Home Fires Burning: The Great War Diaries of Georgina Lee

Georgina Lydia Lee (1869-1965) moved in high society and, together with her husband Charles, had many contacts with members of the Establishment. In October 1913, aged 44, Georgina gave birth to her only child, Harry. Georgina was closely involved with the domestic war. She describes the food shortages that took hold as Britain was blockaded and the terror and carnage caused by the Zepplin air raids that assailed London.

Letters from the six serving members of her family alerted her to the despair at the size of the Regular Army in 1914, the reality of the shell shortage scandal in 1915, the shortcomings of Sir Ian Hamilton in the Gallipoli campaign. By late 1916 Georgina shared her countrymen’s anti-German feeling, as the scale of the Somme casualties became known. She writes of public figures, such as Sir Edward Grey, Asquith, Churchill and Lloyd George and the events that shook British society in the midst of war. Her diaries offer a fascinating insight into how Britain coped with the pressures and crises of the First World War on the Home Front.