Lives of the First World War

After arriving at Brest in June 1917 the 7th Battalion BWIR (6th Jamaica War Contingent) were moved to their final destination of 'International Corner' at Hazebrouck. As they left the train, almost immediately they were under shell fire and one burst 400 yards from the men. Whilst marching to camp another burst in front of a platoon, with shrapnel just missing a sergeant. This was to be their norm; they were working at the railhead and ammunition dumps and almost every day of the war diary lists men evacuated to base hospital or clearing stations. There was brief respite on 6 July when the battalion lined Zwynland Road for His Majesty King George V. On the 12 September the camp area was bombed. 6 men were killed and 39 men were wounded. On 11 December alone there were 56 casualties. Unusually for a war diary, all of the men are listed individually with number, rank, name and initial, but unfortunately the number used at the beginning of the diary is for JWC, and a mixture of JWC and BWIR in the middle! Names have been cross-referenced with the BW & V medal roll with a high proportion of unique names matched successfully. A few men from 6th Battalion are also in the casualty lists. Amongst the names in the community are men from other regiments. This is because army regulations did not allow black soldiers to rise to senior ranks and it was therefore necessary for senior NCOs to be attached to BWIR to complete the establishment. The battalion moved to Taranto at the end of December 1917.

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