Welcome to Step Short. Please have a browse around our pages. To discover the origin of our name click here

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!!!NEW FEATURE!!!

We have created an Easy Access Document Archive. To open and read the many articles featured throughout our pages, all you need to do is click here 

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Frontline Folkestone

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The Machine Gun Corps War Memorial

One of the WW1 War Memorials in Folkestone, perhaps not as well known as those on The Leas, is that to the Machine Gun Corps. The memorial was originally sited at the southern end of Cherry Garden Avenue.

                                                                                                                       

It was subsequently moved and now stands near the entrance to the Cheriton Road Community Cemetery.

             

The inscription reads:

To

The Glory of God

& in Memory of

The

39 Officers and 458

Warrant Officers, Non

Commissioned Officers &

Men of the

Machine Gun Corps

(Cavalry)

Who fell in the Great War

1914 -1919

To read more about the Corps and its connection with Folkestone, click MCG Memorial

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Remembrance 2013

This year we honour those who have given their lives or their health for their Country by telling the story of just one of the millions of men who passed through Folkestone on his way to the Front Lines in France and Flanders. His name was Bertie Hibbert.

Click here to read more

When you go home, tell them of us and say: For your tomorrow we gave our today

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Folkestone to feature in major BBC drama for WW1 Centenary

The BBC has recently announced its plans for WW1 Centenary programming on TV and Radio. High on the list of what will be on offer will be Radio 4’s new ambitious drama serial charting life on the Home Front during the First World War. The drama, which will be recorded in Birmingham, will follow the lives of a series of characters as they confront the challenges and changes experienced by a nation facing its first experience of total war. Currently a producer in the BBC Radio Drama production team in London, Jessica Dromgoole will take on the role of Editor in Birmingham in early September.

The town of Folkestone will be one of the key locations for the setting of the drama

We are delighted that the BBC has asked for expert historical advice from Step Short. Michael and Christine George of Step Short recently spent a day in Folkestone with Jessica, her assistant Leo McGann and the four script writers for a walk around Folkestone’s WW1 sites and in depth discussions about ideas for the serial.

Pictured above: Christine George, centre, of Step Short and Folkestone School for Girls, with the BBC Radio 4 team on The Leas, Folkestone. The series Editor of Home Front, Jessica Dromgoole is on the right.

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A letter from Edith

There is very little surviving evidence describing events and atmosphere in Folkestone during the first hours  after the declaration of war on 4 August 1914. A unique insight is provided by Edith in a lettercard sent by her to ‘Frank and Maggie’ in Manchester. About Edith, who seems to have been on holiday in the town, we know nothing more. Below are a few lines from her letter; to read the original go to our Footsteps page of click here.

Folkestone August 5^th 1914 Today we have been on the pier to see the French Reserves off. They sang the Marseillaise and cheered as they left in the boat. Boats are arriving from Belgium and French all the time, and we have some battle ships patrolling here to guard the shipping. One boat that came in this morning had been fired upon and damaged slightly, and as I was having my breakfast this morning an aeroplane passed over and shot nine shots to call out the reserves. When we were at the pier the soldiers were guarding the lighthouse with drawn bayonets and all the coastguard men are armed. It is quite exciting. I like it fine.

The letter reveals things not previously known. For instance, the departure of French Reservists, men who had been working in Britain and flocked back to France to answer the call to arms. When German and Austrian Reservist tried to do the same, they were detained at Folkestone harbour and led off to detention camps under armed guard. Edith also tells us that Belgian and French refugees had started to arrive at this early date. What do we make of Edith’s description of the aeroplane firing nine shots? Almost certainly the ‘Blue Peter’ would have been signalled, but it more likely that it would have been from a land or ship based piece of artillery.

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WW1 Nurses on Duty at Sainsbury’s!

October 2013

After Sainsbury’s at Park Farm in Folkestone adopted Step Short as its supported charity, shoppers had a chance to see WW1 nurses at work and learn more about the work of Step Short.

Alongside a display of WW1 artifacts, books and photographs, students from The Folkestone School for Girls, dressed in replica WW1 nursing uniforms, were seen to be treating a wounded officer (in fact a History teacher at FSG) at their hospital. Between bandaging their patient and handling some rather fearsome looking medical equipment, the girls chatted enthusiastically with Sainsbury’s customers.

  

A very big ‘Thank-You‘ to the girls and staff from FSG and to all the staff of Sainsbury’s.

