Frithville to Fricourt – and Back

Description

The story of one private soldier from Frithville, Lincolnshire compiled from family records, letters, diaries, official histories, battlefield visits and a few remembered tales from the man himself.  Just 18 when war was declared.  His war included enlisting in the 8^th Lincolns, fighting in Loos, the Somme, Ypres, Passchendale being seconded to the North Staffs regiment, wounded, being awarded the Military Medal and returning to fight at The Aisme, Selle, Sambre and Malplaquet battles.

There must be something extraordinary about anyone who enlisted in 1914 and saw action in all the major campaigns on the western front however this is not so much a war story but a reflection of how this war and its aftermath played out in the context of very ordinary rural family life that would have been familiar to thousands of others.

George Bell Jnr, born in Boston in the 1920s, still lives in the area. Whilst his father spoke little of his 1914-19 service, George has pieced the story together from what was said together with a cameo collection of memorabilia he and the wider family have been fortunate still to have.

This is his second book, the first Living the Lincolnshire Life being an autobiographical ‘pick and mix’ of his own life and is also available through this site.