Western Front Way

The purpose of this book is to publicise 'The Western Front Way.'  This is an idea based on the thoughts of one 2nd Lieutenant Douglas Gillespie of the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders.  His dream, in late 1915, was o a pathway lying along the 'Front' between the opposing armies, the intention being to look upon the cost of war and perhaps bring reconciliation and peace between enemies.  All very noble but a dream that came to little at the time, Gillespie himself being killed in action during the Battle of Loos, his body, like so many others never recovered.  The effect of his family back home in Linlithgow of his loss, and that following on the loss of his brother a year before, must have been heavy.  Well educated middle class sons who went to 'good' schools, usually one offering an 'Officer Cadet Training Squadron,' saw the loss of many 'sons.'  Such officers, often with much less experience than their men, were always the first to go 'over the top' in any action.  As a result, such officers suffered proportionately higher loss than that of the private in the ranks.  

The war rumbled on for another three years after Gillespie died at Loos and there was little desire for reconciliation or peace in the years following the war.  Belgium saw the vast majority of the nation under German control, only flooding the land in the north prevented further incursion.  France hurried to remove the mess left by the war, hidden explosives removed, trenches filled, land once again ploughed over to return to farmland.  The idea of 'reconciliation' was far from many French and Belgium minds in 1918.  

In recent years Gillespie's words have reappeared and many took up the idea of a long path along the line of the Great War Front.  'The Western Front Way,' now appealed to many, especially in Belgium where support for remembrance of the war has always been strong.  Whether this was in regard to the wars memory or the idea of thousands of tourists searching the land where their family and friends had fought is not easy to determine.  Many of those financially able did seek out the graves of their dead, some hoping to find their by still alive, somewhere, somehow.  Tourism covering now two wars is indeed big business in this part of the world.

Sir Anthony Sheldon, a head of private schools, had often taken students across the battlefields of France and Flanders.  He had acquired a great interest in the war and had picked up some History on the way.  Along with others he worked to bring the idea of the 'Way' into reality.

In an effort to publish the 'Way,' as well as recovering from the loss of employment and the death of his wife, Seldon decides to walk the entire length of the proposed pathway, almost a thousand miles.  His intention is to begin at the far end, the Swiss border, and from there walk towards the North Sea.  This is a simple proposal, and a noble one.  There are however problems here.  For a start he is not a long distance walker, he is 68 years old, the walk takes place late in summer, and Covid restrictions hinder progress and ensure almost all businesses are closed, this means hotel and other facilities are very limited.  However, he manages to survive and eventually finishes the course.

Several problems concerning the war remain however.  The majority of the 'front' has been swept away, especially in France where there appears little desire to 'remember.'  In the southern parts, where it was France v Germany alone and thousand died on both sides, little remains of the conflict.  Occasional villages stumps can be seen, the evidence of heavy shelling, instead of rebuilding the village a new one is often created along the road.  Memorials exist but the indication here appears to be that these are not visited much by locals.  

Elsewhere the border itself has moved and for a 'pathway along the front' the author appears far from the actual battle lines in my view.  Modern day construction, woods, farmers fields and the roadways interfere with a war 105 years before.  The needs of today take priority.  

Belgium is more interested in the 'Way,' and already the path is marked out in places.  There can be no doubt that such a path will bring tourists interested in war and visiting Europe to walk or cycle, France prefers cyclists to walkers, and small business along the way will indeed benefit.  Will 'peace' be encouraged by such a walk?  The idea did not stop a second war 20 years after the first, it has not stopped fighting in the Ukraine, Cameroon, Syria, north Africa, southern Sahara, and many other places.  Human nature does not change, and somewhat hopeful attempts at 'peace' will not defeat the human 'self.'

The writer managed a very difficult walk in hard circumstances.  His emotions were disturbed, his feet painful, and while it is a requirement of such books to mention all such instances I found it became somewhat embarrassing as the authors life unfolded before us.  There is a limit as to how much of the author needs to place in such books.  

I also found his History of the war to be somewhat unsound.  An example is his condemnation of the generals for the battles at Loos and the Somme.  He ignores the politicians demand that forced these battles on the generals.  Possibly this is because he himself is an honorary Historical adviser to No 10?

