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The British arrive at Messines October 1914

Josephine Scheerlinck was the economist of the Institute at Messines, The ladies who originally belonged to the community led a quasi-monastic life, but they were only bound by temporary vows, the duration of which was also limited. They were only concerned with the education of the children in the boarding school. Jospehine talked about a lord that had stayed with them, I left his name incorrect in here account of last week. It was not Captain Lord Hugh William Grosvenor (6 April 1884 – 30 October 1914) the commander of C Squadron, 1st Life Guards, who was killed in action, aged thirty around Zandvoorde. It was Captain Robert Arthur Robin Grosvenor The son of Lt. Col. Arthur Hugh and Helen (Sheffield) Grosvenor, 2nd Lieutenant Robert Arthur Grosvenor, of the 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queen’s Bays), transferred to the Royal Flying Corps in 1916 and received Royal Aero Club Aviator’s Certificate 3513 on a Maurice Farman biplane at military school, Brooklands on 7 September 1916. Posted to 84 Squadron in 1917.
A name and a title can cause confusion and dates can too, she wrote this in February 1915, but to what I found he became a pilot in September 1916.
Josehine’s words about the British
The 14th of October 1914 at 6 pm the first British arrive and it makes us happy, they came from the Mont des cats where they had chased the Germans from the convent , during that action the German Prince de Hesse got wounded and died. We gave them all the available rooms we had. What a lovely bunch they were.
Always full of courage, despite the dangers. They were well supplied! every day, a bus arrived at the institution, well loaded, bringing them from the country: bread, meat, canned food, butter, cheese, tea, sugar, cigarettes, etc., and with that their mail. And so every morning: officers and soldiers found themselves, at least in spirit, near their loved ones left behind: their letters speaking of sacrifice and courage, they drew from them, a new dose of energy and ardour and went, almost cheerfully, to the battle until the evening. we had the pleasure of distributing to them every morning, on departure, large baskets of our good Messinian pears. The Germans occupied Warneton, the English had placed their guns in Messines, all day long there was a succession of shots. We could see up to twenty fires on the horizon at the same time, it was frightening! The English infantry had to arrive to dislodge the Germans, who had taken refuge in the cellars and houses, because we had only cavalry and artillery… on the other hand the Germans were receiving continual reinforcements.
On Thursday 15 October we had the 5 Royal Irish Lancers. well every day at least 250 men and as many horses. What officers! So paternal to their men, whereas the German officers treated their soldiers like brutes. And what a spirit, in the evening, they came back broken, shattered, but after they got washed up, they would play the piano or talk cheerfully among themselves, one would never have said men who had faced death for twelve, fourteen and sometimes eighteen consecutive hours. On Friday the 16th Lancers in addition.
That evening, however, we were very worried. At eight o’clock in the evening, no one had returned. Nine o’clock was ringing, then ten o’clock… still no one. The battle was raging in Warneton, the fight was terrible; the cannons were roaring, we could see in the night several fires, farms, houses, millstones and a whole street of Warneton was blazing… I had sent all the servants to bed and I had stayed up, alone, in the institute, to be able to keep the gentlemen’s dinner warm. Finally, towards midnight, the first ones arrived, tired and exhausted: they had been at the fire for eighteen hours, without having been able to take even a drop of water. Then, little by little, the others came in, all happy to find something to eat. Mrs. Vander Mueren got up to help me, but as they arrived in ever greater numbers (we had 28 officers at the table at 1 a.m.) we called in two maids to help us. They had to come to our house, because in the village all the houses were closed. Finally that night we had 600 horses and as many soldiers in our institute. The next morning, there was not a blade of grass left in our beautiful lawn at the laundry. But the main thing was that the men and horses were able to be housed. On the 17th the lancers were replaced by the §th dragoon guards.
The English guns were still firing, but no serious response from the German guns. The tower of our church was an excellent observatory for the artillery and in our well placed institute, dominating all the surroundings, there was no lack of observations. On Sunday 18th we could see the German bombs, coal boxes exploding on the side of the chateau ‘ la Hutte’, where there was an English gun, and a little later we saw them on the side of the ‘qautre rois’ on the road to Warneton. On Monday the bombs were coming our side, but still far enough away not to worry us too much. On Monday morning a big artillery commander came to look at our gardens to have a gun placed there? we were panicked! It was certainly to attract the bombardment of our institute. I ran to him, but he told me abruptly: “Madame, it’s the necessity of war, if we can do otherwise, we won’t bother you. One of the officers came to the house, went to find the commander and obtained that the cannon not be placed in our house. We thought we were safe, but what a mistake we made.
Next week the bombardment of the institute
Source : oorlogsdagboeken uit de streek tussen ijzer en leie by Luc Devlieger