Sikh in Coldstream Guards 2018

[BWEF]

Originally Posted by Frank Kelley

Sorry, was looking at Saturday's, not yesterdays, yes, indeed, words fail me!
I wonder what an average Thomas Atkins of a hundred years ago would make of it?

There was a problem with drugs in the Empire armies 100 years ago. A problem with cocaine in particular:

http://volteface.me/features/great-war-cocaine-panic/


The richer soldiers, mostly officers, were having things like "patent medicines" sent out from home.

"In a December 1915 edition of the Times Savory & Moore advertised a small mail-order medical kit in a handy case containing, among other items, cocaine and heroin. And Harrods offered small packages of morphine and cocaine complete with syringe and spare needles, which was recommended as “A Useful Present for Friends at the Front.” Girls often brought to the train station a cocaine kit as an ideal gift for their loved ones leaving for war. Despite itself advertising cocaine products, the Times, like most other papers, created alarm by suggesting that supplying soldiers with this drug would inevitably undermine the combat effectiveness of the British Army."

I believe that this topic was frequently mentioned in Alf Peacock's "Gunfire" magazine.