Commemorating the 110th Anniversary of The Battle of the Somme, with the Big Battlefield Bike Ride. A 4-day charity cycling challenge in June 2026 to help veterans get the support they need; mentally, physically, & financially.

My grandmother had 3 big brothers and the eldest was called George Marsden-Smedley. George was born in 1897 in Derbyshire. He graduated from Harrow in 1915 and had a place at Cambridge, but he never took it up. Along with his best friend, and without telling his family, he signed up to join the Rifles regiment and trained in various locations around the UK throughout 1915 and early 1916. In July 1916, he left for France and was posted with his regiment to the area near Guillemont at the start of the Battle of the Somme. After 6 weeks of fighting, mainly along the railway line near Guillemont, George was killed in an attack on the front line on the 18th August 1916. His body was never found. If you want to better understand the nature of warfare in that place, at that time, the author Ernst Junger chronicles his experiences at Guillemont at almost the same time from 'the other side of the wire' in his diaries "Storm of Steel". After the War, George's Father (my Great Grandfather) purchased a plot of land near to where he thought George might have died and erected a monument that our Family still maintains today. I have enclosed a photo of George in his Harrow Cricket Captain's whites and his military uniform, a photo of my Grandmother Diana, and the monument as it stands near to Guillemont today.

This cycle ride, 110 years after the event, will bring me to see George's monument for the very first time. I am looking forward to it.