Lord Kitchener approved the scheme for raising a Manchester battalion, sending a telegram of approval to The Lord Mayor.
The people of Manchester were told for the first time of conditions in Belgium as a letter from the front was published describing for the first time the BEF’s encounter with the German army.
Sent by Sergeant W.Loftus to his brother, he described how the enemy appeared unexpectedly after they had given up hope of engaging with them:
“our artillery opened on the beggars in fine style.It was a fine sight to see the shells speeding on their way to lay our respects to Kaiser Bill and his men. Soon they returned the compliment but they were a long time about finding anything approaching our range and they didn’t know of our shelters, a trick we learnt from the Boers I believe.”
The battle intensified, the Germans in solid square blocks standing out sharply against the skyline , ” you couldn’t help hitting them, it was like butting your rifle against a brick wall.”
Though repulsed the letter described wave upon wave of soldiers backed by cavalry, the British forces defending from the front ranks with bayonets and from behind with incessant fire.
This, he continued carried on through the day with the German troops right up against the British lines.
At sunrise the order came to abandon their position-he couldn’t understand why but ” like good soldiers we obeyed without a murmur”
There were reports of British attacks on German shipping at Heligoland with reports of four German ships sunk and many more damaged with little British loss of life.
Back in Manchester, at Hyde Road, a Manchester city trial game attracted a crowd of 3,000, the standard of play said a report in the Evening News, was not of the highest quality even though seven of the players featured were already on city’s books , by the end of the game though the crowd had increased to five thousand.
Two tram cars collided in Salford at the junction of Chapel Street after a points failure, a number of passengers complained of shock it none were seriously enough injured to be detained.
