archiwalia arch

A line of men walking across a bare slope, carrying all the gear needed to set up a new barbed-wire line. Many of the men are carrying tall metal posts shaped like corkscrews. These were used in the later part of the war as they could be screwed into the ground more quietly than straight posts could be hammered in. THE HEROES of World War One have been brought into the twenty-first century thanks to a series of stunning colourised images to mark the 100th anniversary of the end of the war. Striking pictures show men hauling a howitzer out of the mud at Beaucourt sur Ancre, four British soldiers using a fallen tree-trunk as a temporary bridge over the River Ancre and six soldiers looking out of a dugout on the Western Front. Other vivid colour photographs show soldiers digging a trench viewed between strands of barbed wire, officers showing a map to their men at the Somme in France and infantry waiting in a trench for their turn to advance. The original black and white photos were expertly colourised by electrician Royston Leonard (56) from Cardiff, Wales. Royston Leonard / mediadrumimages.com