And then there were outright brothels where sex was the main item on the menu. These ranged from the establishments described by Gunnery Aubrey Wade in the opening chapter, through Le Drapeau Blanc in Rouen – where several young officers on a draft conducted to the front by Robert Graves lost their virginity – to a decorous house behind the Somme battlefield whose beautiful and engaging ladies bore as little resemblance to the pale and overworked women of the notorious Rue des Bons Enfants in Armentières as a regular footguards battalion did to a down-on-its-luck pioneer battalion.

Haig, an abstemious man, often used to stop at a café for a light lunch during visits to units or headquarters, and on one occasion selected this most up-market of bawdy houses. He remained wholly unaware of its real raison d’être, and the story caused huge delight.

Source:

Holmes, Richard. "Heart and Soul." Tommy: The British Soldier on the Western Front, 1914-1918. London: HarperCollins, 2004. 596. Print.

Further Reading:

Robert von Ranke Graves

Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig, KT, GCB, OM, GCVO, KCIE, ADC