HG12/30/12

Letter to Henry Hugh Longuet Longuet-Higgins from his aunt Mildred Sampson, nee Johnson. Sent from Grahamstown, South Africa

Recieved 22 Aug 1916

From: 1916 To: 1916

Shocked to hear of Godfrey's death from Hugh [Godfrey Wiglesworth, cousin of Hugh, son of Edith, nee Longuet-Higgins]. Comments about the waste of young lives in this war. Harold [writer's youngest son] was in the forward push started by the British on July 1 with all his friends. They were ordered to walk across open space to take a German trench and were shot at as they advanced. Harold fell with a badly injured right arm and managed to roll into a shell hole where he lay for several hours watching his comrades being shot down. The Germans trained their guns on the wounded and shot them dead. The whole regment was destroyed, including the colonel. Harold is again in hospital - he is very ill with septic poisoning from the shrapnel and his nerves shattered at the awful sights he has witnessed. A letter last week from 'the kind lady who mothers him' reports that he is getting on slowly, the anxiety that he will lose his arm is over and that he had been wheeled into the garden for the first time that day. Sees in the paper that second son, Basil has been gazetted a medical captain in the South African Medical Corps. 'Everything is very sad here ... treasured sons are being lost by nearly everyone.' Comments about the health of Hugh's father. Comment about Kathleen wanting to come out to South Africa to teach History, and bring her friend to teach art.

item

Longuet-Higgins, Henry Hugh Longuet,
Sampson, Mildred Alice Longuet,
Sampson, Harold,
Wiglesworth, Godfrey,
Sampson, Basil,
Longuet-Higgins, Kathleen,
Longuet-Higgins, Henry Longuet

family correspondence, World War One, South Africa, DEATH, illness, teaching, injury