Warm. Dark
Quiet all day.
Fellowes is dished on his majority for a while & all thro’ Mieville. – Will go to an A.T. Co’y instead.
Cockram, Wheeler & I went to see the “Balmorals” – The show of the “good old 51st” (Still stickin’ it)
The Bosche is reported stopped down south by Rheims.
Warm Clear, dark
Had a couple of Americans in to brekker. – One from Chi. & the other from Georgia.
– Went down to SAVY & had lunch with Gus & Bridges (4th D. T.M.s)
– Went to 1st Div. Art. Sports this aft & heard things about myself from Copland. – Confirmed later by Jack Calvin. – #2 section of the Transport & Bridging train (or words to that effect is to be my command.
The hun has reached the Marne again.
Robertson is still tracking the offensive from the May 29 box, now at its high-water mark. German troops crossed the Marne itself near Jaulgonne on May 30 and reached Château-Thierry that same day, the closest any German army had come to Paris since 1914, ending up within about 35 miles of the capital by June 3. The American 3rd Division took up the defence of Château-Thierry on June 1, one day before this entry, and would be followed into the line by the 2nd Division at Belleau Wood on June 6. Robertson writes "again": the Marne had already stopped one German army in 1914, and by June 3 the papers he reads are reporting it had done the same a second time.
The Third Battle of the Aisne, May 29 →
War,, cool breeze. Clear.
The odd shell in the vicinity.
– He put a dud under the coal-pile yesterday.
– Have everything pretty well fixed up so I can pull stakes & shift as soon as I get notice.
They’ve started calling me the Admiral in the mess.
– No news from the MARNE. – General opinion seems to be that we once more have ‘em stopped.
– The Pemberton-Billing, Maud Allan case attracts more attention these days.
The case working its way through the Old Bailey as Robertson writes was one of the strangest news stories of the war on the home front. MP Noel Pemberton-Billing had published an article, "The Cult of the Clitoris," implying the dancer Maud Allan was part of a supposed conspiracy in which German intelligence held a "black book" listing 47,000 highly placed Britons, Margot Asquith among the names Billing raised in court, being blackmailed into treason over their sexual conduct. Allan sued for libel; Pemberton-Billing, defending himself, turned the trial into what one newspaper called a "Mad Hatter's Tea Party," at one point implicating the presiding judge, Mr. Justice Darling, in the same conspiracy. Billing was acquitted on June 4 to a standing ovation in court and a cheering crowd outside, a bizarre episode of wartime paranoia that reached Robertson's own mess a few hundred miles from London.
Warm.
A dud just behind the mess during brekker.
Went down to SAVY with Barclay. – Had lunch with Gus. – Stopped off at AUBIGNY on the way back & visited with Tobin till the Voyageur had gone thru.
–
Warm.
Very little doing. –
Not so many duds in to-day’s allotment. – Closest one hit just behind Wheeler’s hut. –
Warm.
Copland came over this morning. – Notice to shift came by wire at noon. – Borrowed a side-car from McCuaig & took a run back to Div. to report in.
– Saw my fleet at Gauchin Legal & arranged things with Fox. – Will shift back there to-morrow. – Things seem to be a bit unsettled at present, but that is only natural. – We probably have the crocks from the Field Coy’s as far as horses go & no saddle horses at all yet. – Am outfitting my orderly room from here.
