Edward Thomas and the Shot That Unleashed Hell in Europe

August 22nd, 1914, on a road near Casteau in Belgium, Ernest Edward Thomas of the 4th Irish Royal Dragoon Guards raised his rifle, steadied his breath, and changed history forever. 

The Drummer and Cavalryman had just fired Europe's first shot of World War 1.

Join us as we tell his story, explain his connection with the history of Brighton and The Duke of York's Picturehouse, and we'll describe that fateful shot, taken the day before the first Battle of Mons.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_05 0:07

Honourable mentions. Hello, listener. How are you? Welcome back to another exciting episode of your favourites podcast. Now before I introduce Neil today, I've got a quick question for you, listener. Let's see if you know the answer to this, and then we'll ask Neil the same question and see whether he can answer it. I bet you'll win. But where is the oldest purpose built cinema in continuous use in the UK? That's today's question to start our podcast of Honourable mentions. Let's see if he's there, shall we, boys and girls?

SPEAKER_01 0:50

Hello, Neil. Hello, Stephen. How are you? I'm alright. Thank you very much so much. Okay? Yeah, I'm good.

SPEAKER_05 0:56

Me and the listener have been talking before you joined us, and I've got a question that the listener probably has already frantically googled.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

Hmm.

SPEAKER_05 1:07

But the question is, Neil, see if you can answer this. Where is the oldest purpose-built cinema in continuous use in the UK?

SPEAKER_01 1:15

Ah, I know this.

SPEAKER_05 1:17

Do you?

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:18

What's the answer, please?

SPEAKER_02 1:20

Um.

SPEAKER_05 1:23

Oh no. No. But it is coastal.

SPEAKER_01 1:28

Is it? Birmingham.

SPEAKER_05 1:29

By coastal I mean on the coast of the UK.

SPEAKER_01 1:32

Well there's a river that goes through Birmingham's.

SPEAKER_05 1:33

And there are many canals and the old chestnut goes. There are more canals in Birmingham than there are in Venice. But that's not for the purpose of the question. We're talking coastal here, Neil. We're talking rimming the whole of the UK.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

And looking like doing that, wouldn't you, Phil?

SPEAKER_05 1:52

And looking for towns and cities that may host the oldest purpose-built cinema in continuous use.

SPEAKER_01 2:00

Scarborough.

SPEAKER_05 2:01

No. The answer's Brighton.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Oh, we're far off then. Brighton.

SPEAKER_05 2:08

Oh, well done. Yes. It's Brighton, of course, you silly nonsense. Thank you. The Duke of York's picture house in Brighton's Picture House. Picturehouse. Yeah. In Brighton. It opened in 1910. Wow. So about ten minutes past seven in the evening. Yeah. And to this day it retains a unique historical charm that makes it a centrepiece of the city's cultural life. Now, for anyone who doesn't live in the UK, you probably wouldn't appreciate the cultural pull of a city like Brighton. I think outside London, they call it London by the Sea. It's got lots of nightlife, lots of vibrant things going on in Brighton, wouldn't you say, Neil?

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Yes, I would say that I would agree with you on that one, Stephen. Yes.

SPEAKER_05 2:55

The Duke of York's picture house in Brighton features a striking ornate Edwardian facade of archways, columns, balconies, alcoves, and windows. All topped with a pair of twenty foot tall Kan dancers legs in black and white striped stockings.

SPEAKER_02 3:15

Really?

SPEAKER_05 3:15

Yeah. Which have become a much loved local landmark. The sole of one black high heel shoe kicks up against the sky while the other leg curls down over the cream coloured facade of the building.

SPEAKER_01 3:29

Well, I've never seen that. Can you picture that? I'm trying to picture some kankan legs up in the air, yeah. Do you know what?

SPEAKER_05 3:36

I've been to Brighton numerous times, I don't think I've ever seen it either. The legs were acquired in nineteen eleven.

SPEAKER_02 3:42

Right.

SPEAKER_05 3:43

So it opened in nineteen ten, and one minute later they acquired these legs at nineteen eleven. I thought this building needs a pair of legs took on the top. They got them from a closed theatre in Oxford, and they have been an inseparable part of Brighton's skyline ever since. Hence the phrase, nice legs, what time do they open? But I'm not here to talk with you about that, Neil. That was all a bit of a preamble. Okay. I'm not even here to talk with you about Edwardian picture houses in the grand baroque style.

SPEAKER_01 4:12

For that. I mean oh okay.

