Preview Mode Links will not work in preview mode

WW1 Digger History Podcast

WWI Digger Stories Podcast reproduces the diaires, memoirs and letters of the real participants in the war that changed the course of the 20th Century. What was it like to be in the trenches, on the ships or behind the big guns where death stalked in infinite ways and it was impossible to make friends unless you were prepared to lose tham at any moment.

This podcast is formatted with each diairy or memoir forming a series, usually taking the listener through the war from beginning to end, from raw recruit to returning veteran, as it was experienced by the soldier and in his (or her, when I include Nurses stories) own words.

Dec 24, 2019

This is a very short episode on the Glosters and their part at Fromelles. Short because? Well, unfortunately I can't find any written accounts of the battle by these boys. Famous war poet Ivor Gurney was in their sister battalion over to the right and one of his poems sounds just like Fromelles.


Nov 14, 2019

100 years after winning the Victoria Cross in North Russia, the remains of Welsh born Aussie soldier, Samuel George Pearse are thought to have been rediscovered in a scrap yard at Archangel. At the time of his death, recently married Pearse, was already a war hero with a Military Medal won at Glencorse Wood 2...


Sep 9, 2019

Leon Gellert, a 23 year old Physical Education Teacher from Leabrook, South Australia is considered to be the best Great War poet from Australia. This episode focuses on his war experience and his poems.

I watched the place where they had scaled the height,

The height whereon they bled so bitterly

Throughout each day...


Aug 16, 2019

To the right of the Australian 5th Division at Fromelles was the 61st Division of the BEF. These were second line territorial troops that had never seen action before. They had slightly different problems to the Australians but both Divisions suffered from bad generalship and primary among these bad generals was...


Jul 3, 2019

Pompey Elliott's Australian 15th Brigade attacked the unbreakable 'Sugarloaf' on 19 July 1916. This is the story of this disastrous attack.

Teddy Roosevelt befriended one of the survivors. Hear T.R.'s words and hear his friends description of Fromelles. This is some of what he wrote:

"I lay for half an hour with my arms...