ORBIT-OnlineRepository ofBirkbeckInstitutionalTheses Enabling Open Access to Birkbeck’s Research Degree output Home away from the home front: the British in the Balkans during the Great War https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/40072/ Version: Full Version Citation: Richardson, Rachel (2014) Home away from the home front: the British in the Balkans during the Great War. [Thesis] (Unpublished) c 2020 The Author(s) All material available through ORBIT is protected by intellectual property law, including copy- right law. Any use made of the contents should comply with the relevant law. Deposit Guide Contact: email Home Away From the Home Front: The British in the Balkans during the Great War Rachel Richardson Department of History, Classics and Archaeology Birkbeck, University of London Submitted for the degree of Doctorate of Philosophy June 2014 1 Declaration The work presented in this thesis is my own. 2 Abstract This thesis is a social history of the British in Serbia, Greece, and what is today Macedonia during the Great War. It explores British wartime experiences by examining their perception of national identity and their attitude towards other nationalities, their relationships and standards of propriety and appearance, aspects of everyday life including recreation, food and drink, the role that events played in forming a communal identity, reactions to and interactions with space and place in Salonika, and their motivations and perceptions of the worth of their work. British people on the Balkan front adapted to their wartime experiences and circumstances with the aid of their cultural background and priorities, existing connections and relationships, their interpretation of their environments, and their sense of duty and accomplishments. Rather than considering or acting as though their wartime experiences were a deviation from their prewar lives, Britons actively integrated these experiences into their everyday lives, and furthermore relied upon their prewar perceptions, connections, and understanding in order to make sense of their wartime lives. 3 Acknowledgements It would be impossible to acknowledge all of the debts I have accrued on this long process, but there are many people who have contributed in meaningful and significant ways to this thesis. Firstly, thanks to my supervisor, Fred Anscombe, for his unfailing support, confidence-building, and astute observations. Thanks also go to Joanna Bourke for her input during the early stages of this project, particularly on what eventually became chapter five, and to David Feldman and Maria Margaronis for their support when I needed it most. Thanks also to the Birkbeck department of history for the generous award of the BIRS which made possible the completion of this thesis, and to my fellow graduate students for lighting the way with their friendship and examples. I have been amazed at the wealth of scholarly and emotional support forthcoming from the academic community. Parts of this thesis made their debut as conference papers at the LSE, Goldsmiths, and UCL PhD Symposium on South Eastern Europe (chapter one), the 2010 Social History Society conference (chapter four), the University of Liverpool Port Cities at War conference (chapter five), and the Birkbeck graduate student research seminars (chapter two). Chapter six has taken inspiration from my MA thesis, "The last place for joy-riders": British Experiences and Gender Roles at the Serbian and Macedonian Fronts, 1914-1918," submitted at CSU Bakersfield in June 2007. The faculty there, in particular Cliona Murphy and my supervisor, Mark Baker, deserve thanks for encouraging and supporting me to embark upon the PhD. I would also like to thank the many libraries and archives who have aided my research, in particular the staff at the Imperial War Museum department of documents, the special collections at the Mitchell Library in Glasgow, and the Social Sciences reading room in the British Library. I would like to thank my colleagues (and friends) at Working Partners for their patience and understanding throughout the years, without which it would have been impossible to continue. In particular I would like to thank Charles and Chris for the kindness they showed me in my darkest hours. Thanks also to my family for their unfailing guidance and love over the years and miles, particularly to my sister for endless gchats and stationary supply and my brother for channelling our mother in his editorial, emotional and material support. Thank you to my friends who have tolerated years of complaining, tears of joy and sorrow, and most recently, my complete disappearance. Special mentions must go to Eva for enforcing productivity on "library nights" and wielding her editor's pen, and Jenn, the most dedicated copy-editor this side of the Atlantic. And above all thank