Letters from Harry North to his sister Alice during active service 1916 to 1918
Alison and Alan Johnson
The letters in this book were written by Harry North to his sister Alice in Lincoln while he was in the British Army between November 1915 and December 1918. They show the change from excited new recruit, to the bitter experience of life at the Front in France and Belgium, through hospitalisation after being wounded, followed by training other soldiers in the use of machine guns, and to his duties after the end of the war. In his letter of 16 March 1917, he writes “I wish I was coming up Spring Hill again. I wouldn’t mind if the buzzer was blowing and the lights going out.”
Alan Johnson is Harry’s great nephew. The letters came into Alan and Alison’s possession when Kath Johnson, Alan’s mother, moved into sheltered housing in Rasen Lane, Lincoln. We wanted to share the experiences that he told his sister about.
