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Month: September 2011

Alan P Herbert

Alan Patrick Herbert was born on September 24th 1890, at Ashtead in Surrey, the oldest of the three sons of Patrick and Beatrice Herbert (née Selwyn). His father’s job, as a civil servant at the India Office ensured a comfortable and happy childhood for Alan and his two younger brothers, Sidney and Owen. However, their idyllic childhood ended in 1898, when their mother died from consumption aged just 33 and the care of the three boys fell to their housekeeper, Amelia Deacon.

At the age of nine, Herbert was sent to a preparatory school called The Grange, at Folkestone in Kent, moving on to Winchester College in 1904, where one of his contemporaries was the future war poet, Robert Nichols. Herbert moved up to New College, Oxford in October 1910, having first published several poems in Punch Magazine during the previous summer. He also began working at Missions for the poor, which work he continued while at Oxford, where his contemporaries included the Prime Minister’s son, Cyril Asquith and Francis Newbolt, the son of Sir Henry Newbolt. Having graduated with a First in Jurisprudence, Herbert was staying with the Newbolts at their home at Netherhampton, in Salisbury, when the First World War was declared and he enlisted as an Ordinary Seaman in the Royal Naval Reserve on 5th September 1914.

In the meantime, Herbert had also fallen in love, with Gwendolen Quilter, and the couple were married on December 31st 1914 at St James Church, Bethnal Green. Theirs was a long and happy marriage and they had four children: three daughters (Crystal, Jocelyn and Lavender) and a son named John. However, the First World War had already claimed the first of many friends and family, when Herbert’s youngest brother, Owen, was killed on 27th October 1914, while serving as a Second Lieutenant in the 23rd Brigade of the Royal Field Artillery.

Herbert himself was quickly promoted, first to Leading Seaman and then to Temporary Sub-Lieutenant and he joined Hawke Battalion when it sailed for Gallipoli on 10th May 1915. He enjoyed the unconventional nature of the Royal Naval Division, which stuck to naval traditions, despite its service on land, and refused to adhere to army regulations.

Herbert continued to write poetry, which was again published in Punch, but once in Gallipoli, he developed a severe digestive disorder and was invalided back to England in August 1915, to find that his father had died in his absence (on June 14th). He and Gwen rented a house at 12 Hammersmith Terrace, backing on to the River Thames, enabling Herbert to fuel his love of the water and boating.

By the time Herbert rejoined his battalion, they had returned from the disastrous Gallipoli campaign and were serving on the Western Front. He was promoted to Assistant Adjutant in July 1916, which kept him out of the fighting during the Battle of the Ancre in November 1916, during which Hawke Battalion suffered catastrophic losses, with 400 casualties out of 435 men. The whole division suffered similarly and was withdrawn for major re-structuring, returning to the front in January 1917. Herbert then remained at the front, keeping his men in good humour and refusing (as usual) to conform, until he was wounded in April 1917. While recovering in England, he wrote his semi-autobiographical account of the war, Secret Battle, which was published in 1919, to great acclaim. Herbert only returned to fighting one month before the armistice, which was declared while he was serving in Algeria.

After the war, Herbert joined the staff at Punch Magazine, where he wrote satirical articles on the legal profession. He also wrote novels, musicals, comic operas and plays, some of which were performed at the Lyric Theatre in London.

In 1935, Herbert successfully stood for parliament in the Oxford University seat, as an independent candidate. He made his mark in the House of Commons, with the passing of the Matrimonial Causes Act (also known as the Herbert Act) of 1937, which simplified divorce proceedings.

During the Second World War, Herbert served as a Petty Officer in the Royal Naval Auxiliary Patrol, which formed part of the London defences on the River Thames. In May 1941, however, Herbert lost his only surviving brother, Sidney, who had been serving as an Engineering Officer aboard HMS Hood, which was sunk by the German battleship, Bismarck. Gwen served throughout the war as an ambulance driver, despite her husband’s absence and the fact that their house was bombed twice.

In 1945, Herbert was knighted and continued to serve in parliament until 1950 when the University seats were abolished. In his later years, he became irritated by those who attempted to provide a different – and in his mind, inaccurate – representation of the First World War. Among his targets was the Joan Littlewood Theatre Workshop production of Oh What a Lovely War, which Herbert accused of trivialising his past.

In common with many who served, the First World War would remain a subject dear to his heart throughout Herbert’s life as he was haunted not only by his experiences, but also by the friendships made and lost during the conflict. It seems, therefore, somehow appropriate that, when Alan Herbert died in 1971, the date of his death should have been 11th November: the day on which so many people remember the sacrifices made by the young men of his generation.