Theses two battles were rejected by the generals as being impossible places to fight.  However, London 

preferred the opinion of French generals to British ones and thousands were lost because of this.  You can add Gallipoli, Salonika, Mesopotamia and Africa to this list of London failures, yet the generals are blamed.  The generals did not have friends in the press!

The idea of this walk is a good one, many will make use of it, but any idea of peace comes from hope rather than an understanding of human nature.  Far many the book will be a good starting point on a journey, but for me with Covid hindering progress much required information for the walker is missing.

I also found the author tiring and struggled to finish the book.  While he offers historical insights into some fighting as he passes this is overshadowed by too much of his own troubles.  It is to be hoped a better guide will be forthcoming in the near future.

@Punch 1981

A Walk

  
Having got myself on the bike this morning, I had to get myself on the bike as no-one would help, and cycling around for thirty minutes, it may have been five but it felt like thirty, and finished by coming up the slope in the park and near killing myself I found climbing the stairs back home enough for the day, or so I thought.
Exercise is a good thing when you are young and fit, it is less entertaining when a short bike ride leaves the rider looking for a defibrillator!  However I made it and more will occur if I remember tomorrow and at the weekend.  I am now searching the weather forecast hoping for rain!
During the afternoon I decided my knees, now aching with stiffness required a walk.  Off we hobbled across the park as the clouds that have covered us for a week thinned out and pretended they were going to let the sun shine through, they didn't!  
There is an old picture from around 200 years ago showing this park as a field, a cow or two grazing idly and a yokel wandering about.  In the distance the new Congregational church building stands alongside one or two grand houses, the church the only remaining memory of that time.  All else has changed.  Probably owned by a wealthy type and farmed by tenant farmers the field was turned into the grounds of the large house built by one of the Courtauld family of weaving fame.  His grand large home lasted for around forty years before it passed into the hands of a school in whose possesion it remained for many years.  Near one gate there was a grass verge and one day I saw a lady of undetermined age walk across this grass quite deliberately.
"I was never allowed to do this while at the school so I am doing it now," she laughed and went on her way.  In recent times the house became flash flats with a few houses alongside owned by folks who can afford half a million, I did not apply.  
Passing the school gym which now serves as the registry office usually with a flash car dressed for a bride outside, I walked slowly past the few large houses that stand alongside the church.  The names and uses have changed with the years, one superb house is now used by the Salvation Army to rehouse people with specific difficulties, another rebuilt by a painter and decorator and the only one I can identify used by a Council 'Community' office whatever that is.  The gray brick community building was built by one John Brown, his initials in the Latin version 'IJ' and seen above the door, Latin was the trendy Victorian manner, and it is clear he did well for himself in his day.  As far as I can gather he began as a brickie and later made bricks near the railway and made his money that way.  It is clear he had talent and was seen by the later years of the nineteenth century as one of the towns more important people.  He would be shocked by the house today.  In fact several other houses have similar styles if not the same bricks and possibly he built them, or got his men to do so, and established his reputation.  He is not there now of course.
I strolled against the wind along the Roman Road called Stane Street (which also lies outside my window) heading east.  I passed the 'Horse & Groom' a pub where one Saturday lunchtime two workmates ran outside and pulled me through the door and made me join them!  Even in 1937 this pub was where people gathered if they wished goods to be taken to the villages round about.  Most pubs continued the tradition of carriers, by vehicle in the thirties no longer plodding horse and carts, delivering goods near and far, well into the big towns at least.  The 'Horse & Groom' appeared to be best placed for the villages within a ten mile radius.  UPS and a variety of others can find their beginnings in men plodding along at two miles an hour beside a pair of carthorses with loaded cart.

The rest of this side of the street contains many houses from the past including further along a row of weavers houses, the narrow homes contain windows designed to aid weavers.  It is said that once upon a time the attic roof had no divisions as long rolls of cloth would be stretched out up there.  On the other side of the street all was demolished and a new roadway capable of dealing with increased traffic established, also the new shopping centre sweeping away generations of buildings.  However the museum benefited from this as an archaeological dig must take place before building work and many items were found.  There is a Iron Age, Roman and Anglo Saxon finds from there.  A hamlet of some sort containing roundhouses was later joined by Roman dwellings.  When Rome withered and the Saxons arrived the may well have farmed much of this area although it is possible there were houses at this spot also.  Now there is a variety of modern day shops in the usual style, sometimes I wish the one time inhabitants were still around.  

