Postings of excerpts from A.D. (Douglas) Gillespie’s letters home and other quotes. (More to come on this page!)
When my Mum passed away in 2001, one of the family heirloom books passed on to me for safe keeping was a copy of “Letters from Flanders” by A.D. Gillespie published posthumously in 1916. It is a collection of correspondence to his parents beginning with letters from his various training camps in July/August 1914 (that express hopes for peaceful resolution before hostilities were to break out) right through to just before his tragic death in the trenches in September 1915. The book also contains an Appendix with a longer description Douglas’ idea for a Via Sacra (Sacred Road).
“..when peace comes, our government might combine with the French government to make one long avenue between the lines from the Vosgues to the sea… I would make a fine broad road in the “no-mans land” between the lines with paths for pilgrims on foot and plant trees for shade and fruit trees, so that the soil should not altogether be a waste. Then I would like to send every man, woman, and child in Western Europe on a pilgrimage along the Via Sacra so that they might think and learn what war means from the silent witnesses on either side..”
~A.D. (Douglas) Gillespie, 1915
Screen capture of a bit more info about A.D. Gillespie’s letter home proposing a Via Sacra in the Appendix
The appendix transcribes the letter in full, but here is a screen grab of an important paragraph
This morning I’m up early for a planned 90 km ride over the Vosges. I brought along copies of transcribed letters in the book. Today is September 12, 2022. On September 12, 1915, A.D. Gillespie wrote:
An excerpt from A.D.’s letter of September 13, 1915
A excerpt from A.D.’s letters from September 15, 1915…. The previous page of this screen capture starts: “ Yesterday I was nearly arrested as a spy, while making a reconnaissance of some swampy….
Rupert Brooke verse that captures the impact of loss of life from war
A very poignant quote from A.D. on September 17, 1915…
A.D.’s full letter from September 19, 1915
A.D. Gillespie’s letter from the front September 21, 1915
September 23, 1915 (I see I did not scan the whole letter, but here is the first part…
Very impactful paragraph in AD’s last letter from the Western Front September 23rd, 1915. Gets me every time…
The famous poem by John McCrae In Flanders Fields.
Walking in Europe 