The bunk of NCO Otto Riecke in Janovka, July 14, 1916. Riecke served with 2nd battalion, 5th company, reserve infantry regiment 227. There are two Janovkas in the current Czech Republic, one north of Prague, the other south. Both would have been well behind the front in July, 1916. Note the stick grenades under the fire step in the right foreground.
Mein Schlafraum!My bunk room O.R. Jul 14 1916 Janovka. Signed: O. Riecke
"The kite-balloon, too, on the hill, began to sway huge and bulbous—upward—another was seen far off against the rosy east. All night the distant waves of gunfire had crashed and rumbled, soft and terrific with broad flashes, like waves of some immense tumult of waters, rolling along the horizon. As dawn broke, and I came down the hill again, I heard the clear skirl of the Second Gordons piping into their bivouac—a brave note, shrill as the lark, but the Jocks were a weary crowd as they hobbled in. Before dawn a horse neighed twice, high and shrill and scared. . . ."
Excerpt from the diary of Siegfried Sassoon, author and infantryman in the Royal Welch Fusiliers, writing on the morning of July 21, 1916, as soldiers returned from the front line of the Battle of the Somme.
Siegfried Sassoon Diaries 1915-1918 by Siegfried Sassoon, pp. 97–98, copyright © George Sassoon, 1983; Introduction and Notes Rupert Hart-Davis, 1983, publisher: Faber and Faber, publication date: 1983
1916-07-21, Battle of the Somme, Somme, Corbie, Riecke, O.R. Riecke, 1916-07-14
