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Key dates over November 1917

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Lives lost on this day: 20

20th November 1917 - Battle of Cambrai. Using tanks, aircraft and artillery a major advance is made into the Hindenburg Line.

Rolling casualty count: 8163

War Front:

1st Batt. Holding muddy shell holes. Captured prisoners past Passchendaele

4th Batt In assembly positions between Gouzeaucourt and Villers Plouich. Following tank assault, the Battalion advanced across captured trenches towards canal crossing at Masnieres. A tank leading the Worcestershires south of the town mounted the bridge which collapsed into the canal, halting the advance. Battalion Commander, Colonel Linton was killed by a sniper.

Yeomanry Rode to Deir Ayub guarding Wadi Aly in pouring rain

Home Front:

This afternoon, about 3.10, John Crosby Johns (68), shoemaker, of 17, Copenhagen Street, Worcester, was found hanging by a rope from a railing at the top of some steps near his house. Mrs. Johns immediately reported her discovery to the police and Sergt. Wilkes cut down the body and commenced artificial respiration, but without avail. The man had been dead about a quarter of an hour.

Pte. Arthur Sanders, son of Mr. Matthew Sanders, an employee of Mr. Maddocks, farmer, Martin Hussingtree, is reported as being in hospital at Bradford, in a bad condition. In France he underwent a serious operation.

City Police Court: Henry George (12), Archibald George (9), 31 Little Boughton Street and George Edward Cox (12), 23, Powell’s Row, all schoolboys, were charged with stealing from the Pavilion, Boughton Cricket Ground, one cricket bat, three cricket stumps and two golf balls, valued 16s., the property of William Souch. Cox did not appear. Mr. Souch (caretaker of the Pavilion) said that on the 6th November he saw the articles safe and later saw that a board had been broken off the Pavilion. D.S. Penlington said that he recovered the articles from a wood in Boughton Park. The Chief Constable said that these boys had been in the habit of sleeping out at nights. Mrs. George asked that the boys might be birched. Her sister would take one of the boys. The elder boy was ordered to receive six strokes of the birch and the younger four strokes.

Food Economy: Miss Edith Taylor, of the Ministry of Food, addressed a meeting of the Angel Street Sisterhood on Monday evening on the subject of food economy. There was a large attendance. Miss Taylor said she was not there to ask them to make any sacrifices above those which God would give them strength to make, but rather to take up their privileges to help those who were dear to them. She did not ask them to stint themselves of food necessary for the upkeep of their bodies but to see that in their homes there was no waste. She explained the difficulties of importing food owing to the enemy’s action and said that if there had been any extravagance and waste before the war it was very wrong, but today it was criminal, because it meant literally wasting the lives of men.

Information researched by The Worcestershire World War 100 team