I wandered about the town for a while and made my way home.   I came back via the park, the sun still striving to break through as it dipped in the west but the clouds were not relenting.  A couple of new houses are being constructed nearby right next to the road and not far from the skatepark.  How the new tenants will love those brats come summer!  Along Stane Street, but a different part my aged home stands, just.  The houses nearby go back some distance also, at least two hundred years but possibly more.  It is possible to discover something of those who lived there in the last hundred years but going further back this is harder.  When I have time I will seek more re the doctors who used this building as a surgery and the woman who made corsets in the 1920's, I wonder how she made enough for this place!  Maybe their story will always be hidden.

Searching but not Finding

Earlier today I went searching for one of these locks pictured above.  This lock usually resides at the bottom of an inner door but was dunted by a man in a mobile disabled scooter a while back and has been wanting fixed ever since.  Nothing was done as it is an inner door and only opens in summer when the weather is like this (and I should indicate that tomorrow is again stotting rain!) and therefore is rarely used.  Howver the other day it was 'suggested' that I go to B&Q and get another.
You all know what a woman's 'suggestion' is like..... 

So off I trundled this lunchtime on the Free Bus along with some badly dressed school girls on much needed fashion shopping trips to the out off town shopping emporium.  The bus stops at the far end from B&Q, that's B&Q way down there hidden behind the trees, cars, trolleys and confused women attempting to get large boxes from said trolleys into car boots (I kept going!), so I had to walk all the way back and down through the car park to the store.
Taking my broken lock in hand I approached two attractive young female members of the B&Q staff gossiping discussing work behind the checkout and enquired.  "Do you possess one off these," asked I, "Which isn't broken?"
"er, umm, er..."  They began muttering that they had never seen one before and one pointed me in the direction of the appropriate aisle.  Here I, along with several other lost souls, searched aisle 35 back and forth and while discovering dozens of locks, padlocks, bolts and the like I noted that they were all completely different from mine.  "Hmmm thought I, this could be an out of date, not likely to be found anywhere type lock."  You canny say I'm not quick.  Well OK you can.
I glumly made my way back to the door when the dark haired young lady previously encountered asked if I found what I was looking for.  I informed her of my failure and she tried to encourage me in my endeavour with appropriate words of wisdom and sent me on my way.  Two excellent members of staff Mr B&Q and don't you forget it.

I pondered my options and considered my knees.  I could walk through the clothing side of the shopping centre where overpriced outfits are reduced to far too much money for anyone with half a brain (I note the free bus was a double-decker implying the centre expects lots of kids soon during the holidays) and having pondered and considered I remembered the Screwfix establishment on the other side and headed in that direction.  Sadly I wandered through the shops where I was tempted to look in and be depressed by the price tags.  However I still managed to buy three T-Shirts (size fat) from an attractive capable young lass I that Sports Shop that thinks it owns Rangers FC.  Actually now I think about it, it does!  These T-Shirts I buy there because I find they shrink less than the majority I buy.  The girl pointed to the store magazine as they always do 'Sports Something' it was called.  As I hung my belly over the counter I asked if she thought I was the 'sporty type.'  I then noticed a headline on the magazine which read 'Burn Fat' so maybe she was just making a point?

Onwards I walked blocking out the sun from folks sitting on benches my knees asking where we were going and reminding me by the creaking noises they make that this was not a clever idea fatso!  I went anyway, I had promised to get this bolt/lock thing and the man in the know was in Texas showing off his Landrover to jealous Yanks so he was no help and I had to check out this place.  I asked the kid on the desk (was he 18?) about the lock.  He did not recognise the lock and did not lose his confused somewhat dull expression but as is their way looked up his catalogue and searched for me.  Pages were turned, turned back, turned again, and he agreed with me it was not to be found.  I agreed even though I could not see what he was looking at as it was upside down and small.  Screwfix work on an 'Argos' style basis where you search the catalogue, fill in the form and they get it from the store.  Excellent idea if you know what you look for.  The kid looked to his elder colleague also wearing the same dull expression who made it clear he had no knowledge of the lock.  Only later did I realise they were 'Argos' like in their knowledge of the goods.  "Hmmm, thought I, this lock is out of date or maybe the world is fighting against us."  

