I can add a little background to this image. I was in touch with a family member of the CMP corporal. The Frenchman is also a provost...a 'chef de section' apparently.

There is a second photograph of the same French liason alongside a Morris-Commercial 15cwt which also shows the 1 Corps sign and a '68' Arm of Service serial indicating No. 102 Provost Company who were Corps Provost.

The 1 Corps diaries indicate that their phoney war HQ was at Cuincy, close to Douai and that the APM was also based there. The location is probably somewhere in the centre of the village.

It's surprising there are as many photos as there are...The availability of film (in the UK) was, theoretically at least, pretty strictly controlled for obvious security reasons...There was plenty of official paranoia about 'fifth columnists' and actual German spies...My village historical society has a distinct lack of wartime photos and that was reason they gave me for it...
I guess human nature tries to find a way though or maybe those controls came in later...
Regarding the sending of photos to families I wouldn't have thought the average soldier would be likely to send a snap that indicated he was in fear of his life to a worried family member and the official censor was also in the background, so 'smiles all round' was probably the order of the day...
Anyway, at that stage there hadn't been any shooting and we still imagined we were going to give the Germans a damn good thrashing, not that it would be the other way round....Ian

email (option): ian@wright52.plus.com

Is the chimney in the last photo, possibly the one here at the Paul Paix Raffinerie, Douai, which was I presume on the out skirts of Douai ? I guess if you are going to guard something from the enemy, it would be this ?




Also the architecture of Cuincy certainly matches the first photo, this is close and although now with a rendered finish, this building is almost a match but not quite..