From Newport To The Somme: A Collection of Letters

How a young Island couple were separated by war, told through their letters to family and friends. A collection of nearly 400 letters were discovered in a Victorian house on the Isle of Wight in 2013. They had been written during the First World War by Bob Brimson, a soldier serving in the Royal Engineers in the trenches on the Western Front and his family on the Isle of Wight, and in particular to his fiancee, Mabel Attrill. They present a snapshot of family life on the Isle of Wight in the shadow of war. From the hardship of the Front to daily life at home, these letters are first-hand social history, telling personal stories in intimate detail.