SPEAKER_05 4:14

You might be disappointed with that, Neil, because I'm where your interests lie, isn't it? But my interest lies in the man employed as the theatre's commissionaire. What was a commissionaire, please?

SPEAKER_01 4:29

Um it was some of the office.

SPEAKER_05 4:32

I'm bored waiting now. In the early 20th century, a cinema commissionaire was the face of the picture house. Dressed in a cinema. Dressed in an elaborate military-style uniform, he was responsible for setting a tone of luxury, order, and safety for the public.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

So a steward then.

SPEAKER_05 4:50

He was a bit more than that, as we'll discover. At a grand venue like the Duke of York's, the commissionaire was much more than a security guard. You see, that was the very next line. He was a ceremonial figure who bridged the gap between the real world and the dream world within.

SPEAKER_04 5:07

Oh.

SPEAKER_05 5:08

Because let's not forget at the start of the twentieth century, around 1910, and that sort of time, cinema was brand spanking new. This is a time when you had people running out screaming because a train was coming towards them on the screen in black and white and crackly with no noise whatsoever.

SPEAKER_01 5:26

But it was new technology.

SPEAKER_05 5:27

It was new technology. Yes. The commissioner stood at the entrance to greet patrons in his grand uniform, complete with gold braiding, brass buttons, and often military medals. Alright. And he served to reassure the public that the cinema was a respectable, high class establishment. His role included crowd management whenever there was a full house.

SPEAKER_02 5:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 5:52

Because again, there was no television. There was no other cinemas. These weren't multiplexes, these were single screen cinemas.

SPEAKER_01 6:02

No popcorn, I should think.

SPEAKER_05 6:03

They had a state and kidney pie.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 6:06

Or lamb's entrails and Yeah, probably sweetbreads.

SPEAKER_01 6:11

Sweetbreads and gravy or something.

SPEAKER_05 6:13

What's the Monty Python one? Wolf nipple chips.

SPEAKER_01 6:16

Mm.

SPEAKER_05 6:16

Lots of lot of spleens, that sort of stuff. Yeah. He checked the tickets and protected the honour of the ladies.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Ah, so he he closed the back row off.

SPEAKER_05 6:27

Well, inside the commissioner was ultimate authority on behaviour. So this may be where you were going there, Neil. If you were talking too loudly, heckling the screen, or being overly affectionate in the dark, it was within the commissioner's rights to hoike you out of your seat and physically scorch you from the building.

SPEAKER_01 6:48

Oh, so if you were doing that it it'd literally pull you off and pull you out.

SPEAKER_05 6:52

Not literally. Well, it pull you off your seat.

SPEAKER_01 6:56

Yes, that's what I meant.

SPEAKER_05 6:57

And then throw you outside, yes.

SPEAKER_01 6:58

Yes, I was that's what I was saying.

SPEAKER_05 7:00

Was it? Yeah, it wasn't an additional service. And it but it may have been in some cinemas.

SPEAKER_01 7:04

I was all about pulling you off your seat.

SPEAKER_05 7:07

Yeah. This is why most commissioners were ex-servicemen. Their military background gave them the discipline and command presence needed to handle large crowds, delicate situations, and a bit of the old rough and tumble.

SPEAKER_04 7:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 7:20

Not like today's Mambi Pambies with their popcorn and their brush that comes along after you to sweep up. These guys were in there.

SPEAKER_03 7:27

You were messing about, figured out you're gonna get back in the head.

SPEAKER_05 7:32

Yeah, probably not unconscious for you were sent out. Like you said, you were pulled off and then thrown out.

SPEAKER_02 7:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 7:40

The uniform was intentionally designed to look like an army officer's to command instant respect from the public. After being discharged from the army in nineteen twenty-three, so this is nearly twenty five past seven now.

SPEAKER_02 7:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 7:56

A man called Ernest Edward Thomas settled in Brighton with his wife, Mabel, and it was he who took a job as head commissioner at the Duke of York's picture house, where, with his sharp humour, smart uniform, and a chestful of military medals, he became somewhat of a local celebrity, due in no small part to the matter of his wartime heroics.

SPEAKER_02 8:21

Ooh, interesting.

SPEAKER_05 8:23

That may be where we're going next. Shall we see? Please. Born in the Lambeth Battersea area of London on December the sixteenth, eighteen eighty-four.

SPEAKER_02 8:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 8:34

To parents who were either Irish or of Irish descent, one way or the other. We're not sure. We just don't know.

SPEAKER_01 8:40

Got Irish in them.

SPEAKER_05 8:41

They got Irish in them. Ernest was known to his family and friends simply as Tom.

