Charlie May

Captain CC ‘Charlie’  May                   Letter to Charlie May from his wife, dated 30 June 1916.  Charlie was killed the following day.  Images reproduced courtesy of the Manchester Regiment Archive and Museum, Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council

Infantry Captain Charlie May was one of the 750,000 men deployed by General Sir Douglas Haig on 1 July 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme. He was one of the 20,000 killed on that day – the worst in the history of the British Army. May suspected he might be killed and the night before the battle asked his adjutant
to take care of his wife and young child. This he did – later marrying Mrs May.

I do not want to die… If it be that I am to go, I am ready. But the thought that I may never see you or our darling baby again turns my bowels to water. I cannot think of it with even the semblance of equanimity.
Captain C C ‘Charlie’ May, writing in his diary as though to his wife, 17 June 1916.

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