Some more smoking material.
In Aubrey Smith’s Four Years on the Western Front (1922), an incident occurs where a convent building
which is being garrisoned by the Lancashire regiment is being shelled. There is
a calculation, born of experience, of when and where the next shells with land,
and how much damage they will do – ‘they just turn out, stand behind the wall
and put on a pipe’. (p23)
How much evidence is there for the idea that officers smoked
pipes, while other ranks smoked cigarettes? Not a lot. Occasional occurrences
like this, from Verse and Prose in Peace and War, by Lt William Noel Hodgson
(1917): Cheery little cigarette-ends gleam in the darkness, and the subaltern
is smoking what was once a fine specimen of Fribourg and Treyer’s art in
pipes.’ (pp61-2). Fribourg and Treyer were very upmarket tobacconists, with
shops in Haymarket and Cornhill, London.
Bert Thomas reprised the ‘Arf a mo’ image in 1939 for the
Second World War, in a poster for National Service recruiting; a fire-fighter
is seen with a tin hat and a breathing apparatus tank on his back. He is
lighting a pipe. The caption is ‘Arf a mo’ ‘National Service needs you. Learn
now! – Be ready!’
It seems that the original ‘Arf a mo’ postcards were as
sought after in 1915 as they are now – witness the text on the back of this one,
sent from Derby to Newcastle on 24 January 1915:
Dear W,Was at Birmingham y’day & saw this in a window. N has wanted me to get you one for a long time, but couldn’t get it in N/c. Thanks for your card which made me feel quite Scottish – I didn’t say skittish! My, you would like to see some of the Birmingham shops! Glorified market (?)! Guess the name of someone I saw here today & ask N for the answer. No prize offered. Having a fine time. Britannia (?) Theatre or Bed every night after work!Love to all, Tom
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