Siegfried Sassoon

Born on 8th September 1886, Siegfried Loraine Sassoon was the second of three sons of Alfred and Theresa Sassoon. His parents separated when he was four years old, leaving his mother to raise her three sons alone. Nonetheless, Sassoon spent a happy and secure childhood and was educated at Marlborough before going on to Clare College, Cambridge, although he failed to obtain a degree. Back home in Kent, Sassoon lived the life of a country squire, as well as writing poetry, some of which was shown to the influential art collector, Edward Marsh, who quickly became friends with Sassoon, introducing him to several other literary celebrities, including Rupert Brooke.

Upon the outbreak of war, Sassoon immediately enlisted as a Trooper in the Sussex Yeomanry, but a bad fall while riding left him with a broken arm. When he had recovered from this injury, Sassoon transferred to the infantry and was commissioned into the Royal Welch Fusiliers in May 1915, leaving for France that November, following training.

Sassoon’s war soon became personal. He received news of the death of his brother Hamo in Gallipoli in November 1915, then in March 1916, his close friend Second Lieutenant David Thomas was shot and killed. The tone of Sassoon’s poetry changed from this moment on, as did his attitude to the war: he wanted to avenge these deaths, regardless of his own personal safety and his exploits earned him the nickname “Mad Jack”, as well as a Military Cross.

In mid-1916, Sassoon was sent back to England, suffering from trench fever, and didn’t return to the trenches until February 1917, where he participated in the First Battle of the Scarpe and was wounded in the shoulder. By the end of April, Sassoon was back in England again.

While convalescing from his wound, Sassoon became more and more embittered about he war and also fell under the influence of a group of pacifists, including John Middleton Murry and Bertrand Russell. The culmination of these events was Sassoon’s now famous Declaration against the validity of the war. Once knowledge of his Declaration became public, his friends, especially Marsh and Graves, tried to convince him that his aim of being court-martialled would never be permitted. Sassoon therefore, reluctantly, agreed to attend a medical board and, following evidence from Robert Graves, was declared as suffering from shell-shock. On 23rd July, he was admitted to Craiglockhart Military Hospital in Edinburgh, where he came under the care of Dr. William H. R. Rivers.

While at Craiglockhart, Sassoon wrote some of his most affecting and effective poetry. He also met Wilfred Owen (a fellow patient) and the two quickly became friends. Sassoon’s influence over Owen’s poetry is obvious, but Owen also idolised the older poet and war hero.

Under the influence of Rivers’s treatment, Sassoon came to realise that he could no longer tolerate remaining safely in Scotland while his men were suffering in France. On 26th November, he was declared fit for active service and left for Palestine in mid-February 1918, only returning to France in May. On 13th July, Sassoon was in No Man’s Land when he stood up and removed his helmet, whereupon he was shot in the head. He later discovered that it was one of his own men who had delivered the blow, believing him to be an advancing German. The wound was not fatal, but resulted in the end of the Sassoon’s war and he was placed on indefinite sick leave, eventually being discharged from the army in March 1919, with the rank of Captain.

Sassoon waited for several months to hear from Owen and it was quite some while before he heard of the younger poet’s death on 4th November 1918. Immediately after the war, Sassoon threw himself into literary work, meeting Thomas Hardy and T. E. Lawrence, among others, and becoming literary editor of the Daily Herald, in which position he was able to advance the career of Edmund Blunden, who became a lifelong friend.

In 1928, Sassoon began writing his autobiographies, initially as fictionalised accounts and then in non-fiction versions, as well as continuing to write poetry. During the 1920’s, Sassoon’s homosexuality became a more important part of his life and he embarked upon a few romantic liaisons, most notably with Stephen Tennant. Eventually, however, Sassoon tired of the fickle nature of these relationships and he married Hester Gatty in December 1933. They lived at Heytesbury House in Wiltshire and had one son, named George, in 1936. The marriage did not last, however, and the couple separated in 1945. In 1957 Sassoon converted to the Roman Catholic faith and he died on September 1st 1967.

Siegfried Sassoon’s war poetry is often – and unjustly – eclipsed by that of Wilfred Owen and yet Sassoon’s poems contain a brutal honesty that is lacking from almost every other poet in this genre. This, mingled with his humorous, ironic and occasionally lyrical style allows us to see the effects of the war: the anger, the waste, the bitterness; but underneath all of that, we can see the unutterable sadness of the “world’s worst wound” as Sassoon called the conflict, and a love for his fellow sufferers that few would succeed in conveying so beautifully or so honestly.