SPEAKER_01 8:47

Tom Thomas. Because of his surname. Because of his surname, he was Tommy Thomas. Tom, Tom, Tommy Thomas. Makes sense. Otherwise I'd have thought what the hell they're calling him Tom for.

SPEAKER_05 8:55

Tom Thomas. He enlisted for a military career as a drummer boy in the Royal Horse Artillery, and at the age of what did he find himself serving in India? How old do you think? Fourteen. No.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

Oh.

SPEAKER_05 9:13

Fourteen. At the age of just fourteen he found himself serving in India.

SPEAKER_01 9:19

I think I just said fourteen.

SPEAKER_05 9:21

I think you said you're fine if we rewind the tape, Neil. You said forty-two. You might have thought you said fourteen. Ten years Pardon? I think. Right. Ten years later. Ten years later in nineteen oh eight. Yeah. So we've just come up to ten past seven now. He transferred to the fourth Royal Irish Dragoon Guards.

SPEAKER_01 9:46

Ah, the Dragoons.

SPEAKER_05 9:48

A unit of the British Army's regular cavalry.

SPEAKER_02 9:52

Yeah. Cavalry. That's what they spoke back then.

SPEAKER_05 9:55

Cavalry?

SPEAKER_02 9:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 9:57

Now, Neil, did you receive a photograph that I sent to you?

SPEAKER_01 10:01

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 10:02

Did you have a good look at it?

SPEAKER_01 10:04

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 10:05

Would you like to describe that photograph now to the listener who should still be listening?

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Hello, listener. Yeah, it's a man in uniform, and it looks like a soldier with some soldier chums sat around him, and he looks a very tall gentleman. He looks quite taller than everybody else in the picture. And there's a group of people in the but this chap looks very stern, very mustached chap with a white strap around his shoulders.

SPEAKER_05 10:30

Very stern, very mustache. He's got a magnificent moustache.

SPEAKER_01 10:33

Yeah, it has got a magnificent moustache.

SPEAKER_05 10:36

Standing rather ramrod straight, isn't he?

SPEAKER_01 10:38

Yes, he is, and everyone else seems a bit slouched.

SPEAKER_05 10:41

Why does everyone else seem a bit slouched though?

SPEAKER_01 10:44

Uh because they're carrying they've got large instruments. Oh there's bagpipes I can see. There's um there's uh there's yeah, there's all sorts of instruments. There's a man on his knees. There you go. Is that an instrument that someone's playing his head?

SPEAKER_05 10:57

Can you play? I can play a man on his knees. I bet you can, you dirty boy.

unknown 11:02

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 11:03

But are they brass instruments that which is you're referring to?

SPEAKER_01 11:06

There is brass instruments there, yes, and there is definitely bagpipes.

SPEAKER_05 11:10

Well, that was beautifully described, wasn't it, listener? I hope you've got the image in your head now of what Neil is describing.

SPEAKER_01 11:17

That gentleman If anybody if anybody wants me to describe any of their pictures, I'm more than happy to do so.

SPEAKER_05 11:22

For a small fee?

SPEAKER_01 11:23

No, I'll do it for free.

SPEAKER_05 11:25

Oh, well done. The gentleman to wit you refer at the centre of that image, who's the tall ramrod straight chap with the cap on.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

Yeah, he looks very, very stern and looking straight at the camera, but the ones seemed a bit more relaxed and smiley.

SPEAKER_05 11:40

He's the one with the rather magnificent mustache.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

It was a mustache, a bit like a Tom Sellick.

SPEAKER_05 11:45

It's a very good mustache, isn't it? That is Ernest Edward Thomas. Is it Tom Boy? That's our boy. Yeah. So obviously, by taking a clue of the instruments that these fellows have.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

He looks older than fourteen.

SPEAKER_05 12:01

Well it would have been 'cause it was ten years later that he left, so that would have been probably he was twenty four when he left.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

I'd have been impressive if I could have brought a mustache at fourteen like that.

SPEAKER_05 12:10

Well, in his early twenties, probably, I'd imagine. But they all have rather magnificent mustaches then, didn't they? Despite the Royal Irish title, the regiment recruited from across the UK. So there were all Irish peoples or Irish people of Irish descent. However, it maintained a strong Irish identity symbolised by its badge of the heart and crown and the motto Quisperabit. Sorry? Quisparabit. Quis separabit.

SPEAKER_01 12:45

Oh your furniture's floating in the background. How you done that?

SPEAKER_05 12:50

It wasn't a magic incantation. It was your Latin. Oh, okay. Perfectly pronounced probably. I wouldn't know.

