Salonika Campaign Society, 1915-1918

Can you help the Society’s AGM go online?

On Saturday October 1^st, the Society is holding its Annual General Meeting. The location, at the Civil Service Club is close to the Cenotaph where earlier in the day a short service of commemoration will be held. We hope that you will be able to travel to London to join us.

However, for many, making such a journey is not possible. Train and other travel issues, cost, travelling times, domestic/work responsibilities, or even continuing worries about COVID may make the trip unfeasible for many. Which is a shame as we would like as many as possible to participate in the AGM.

To that end, we have been exploring ways in which we could live stream, or web cast, the meeting. Our research shows that it would come at a cost – if done professionally. That cost is not extortionate – after all, a camera operator must earn a living, pay for equipment, and so on – but the likely cost is too high for a small society such as ours.

However, if we were to manage things ourselves, using one of the many free or low-cost services (for example, streaming live via Facebook) turning the AGM into an online event becomes much more of a possibility.

We are therefore throwing the net out to members and asking for help. Do you have experience in this area? Are you technically minded, willing to travel to London, and able to set up a streamed event? Do you have a friend, son, daughter, grandchild, niece or nephew who could help out?

If so, do please get in touch by emailing us at scswebeditor@gmail.com to discuss things in more detail. We would of course help to meet any necessary travel and other expenses.

Thanks for taking the time to read this and, with luck, we will meet each other both in person and online at the AGM.

Featured image by JB_Home from Pixabay

Would you like to write an article for ‘The New Mosquito’ ?

I always look forward to the thump of the society’s journal, The New Mosquito, falling through the letter box onto the floor beneath. I also look forward to the tactile pleasure of holding a printed publication and reading with more leisure and a slower pace than I tend to do with online materials.

It may be that you have something that you would like to share, via the journal, with fellow members of the society. Perhaps you have a story of a relative who served in Salonika, results of research, or letters and photographs from the time. If so, we would be delighted to hear from you and, to help the process, we have put together a simple webpage which you can find here. We look forward to hearing from you!

The very first *New Mosquito* of April 2000 and, twenty years later, Issue 41

Remembering William Hernaman

On a recent visit to Walthamstow I took a look at the Vestry House Museum. A former workhouse – built in 1730 – it has a chilling message over the front door: If any would not work neither should he eat. Well, it was chilling for this retired gentleman! Anyway, the building has changed use many times since then – including a spell as the armoury for the local volunteers – but is now the museum for the local area, under the care of Waltham Forest Council, for which it is also the archive and local study area.

SCS Annual General Meeting 2022

Recently published in the latest edition of ‘The New Mosquito’, here are details of the SCS Annual Meeting 2022 and also, as it’s easy to misplace, a copy of the registration form.

scs-annual-meeting-2022-form Download

Who Do We Think He Was?

Thursday saw the start of the latest series of the popular BBC TV family history programme, Who Do You Think You Are? which will be repeated tomorrow, Tuesday. The first subject was comedian and presenter, Sue Perkins and there was – in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment – the very briefest mention of the Salonika campaign.

RIP Harlequin

I’ve just come across this fascinating story related to 9/Border Regiment (Pioneers), although it pre-dates their time with the BSF (22nd Division):

Rick Stein in Thessaloniki, tonight at 8pm on BBC4

So, nothing about the campaign, but a reminder of what a great city it is to visit and what great food you can get there!

On International Dance Day …

… these photos from the IWM’s incomparable online collections immediately sprang to mind to share with you:

Gas! 22 April 1915

Thursday, 22 April, was a beautiful spring day: warm, sunny, with a faint breeze. German guns shelled French and Canadian trenches throughout the morning but fell silent in the afternoon. The brief period of peace suddenly ended at 4:00 p.m. when the Germans unleashed a violent bombardment, first on the salient and then gradually extending to nearby roads and Ypres, turning the town into a flaming inferno and causing its citizens to flee. An hour later an ominous greenish-yellow wall of fumes was seen drifting slowly across no-man’s-land toward the French line.
Cassar, G.H. (2014), Trial By Gas – The British Army at the Second Battle of Ypres; Potomac Press, University of Nebraska Press.

Happy Birthday, Muffin!

Photograph of Muffin, Adoption Star of the Redwings Horse Sanctuary, and adopted mule of the Salonika Campaign Society.

Today, Redwings Adoption Star (Ret’d) Muffin celebrates his 34th birthday. Muffin has been an Honorary member of the SCS – with the special membership number ‘Salonika 4’ – since the centenary, so we send him very best wishes for his special day.