you to Brett, for everything from track changes to laundry to making this past year, with all its hard work, the best of my life so far. Thanks to him, I am now as inspired about the future as I am about the past. 4 In loving memory of Frances Whitney who would have been the first and most eager reader of this work. 5 Table of Contents DECLARATION ___________________________________________________________________ 2 ABSTRACT _______________________________________________________________________ 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS___________________________________________________________ 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS_____________________________________________________________ 6 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS _________________________________________________________ 8 A NOTE ON PLACE NAMES _______________________________________________________ 11 INTRODUCTION _________________________________________________________________ 12 Historical Background __________________________________________________________ 12 Historiography ________________________________________________________________ 15 Chapter Outline _______________________________________________________________ 24 Sources ______________________________________________________________________ 28 CHAPTER ONE: "THE ONLY NATION THAT'S TRUSTED & RESPECTED WHEREVER IT GOES": BRITISH IDENTITY_______________________________________________________ 33 Who is British? Parameters for this thesis ___________________________________________ 33 Self-identification and community _________________________________________________ 35 Britishness vis-à-vis others_______________________________________________________ 36 "Shake hands and offer cigarettes to the captured": Positive Britishness ___________________ 38 "Troops are never purists": Drunkenness and pilfering_________________________________ 42 "In the Balkans one must get used to things": The uncivilized other _______________________ 42 "A wonderfully cheery lot": Plucky little Serbia_______________________________________ 49 "Rather an up hill job": Language and communication_________________________________ 52 "How universal is the dislike of the French": A common enemy __________________________ 55 CHAPTER TWO: "YOU SEEM SUCH A HAPPY FAMILY!": CONNECTIONS AND COMMUNITY ____________________________________________________________________ 62 PART I: "DANCING, MUSIC, AND A LITTLE LOVE-MAKING": CONNECTIONS ON THE BALKAN FRONT __ 62 "Good friendships begun and stoutly forged beneath Serbian skies": Friendships and inter-unit relationships __________________________________________________________________ 64 "One has to be careful if one is going to work with people afterwards": Intra-unit relationships_ 69 PART II: "IT ONLY TAKES A LITTLE TIME TO LOSE ALL SENSE OF DECENCY": STANDARDS OF PROPRIETY _______________________________________________________________________________ 81 "Not a soul knows of our escapade": Supervision _____________________________________ 81 "Fair goings-on, what!": Romance_________________________________________________ 83 "We were very close to nature": Hygiene and privacy__________________________________ 89 "The greatest imaginable blessing": Changing appearance _____________________________ 91 CHAPTER THREE: "WAR SEEMS FURTHER OFF THAN EVER": EVERYDAY LIFE ON THE BALKAN FRONT ____________________________________________________________ 98 "Cricket after tea": Recreation____________________________________________________ 99 "The Balkan Noos": The British daily newspaper ____________________________________ 110 "This benighted spot": Hardships in Macedonia_____________________________________ 112 "The all important topic of grub" _________________________________________________ 116 "Drink is as scarce as it is indispensable" __________________________________________ 124 CHAPTER FOUR: "ALL OF US WHO HAD BEEN ON THE SERBIAN FRONT": EVENTS AND COMMUNITY IDENTITY____________________________________________________ 128 "A seething mass of folk of every kind": Serbia's "great retreat"_________________________ 129 "It is worth being a prisoner to realise the joy of being free": POWs in occupied Serbia ______ 136 "We were [there] when the German Zeppelin was brought down": Salonika's Zeppelin_______ 148 "A great local stir": Katherine Harley's funeral______________________________________ 151 "A day that will be long remembered": Salonika's great fire ____________________________ 152 "We hardly seemed to realize what it meant": Armistice day____________________________ 155 CHAPTER FIVE: "PICCADILLY CIRCUS" IN SALONIKA: REACTIONS TO AND INTERACTIONS WITH THE CITY ________________________________________________ 158 6 PART I: REACTION _______________________________________________________________