WWI soldiers’ autograph book found in Cambridgeshire
By ANIMonday, January 24, 2011
LONDON - A book containing inscriptions written by World War I soldiers has been discovered in Cambridgeshire.
The autograph book, which was written at a military hospital more than 90 years ago, was found among old photographs at Roy Chamberlain’s home in Foxton.
Chamberlain, 90, believes his mother, Mary, visited soldiers being treated at Shepreth village hall, which was turned into a temporary hospital in 1915.
They have written and sketched in the book and included names and dates.
A private known to have died during the Battle of the Somme in 1916 copied lines from Thomas Babington Macaulay’s poem Horatius, which read: “And how can man die better, Than facing fearful odds…”
Chamberlain said his mother was a cook at a manor house in Shepreth during the war.
“I think it was quite common in those days for young people to have autograph books,” the BBC quoted him as saying.
“Quite a few soldiers have written and drawn in the book and signed their names.
Shepreth village hall operated as a military hospital from 1915 to 1919
“My mother would have been in her 20s and single. I suppose she would have visited the soldiers. My grandmother worked as a nurse at the hospital.”
Chamberlain unearthed the book a month after workmen at Shepreth village hall found a 1915 postcard written to Private Edward Wolstencroft. (ANI)
