'Fighting Spirit' - Patrolling and Raiding with the West Yorks by Fraser Skirrow

[@TheSonicfrog]

Spectacular visuals! Love the current battleground photos, WWI aerial photos, maps, absolutely outstanding. Great photos of the soldiers involved as well. Wonderful comment about live and let live on both sides, indeed.

[@JHamList]

Absolutely fascinating presentation, really brings the patrol reports to life.

[@ramseygreen808]

Superb talk, thank you!

[@Mush179]

I was with the ta West Yorkshire in Leeds 🇬🇧.👍

[@shoofly529]

@33:00, "The CO puts him straight in with C Company...with the other lunitics..." Or who said trench raiding can't be fun!😀

[@naguerea]

as a poststman in selby, then 9 years in the royal signals, Cirta Cito.

[@MackinOz]

Surely the introductory photo is of the Headquarters platoon of the company? When I was in the army a company was more than 100 men and nowhere near that officer heavy. What's the story?

[@Vegas_Des]

What is the scale of the map, what is the distance between each square?

[@seanmccann8368]

Can't help wondering if Fraser Skirrow is a relative of Geoffrey Skirrow?

[@wsam.1984]

What's the name of the song in the beginning?

[@shoofly529]

Mademoiselle from Armentières, Link below with lyrics kzbin.info/www/bejne/e6XMqqGkermCoq8si=Kc59CBIswK3os5W1

[@FilipDePreter]

Belgium here. Could somebody please explain what 2/5th actually means?

[@lovablesnowman]

It's just the name of the unit. So in this case I think they're the 2nd battalion in the 5th brigade.

[@honeyroastpenut]

It's to do with the pre-war structure of Regiments: Regular, Special Reserve and Territorial Force. A regiment might have a structure like this: 1st and 2nd Bn regulars, 3rd Special Reserve, 4th - 8th Territorial Forces. As the territorials mobilised and went to war, the regiment formed a Cadre and recruited to replace the Battalion. So the pre-war 5th (TF) Bn would have marched to war as the 1/5th, and its replacement formed as 2/5th. The Hampshires had, for example, 6 TF Battalions at the start of the war, but raised a further 6 Service Battalions from these during the war (i.e 4th - 9th Bns, each with a 1st, 2nd & 3rd Battalion). Just to confuse things, it also raised a further 7 Service Bns, numbered 10th - 16th Bn. Presumably this was because things were getting confusing with the numbering.