An Officer Under Instruction

Louis settled quickly into military life at Forton Barracks – the routines must have seemed strangely familiar after four years in School House, after all. As an Officer Under Instruction his life was rather more comfortable than the Marines across the parade ground. In the officers’ mess (photo above) he had his own cabin and a servant, though his explanation of the weekly routine is hardly brimming with enthusiasm. On the 31st of January 1916 he wrote:

‘My routine is not very exciting, being drill at 8.15 to 10.30 with a 1/4 hrs break, and 11-12.30 lecture on field work. Then in the afternoon 2-3 and 3-4 either drill and lecture or drill and signalling or drill and drill. This is the routine regularly for every day. The exceptions are that on Wednesdays there is a route march parading at 8am and finishing at about 2.30 at the earliest, and on Fridays a 3/6d expedition into the country for fieldwork parading at 9.30 at the station and home about 3.0.

On Saturdays there is nothing after 12.30 and Church Parade on Sunday at 9. Every evening there is a mess dinner for all who are not billeted out. This you must attend unless you ask the Mess President for leave off. It is at 7.45. On Saturdays and Sundays there is no dinner, but supper which is optional.

Breakfast in the morning at 7.30. I get my servant to call me at 6.30.’

Such a life must have seemed immediately familiar to a public schoolboy such as Louis, so familiar in fact that he didn’t find it particularly exciting. Distractions were welcome, such as when his evening’s newspaper reading in the mess was disturbed by the bugle call that Louis knew meant a fire alarm, as a cinema a short distance away was burned to the ground. Trips to Portsmouth were an exciting privilege, and he wrote excitedly to his mother of the wheeling gulls swooping low over the harbour in the snow as he crossed on the Gosport Ferry (below), as well as the huge range of vessels ‘…everything from the Mauretania and Aquitania to a Lowestoft trawler…’. The most impressive, of course, was HMS Victory, calling to Louis’ mind the days of Nelson and Trafalgar.

Upon arriving at church in Portsmouth he found another reminder of life at Rugby too…