Battlefield horror is recalled in new book

Battlefield horror is recalled in new book

5 March 2014

KILLYLEAGH library will be the venue for a fascinating lunchtime talk on a gunner officer’s experiences during the First World War later this month.

The March 21 talk entitled, Scarce Heard Amid The Guns: The experiences of a Gunner officer in the First World War, will be given by Major John Potter.

He will recount the graphic story of his father, Lieutenant Colonel Claud Potter’s battlefield experiences as a gunner officer in the First World War.

Colonel Potter fought in every major battle and served with the 36th (Ulster) Division, and the account of battle from the front line is drawn from his diary and letters home which have been carefully edited by his son.

The book is illustrated by sketch maps of the front line and the location of the batteries of guns. Photographs depict the battlefield, then and now.

Major Potter explained his father was a regular soldier and went to war in 1914 in France, serving right through until October 1918 when he was finally wounded and had to be sent home.

“My father kept a diary, quite a detailed diary in fact which I have. It runs to about five volumes. He left behind a very detailed account of his war experiences and his mother kept all the letters he wrote to her,” he explained.

“The letters number around 80 which I also have. I used the diaries and the letters to write an account of my father’s experiences in the Great War which is graphic in places.”

Major Potter revealed his father was eventually badly wounded in the leg, but was also hit by stray shells and bits of shells a number of times and had “quite a charmed life.”

The author continued: “It was only at the very end when his luck ran out and he was wounded, which resulted in him having to be sent home.”

Major Potter’s new book runs to some 140 pages and he has described the publication as an invaluable resource for people.

He continued: “My father saw the war from two points of view. For his first few months he was a Staff Officer but that did not mean that he wasn’t in the war.

“He went almost daily up into the trenches to see what was happening and then in July 1917 he transferred to the Ulster Division with whom he spent the remainder of the war.”

Major Potter said his father was involved in some way or other with every major battle field throughout the war, of which he left detailed accounts.

Commenting on the new book, Colonel John Steele, President of the Royal Artillery Association in Northern Ireland, said in his diary entries and letters, “Potter holds nothing back which helps to explain why they are so vivid and immediate.”

Admission to the talk in Killyleagh library on March 21 which starts at 1.15pm is free. For further details contact the library on (028) 4482 8407 or email killyleagh.library@librariesni.org.uk.