Main content

Edinburgh, Scotland - The Dreghorn Training Trenches

A World War One trench training network still survives on the outskirts of Edinburgh, near the Dreghorn Barracks. For many years they had been largely forgotten in woodland, until local historian and author Lynne Gladstone-Millar successfully led a campaign to preserve them.

Her father, William Ewart Gladstone-Millar - or "Glad" - trained in the Dreghorn trenches before he was sent to the Somme where he was shot in both legs in the Battle for High Wood. After a year convalescing back home, "Glad" volunteered to go back and was later awarded the Military Cross at the Second Battle of the Marne.

Captain Gladstone-Millar survived the Great War and was able to share his memories of the Dreghorn trenches with his daughter. Lynne remembers her father saying: 'There was a specialised kind of mud there. We called it 'Dreghorn Sludge'. It was good training for the Somme.

Release date:

Duration:

5 minutes

This clip is from

Featured in...