Episode 17: 5th March - 23rd March, 1918

Nan Reay’s prolific entries are astonishing in this episode. Despite awful weather, the constant barrage of enemy bombs and the chaotic arrival and evacuation of wounded soldiers, she manages to write in her diary nearly every day. The number of wounded brought to the Advanced Operating Centre near Chauny is extaordinary. She goes for a stroll one evening and sees the beginning of some “Hun” (German) saps in a cutting which shows how close she was to the front line. Saps were short trenches dug towards the enemy trenches across No Man’s Land and enabled soldiers to move forward without exposure to fire. Several saps were dug along a section of a front-line.

This episode is quite remarkable for its detail of normal routines, such as having tea and doing a spot of gardening despite the intensity of her work.

"Liza-Jane" – a naval gun near their camp.

The town of Noyon changed hands throughout the war. It was the British General Head Quarters on 26 - 28 August 1914. It was entered by the Germans on 1 September 1914, by the French on 18 March 1917 and by the Germans again in March 1918. The French finally retook it on 29 and 30 August 1918.

World War 1 Timeline for Episode 17

8 March 1918 Camp Funston at Fort Riley, Kansas makes the first report of influenza. The disease spreads overseas to the Western Front. Over the next year this “Spanish Influenza" kills 20 million worldwide.

21 March 1918  Start of the Spring Offensive. Now that Germany and Russia were no longer at war after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Germany was able to remove its troops from the Eastern Front and begin an offensive along the Western Front at Arras, Aisne and Lys. 

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