SPEAKER_01 12:59

It would sound very good. I would have been convinced.

SPEAKER_05 13:01

It means who shall separate us.

SPEAKER_01 13:04

Exactly.

SPEAKER_05 13:04

Quiseparabit. Hmm. Well done. Who shall separate us? Come from the time from when they invented super glue.

SPEAKER_02 13:12

Oh, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 13:14

And obviously they they were trying to talk to some Latins who had got themselves stuck to some Irish, and that was the language they were trying to use. And of course you know, as you're about to tell me, Neil, that it's also featured on the coat of arms of Northern Ireland and is the motto for the Order of St. Patrick. What's the Gaelic Irish for the Order of St. Patrick, Neil, please, as you're your multilinguist?

SPEAKER_02 13:38

Uh it will be Order of St. Patrick.

SPEAKER_05 13:41

Thank you. Thank you. If that is Order of St. Patrick. The Order of St Patrick.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 13:48

Around 1908, so we're getting closer to ten past seven again. The regiment was stationed in Southifrica.

SPEAKER_01 13:57

Socifica? But I'm I don't like your attitude.

SPEAKER_05 14:00

What's that South African for? Because I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 14:03

I don't like your attitude.

SPEAKER_05 14:04

Is it?

SPEAKER_01 14:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 14:06

Okay. Alright. Sorry.

SPEAKER_01 14:08

Alright.

SPEAKER_05 14:09

Can I continue there? Around 1908, the regiment was stationed in South Africa, specifically Middleburg.

SPEAKER_01 14:16

That's the best of the Berg, something.

SPEAKER_05 14:17

Probably in the middle somewhere.

SPEAKER_01 14:19

Yeah. Well there's there's Top Burg and Bottom Burg, and then you've got Middleburg.

SPEAKER_05 14:23

As long as it's better than Middlesbrough.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

Yeah. Northampton. Northampton, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 14:29

As part of the post-Bor War Garrison. That's what they were doing there. They were po part of the post-Bor War garrison. Having previously been stationed in India Roar Pindi and the Mudra until 1904. It's been around a bit, then. This unit has, hasn't it? Yeah. By late 1908 or early 1909, we're not sure. Round about that vicinity. Within those sixty seconds, the regiment returned to the British Isles and were initially stationed at Brighton in the Preston barracks. Good old Blighter. Later, the regiment moved on to Tidworth in Wiltshire, where they would remain until the outbreak of World War One in 1914, quarter past seven. They were a heavy cavalry unit, and the years leading up to nineteen fourteen were spent in rigorous peacetime training, perfecting horsemanship, sword drills, and rifle drills. Yes, and rifle marksmanship.

SPEAKER_01 15:34

Is that what we we've got power drills these days?

SPEAKER_05 15:37

Yes. When I say sword drills, Neil, I'm not on about boring into a piece of wood, although you could bore into a solid brick wall, you could. But anyway, sword drills.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

You could bore a hearse into wooden horse, you could.

SPEAKER_05 15:51

Sword drills were them charging around with their swords going cha-cha- cha-cha-ching ching ching cha-ching. That's how the sword sounded when they clashed.

SPEAKER_01 16:03

Oh, that was nice.

SPEAKER_05 16:04

So that's what they were doing. All very useful stuff, of course, for the outbreak of the First World War.

SPEAKER_02 16:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 16:12

Nicknamed the Donkey Wallopers by the regular army. That's what they call them.

SPEAKER_01 16:19

So it sounds like a euphemism. Where's Joezo gone?

SPEAKER_05 16:26

Nicknamed the Donkey Wallopers by the regular army, a heavy cavalry unit consisted of heavily armoured soldiers on large, powerful horses.

SPEAKER_02 16:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 16:37

Designed to deliver devastating shock charges to break enemy formations using lances, swords, or maces for impact.

SPEAKER_01 16:47

So these boys are the kiddies, aren't they?

SPEAKER_05 16:49

Well they're pretty useful in the wide open green lush and not a tall shooty battlefield of the First World War.

SPEAKER_02 16:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 16:57

Very, very useful for that, isn't it? I say, sir. Jerry seems to have machine guns.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

Don't worry. We've got a man on the horse.

SPEAKER_05 17:06

We've got a man on the horse. Tally here Charge boys. As a corporal his rank in 1914, Tom was highly trained and seasoned NCO, non-commissioned officer, NCO, by the time the war began, and he and the fourth Royal Irish Dragoon Guards were in Belgium at the very beginning before any hostilities had broken out. With no idea of the brutal blood soaked years that lay ahead. No, I read a book once.

