Remembrance Day 2021

I thought I would take this opportunity to bring people’s attention to the story of the Swindon Company of the Wiltshire (Fortress) Engineers.

This is not my story and I am indebted to the work of Mike Pringle in his fantastic book “Swindon Remembering 1914-18” from which I am paraphrasing.

During the Great War, Swindon (being a railway town and home to the Swindon Locomotive Works) fielded a company of Engineers. They had quite an eventful war, beginning with coastal defences around Portsmouth when war was declared before moving to France in 1915 at Ypres. Their role was to provide the infrastructure to support the front line and included laying cables, digging tunnels, maintain bridges (for which two members of the company received the Distinguished Conduct Medal for bravery under fire) and building barracks and stables. In 1916 they moved to the Somme where they did much the same and continued through the winter of 1917 when temperatures fell to -15.5C. Under these conditions the Swindon Company were responsible for keeping water flowing and ended up creating a water pumping station driven by 3 sets of 70BHP and four sets of 40BHP engines and maintaining piping under 2.5’ of frozen mud. All while under fire. At the end of the winter theirs was the only one still running!

A lot of communities have been touched by war – something more present this year with the situation in Afghanistan – but for every tale of destruction there is one of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Something to think about today.