Leonard LABAND, ITVs drama Victoria and Harewood House

This is Leonard LABAND; my Grandfather! Although he has been gone for 40 years, he has a bizarre yet fascinating connection to ITV and Mammoth Screens’ production of the ‘period drama’, Victoria.

Leonard LABAND

Leonard was born in Leicester in 1896. He probably grew up with no recollection of the reign of Queen Victoria. She had died 22 January 1901; he wasn’t quite 5 years, at that time.

He would however, grow up to know exactly what it meant to serve King and Country. For in August 1914 Britain found itself flung into a Great European War; involving many Countries. Notably, two of those Countries’ Monarchs were related to Queen Victoria, i.e. King George V and Keiser Wilhelm II; both being Grandchildren.  Having other connections to Zsar Nicholas II also.

Private LABAND Leonard 2452 Joins the 4th Battalion LEIC.R.

Just days after the start of the War, on 31 August 1914, Leonard had Enlisted into the Army. The records I have seen, suggest he may have, let’s say, given ‘false information’ on his attestation papers, by adding 2 years to his age.  Just a week before, the local paper had reported that, the 4th Battalion Leicestershire Regiment were looking to boost their number by 250 men. Going on to say they should be between the ages of 20 – 25. Leonard was only 18, thus he made himself 2 years older in order to join and be accepted, (n.b. you had to be 19 years to server abroad on active service).

He followed the 4th Battalion Leicestershire Regiment through their training and with them on to France, landing at Le Harve on the 3rd March 1915. As it happens, just 1 day before his 19th Birthday.

Leonard at the ‘Front’

The Battalion went straight to the front line and into the trenches; taking 24 hour instruction from a regular Battalion, before commanding a section of the line, them selves. Here, they learned very quickly about keeping their heads down, as ‘sniping’ was rife. They sat behind sandbag trenches on the Messines Ridge until June 1915, when they moved to the infamous, Ypres Salient.

On 23 July 1915, the Germans blew a mine under one of the trenches held by the 5th Battalion of the Regiment. Most of the garrison became casualties and men of the 4th, who were in the trenches on the right flank, came to their aid.  During the next 24-36 hours men of the 4th endeavored to secure the blasted and broken trench. It was during this time that Leonard took a ‘bleighty’; a term given to someone whos wounds were severe enough to be sent home.

Leonard had taken a gunshot wound to the neck. After 4 days of going through the process of casualty clearing, he is admitted to a hospital in Rouen on 27 July 1915. By the 11 August he is on a hospital ship back to England.  From Leonard’s records we know he joins ¾ Battalion, a reserve unit of the Battalion, in November 1915.

Leonard’s Convalescent photograph

So, we know this photograph is around this time, as Leonard still wears the Leicestershire Regiments Cap Badge. After November, he went on to serve in the Labour Corps; for Home Service only.

Update2/2/2024 Loosing direct connections to the Leicestershire Regiment in May 1916.

I have been custodian of my Grandfathers photographs and War medals for a while, but didn’t really take any notice of them until 2014. In the following 3 years I have been doing all I can to understand what my Grandfather did during that War.

As mentioned, all I knew about this photograph is Leonard is sitting in his regulation ‘convalescent blues’ on the steps of a building during the end of 1915. Also in the picture, are two large pillars and inset balustrade. Although we only see a very small part of the building, I believed there was enough detail that may help in its identification.

For 3 years, every documentary or drama on the TV that showed period buildings with steps and pillars, I ‘googled’, but to no avail. In reality, I didn’t really expect to find anything. Over the same period of time, I have been developing a WW1 research project  with the intention of producing a web site. Along side this, I began to reach out to new people via LinkedIn and Twitter, etc.

In fact, during the end of August this year, (2017) I had one of my nieces round to help set up a Facebook account. That very weekend, the very first thing I did was to post the photograph and ask any Facebook user if they recognised the building… ‘Its whereabouts is thought to be somewhere in the UK’. I declared! I had no followers at the time, so didn’t really expect much return. However…

ITV and Mammoth Screen production ‘Victoria’

That very same day of posting the photograph, I was sitting watching the new series of Victoria; a brilliant ITV period drama. I had enjoyed series 1 and was looking forward to the new series. Episode 1…

Half way through, there was a scene where Skerrett, Assistant Dresser to Victoria, went to find Francatelli the head Chef. The scene is in a street in front of a building with steps, pillars and inset balustrades.

I sort of did a ‘double take’, as usual and took the remote to rewind… Could it be the steps Id been looking for. It couldn’t be could it? The Wait for the Tuesday morning, to get in touch with the production company, was long.

Early on Tuesday, I sent an email to the enquiries at Mammoth Screen Production and by the end of the day I had received a reply from Paul, a producer on Victoria; fair play to them for replying so quickly. I was expecting days of waiting. His reply was

Hi Nick

What a fascinating enquiry…
Very pleased you are enjoying the series…
I have been onto your twitter-feed and had a look at the photo you posted…
I can immediately see the resemblance to the house in our scene – the inset balustrades are very distinctive features….
We shot the scene at Harewood House near Wetherby in Yorkshire…

Do have a look online … Do please let us know if you think it might be a possibility as your Grandfather’s convalesce home ..

Good luck!

All best
Paul

Harewood House, 1915

I did have a look and believe it ‘was’ Harewood House up near Leeds. My Grandfather spent a number of weeks in one of Yorkshires beautiful houses; convalescing after being shot in the neck in a dirty little trench in ‘Ypres Salient’.

Does any one know anything else about Harewood House’s roll as a convalescent hospital during WW1; then please let me know. I think it would be very much worth another blog.

If you would like to read more about how I got into researching my families WW1 story then please take a few minutes to read another blog called Trench – The Great War Project, a prologue.

I believe there is a ITV Victoria Christmas special… Not long to wait.