Remembering the First World War

We're currently preparing to commemorate the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914 as, I'm sure, lots of other archives are doing. We're fortunate to have a number of first hand accounts in the Archive, written and told by men posted both here in Orkney as well some of those sent to the Western Front.


Time has, of course, moved on and there are no survivors of the Great War still alive to tell their stories themselves but, thanks to Orkney Sound Archive, we can still listen to them.


One account held in the Sound Archive is an interview, recorded in 1985, with William Spence, from the island of Stronsay, who served with the Machine Gun Corp. You can listen here to a short edited clip from the recording in which William talks about his involvement in the start of the third battle of Ypres on 31 July 1917.

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