Sex and soldiering in France and Flanders: the British Expeditionary Force along the western front, 1914-1919.

Abstract

Within the area in which [the typical ranker's] life was lived women were rare. The few attractive ones by all accounts became expert in rebuffing the amorous advances of the hordes of soldiers who passed daily through the villages they lived in. The only soldiers in France who had a chance of making love to a French girl were those whose duties kept them far behind the lines. Once again the despised 'base-wallah' had all the luck.