Four Years on the Western Front, November 1914 - November 1918

by Aubrey Maurice Bowe-Smith

One eye closed, the other staring down the scope of a rifle; Aubrey Smith stood in the firing line and witnessed the harsh realities of war – Anxiety and loss, hope and passion, life and death – always with one eye open.

Aubrey Smith was just one of countless thousands of young men who worked in an office in London when the Great War rumbled across Europe, engulfing the whole world in its path; one of countless thousands who enlisted to fight.

These first-hand accounts follow Smith’s adventures with the London Rifle Brigade. Compiled from the letters he sent home during the war, sometimes quoted verbatim, often woven into a narrative, a more vivid or authentic picture of a soldier’s time during the First World War could hardly be wished for.

From the naïve optimism of enlisting for duty, when all thought the fighting would cease before they’d even had to fire a shot and ‘for weeks we simply played at soldiers’, Smith’s epistolary tales take us through his training, his first foray on the firing line, the Battle of the Ypres, the Battle of Somme, the last blows of the British offensive and the eventual armistice four years later.

Retaining the original language of his pen we can peer through the eyes of a rifleman on the lowest rung of the military ladder. Smith’s fascinating journey into the annals of history is recorded with the intimacy of a private journal, full of detail and humour, joy and sadness.

“We were a very jolly party in those days and we felt we were having a glorified holiday. For one thing, we thought the War would soon be over and that there was only a remote possibility of our being required. As the messenger said to me when I called at the office one day in October: “There are twenty millions fighting together, and, if everyone only fired ten rounds a day, it makes two hundred million cartridges fired daily. Now, sir, how can they keep that up till Christmas?”

Aubrey Smith (1893-1935) served with the London Rifle Brigade throughout the Great War, one of the first Territorial battalions to land in France. He was awarded the Military Medal in August, 1917, and a bar to the Medal in November, 1918. After the war he moved to Hong Kong, becoming a prominent businessman as well as playing the piano in the Shanghai Municipal Orchestra with his wife. He died on the 29th September 1935, aged 42 years.

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Genres: History, World War I

540 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1922

About the author

Aubrey Maurice Bowes-Smith (1893-1935), using the pseudonym 'A Rifleman' wrote 'Four Years on the Western Front; By a Rifleman; Being the Experiences of a Ranker in the London Rifle Brigade, 4th, 3rd and 56th Divisions.'

Recipient of the Military Medal and Bar (MM*).

Reviews

[Philip Edwards · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating

Not a novel. These are the diaries of Aubrey Smith, a First World War private soldier involved in transport of supplies to the front. It provides a remarkable insight of life at the front. It is no surprise to learn that the food was dreadful but it did surprise me to learn that newspapers were delivered to the front promptly. Aubrey himself was a most likeable chap. Whilst on leave his primary concern was to find a family that would let him use their piano. It left me wondering what became of him in later life.

[Stuart Binnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very very good read

It is unusual to read about WW1 from a privates point of view, this book does not give a broad picture of the war but rather the trials and tribulations endured by the ordinary Tommy. It does take some close reading as the book is strewn with spelling errors mostly I imagine from the digitisation process. This is not a blood and guts book but rather a slow and steep decent into the mindset of a WW1 soldier and its over familiarity with death and destruction. All in all an excellent read

[Tony Eade · Rating 5 out of 5]

thoroughly recommend this book it is absolutely packed with day to day detail of almost four years at the front from 1914 to 1918.this book gives the finest insight on the daily lives of aubrey smith and his
comrades in the london rifle brigade. this book is right at the top.- even the occasional typing errors seem to accent the raw and original nature of this so valuable record.

[Graham Mott · Rating 5 out of 5]

