…although there is plenty of space on a gravestone to contain, bound in moss, the abridged version of a man’s life, detail is always welcome.

—Vladimir Nabokov, Laughter in the Dark

In the case of my great-uncle, George Norman (“Norm”) Olds, that detail is sparse indeed and his public existence is now reduced to a single reference on Google, a mention that barely replicates what that moss-bound tombstone usually contains. Born in 1895 in Glebe, an inner-city suburb of Sydney, Australia, he saw active service in the Great War in Turkey, Egypt and France and was killed in action in the Somme on 27 March 1917. He is apparently buried in Bapaume Communal Cemetery in Pas-de-Calais. (In March 1917 the allies occupied Bapaume.)

I have in my possession a photocopy of one of his war letters, addressed to his brother Gilbert, the uncorrected transcription of which reads as follows.

Dear Gil,

Received your letters also Dot’s. We got all our mail in a heap so am just answering the bunch. I do not get time to write regular to you but you can get your news from down home when you dont get letters. I have not had leave from here yet but if I get leave before we go into action again I will send you a Turks pay book as a momento. I got it while we were burying the dead and I took it out of his breast pocket—so if you happen to get it you will see how our machine guns play hell with them. I am sending the boss a belt of badges I have collected, at least I hope to but there is no place here to send anything from here unless I get to Cairo but I hope to get in there soon on leave. It is up to us to get a few hours off after doing 5 months stouching. I meant to tell you Gil—burying the dead is a good job at any time especially if they have been out about 3 weeks. You dont have silhoutted moons at home like Turkey & we were burying one night—me with a Scotch chap a hard doer under a silhoutted moon & I put my hand on something of a poor Turks face mouth open & eyes open. I whispered for Scottie & he came over and I said have a look here Scot. He put his face pretty close to the ground and about an inch from the Turks face [several words illegible where letter has been folded and creased] and said Och man cover it op. I could hardly keep from laughing at the look on poor Scotts face. There was another chap, the saddest sight I ever saw, one of our own boys had been wounded and could not get back to the trenches. He laid his bible & pay book and a couple of letters from his mother in his cap and his identification disc on top, on the ground beside him and settled himself down for his trip home for ever. I could have got plenty of souvenirs of the place but as I was one of the last off the Peninsula in the evacuation I had to leave a lot of things behind I would have liked to have kept. Well Gil I suppose you will be in business by the time you get this, and I wish you all sorts of luck if you do but think before you start old man now you have a few quid don’t do the lot in. Money flies round here but I bet it does not fly in Sydney like it. I see them gambling here of a night and it is nothing for them to do £50 in a couple of hours some do a couple of hundred in a night, and try and draw every penny on their pay book. The game has never appealed to me Gil and I hope it never will but by ghost it is the ruination of many a good lad here. Money never troubled me, if it did I would have gone for stripes but it is the biggest curse a man can have. Half the doses here were got because the chaps had plenty of money to throw away and [erased word, probably military censorship] are cheap you can get a [two erased words] and all the beer you want for 30 or 40 piastres so you see a few quid goes a good way if a man spends it that way. I lobbed in Cairo with about £9 but I got rid of a few of it in sending things home to Ma I thought it was the easiest way out of it. I am no angel and by Ghost if you could only see the women that are here it would make you wish you were home if it were only for morality [entire next line illegible on paper crease] and I will write when I get another chance. Soldiering is not beer and skittles you know. Remember me down home & give my love to Dot and kiddies.

A second photocopy, largely illegible, emanates from Base Records Office, A.I.F. [Australian Imperial Force], is dated 10th January, 1917, addressed to the soldier’s mother and details the award of the Military Medal to her son:

Dear Madam,

I have much pleasure in…extract from Third Supplement…Gazette of 19th September, 1916…conspicuous services rendered by your son, Wa.[?] 1054, Lance-Corporal G. N. Olds, 20th Battalion…AWARDED THE MILITARY MEDAL…has been graciously pleased…the above has been promulgated in Commonwealth of Australia Gazette…

Yours faithfully…

And that’s all.