Rachel Duffett
Doctoral Competition
It's said that an army marches on its stomach. Rachel Duffett who completed her doctorate in history at the University of Essex has been testing out this saying while researching the rations of those serving on the Western Front during World War 1.
While food parcels from home to troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan are known to distract a soldier, if only temporarily, from the trials of a frontline environment, the soldiers’ experiences of 90 years ago in the trenches of the Western Front offer an especially poignant example of the importance of food to the fighting man.
Unlike today, the logistics of supply were unreliable and it was not unusual for the First World War rankers to find themselves short of rations. Even when food was plentiful, nutritional science was in its early stages and whilst the importance of sufficient calories was understood, the need for a varied diet to provide a mix of essential vitamins and trace elements was not.
Individual ration packs, other than the standard emergency ration, were still a future development for the British Army, and rankers had to share the tins of bully, loaves of bread or jars of jam. The portion size varied depending on the wealth of supplies; at worst, when units were marooned in forward trenches or caught up in chaos, as in the retreat from Mons, it could be as many as 18 soldiers to a tin of meat.
Food parcels at this time therefore were celebrated as symbols of affection; it was difficult to articulate love and concern in a letter but a package of food was its tangible embodiment. Importantly, the contents were voluntarily shared between groups of pals, food cementing the sense of comradeship that was, for so many men, the only positive aspect of their war service.
From completing her doctorate in 2009 Rachel’s interest in the military, social and cultural impact of warfare in the twentieth century, particularly the way in which affective experience has been captured in personal narratives has continued along with her research into the history, anthropology and the sociology of food. She has written on the subject for BBC History Magazine and has a new book due out in 2011 called The Stomach for Fighting: Food and the Soldiers of The Great War (Manchester University Press). Rachel has also spoken at several events on the subject including a forthcoming talk as a guest lecturer on the First World War Education Day at IWM Duxford in November.
Images courtesy of Rachel Duffett