Schwarzer Tag des deutschen Heeres

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"The black day of the German Army".....     General Erich Ludendorff, describing the events of the 8th of August 1918, the first day of the Battle of Amiens, which ultimately lead to the end of the First World War. On the first day of the offensive Allied troops pushed some 7 miles into German territory, making it one of the greatest single day advances of the war. It is reputed that when General Ludendorff uttered the above words he was not referring to the 30000 German soldiers who had been killed that day, nor the 18000 who surrendered or were captured  by the Allied forces, but to the crushing blow to the morale of the German army. 

My great grandfather fought in this battle with the 10th Battalion of the A.I.F. He was wounded two days later on the 10th at Harbonnieres, suffering for the second time, a gunshot wound to the head. He was evacuated and hospitalised and while he eventually fully recovered, he did not return to the trenches before the Armistice was signed three months later and was amongst the last troops home in September 1919.  

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Around the time of my 13th birthday, one of my great aunts, the custodian of all things family, handed me  a plain white sack and a battered Roses chocolate box.  "Well, It must be your turn to look after these now."  In the sack was his uniform and in the chocolate box, a small collection of memorabilia; his payroll book & sergeant's roll call, a service medal, a doily in the 10th's colours embossed with - "Souvenir, Salisbury Plains England, 10th Battalion, Love To Mother and Father from Otto, 1916", a postcard sent home from Capetown in 1916, the card of a Parisian Restaurant, the addresses of two Glaswegian nurses on a leaf of YMCA note paper, two newspaper cuttings, an Anzac Day program from 1923, a thin book detailing the 10th's actions during the war, and some postcards. 

Of these items it is the postcards which fascinate me the most. Not for what is written on them, as excepting one, where the intended recipient's name and address has been completed, all are completely blank. No, the reason they captive me whenever I pick one up and look at it, is that they once belonged to German soldiers. 

Who had they belonged to? Where and how did they come to be in the possession of my great grandfather? Why did he keep them till the day he died? 

I can only assume that they haunted my great grandfather as they haunt me now. 

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Schwarzer Tag des deutschen Heeres