Dangerous Work

British military labour during the First World War developed from an ad hoc arrangement in 1914 to a Corps in 1918 some 400,000 strong, supported by as many as a million dominon and foreign workers. Records of this contribution to victory are extremely rare. George Weeks wrote down his experience on squares of wallpaper - always a practical man - and what a record it is. The Somme, Passchendaele, Messines Ridge, all feature in George's calm description of his extraordinary experiences. He camped in 'the vast graveyard of Cambrai', he cut down an entire forest for duckboards, he mended the aircraft of Captain Ball VC with dope and canvas! 'Some days the amount of bodies to be re-buried was so numerous that hardly any construction work was accomplished. It wasn't long before the line Regiments in the trenches discovered our Unit was an unarmed, non-combative one, and formed the impression wrongly that we were conscientious objectors. One day this led to some trouble...'