, whose regimental HQ was in the town. Many of the men on our Roll of Honour were from this regiment. The Echo reported that 90% of the 5th Leicesters had volunteered for service overseas (the first contingent left for France the following February). Squads of new recruits had already been seen, some in khaki and some in their own clothes, marching through the town, and one contingent had already left, “happy with the idea of doing something to keep this tight little island safe from invasion.”.
The Leicestershire Yeomanry, a part-time force who had no obligation to serve overseas, were also on a war footing, with the result that “these brave fellows who started as amateur soldiers are now qualifying to be our defenders.” Many of them had civilian jobs, and at the Falcon Works (later Brush), pledges were made to look after the families when their employees were at the Front. Other firms including the Empress Works, Mountsorrel Granite, and hosiery companies were making similar efforts. 94 of them were to be slaughtered in one single day at the Battle of Frezenberg Ridge on 13th May 1916, including Major William Martin, a partner in Mountsorrel Granite.
Support at home
As the Echo reported, “The war, the whole war, and nothing but the war, is the topic of conversation wherever one goes.” But how could civilians get involved?
Women were keen to pick up their needles and start sewing garments for the soldiers. They should, the article advised, follow the approved patterns. Committees and working parties were already being set up to organise this. Nursing was the other great calling for women, whether they served abroad or helped at the short-staffed hospitals at home. Loughborough General Hospital was designated an auxiliary military hospital and eventually 42 Loughborough women worked there as VAD members of the Red Cross, 27 of them for the whole of the war. Dorothea Butler, Countess of Lanesborough, promised 25 beds for the wounded, to be located in the Mountsorrel area.
Food supplies at risk?
People were naturally worried about food supplies and prices. But the Echo assured them that there was at present nothing to be concerned about, even though there had been earlier reports of customers stockpiling. There had been a good wheat harvest, the country had ample food supplies and it was possible that certain imported foods might even be cheaper, because they could not be landed at German ports and end up on British shores instead. This was not to be the case; the war severely impeded the production and distribution of food, resulting in serious shortages. Rationing was not introduced until 1918.
But if you wanted to be sure that your shopping followed ethical lines, Moore’s the grocer at 14 High Street, advertised in patriotic voice that they sold English granulated sugar and English-made apricot jam, so “why buy German?”
Leicestershire Yeomanry on their way to camp
