Saturday June 1st, 1918
Work 7 to 11am finished. We go down the line tomorrow. Sunday being relieved by the LF. Warned to leave at 6pm tonight for Kite Balloon guard. Left 7pm arrived at 3 Trees transport 10:30 – got lost – tired and cold.
Kite Balloon
According to Operation Order 38 issued yesterday, the 13th will be relieved by the 12th Battalion of the Lancashire Fusiliers. Tonight however Frank is sent to guard a Kite Balloon. He is obviously travelling some distance to do this. The first stop is 3 Trees Transport. Unfortunately it seems that the guard got lost en route and arrived late, tired and cold.
Enemy Intelligence
Tonight, acting on the intelligence received from the Bulgarian prisoner, a patrol is sent out to capture Johnny. The interrogatory described a standing patrol in the region of White Scar Hill. It comprised one sergeant and 12 other ranks with a telephone on the northern slopes of Goldies I. Unfortunately the patrol could not find any trace of the enemy. They even resorted to creating a disturbance to see if Johnny would retaliate.
This must have made the Intelligence Officers wonder whether or not the information they received from the prisoner was reliable.
As Captain Tuohy noted, ‘Besides dealing with agents and their reports, the Intelligence Corps – the Secret Corps – had other, much other work on hand. Air reconnaissance and photography and ground observation; the examination of prisoners and captured documents; the identification of the enemy’s dead and the study of his signal traffic were phases of ‘Intelligence’ hardly less important than Secret Service work.
For ‘intelligence’ is the welding into a whole of information derived from a dozen different sources, some trustworthy, some not, and the weighing of such information against already known facts and outstanding deductions.’¹
Intelligence Officers
The role of the Intelligence Officer was not fixed and over time responsibilities seem to have been delegated upwards as the war progressed.
A case in point, this image shows an extract from an 1917 administrative order of the 4th Canadian Division. It forbids any ad hoc interrogations or conversations with prisoners below Corps or Division level – even by an Intelligence Officer. The order goes on to describe prisoner transfers, the ideal number 100-150 at a time. With the ones and twos in Salonika, perhaps this and other rules, including those relating to interrogations, were different.
Reference Maps: Dojran; Kilindir & Pobreg
13th (Service) Battalion War Diary – 1st June 1918 – Sporan
Artillery activity on both sides was very slight. Our planes were very active during the day. Our bombing squadrons went over at least three times. Making use of the statement made by the Bulgar prisoner (Appendix No 4 of the May 1918 Diary) a patrol attempted to locate and if possible capture the post of 1 sergeant and 12 OR mentioned. The patrol moved with great caution but could find no trace of the enemy. Eventually stones were thrown and noise made but without result. Operation Order No 38 Part 2 issued 19:00 hrs (Appendix I)
References & Further Reading
¹ ‘The Secret Corps, a tale of ‘intelligence’ on all fronts’ by Captain Ferdinand Tuohy, 4th edition, London, 1920, page 4
² Sharing the Secret, the Military Intelligence Museum
³ Thread on ‘Role of the Battalion Intelligence Officer‘ on Great War Forum. Image provided to the Forum by ‘jhill’.