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The Beginning and the End

The two images below tell just two parts of Folkestone’s WW1 story. The first, in August 1914 shows the arrival in the town of the very first wounded British soldiers. At the time, when it was thought the war would be over by Christmas, no one guessed that the lists of dead and wounded would grow and grow. These men were welcomed with bands, flowers and were carried head high to the waiting ambulances. The next picture is from November 1918, and the bell ringers from Folkestone who rang out the church bells for the first time since the war started.

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Step Short 5th Annual Commemorative March

View the highlights of the 2013 March. Thanks to Colin for the filming and editing.

 

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A Lost World

With less than a year until the WW1 Centenary, we will be looking at life in the year before war broke out. With the help of Revd J C Carlile, author of Folkestone during the War, and film clips from BritishPathe, let us take a look at a world and time that was soon to be lost forever in the catastrophe of total war.

“August, 1914, seems almost prehistoric, so remote that it is difficult to reconstruct the period. Yet the world went very well then. The Folkestone season was opening; thousands of visitors had flocked to the town, attracted by the health-giving qualities of the breezes from the sea and the charm of the scenery. Passengers crossing from the Continent watch for the white cliffs that stand for England. How lovely they are to the eyes of wanderers returning home. They are as welcome as the grasp of friendship. As the ship comes nearer there is the view of the Warren — called “Little Switzerland.” It is always a dream of beauty to lovers of Nature: the cliffs with their glory of gold, blue, and white, the wealth of wild flowers, the deep ravines; the beach with its boulders flung about as if by giants in their sport; the growths of moss; sheltered nooks that lovers linger to explore; the trees rich in foliage and music; and the sea with its fantastic crests upon the waves and restless movement; all creating an impression upon memory that remains among the precious things of life.”  

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The Canadians leave their mark

With so many Canadians having been stationed in Folkestone during the First World War, it is a challenge to decide which items to feature. There are many stories within the pages of this website, but here we focus on the 49th Battalion CEF.  DUring their period of training in Folkestone and Shorncliffe, the 49ers published their own magazine. Click here to read the magazine, complete with adverts from many local businesses and organisations.

For more details and pictures visit the Loyal Edmonton Regiment Museum

Compelling reading!

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A Gift from Dublin

We are grateful to Ian Chambers, Chairman of the Dublin Branch of the Western Front Association for sending us some photos taken in c1938 by Mr G T Watson, a professional photographer from Manchester.

The images are of the Road of Remembrance in Folkestone and of the cairn at the top of the road, which is still there, paying tribute to ‘the tens of thousands of soldiers’ who marched down the road to the harbour and the Troop Ships to begin their journey to the Western Front. Click here to visit the Dublin Branch of the WFA, which includes a valuable collection of photos, including several more by Mr Watson depicting the Western Front just before the start of WW2.

Click on an image to open.

 

UPDATE

October 2013

 We are pleased to announce that notification has been received that the Memorial Cairn featured in the above photos has now been now been listed by English Heritage as a Grade II structure of Special Architectural or Historic Interest. During the process of investigating the listing application it has been discovered that the cairn is constructed out of bricks that formed the road fabric during WW1. As such, when we look at the Memorial, we are brought even closer to the soldiers who made their way down the slope to the waiting troops ships. This, surely, makes the cairn of  unique national importance and significance in our Centenary Commemorations next year.

To read the English Heritage listing document click EH Cairn Listing

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The Great Air Raid 25th May 1917

The date of 25th May today holds little significance for the people of Folkestone in Kent; but it should. On that day in 1917, the Friday of Whit weekend, the town entered the history books as the victim of the first air raid by a mass formation of bomber aircraft. The route taken by the German Gotha GIV planes left a trail of dead and injured, but the full horror of this new weapon of war was revealed only as the warplanes flew over Tontine Street in Folkestone. Here, a single 50kg high explosive bomb left dozens of civilians, mostly women and children, dead and injured.

A new memorial to the victims of The Great Air Raid is a series of drawings by Thanet artist, Roy Eastland. 

Roy’s unique silverpoint drawings of the victims of The Great Air Raid of 1917 have now won critical acclaim and have been included in the Jerold Drawing Prize exhibition for 2013, Roy’s work will be displayed at The Jerwood Art Space, Union Street, London until 27 October 2013. It will then tour, including the Sidney Cooper Gallery in Canterbury in March 2014. We are hoping that Roy will be able to come to Folkestone next summer to exhibit at one of the Centenary exhibitions being arranged by Step Short.

Click HERE to read a review in The Independent and Here to visit Roy’s blog

To read more about the day when death and destruction fell from the skies above Folkestone, click here

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