IT WAS difficult for readers of the Southern Daily Echo and Southampton Pictorial a century ago to hear of the individual heroism being displayed by our soldiers around Ypres without realising how vital tobacco was to the men.

As was often remarked, soldiers, while advancing into the thickest of the fighting, would puff at their pipes or take that last drag on a cigarette to calm the nerves before confronting the Kaiser’s men head on.

A pipe of tobacco or a cigarette in times like these indeed seemed to solve all the British soldier’s cares, and to deprive him of a smoke, for even a few days, was deemed so unthinkable, that a fund was specially set up in Southampton to help keep our boys in tobacco and also give the people of Southampton a chance to pay a small debt of gratitude to those fighting in the war.

A poster to promote the “Southampton Pictorial Tobacco Fund” campaign, which appeared on the pages of the Pictorial in June 1915, offered readers a chance to help make sure that at least every man with the Hampshire Regiments was looked after by making a modest subscription.

“Whether you send us 6d or a sovereign, it will be spent entirely in smokes, and not one farthing deducted for fund expenses – our services being gladly given free,” the poster claimed.

The service, which together with assistance from Martins Ltd, the well-known tobacco firm of London, the War Office and Admiralty, aimed to distribute tobacco and cigarettes to the Hampshire Regiments in France and the Dardanelles that were so valiantly fighting for our king and country.

For every 6d donated, the Fund would send to some soldier in the Regiment a 2 oz mixture of tobacco, 30 cigarettes, and some matches. In addition to this, and perhaps one of the most pleasing features of the fund, was that each of these parcels contained a special return postcard bearing the name and address of the subscriber to enable the soldier who received the gift a means to personally acknowledge his gratitude.

These postcards were also gratefully received by fund subscribers as they made fascinating souvenirs from the men who were “doing their bit” in the trenches in Flanders.

Parcels could also be sent to relatives and specific soldiers serving with the Hampshire Regiment on request, although subscribers were advised that this service would take slightly longer due to the extra care being required to ensure that the package reached its intended recipient.

However, as the poster suggested, “every man in the firing line was a man you would be proud to hand your cigarette case to”, and that subscribers would not only be rewarded with the personal postcard expressing the soldier’s thanks, but all have their name in the Daily Echo.