NOTES FROM THE WEATHER DIARY OF A B.E.F. OFFICER. 33I 
NOTES FROM THE WEATHER DIARY OF AN OFFICER IN 
THE B.E.F. 1915-1918. 
BvJMajor C. L. Ward- Jackson. 
Nothing could exceed the dreariness of the winter 1915-16. I was 
attached to the Headquarters Staff of a Corps which had taken over 
in the previous July from the French a portion of the Front Line 
opposite the villages of Gommecourt and Serre of gory memory. 
Until the arrival of the British this part of the front had been almost 
peaceful. Peasants worked on their fields within easy range of hos- 
tile held artillery, and even of machine-guns. It was possible in places 
to ride on horseback within view of the enemy's front trenches and 
spy them through a glass without evoking the stuttering protest of 
an angry Maxim concealed in its emplacement of German concrete. 
Indeed a French villager related to me how a truce was always declared 
at the hour of dejeuner between a French battalion on one side of 
No-Man's-Land and a German battalion on the other, and each party 
on fine days scrambled out of its trench into the open and partook, 
unmolested, of the midday meal in full view of the enemy. Despatch- 
riders rode their machines backwards and forwards to Battalion 
Headquarters with little more fear of gun trouble than at home, while 
aeroplanes were almost always, except for their curiosity, politely 
behaved. 
Things livened up considerably after the arrival of the British, 
full of pride now in an increased supply of gun-ammunition and very 
wrathful against the Huns, whose unwelcome attentions they had had 
strenuously and patiently to bear for many months further north. 
Yet even now Staff Officers in their motor-cars could daily be seen 
entering Hebuterne, which was almost in the Front Line System, 
while the artillery on either side chiefly fired when the respective 
C.R. A.s wanted to let the other fellows know that they were awake and 
entitled to some respect, and when the British wanted to show, by 
Jingo ! that they had actually two rounds per gun to spare. 
As winter approached, down came the rain and with it increased 
activity and discomfort, together with a far greater tension between 
the opposing armies. And certainly the weather was not conducive 
to Christian charity. There was scarcely any snow and but little 
more frost the whole winter until the end of February, when we had 
severe frost and blizzards, in one of which the Huns attacked at Ver- 
dun. It rained and rained instead. During December rain fell on 
twenty-four days, and a wet, mild, and blustery Christmas Eve 
culminated in a heavy thunderstorm in the afternoon. 
March and April of 1916 were bitterly cold ; May and June were 
