Spiritualism, Superstition and the Supernatural During the First World War
During the First World War there were many events that some regarded as paranormal in origin. From prophecies of the Great War to the Angels of Mons and seance room communications with the spirits of deceased soldiers, the First World War gave rise to an unprecedented number of legends, mysteries and allegedly paranormal experiences.
Was Corporal Bird Saved by His Dead Brother at Vimy Ridge? Corporal Will Bird of the 42nd Battalion, The Black Watch (Royal Highland Regiment) of Canada, was sleeping fitfully in his cold dugout near Vimy Ridge, April 1917. Two warm hands on his back woke him. He opened his eyes expecting to see one of […]
Did the Spirit of a Dead Soldier Save His Friends in the Ypres Salient? December 1915, in a frontline trench somewhere in the Ypres salient, Belgium, Second Lieutenant William M. Speight of the 3rd Battalion, West Yorkshire Regiment (Prince of Wales’s Own), sat in his dug-out. The First and Second Battles of Ypres had already […]
The Thirteenth Casualty, A Story of Luck During the First World War The number thirteen had followed Joe Cassells through the First World War. First at Dixmude, then at La Bassée and when ‘crossing the bar,’ now the number would crop up a final and fateful time. From what I can tell, Cassells was still […]
Could Unlucky Thirteen Be This First World War Soldier’s Lucky Number? Joe Cassells and his unusual relationship with the number thirteen during the First World War were not over after the strange events at Dixmude and La Bassée. The Black Watch scout had another tale to tell and this one, more than the others, was […]
War Poet Rupert Brooke died during the First World War. The mystic Aelfrida Tillyard claimed to have paranormal experiences in which she was visited by his ghost or spirit in dreams and received communications allegedly from Brook via automatic writing.
Soldier Joe Cassells, a scout with the Black Watch, told several stories of how he came to regard thirteen as his lucky number. Trench superstitions were rife during the First World War, but whereas most people think of thirteen as unlucky, a series of strange coincidences and events convinced Cassells that thirteen would always bring him good fortune.
A British Soldier’s Account of the Christmas Truce during the First World War Almost as incredible as the many stories of the supernatural recounted in Angels in the Trenches is that of the Christmas Truce between the British and Germans. Scotsman Joe Cassells, a scout in the Black Watch, was in the trenches on Christmas […]
How Christianity United Enemies During the First World War The Christmas Truce of 1914 began on Christmas Eve at some parts of the Frontline. Here Bruce Bairnsfather, famous for his ‘Old Bill’ sketches, recounts his experience of a truce on Christmas Eve. It is a testimony to the shared culture of the warring parties and […]
Joe Cassells, a soldier in the First World War, tells of a strange coincidence concerning the number thirteen on the Western Front. Cassells would come to believe that thirteen was his lucky number.
Did a Frenchman’s Lucky Coin Save a British Soldier at the Battle of Mons? More than one soldier during the First World War put superstitious faith in a lucky coin, here is one man’s story from the Battle of Mons and the Retreat after. As a former regular soldier, Scotsman Joe Cassells was a first-class […]