A hundred years ago, the First World War was beginning. Here, the Dean of Durham tells what it was like, and the Echo gives womenfolk some tips about how their sewing needles could help the soldiers get to sleep

‘ARMAGEDDON is actually beginning,”

wrote Hensley Henson, the Dean of Durham, in his diary on July 29, 1914. He was a good prophet. Six days later, Britain joined the First World War.

Dr Henson joined the fray, too, acting as a recruiting sergeant for the army. But then, he was a colourful and often controversial character.

He was Dean of Durham – the man in charge of the cathedral – from 1912 to 1917, before becoming Bishop of Durham in 1920.

The Northern Echo:
Hensley Henson was rather scared by his first sight of a warplane over Durham. This picture was taken in August 1914 and it shows a Royal Flying Corps BE-2 observation plane on the moors near Whitby. A replica of it has been created by Stephen Slater, of Darlington, who, as our news pages have told, is flying to France in it to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the war

He kept a diary throughout, and Durham Cathedral has just begun a project to transcribe the First World War years and place them on the cathedral’s website, durham cathedral.co.uk The website is updated at least once a week with Dr Henson’s view of events from exactly 100 years ago, and his daily entries are being displayed next to the DLI chapel in the cathedral.

Dr Henson supported the war – in fact, in his first extract he is rather rude about newspapers such as The Northern Echo which proposed “ignoble neutrality”. He saw it as the nation’s duty to oppose evil.

Below is an edited taste of his view of the beginning of the war – go online for the full picture. Memories will keep an eye on the diary as the war unfolds.

August 2, 1914

WE are overshadowed by the war cloud all the time. The Cabinet met in the morning & are set to meet again in the evening.

The country awaits with calmness their decision &, though the Radical Rump still clamours for an ignoble neutrality, the general sense is hostile to any desertion of our Continental friends.

August 5, 1914

THE papers carry the fateful tidings that Great Britain declared war against Germany in defence of the independence of Belgium.

We decided to return home at once; the stations swarmed with Territorials and Reservists being mobilized.

August 7, 1914

I WALKED to the Race Ground to see the horses which have been collected by the military. There are about 500 mostly goodlooking beasts.

August 9, 1914

At 9.30am, Colonel Doyle brought 400 Artillerymen to a special service in the Cathedral. The singing of the hymns was very vigorous, and to me at least extremely moving.

Indeed I had hard work to master my emotion. The men sang God Save The King with much fervour before leaving the Cathedral.

Ella and I walked to the Goods Station in Gilesgate & saw a number of infantrymen leaving Durham for Sunderland.

  • Ella, or Isabella, was Henson’s wife.

August 11, 1914

WE had a crowded and enthusiastic meeting of citizens in the Town Hall presided over by the Mayor.

I made a ten-minute speech which aroused much enthusiasm. Between 200 and 300 names were handed in at the close of the meeting.

Ella made a start with a ladies work party. 28 responded to her summons & stitched with much zeal.

August 13, 1914

AFTER tea we motored to the coast from Seaham to Whitburn in order to see the trenches which the Territorials have been digging against an attack of the Germans.

As we passed through Sunderland the townsfolk were all agape with excitement by reason of the sinister war-fowl, an aeroplane which soared high above their city.

August 15, 1914

I MET Mr Meade Falkner returning from Newcastle.

He tells me that the menace of German spies is a real one. They caught one signalling near the Elswick works last night. The Tyne is a very tempting bait just now with 4 battleships practically completed.

  • Novelist John Meade Falkner lived on Palace Green and became chairman of the Newcastle-based armaments manufacturer Armstrong Whitworth during the war.

August 27, 1914

WHAT effect has war on Religion? I suspect that the effect is almost universally bad. There is no time for thinking, a vast stimulus is given to feeling. While the intellect is barren the emotions run riot.

In an atmosphere of morbid sensationalism every superstition grows rankly. Death and the fear of death lie like a pall on the intelligence and paralyse the conscience.

Every form of teaching and devotion which seems to illumine or affect the shadowed existence beyond the grave appeals to the bereaved, and a fat soil is prepared in which charlatanry can flourish.

The prophecy-fanaticks secure a hearing & every type of wonder worker can count on a market.

August 28, 1914

THE Government makes the very important announcement that native Indian troops are to be employed.

It is held that there would be grave discontent in India if, while the French employed their African troop, we refused to give our Indians a ‘look in’. The reasoning is cogent and probably sound; nevertheless the appearance of Asiaticks on the soil of Europe must needs be regarded as regrettable, and will be exploited to full by the Germans.

The casualty lists are still withholden.

We are only permitted to know that they grow longer every day.

There are many signs of restiveness provoked by the severe economy of news practised by the Press Bureau; it is maintained, not perhaps unreasonably, that the lack of information is telling unfavourably on the recruiting for Kitchener’s new Army. The public wants its comforting ‘purple patches’.

August 29, 1914

AFTER lunch we motored our guests to South Shields and along the coast as far as Seaham Harbour in order that they might see the sinister and unwonted spectacle of the entrenchments cast up on the shore against the attempt to land invaders. Two aeroplanes soaring above us added to the impression of peril.

September 2, 1914

AFTER tea I motored to Houghtonle- Spring, & joined Lord Durham in a meeting held in the village square to assist enlistment.

There was an assembly, as I judge, of about 2,000 men. They received Lord D. with much heartiness, & listened to my speech with much attention.

At the close they even manifested some enthusiasm & I left the place amid cheers like a prince!!

It is perhaps unusual for a clergyman thus directly to associate himself with these warlike preparations, but surely it is not really unfitting.

For there is no middle position possible on the question of individual duty.

The Northern Echo:
A postcard from the time of the First World War, like the one on today’s front cover, featuring Durham Cathedral, of which Dean Hensley Henson was in charge

If enlistment is the duty of young Englishmen at this serious juncture, who could more fitly bid them enlist than the man whose official character is precisely that of the advocate and exponent of human duty?

Accordingly, I propose to exert myself as a recruiting sergeant!!