Follow the Drum: Christmas 1917
Springbok Blue December 1917 To celebrate Christmas one hundred years ago in 1917, it was necessary for people to dig deep within their own personal reserves of strength as the…
Follow the Drum: South African Military Hospital
Leading the way The special collection of materials available in the Local Studies Library & Archive provides a unique insight into the ground-breaking treatments and therapies that were available to…
Follow the Drum: Life’s Essentials
Patricia Moloney, Local Studies Assistant, considers the problems caused by food shortages in everyday life for the local community during the crisis caused by the First World War. Local Authorities…
Follow the Drum: Christmas 1916
Christmas 1916. The third Christmas of the War. In this article we consider daily life in the Borough at the time of the third Christmas of the War. It was…
Follow the Drum: The South African Presence
Patricia Moloney, Heritage Assistant, takes a look at the impact of the increasingly international military presence in Richmond during the Great War. The town was assuming a cosmopolitan character as…
Follow the Drum – Go on the Die Hards!
The gripping story of the Middlesex Regiment at Neuve Chapelle continues as the local men face going over the top. The detail of this part of the battle is based…
Follow the Drum – Go on the Midds!
Using eye-witness accounts from some of the archive material that we hold, this month’s blog looks at the important role played by the Middlesex Regiment in a key battle of…
Follow the Drum: Spring 1915
Springtime on the Front As spring develops on the Front, Pte W. Boddy (8th (King’s Royal) Irish Hussars), a Richmond resident, writes enthusiastically about a slight improvement in the weather…
Follow the Drum: Experiencing the trenches
Life on the Western Front Local families would have been able to construct a picture of life in the trenches for their family members through their personal correspondence (though military…
Follow the Drum – The Terriers far from home
The latest post from our Follow the Drum series looks at how local soldiers of the East Surrey 6th Battalion coped with life away from home in January-February 1915. Local…