SPEAKER_01 17:47

Yeah, same works. I read a book once. It was it was called My Life by Bill Clinton. Was it? What yeah, what he knows about my life. I've got no idea, but there you go.

SPEAKER_05 17:57

I was still reading the book that I started a few years ago. Yeah. The caterpillar's still very hungry. But so far he's got through numerous amounts of fruit. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 18:07

Well, that sounds good.

SPEAKER_05 18:08

I haven't finished it yet. It's very long. Takes me a while to read it. Makes me sleepy. I read about also about a man who was on the front line at the Somme before anything ever happened. And in his diary he wrote about how boring it was and how he longed to be transferred out of there to see some action rather than just going around and putting up barbed wire fences and testing them for their strength and resilience. Just shows, didn't it? When we look back now to the Battle of the Somme.

unknown 18:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 18:46

Yeah, I wish I was bored. Yeah, imagine.

SPEAKER_01 18:49

Anyway, folks.

SPEAKER_05 18:51

Yeah, yeah. These guys, right? So the fourth whatever they were, the Donkey Wallopers.

SPEAKER_02 18:58

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_05 18:59

So the the Donkey Wallopers left Southampton on HMS Winnifran at twelve noon on August the fifteenth, nineteen fourteen. Okay. They left Southampton because no one was mad enough to send their boys to war from Northampton.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

Well, you just send them if you want to go to war to Northampton, wouldn't you?

SPEAKER_05 19:19

Yeah, you won't want that as your last sight of Blighty, would you? It wouldn't be very uh encouraging. The boys arrived in Boulogne, France the following day, before moving on to Belgium to face the Germans. Still full of optimism that it all be over by Christmas.

SPEAKER_02 19:41

Yeah, they didn't know.

SPEAKER_05 19:43

They didn't know then. Off they went for their optimism. For the days preceding the 22nd of August 1914, the city of Mon in southern Belgium, baked in sweltering heat that rose up from the roads in a shimmering house.

SPEAKER_01 20:00

Yeah, I like that stuff.

SPEAKER_05 20:02

Can you picture that?

SPEAKER_01 20:03

Yeah, I can. Yeah, you can see it, can you can sort of see images behind it and it's all wiggly squiggly.

SPEAKER_05 20:09

The relentless sun and high temperature caused significant distress to the marching British Expeditionary Force, or the BEF.

SPEAKER_02 20:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 20:19

With loaded backpacks, weapons, and thick itching buttoned up military uniforms. Many legs wobbled, some collapsed altogether, there was sweat, red faces, and grumbling, but there were also veteran soldiers like Corporal Ernest Edward Thomas.

unknown 20:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 20:36

Who were used to even warmer climates and teased the newer recruits, saying this was just a cold spell compared to India.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

Yeah, but it was.

SPEAKER_05 20:45

Yeah, but it was as well.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

Get up, you pansy.

SPEAKER_05 20:48

Is that what he said? Is that your impression?

SPEAKER_01 20:51

That's yeah, that's what I did. Um actor's bit.

SPEAKER_05 20:55

Um can you do acting?

SPEAKER_02 20:57

Yeah, you ready?

SPEAKER_05 20:58

Come on then.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

Get up, you pansy. There you go.

SPEAKER_05 21:03

Yeah, yeah, that's um yeah. Uh yeah, it's okay now, it's a good try. It's a good try. I'll I'll do the acting, you do the translations.

SPEAKER_02 21:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 21:17

Oh here, get up you pansy. That's probably more what it was like.

SPEAKER_02 21:22

That was really good.

SPEAKER_05 21:24

Yeah, see. See, I told you, I I I inhabit the character.

SPEAKER_02 21:29

Yeah, you like being in Mendo you sometimes.

SPEAKER_05 21:31

That's all about. Although August the twenty second dawned from a chilly night, it promised yet another day of punishing heat.

SPEAKER_03 21:43

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_05 21:45

Don't worry, that's the magazine. Spanked on the bottom with a rolled up copy, probably.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

Probably, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 21:51

Tom was part of a reconnaissance patrol from C Squadron sent out in the early hours to scout the area north of the city of Mon.

unknown 22:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 22:01

The sun's low golden rays glistened the hedgerows and illuminated the haystacks in the fields like a peaceful oil painted landscape. Around six thirty AM near the village of Casteaux, Tom was within the shadow of a chateau on the southeast side of the road when a patrol spotted a small group of German cavalrymen heading their way on the road leading to Brussels. Right. Major Tom Bridges gave the order for troops to take cover, dismount, and ready for action, with further troops behind, still mounted and swords drawn, ready to go on his command.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

Wow. That's gotta be quite nerve wracking, isn't it?

