The Manchesters, Arras. 'Just out of the trenches near Arras. Been through the battles of Ypres and Somme untouched. Going home to Sheffield to be married.'

In An Onlooker in France William Orpen describes the following scene 'This was the time of the great fight round the chemical works at Roeux, and I was drawing the men as they came out for rest. They were mostly in a bad state, but some were quite calm. One, I remember, was quite happy. He had ten days' leave and was going back to some village near Manchester to be married. He showed me her photograph, a pretty girl. Perhaps he was killed afterwards.'