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WWI Letters From Soldiers in The British Indian Army

The document presents letters from soldiers in the British Indian Army during WWI, highlighting their unique hardships and experiences. The letters, compiled by historian David Omissi, reveal feelings of isolation, destruction, and the futility of war, as well as the increasing resentment between Indian and European troops. Censorship limited communication, preventing the full expression of their grievances and experiences from reaching home.

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68 views2 pages

WWI Letters From Soldiers in The British Indian Army

The document presents letters from soldiers in the British Indian Army during WWI, highlighting their unique hardships and experiences. The letters, compiled by historian David Omissi, reveal feelings of isolation, destruction, and the futility of war, as well as the increasing resentment between Indian and European troops. Censorship limited communication, preventing the full expression of their grievances and experiences from reaching home.

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amsterplays
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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WWI Letters from Soldiers in the British Indian Army

Colonial soldiers faced additional hardships during their military service. They were
even more isolated by geography and language from their homes than their European
counterparts. This letter comes from a collection assembled by historian David Omissi
to provide access to the Indian experience of the war. All of the letters were found in
government censorship files. Here Sowar Sohan Singh echoes the sentiments of other,
more privileged, troops about the destruction and futility of the conflict.

Kitchener’s Indian Hospital [Urdu]


Brighton 10 th
July 1915

The state of things here is indescribable. There is a conflagration all around, and
you must imagine it to be like a dry forest in a high wind in the hot weather,
with abundance of dry grass and straw. No one can extinguish it but God
himself—man can do nothing. What more can I write? You must carefully
consider what I say. Here thousands of lives have been sacrificed. Scratch the
ground to a depth of one finger, and nothing but corpses will be visible. They
say that God is the great and everlasting soul of the universe, and it is only a
year since all these souls were seated amongst their friends and relations and
enjoying all the delights of life, and now the whole of them are lying hidden
under the ground.

As was the case with soldiers everywhere, communication between colonial troops from
India and their friends and family back home was tightly censored. We know very little
about the writers of such letters, not even whether they were literate or dictated their
words to a scribe (the more likely scenario). In this letter, Behari Lal complains about
his treatment by the army. Unsurprisingly, the letter was not allowed to reach its
intended recipient; government censors described his comments as “likely to do harm
in India.”

Supply and Transport Corps


Secunderabad Cavalry Brigade 28th November 1917

There is no likelihood of our getting rest during the winter. I am sure German
prisoners would not be worse off in any way than we are. I had to go three
nights without sleep, as I was on a motor lorry, and the lorry fellows, being
Europeans, did not like to sleep with me, being and Indian. [The] cold was
terrible, and it was raining hard; not being able to sleep on the ground in the
open, I had to pass the whole night sitting on the outward lorry seats. I am

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sorry the hatred between Europeans and Indians is increasing instead of
decreasing, and I am sure the fault is not with the Indians. I am sorry to write
this, which is not a hundredth part of what is in mind, but this increasing hatred
and continued ill-treatment has compelled me to give you a hint.

Source: David Omissi, ed., Indian Voices of the Great War: Soldiers’ Letters, 1914-18 (New
York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999), in Grayzel, Susan, ed. The First World War: A Brief History
with Documents (New York: Beford/St. Martin’s, 2013), pp. 73-5.

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