SPEAKER_05 22:45

It's gotta be quite nerve wracking, because there they were, nothing's happened in this war yet.

SPEAKER_01 22:49

Exactly.

SPEAKER_05 22:50

And then you've got the Germans on the road riding up, trick trotting along on their horses towards your sword riding.

SPEAKER_01 22:58

Klick kick tick click click click yeah.

SPEAKER_05 23:00

And then you've got Major Tom at the front there, talking to ground control. Tom, this is our Tom now, not Major Tom, but our Tom said that he didn't feel any more real or exciting as their peacetime manoeuvres. Okay. But a small troop of German cavalry soon came into view, trotting leisurely down the road with a lead officer smoking a cigar. His horse had one of those buttons that you press in and then it glows red and you take it out and not your cigar.

SPEAKER_02 23:32

Yeah, probably.

SPEAKER_05 23:34

Suddenly the German officer raised a hand and they halted.

SPEAKER_02 23:38

Ooh.

SPEAKER_05 23:39

Then they turned around and headed back the way they came, having obviously spotted something. Turn around now. And what's that mean in English?

SPEAKER_01 23:50

That means turn around now.

SPEAKER_05 23:52

Oh, thank you. It's very good your uh your command of language. The British commander, Captain Charles Hornbitter was given permission to follow on with the sabre troops and off they galloped. Corporal Thomas's troops ordered to follow on in support. Initially the engagement was jolly good old fashioned cavalry skirmish.

SPEAKER_02 24:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 24:16

With Hormey leading a charge with drawn swords against the German Lances.

SPEAKER_01 24:21

Right. Tally here There we go, chaps. Put the pens and paper away, thou s bring your swords at this time.

SPEAKER_05 24:29

The Germans begin to retreat.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 24:32

Hurrah Take that, Jerry.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

Yeah, go on on your bike.

SPEAKER_05 24:38

But then, when it's a distance, they dismounted from their horses and prepared to open fire. Which just isn't cricketal boy, is it? I mean, what are they doing? Exactly. Tom, who was especially noted for his marksmanship and quick reflexes dismounted and took Ain with his rifle.

unknown 24:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 24:59

Four hundred yards away, which is around three hundred and sixty-six meters now, as you'll know.

SPEAKER_04 25:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 25:04

And in full view, a German officer was mounted on his horse and gesticulating left and right to organize his men who were on foot.

SPEAKER_02 25:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 25:14

What would he have been saying?

SPEAKER_02 25:16

Yavul, Yavul, stand up, you pigs.

SPEAKER_05 25:20

And that's German for Um Okay, chaps.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Get ready, here they come.

SPEAKER_05 25:26

Okay, thank you. Tom held his breath, squeezed the trigger, and felt the recoil in his shoulder. Instantaneously the officer tumbled from his horse like a sack of spuds. Oh, shocked him. It was seven AM. There were no cheers, no time for congratulations, just the smell of cordite in the bright morning air, and in an elongated second of quietness, there was only the sound of Tom's horse breathing hard. Before everything exploded in a cacophony of rifle and machine gun fire, bullets ripped through haystacks, sending plumes of golden stalks upwards into the blue sky as British troops scurried for fresh cover. Yeah. Remarkably, not a single British soldier was injured, and with the small German force retreating, Captain Hornby ordered the withdrawal, taking five prisoners captured during his initial sabre charge back to the village of Casto.

SPEAKER_01 26:30

Let's pull out these nuts and just get back.

SPEAKER_05 26:33

What we did there, Neil, we gave Jerry a jolly bloody nose.

SPEAKER_02 26:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 26:39

This was the very first exchange of fire on European soil at the beginning of the Great War.

SPEAKER_02 26:46

Wow.

SPEAKER_05 26:47

And Corporal Ernest Edward Thomas had fired the very first shot. The first of billions that was to follow.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

I'd imagine there was, yeah. You can still find shells and stuff there, can't you?

unknown 27:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 27:00

They're still they're still digging bits up and like with power field and these buttons and you just can't get your head around it, can you?

SPEAKER_05 27:07

My son went to the battlefields in Flanders and he found a shell, a bullet casing. You're not allowed to take them away with you. You have to report them as it was just laying on the top of the earth.

SPEAKER_01 27:21

Yeah. Just there. Just it's just you just can't get your head around the devastation. The devastation of it all, yeah. And then all men knew what was gonna happen.

