Produced by David Clarke, Jeannie Howse and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) * * * * * +-----------------------------------------------------------+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. For | | a complete list, please see the end of this document. | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+ * * * * * LETTERS OF LIEUT.-COLONEL GEORGE BRENTON LAURIE [Illustration: (signed) George Brenton Laurie] For Private Circulation LETTERS OF Lt.-Col. GEORGE BRENTON LAURIE (Commanding 1st Battn. Royal Irish Rifles) Dated NOVEMBER 4th, 1914-MARCH 11th, 1915 EDITED BY FLORENCE VERE-LAURIE _Printed by_ GALE & POLDEN, LTD Wellington Works, Aldershot 1921 TO HALIBURTON, BLANCHE, AND SYDNEY. MY DEAR CHILDREN, I dedicate this little volume to you in memory of your father, who, as you know, fell on March 12th, 1915, in the Battle of Neuve Chapelle. These Letters, which were written to me from France during the first winter of the World War, do not in any way pretend to literary attainment; they are just the simple letters of a soldier recording as a diary the daily doings of his regiment at the front. Often were they penned under great difficulties, and many a time under a rain of fire. The accounts of the awful loss of life and the discomforts experienced, both by officers and men unused to such severe climatic conditions, are sometimes heart-rending, and they make the reading sad. Touches, however, of his natural cheerfulness relieve the greyness of the situation, and at times one can almost hear the lightheartedness of a schoolboy speaking. Your father cared for his regiment as a father cares for his child, and was beloved by it. He obtained his commission in 1885 at 18 years of age, and was, curiously enough, the last officer to enter the British Army with the rank of a full Lieutenant. Had he lived till the following September, he would have been 30 years in the Royal Irish Rifles.