Dorset Brothers at War

This book tells of the wartime experiences of Bertram, Stanley and Roy George, based on their hitherto largely unpublished writings. Volunteers with the Queen’s Own Dorset Yeomanry, they were posted successively to Norfolk, Egypt and then Gallipoli. Stanley subsequently joined the Imperial Camel Corps and served in the Nile Valley, the Western Desert and Palestine, while Bertram – the eldest and the only survivor – became an officer in the Royal Garrison Artillery and moved to the Western Front, straight into the mud of Passchendaele.

For much of 1915 Stanley kept a diary, unusual among contemporary accounts for its comprehensive coverage of their time in Norfolk – training while waiting for an expected invasion – and their voyage to Egypt with the horses. It continues through their first few months in Egypt and their move to Gallipoli, ending with the heroic but disastrous assault on Scimitar Hill on 21 August and its aftermath. The brothers’ letters home contrast with the diary’s vivid vignettes in their often expansive descriptions of widely differing theatres of war. Their writings are illustrated as far as possible with their own photographs, and set in context for readers unfamiliar with the geographical or historical background to each campaign.