 
I headed to Wicks around the corner and made my way wearily there.  The lassies there were welcoming and helpful, one leading me round at far too far a pace for my knees to where the locks were to be found all proudly displayed in their little bags or plastic wrappings.  None were suitable, none were what I looked for and none had ever passed the ken of the girls before.  At least theyw ere helpful.  As elsewhere all on display had been modern efficient locks of recent date much loved by the tradesmen and DIY folks who use such stores, they were no good to me, someone famed for having the DIY skills of a chimpanzee on Expresso coffee and a pint of vodka!  
Home beckoned and I turned in that direction.  I should remind listeners that the sun was shining through the clouds and the temperature was around 70ish and I was walking not sitting on the free bus.  Not only was I wearing my wee jacket that was fine earlier when the wind was blowing when I ventured out the house but now the wind died and I was lumbered with a bag with T-Shirts and a 'Screwfix' catalogue.  This was brought just in case we need one next time, and there will be a next time.  My knees ached, my feet complained and now I had run out of ideas, also it was so far to walk back for the free bus I decided to walk on myself.  Stupid man! I headed home avoiding the builders in their transit vans as they charged out of the gates to the stores I had left (do they have brakes?) and made for home.

My brain was befuddled before I set out and now it was frying away quite happily.  There is an ironmongers in town, too far for my knees my knees said creaking loudly but it seemed good tome to try for it.  As I struggled up the slope into town the free bus raced past me giving me a smug grin as it did so.  This added to the realisation that the walk into town where the ironmongers were situated was further than I realised.  The bus's grin pleased me no end and I informed the bus of my considered opinion especially as it stops quite close to my destination.  There was no-one there to listen, the bus certainly didn't.  The ironmongers when I reached there are often helpful and naturally were of little use.  I didn't even consider Tesco over the road as I would have to climb the stairs to be disappointed , and I made my way home with a broken lock and broken knees.
I grumbled when after dowsing my fat hulk in cold water I stood on the weighing machine to see how much weight had been lost by walking the hundred miles back and forth.  NOTHING!  I still stood at 16 stone!    

Now, looking through the Screwfix catalogue I find 'Flush Bolts' that look exactly like the ones I have, apart from the difference.  Bah!  How come kiddo did not notice?  Lets not go there.  


.

No Change

No change where my huge weight is concerned. I am eating less, and better, sometimes at least, yet I remain 'overweight. At least the last time I had to go to the doctor, for what I thought was possible skin cancer and turned out to be nothing at all (no wonder men do not run to their GPs! Why do we waste their time for nothing?), he went through the usual routine of blood pressure and weight. He was not keen on stones and pounds, he being one of those men brought up on kilograms, whatever they are. However he agreed I was not the 'fat slob' previous medical men have indicated, merely 'overweight.' This is the nice way of saying 'fat' but not as fat the next man.....who is a 'fat slob' by the way!

I waste precious minutes of your busy time, and as you get older time passes much quicker, I say I waste minutes of your time mentioning this because when I got back from a short walk this morning I weighed myself on the old scales. I discovered that if you put most of your weight on to the left side you only weigh 15 stone 4 pounds. (translate that yourself) so I spent a while at an awkward angle before falling off.

I was tempted out by the warm weather today. In spite of gray cloud cover it was remarkably warm, in fact I had the window open all night, not something folks in Edinburgh would understand I imagine. Not only would they freeze to death some wee ned would attempt to break in and steal life saving equipment, 'I-pod,' 'Mobile phone,' 'digital camera,' 'laptop,' and the like. Those things that life would be impossible without these days. I mean how did we live in the distant past of ancient history, say 1980, when such things were unheard of bar among those who read Sci-Fi? Anyway I walked up hill and down dale, well they were before someone built all those houses on them, passing the ladies returning from dumping the kids in school for the last day before the holidays. How lovely to think that for the next six weeks the streets will be filled with selfish brats blocking every pavement and shoplifting in every other shop in the town.
I would vote for any party that kept them indoors 24 hours a day seven days a week. Except ours of course, but they have had their visit to the vet and our family keep them all on a lead. The rottweiler and pit bulls we let roam free as they are less dangerous.

Ah well, I can't sit here adding weight, I must be off out to the market looking for veg that has fallen of the stalls and opportunities for cheap stuff they are desperate to get rid off. It is also encouraging as most of the stall holders have huge beer bellies. This encourages me as I feel slim beside them and on top of that I notice their men are even worse!