Mementos
Like many servicemen, Albert Clark, of the 6th Battalion, the Gloucestershire Regiment carried a photo of his girlfriend, Elsie Pearce.
Men carried many reminders of home with them. It might be a small Bible or Prayer Book, or a photograph of their family or girlfriend.
Some kept a lucky mascot in a uniform pocket. These were perhaps made and given by a girlfriend or sister, such as a felt black cat, or something found or bought such as a stone with a hole in it or a ‘touchwood’.
The idea of a good luck charm was universal: many soldiers carried something that they felt would protect them in some way.
Sometimes they did protect a soldier. There are many stories of a Bible or cigarette case in a breast pocket deflecting a bullet. One Bristol family always believed that a Bible stopped a bullet that could have killed William Beach of the Gloucestershire Regiment. They only recently found this was not true: the bullet went straight through the Bible and his chest – but he did survive.