One the best memoirs of the Great War and one of the few from the perspective of Other Ranks, rather than officers. However Aubrey Smith was not typical, public school educated and working in an office in The City at the war’s outbreak he was definitely officer material. However for a number of reasons not least loyalty to his comrades he stayed in the ranks, winning a MM (which he fails to mention). After initially serving in a rifle company he spent most of his time with the transport section of the London Rifle Brigade (of which he was very proud) and as such has an interesting perspective. Written shortly after this war and based on letters and a diary he has a very dry amusing and what feels quite modern style and is great company through a long and detailed book. His love for and skill with horses, a large part of his role, shines through. A definitive anecdote to the “war is hell” school he enjoyed his war and found it interesting and fulfilling, despite the privations, loss of friends, boredom and frequent frustrations with army life. Overall an interesting and engaging book which is thoroughly recommended. While reprinted several times original first editions can be found at a reasonable price.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four Years on the Western Front is a very worthwhile read for anyone interested in the military genre. It is quite eloquently written by a soldier who, as the title states, spent four years on the Western Front in World War 1. Smith remained a private throughout that time, although he did make one attempt at applying for a commission. His capacity to write of his expereiences, just four years after the end of the War, gives us an insight into his education and his capacity to collect his thoughts in an orderly manner and then communicate those in writing. Initially Smith was a rifleman in a fighting company in the London Rifle Brigade and then transfers to the Transport Section as a 'driver', in that he rode a horse that, as apart of a pair, pulled a wheeled cart. The book is almost diary style and takes 580 pages to cover the four long years of that war. In those pages we get many insights into a soldier's lot. Interestingly, the theme of resillience is dominant throughout the book. Whether this is the famed English stoicism or particular to Smith, I'm not sure. He doesn't really complain about his life at war but has an acceptance of it that surprised me. That is not to say that he does not express some frustrations. On one occassion he returned home to London on leave, only to be gripped by a desire to get back to the front. It wasn't that he was addicted to the dangers and the privations, but to the people. The only people that he could relate to by this time were those who had shared his experiences, and they were all at the Front. This is not unique and is heard often in war memoirs - soldiers can't wait for the war to end, but when it does they miss the closeness of the relationships that war develops. Aubrey Smith talks about the death and wounding that he was witness to in a detached way and I was left wondering if that was due to the conditioning of being at the front for so long or maybe his way of dealing with the horrors of war. His emotions are revealed in the affection for the horses that he and his comrades worked with, and this again is not uncommon for soldiers who worked with horses either as cavalry or in a transport role. The British Army's obsession with polishing the steelwork of the harness equipment, supposedly to keep rust at bay, is a pet hate that is mentioned often. He comments that the Australians solved the rust problem by painting the steelwork, but the Brits couldn't come at that. Also the removal of blankets during the summer months is one of the Army rules that casued unhappiness and to be honest would cause deep unhappiness in a 21st century army. There is an astonishing level of detail about places and names which is helped by reference to the copious letters that he wrote home, another indication of his literary capacity. His greatest frustration comes at the end of the War, when the system of sending soldiers home, meant that some soldiers who had only been in France a few weeks git higher repatriation priority than someone like himself who had been there almost from the start. At 580 pages it is a long read, and it tends to be repetitive, but not boring. It took me a while to read, but I'm glad that I stuck with it.

[BigJoe470 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seriously it is both funny and tragic - Aubrey did a superb job telling his story

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this to be an interesting autobiography of four years in France during WWI. The author shipped out to France in January 1915, and returned to England in January 1919. He was present at most of the major engagements in which British troops participated and managed to survive the whole process.

Rather surprisingly, he remained a Private throughout the war, although he did try to seek a commission at various points in time. In many respects, this may have enhanced his survival chances because he didn't have to show any leadership or set an example for others to follow. Those who he joined with in 1914, and who did become officers, tended to have a fairly high casualty rate. I found that an interesting lesson from the book.

It seems to me that the author spent four years plastered in mud and with quite a considerable hunger. My abiding memory of the book is how much it rained on the author, how bad the billets were, if any were to be had at all, and how exposed he was for most of the conflict. This, in addition with inadequate rations, must have weakened him considerably. It seems that the troops in his experience relied heavily on food parcels from home. That surprised me because he spent most of the war in supplying rations to the front line troops. There is a disconnect here that doesn't sound quite right.

The other recollection that stayed with me is the constant German shelling of the supply lines. When you read it like that, it becomes a bit sanitised. You have to bear in mind that the supply lines were actually the author. The view created in my mind is that the author spent four years in France, with his horses and mules, being shelled by German artillery or being bombed by German aircraft. It's miraculous that he survived relatively unscathed, but it does give the reader a chance to reflect on the absolute randomness of casualties as we read about his colleagues who were not so fortunate. It's chilling to recall that, of the company that went out to France in 1915, only two remained to return to England in 1919.

This is an awful edition of the book. It's a badly scanned copy of a previous edition that has all manner of typos that really ought to have been edited out. However, it is what it is and we just have to make the best of it. I didn't find the typos quite as distracting as others appear to have done. Instead, I sank into the narrative. The author doesn't pretend to give an account of the progress of the war or any insight into the strategy of it. All he is doing is recounting what he saw and experienced. We should all be thankful that he did just that. It makes it rather a unique book.

[Reginald Neil Squire]

I found this book incredibly detailed considering the author recounted 4 years activities in great detail. Unfortunately this book contained numerous typos which spoilt my reading experience. I can only surmise that this was due to the digitising process? As grandson of a participant of this horrendous war, I was surprised to read that it was possible to serve and survive 4 years at the front. This book is an excellent piece of historical importance.

[Andrew Hubbard · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good book, but I echo the comments of fellow reader Stuart Binnie and a good few others. The experience was spoiled by the sheer number of typographical errors and misspellings. I accept errors occur during digitisation, but surely the finished 'digital' version should be proof read again properly prior to publication?

I loved reading about a typical Tommy on the frontline and his personal experiences - good and bad. It leaves the reader in absolutely no doubt about the horrors of The Great War from a soldiers point of view. It also highlighted to me just how much luck was involved in anyone surviving the carnage on the Western Front.