SPEAKER_05 27:30

The landscape it looks natural now, because it's all thrown and trees are there and there's grass and plants and it was desolate, wasn't it? But it's changed immeasurably because a lot of hills were like completely blown up and valleys that never existed until bombs were dropped on them and things like that. So though it looks natural, it's not at all. It's all been caused by modern warfare. It's really quite a a thing, isn't it? As with everyone else involved in the skirmish, Tom's war did not end that day. Okay. August twenty-third was wet and thundery, a relief from the intense and stifling heat, but August 23rd brought with it the first battle of Mon. Okay. The British suffered some 1,600 casualties with losses concentrated especially in those units charged with holding the canal. Outnumbering the British three to one, as many as five thousand Germans were killed or wounded in the one-day fight, although they did break through and forced an orderly retreat of the British troops.

SPEAKER_04 28:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 28:38

Now, I I think you're aware of this, but our own grandfather, great grandfather, so our dad's dad's dad was at the Battle of Mon.

SPEAKER_02 28:50

Robert.

SPEAKER_03 28:52

Robert Webb, yeah. He fought in the Battle of Mon.

SPEAKER_05 28:55

I think there is a medal somewhere for that that battle, and he went right through the war. So he was there at the beginning, surviving the battle and promoted to sergeant in November 1915, so precisely quarter past seven. Tom later transferred to the machine gun corps. Right. Now we know Tom also went right through the war because he ended up being appointed commissioner at the cinema in Brighton in 1923.

SPEAKER_02 29:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 29:28

There's not many, I would have thought, who would have fought in the Battle of Mon who went right through and survived the whole thing.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_05 29:37

During one engagement, Tom was mentioned in dispatches for bravery. After a British shelling, he volunteered to crawl out from his trench and into no man's land to inspect the enemy lines. Finding the German soldiers dead, he noticed the superior quality of their boots, and cordy removed them, tied them together, and crawled back to his own lines to distribute the prize to his friends. That's good of him. But the thing is, though, as we know through history again, that just because the British shelled the German trenches doesn't mean that all the Germans inside those trenches were kaput.

SPEAKER_01 30:17

Yeah, they were hidden, weren't they?

SPEAKER_05 30:18

A lot of them were hidden, they went underground into bunkers and things like that. So when we went over the top for the first couple of times, we did that, and then they went over the top and found that the Germans were all well and good, thank you very much, did add all their weaponry machine guns and just mowed them down the machine gun fire. So old Tom here did actually have some courage crawling out into the into the German trench. Yeah. Yeah. You've got by the time he was discharged in 1923, he had earned the military medal, the MM. And the respect of the entire nation. A military medal, in case you're wondering, Neil, were you wondering?

SPEAKER_01 31:01

I was wondering, because I've heard of a Victoria Cross.

SPEAKER_05 31:04

Well, a military medal was the lower ranks equivalent of the MC, the Military Cross, that was awarded to officers showing gallantry in battle.

SPEAKER_02 31:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 31:16

The Victoria Cross is extremely rare, isn't it? That's only for really, really, really exceptionally brave action.

SPEAKER_02 31:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 31:27

I'm not saying these weren't brave men that got the military cross or the MM.

SPEAKER_01 31:32

The VC would be an obsolete item too because of how modern warfare is changing. There's not the opportunity.

SPEAKER_05 31:39

That makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 31:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 31:40

It'd be nice if it was all changing to the point we didn't need it anymore.

SPEAKER_01 31:45

I would be, yes. I'll tell you what, Neil.

SPEAKER_05 31:47

See if you can answer I'll ask you a question, if you can answer this. War. What is it good for?

SPEAKER_01 31:53

Absolutely nothing.

SPEAKER_05 31:55

Say it again.

SPEAKER_01 31:57

Absolutely nothing. Today, Neil.

SPEAKER_05 32:01

Hello, Neil.

SPEAKER_01 32:02

Hello, Stephen.

SPEAKER_05 32:05

Yeah. Today so you've got a bit of time if you've got you got your bicycle.

SPEAKER_02 32:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 32:12

Today, if you were to visit Castot, a memorial plaque stands on the N seven road, marking the very spot where Tom had steadied himself and squeezed the trigger on the first shot of the First World War.

SPEAKER_03 32:26

Really? But wait. You're waiting. I've done it, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 32:33

There are two historical footnotes I need to tell you so I complete the full picture here. Okay. Technically, the first shot fired by British Aligned Forces occurred on August twelfth, nineteen fourteen, in Togo in West Africa, or Togo land, as it was called then. Al Haji Grunchy of the Gold Coast Regiment fired on German led police forces ten days before the encounter at Casteau.

