Thursday Was on guard last [night] N.C.O. was balled [sic]out this a.m. for sleeping with my boots off on [acount] of a stand to at 7 A.M. Expected Fritz over he did not come The weather these day [sic] is the very split [sic] of Canadian, very clear lots of air activity it’s a great night tonight am well
Putting on the footgear shown in this photograph would certainly mean a less than prompt response to the order to stand to, when every man is on the alert and ready to respond to an enemy attack. When the order to stand down is given, only sentries remain on such high alert. (1)
Perhaps the officer who bawled Percy out is mostly concerned to reassert his authority after the topsy-turviness of Christmas, when the sergeants served Christmas dinner to the Other Ranks, and the officers relinquished their gramophone for the entertainment of the enlisted men. Christmas has taken on many features of pagan solstice celebrations, after all, and the levelling of military hierarchy is quite like the Roman Saturnalia, when slaves sat down to a banquet fit for their masters.
The photograph is in Percy’s large album, and is identified only as “Taken in France, winter of 1917.” Percy is seated on the left. Note the tin lids and the gas respirators. The boots look as if they might be waterproof Larrigans; they certainly are high enough and require enough length of lace, but they don’t seem to have a moccasin foot, like the original design. (2)
(1) “Stand-To.” Smith, Lorenzo. N. Lingo of No Man’s Land. A World War I Slang Dictionary. (1918) 2014. 75.
(2) Law, Clive M. Khaki: Uniforms of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. 1997
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