The reorganization confirmed on May 17 finally has a name and a shape. On June 2 Robertson hears, secondhand, that his new command will be "the Transport & Bridging train (or words to that effect)"; by June 3 his mess has already started calling him "the Admiral" over it; and on June 6 the notice to shift arrives by wire and he goes to see "my fleet" waiting at Gauchin Legal for the first time. The unit's own war diary has the paperwork: Lieut. C.J. Fox had organised it at Gauchin-le-Gal on May 29 out of horses, wagons and pontoons taken over from the three Field Companies of the 1st Division and the 107th Pioneers (the horses and harness "very poor"), and on June 7 Robertson joined it "from XVIII Corps Expense Stores, Mt. St. Eloy, and took command, relieving Lieut. C.J. Fox." His official Record of Service dates the rank that comes with the new command earlier still: Temporary Captain from May 24, before he'd even heard about the command itself, though he doesn't mention the promotion in his own writing until an October 10 letter to Doris, "Put my third star up about 6 weeks ago," by which point, on the service record's dating, he'd held it for months. The unit's war diary, though, still calls him "Lieut." on June 7 and on August 20, the day his leave began, and gives him "Capt." only from September 9, and "about 6 weeks ago" from October 10 lands in late August, so the third star seems to have gone up in practice around the August 26 telegram that confirmed the captaincy. A July 9 letter to Doris has more: the unit is the Divisional Bridging Unit, its equipment mostly pontoons, hence "the fleet", and he'd left his old rail-head posting just in time. Within twelve hours of his departure, he tells her, a German long-range gun blew the mess kitchen there clean off its foundations.
The Reorganization, Confirmed →Read the July 9, 1918 letter to Doris →Read the October 10, 1918 letter to Doris →The reorganization charted in his 1921 paper →
Cool – Cloudy
Held ORDERLY ROOM for the first time with the unit & MacCarthy was the first man up.
Nothing out of the ordinary doing. –
Stevenson from V Sq’dn dropped in this aft so took a run back to BRYAS with him.
Cool – Windy Pretty near full
Got to bed in time to get up again. – Handed over to Fox & proceeded to SAVY this aft, – preceded by 1 N.C.O. & 7 sprs. from each Bn, 1st C.E. Bde.
Like getting back home again almost. – Very nice little mess with a bunch of ordnance people in it now. – Only drawback is that they are bridge fiends.
The moon is getting up again so I will be getting apprehensive again. – Have been free from that for the last two weeks.
Fine. Bright
Went down to TINCQUES this morning & got the lay-out. – Some job – A grand-stand to go all the way round the field. – Four private boxes four band stands & 200 yds. of Weldon Trestle. – All to be ready for the decorators by the 27th.
Had lunch with Simpson & came back on the jigger.
Went over to the 215th after dinner.
-20
Showery Full.
Went down to TINCQUES on first lorry & stayed till 4.30 – Got Track, diamond, & tennis court all skinned. –
Should get trestles up to-morrow.
Hot.
All trestle stuff up except 74th Div. – Not yet arrived.
Gen. Farmer came around he seems very interested in the show. – A bit fussy, but Thackery handles him O.K.
Putting up bleachers.
Hot
Construction work practically finished. – Two more boxes called for.
Hot.
Odd jobs. – Tennis court not shaping out very well.
– Farmer around again. – He has every step the duke will take, mapped out in his head.
Visited Harris at 3rd M.T.C. with Thackery.
Fine.
Heaviest day yet. – Up at 5.30 after being kept awake half the night by Fritz planes.
– Currie had a look round this A.M. & seemed satisfied. – Willis-O’Connor says I should be able to pull a few days in Paris out of it. – Think we should finish off in time, if the sappers have to work till dark tomorrow.
A new command comes with new, unexpected work. Robertson's Bridging Unit turns out to be exactly the outfit for building temporary grandstands, and from June 23 the diary tracks a steadily growing construction job at Tincques: a grandstand running the full way round the field, four private boxes, four bandstands, and 200 yards of trestle bridging pressed into service as seating. Trestles go up over the following days, then bleachers, then a tennis court that gives him more trouble than anything else. By June 28 word is going round that "the duke" himself is coming, with a Gen. Farmer fussing over every detail of the visit; on the 29th, the heaviest day yet, Currie inspects the site in person and pronounces himself satisfied, Willis-O'Connor even jokes that it's worth a few days' leave in Paris if the job finishes in time.
Dominion Day itself, July 1 →The company sports day he ran in 1916 →Robertson's own account of building the ground, written in 1921 →