SPEAKER_02 33:05

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 33:06

And the first shot in the Pacific occurred on August fifth, nineteen fourteen, when a battery at Fort Nepian in Australia fired a shot across the bow of the German steamer SS Foltz to prevent it from leaving Port Phillip Bay. Aye, you stay there, Gobba. Yeah, we there you go, pal. But as the Castel Platt will tell you, Ernest Edward Thomas fired most definitely the first shot in what would become a European theatre of war. And in a poetic twist of history, Neil, which we can barely bring ourselves to believe, if you wrote this, you think Yeah, right, but in a poetic twist of history directly across the road from the plaque marking Ernest Edward Thomas's shot is another plaque marking where Canadian troops fired the last shots of the war in nineteen eighteen. Really? So they make us ground. No. No, they didn't go very far. They could have just stayed there and had a punch up, couldn't they? And that would have saved millions of lives.

SPEAKER_01 34:24

They'd just stand outside the road going, Ah, you've got to get smashed your festin. And that's German four. I'll hit you, you Krevit.

SPEAKER_05 34:32

Four years later, and millions and millions of deaths and injury. And we know from our own great-grandfather who was at the Battle of Mother, he died in the nineteen twenties. I was going to say our grandfather died in the twenties or thirties, I think it was the late twenties, as a consequence of the gas he inhaled in the trenches.

SPEAKER_02 35:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 35:04

In the end, all that time later. So you won't find him named on any memorials. But it's not just him, thousands and thousands of men would have been in the same boat.

SPEAKER_01 35:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 35:18

That suffered consequences from their actions who didn't die in action, but died as a result. Which is really quite a terrible thing, isn't it? In February 1939, while on duty at the Duke of York Picture House, Tom fell ill with the temperature, complaining of chest pains, and he was coughing up blood. He died of pneumonia a few days later on February the twenty seventh at the age of fifty-four, and just a few months before the world would be plunged into a second horrific and catastrophic war.

SPEAKER_02 35:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 35:57

He was buried with full military honours at Brightonboro Cemetery in Bear Road, a drummer, a dragoon, a commissionaire, and an absolute legend. Yeah. But what must have been like for the fellows like Tom who went into that war and saw the horrors of the First World War?

SPEAKER_02 36:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 36:18

It was called the Great War, the war's end all wars. Ended in nineteen eighteen, twenty-one years later.

SPEAKER_01 36:26

We're back at it.

SPEAKER_05 36:27

We're back at it. It must have been heartbreaking.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 36:30

So your sons and nephews and and whatever were all going back into what they had to do to go again. Yeah, it must have been absolutely heartbreaking. And we know now as well, really, that the Second World War was a direct consequence of the First World War.

SPEAKER_01 36:49

It was, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 36:49

That's a chewy-note listener, isn't it? There we go. Ernest Edward Thomas, the man who fired the first shot of the First World War, and the man who became a legend in his home city of Brighton. Yeah, we'll be back again. Yeah. We'll be back again next week to have another tale of First World War during do on Honourable Mentions. So please, don't forget, tune in, same time, same place, same channel for Honorable Mentions.

SPEAKER_01 37:23

Please like, share, and post and do whatever it is. Get us out there, baby.

SPEAKER_05 37:28

Thank you very much, Lisa. Thank you very much, Neil.

SPEAKER_01 37:31

That's okay, Stephen. And thank you for your time. It's been very, very emotional.

SPEAKER_05 37:36

It has been very emotional today. And we will see you again. Bye.

SPEAKER_01 37:41

Bye, team. Bye.

SPEAKER_00 37:42

They shall grow not old as we that are left grow old. Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun in the morning, we will remember them. Honorable mentions of tweets by Stephen Webb and is an Uncover Brothers production. The theme tune was written and performed by Pepe and the Bandits. Please subscribe, like share, and leave us a five-star review and listen to Pepe and the Bandits wherever you stream your music. They mingle not with their laughing comrades again. They sit no more familiar tables of phone. They have no lots in our labor of the daytime. They speak beyond English phone. They are listener. It is our duty to never allow their sacrifice to be forgotten or stolen in the name of hatred and division on any side of the political divide. Thank you for listening. If you would like to contact us, you can do so at honourable mentionspod at gmail.com or on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, or message us through Spotify or whatever platform you are using to listen. Thank you, and we'll be back next week.