A WEYMOUTH resident has spoken of his father's brave recovery of two mustard gas shell heads when his unit was attacked in the First World War.

Gordon Thorner's father Arthur Levi Thorner joined the army in 1910 aged 22, and he served as a Corporal in 115th Heavy Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery in France during the First World War from October 3 1914 to sometime in 1918.

In 1918 German mustard gas shells hit a connecting trench used by the 115th to access their guns, but somehow after the gas had cleared Arthur managed to locate two of the shell heads and carried them around France, bringing them back to England before the end of the war.

Heavy batteries in the Royal Garrison Artillery were equipped with huge '60 pounder' guns which fired large explosive shells, destroying enemy artillery and stores, roads and railways behind enemy lines.

The 115th were even mentioned in Douglas Haig's first dispatch May 19, 1916 which summarised local operations at St Eloi.

The dispatch reads, “While many other units have done excellent work during the period under review, the following have been specially brought to my notice for good work in carrying out or repelling local attacks and raids,” going on to list the 115th among other individual units.

Soon after Arthur returned from the War, he married Eva Alice Barnes on November 2 1918 and they went on to have three children: Eva, Barbara, and Gordon.

The shell heads were used as door stops in the family home and Gordon still has them today.

Gordon said: “We had a family friend who was a sergeant and he was in the Royal Artillery during the War too. We used to visit them for Christmas and Boxing Day and he and my father would talk about the War, so I would prick my ears up and listen to them. I heard the Somme mentioned in their conversations, and the conditions. That's how I first found out what the strange door stops were.”

Arthur was born on January 6 1888 in Litton Cheney and studied at Thorner's School, which his ancestors founded, before he left to work on a local farm prior to joining the RGA.

Gordon said of his father: “He was very placid but his word was law, if he told us to do something we did it. He loved his gardening, and as a child I used to help him at his allotment growing vegetables. When I got called up for the Second World War I was an apprentice engineer and was deferred for 12 months, but I was 19 when I joined up and Dad was full of encouragement.”

After the War Arthur set up a village shop in Long Bredy with his wife, but soon left to work at a wireless station near Dorchester.

Gordon said his father's health was considerably affected by the mustard gas shelling.

“When I was away in the Army he really struggled with the five mile walk because of how much the gas damaged his lungs. I remember he said he had to crawl up the hill and sit in a gateway and was sat there for a long time until he got his breath back. He had to retire early because it was so bad and for the last five years we moved him down to the dining room. We changed over 500 oxygen canisters in that time, but he never grumbled.”

“He was a loyal, gentlemanly man. Eventually I bought his house, and when I signed the papers and it was a done deal he said 'thank god for that because now your mother has got a roof over her head for the rest of her life', so he was a very caring family man. Before he died I had the chance to thank him for the upbringing I had, and I'm glad I did.”

Dorset Echo: