1916

My yearly ramblings about the people from Lansdowne Crescent are increasingly becoming stories about people who will never live here again.

When Frank came home last October, after a winter in the trenches and his injury, his character was much developed, but his gaiety was temporarily extinguished. Happily a few months in England restored him to his old self. And so it was up to the very end. With reference to the ‘greatest battle,’ as he called it, ‘top in the world’ he wrote: ‘Everyone is very optimistic as to the outcome of the fight, and I hope we shall soon get some news justifying the optimism.’ And again a few days later: ‘I think we are really beginning to stir the Hun now, and once we do I don't think he'll stop, at any rate we shan't.’

While at home, he divided the winter and early spring between Worcester and Petersfield to be with his financée. He was long enough at home to feel it worth while to resume some of his solicitor's work, and most days found him in his old familiar place at the office, to the intense joy of father and the satisfaction of the clerks.

He also took up the work he had perforce dropped at the outbreak of war, the close personal attention to the cases connected with the National Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children of which he was Secretary. He spent hours going through the cases which had come into the office during his absence, and made himself intimately acquainted with every detail. Each case was thoroughly considered, and the best course to pursue in each much discussed. He realised that of all the many vast problems which will confront us in the future, none is more important than the care of the children.

He also spent much time in reading and weighing the various articles written on Reconstruction and other weighty problems arising out of the war. Always Liberal in outlook, he was becoming more and more convinced of the righteousness and urgency of many of the demands of Labour, and though he had not as yet identified himself with that party, I feel sure that his sympathies were to a great extent with them.

Meanwhile Peter was still in France, The whole of the five months that Peter was in France there was continual agitation as to whether or not the battalion would be broken up and sent back to train for commissions. In February the agitation became acute, and his letters are largely taken up with speculations as to the chances of his getting home. For that was frankly the one thought in his mind. He was as keen now to get home as he had been in England to get out. He still had an unshaken conviction in the righteousness of the war, but at the same time his pining for ‘Blighty’ was obvious, and ‘make some riots in favour of an early peace’ is a typical remark of his letters at that time.

At last it really looked as though he was going to get his wish, and on March 14th he wrote: ‘The first batch of commissionaires went this morning to Balliol. What do you think of that? Apparently we are destined to go for a six weeks' course at Oxford before joining our respective battalions. Almost too good to be true. Personally they can keep me there six years if they like, I shall not grumble. Rather curious if I got billeted at Keble, wouldn't it. I'm hoping my first leave will coincide with Ningy and Carrie’s holidays.’

That was the last letter we had from him from France for a few days afterwards, late one evening, in he walked. His first experience on his return to England was of roughing it as he had done in France, for he landed in the heavy blizzard of late March and had been held up on the journey home for several hours. He had slept on the floor of a waiting-room for some time, and then had been regaled with cocoa by a friendly signalman, who offered Pete a shilling, as he reminded him of his own boy who was fighting in France.

He had very little leave, a bare three days, but the great thing was to have him in England. He went immediately to Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where he spent four months in an O.T.E. That four months was an oasis in a desert, and he enjoyed the short respite to the full, and felt as though he were back in old undergraduate days. It was a. disappointment to him at first that he was not among those who had been sent to Oxford, but afterwards he felt glad that he had the chance of living in the sister University. Except for the fact that he wore khaki instead of a ragged scholar's gown, his days were passed very much as an undergraduate, with lectures in the morning and evening, and the rest of the day being given over to tennis and boating. One real drawback to Cambridge was that it was so inaccessible, leave was rarely long enough to admit of a visit home. But if the mountain could not come to Mahomet, Mahomet could go to the mountain, and Janet punted up to Grantchester on a Saturday afternoon and partook of tea in a celebrated orchard close to the river-side. Aunt Louie and I went and stayed a week with him.

Now going back to Frank, about Easter he was passed fit for light duty, and was stationed for a short time at Wareham, where his chief duty seemed to be taking out convalescents for gentle strolls morning and afternoon. In April he was posted for General Service, and rejoined the 10th battalion just two or three weeks before the beginning of ‘what will probably prove to be the greatest battle in the world,’ as he said.

Frank had a few good stories to tell about his part of the war. This story was when he had returned to his battalion in April - he was out on a route march with his company, and as senior subaltern should have been walking in the rear, but finding an apparently superfluous horse near by, thought he might as well ride it. Whereupon the C.O. asked another officer if Mr. Tree was very done up, as he was. riding his (the C.O.'s) horse!

The Battle of the Somme opened on the 1st July and from the very first the 10th Worcesters were in the thick of it. At first Frank was among the 10 per cent of the officers who remained behind as reserves, and we got letters from him regularly during the first part of the month rather depressed letters for him, and no wonder, for they are full of names of his fellow-officers who had gone under. At last, his Company Commander having been killed, his turn came to take charge of the company, and on July 12th they marched up to defend the British position at La Boisselle, which had just been taken from the enemy. From that day onwards he was in the midst of fighting of the most desperate kind, and save for a field post card on the 14th we had no communication from him of any sort. He fell at Bazentin le Petit on the night of the 22nd July, one day after his twenty-eighth birthday, and two days after the date in the previous year when Charlie had fallen. Of what happened during those terrible last days we learned afterward from his Sergeant-Major. He described it as absolute hell. The story connected with Frank's death is peculiarly moving to those who knew him, a strong man, not by any means hyper-sensitive, and possessed with rather more than average physical courage. It adds its testimony to the unspeakable horror and hellishness of war.

The battalion had been in the trenches for over a week under terrible bombardment. Frank had seen one by one his fellow-officers fall, till he was almost the only survivor. And as they fell more and more of the responsibility fell on him. On the night of the 20th he had come to the end of his tether, and the unutterable strain of the past week had broken him down.

He was in his dug-out with his Sergeant-Major, when the news came that he was to lead his men over the top the following morning. And then he lost courage, and sat for an hour or more saying over and over again. ‘I can't do it. I can't do it. What shall I do?’ The agony of that night we can but dimly imagine. Morning came at last and the moment to go over, and with it the supreme moment of his triumph. He was the first of the company to go over, and all that day he was an example to his men of the utmost bravery. At night came the order to retreat. One by one the men of his company left the trench; when they had nearly all gone the Sergeant-Major said to Frank: ‘Come on now, sir, you can do no more,’ and himself led the way. When at last all were safely out Frank turned to go, and as he did so a shell burst at his feet. The struggle was over, and his own victory won.

‘He played the game, and the world is poorer for his loss.’ Such are the words written by one who knew him well, and all who knew him realise so well the truth of that statement. The world is infinitely poorer for his loss, and for the loss of hundreds like him. And yet perhaps just here lies our own inspiration. For to us is given the tremendous responsibility of ‘making good,’ for them as well as for ourselves. We hold a stewardship of which we must some day give account to them. It is a staggering responsibility, but it makes life, in spite of all, gloriously worth while, and makes it possible for us, because of them, to be both’ brave and strong,’ aye, and ‘glad and gay.’

The Worcester Herald

July 29, 1916

Everyone was devastated by his death. A barrister, for instance, who comes round -on circuit wrote thus of him; ‘I think I have often told you of the great admiration I had for Frank. He was not only clever and tactful, but had such a charming manner, and I have always felt that a great future was open to him. He was admired and respected and loved by all with whom he came in contact.’ Later the same barrister told the clerk, Potter how much he had looked forward to Frank's future. ‘The father is brilliant,’ he said, ‘but the son would have been more brilliant. I had expected him to make a great mark in his profession, he took such infinite pains with his work.’

It was a great comfort to us that Pete's term at Cambridge ended on almost the very day we heard of Frank's death, and he was able to be with us during the time immediately following. In fact, the War Office were for once generous, and he was able to spend the whole of the month of August with us. He proved a tower of strength; he seemed to have turned all at once from a boy into a man, and he assumed in a wonderful way the responsibility of the only son of the family. He felt Frank's death acutely, they had been exceptionally good friends, and Peter always counted upon Frank's opinion on every important point. He said little, but whether it was the war or whether it was his brothers' deaths - probably it was a compound of the two his character changed; he became very silent, and his face in repose was extraordinarily sad. Of course he was not always like that, often he would waken up and be the cause of great noise and laughter, and his sense of humour never left him. But to us who watched him there was behind it all a sense that the burden of something was lying heavy upon him. This sadness of countenance was noticed by others outside the family too. One day at Hampstead a visitor who was introduced to him said afterwards to Aunt Jo. ‘Who is the man with the beautiful face? But how sad it is for such a young man.’

At the beginning of September Pete was given a commission in the Machine Gun Corps, and was stationed at Grantham at the Machine Gun Headquarters. Owing to the circumstances of his case, after undergoing the usual six weeks' training he was not drafted into a company, but was given work at the Headquarters Office, and though much of the work was very boring, he knew that he was safe for Home Service so long as he stayed there.

Grantham is not an ideal spot for a young man to spend time in. As Peter so described it, ‘Grantham is an awful hole. Its redeeming features are a theatre, which runs the usual type of variety show, and a rather superior tea-shop with a cinema attached, or rather the other way about.’

The actual work connected with the guns he found quite interesting. He described it as ‘a sort of cross between Algebra at its worst and Geometry particularly involved, quite interesting, and a vast improvement on anything I have done in the army before.’

Peter has, perhaps, given us a deeper insight into his mind than the other two. For so young a man he has, it seems to me, unusual sympathy with the sufferings .of others. He realises with extraordinary insight the anguish which the mothers have had to endure in this war. I have by me a letter which he wrote to me soon after Frank's death, which shows how deeply he had thought things out. Let me quote it here:

‘Thank you very much for your letter. It's nice to know something, however little, about Frank. I'm afraid he had a very rough time of it those last weeks, and we can't help feeling that it was better for him to die like that than to go on suffering hell indefinitely. It's not very easy for us to take that view of it anyway. In the first place, no one in England realises at all what men can suffer mentally abroad, and in the second, it's very hard to be philosophical and to take the purely unselfish view, however hard we try. And really the .only thing to do is to carry on in the same old way as before, only knowing that when things seem particularly hard and not worthwhile, then if we stick to it and don't give way we are nearer to them. That's why this war is so much harder on women than men. When men are doing something definite in the war it helps a lot. But the bravest of all are the women, and not the women doing war work necessarily, but the women who have to stay at home and keep things together and see their loved ones suffer and die, and can do nothing to help them save hope and pray. They are the real heroes of the war. You are the people whom my heart goes out to, and I wish I could do something to help and comfort all of you at home. But that I'm afraid is beyond my power. I think the two people I have admired most of late are mother and Lucy. You say that mother drew a simile between Christ and those who suffer, but still stick to their duty. I wonder if she has ever considered how God-like the parents are who gladly give their sons to save the world if it can be saved. Surely behaviour like that is better than all these National Missions and special service and so on. The real religion of the world is not to be found in churches but in homes. I think that if these bishops and people spent their time in going round the homes of fallen soldiers and did something for the parents and sisters and wives, they would be doing a far finer thing than in getting people into a state of mental depression in the churches. People have got quite enough to be miserable about without thinking of their sins. Or do these parsons really think that God is so narrow minded as to be angry with people for comparatively trifling sins when they have given their utmost all for the sake of honour? If they do, then either they are wrong or there's something radically wrong with their religion somewhere. It's very easy for a man with a. good social position to get up and tell people that their attitude towards life is all wrong and damn the soldiers for a set of drunken hooligans, but it is really surprising how pained they feel if they are called upon to show a little practical religion and give up their chauffeurs.

Well, I didn't intend this letter to be a sermon, but I did want to show and tell you, and it's not very easy to express one's feelings, how much I do feel and think about and admire you at home.’

Here is something from another letter from him. He wrote this after Frank's death:
 
‘Charlie is gone, Frank is gone, why is it always that the best are taken and the others left? Why indeed? We who are left often ask ourselves that question.’

Peter understood with perhaps a vision clearer than we who have not faced and tasted death the splendid self-abnegation of womanhood. A woman giving freely of her first-born-of those who have lisped their first prayers at her knee-to go forth to die, while she remains in dry-eyed agony at home.

One sees from time to time hints of Pete’s disillusionment with organised religion. Sometimes it is a word as to the action of a particular Bishop, sometimes a few words as to the quarrel among the various sects with the Church; but through it all one sees, together with the growth of his soul in spiritual insight, the growing impatience with the inability of the clergy to grapple with the needs of the age. At the same time, the inner life of the Church still meant much to him, and he never felt the necessity of leaving it.

When Peter first went to college he went with every hope and intention of becoming a clergyman, but as time went on this idea became fainter. It was very characteristic of him that immediately on hearing the news of Frank's death he quietly announced his intention of taking his place in the office, if he should ‘come through,’ and of trying to carry on Frank's work, ‘though very badly’ (as he expressed it). On being questioned afterwards as to his wish to go into the Church, he very emphatically said that he had quite given up the idea, that even if Frank had lived he would not have felt that he could do so, but that by taking Frank's place he hoped to have some opportunity of doing social service. His life was still to be dedicated to service (though he himself did not so express it), but that service must be as a layman.

He saw with remarkable clearness the bitter struggle and trouble that must ensue on the declaration of peace. The enemy defeated abroad, yes; but what of those of our own household? In poignant words he wrote to a friend of his:
‘I was very interested to hear about your impending lecture on Labour. I hope it was a success. Surely it is a great concession for - to have anything to do with a Holy Roman Father, though at times like these it is absolutely ridiculous for 'professing Christians' to fly at each other's throats because they don't happen to adopt the same form of worship as each other. It will need every sane person to do their 'damnedest' after the war to keep things together. There's bound to be endless social trouble, and it is certainly up to the Churches to set an example, which they certainly will not do by flying at each other's throats. To my mind, though I know you won't agree with me in this, absolute uniformity of religion is impossible, if not undesirable, because of natural diversities of temperament. But why people should not be able to let others go their own way when all ways ultimately lead to the same end beats me. It is an extraordinary thing how many 'religious' people are the most unchristian. And certainly, unless this bitterness can be eradicated, religion as an asset to the nation is absolutely dead. I have just finished reading a book by Vachell called Blinds Down, which shows how narrowness of outlook, or rather ‘wilful blindness to things, caused untold suffering.’

One bit of good news for our family this year was the birth of baby Margot, a sister for Betty, and another niece for me on August 6th.

Now for the rest of the neighbourhood:

We have some who have moved out, and others who have moved in. Mr. Needham has left number 2, which is now owned by Mrs. T.L. Williams. One of his relatives, Major A. O. Needham received Crois de Guerre in Belgium.

Now at number 3. we have Robert J. Derbyshire, who is a merchants’ clerk. He is about 36 and came from the Smethwick area. His father is a grocer.
10 is now owned by Austin Barnes.

At 12-13 is Thomas William Badgery – leather manufacturer. He is about 47, and his sister Lilian lives with them. They used to live on Boughton Street.

14 by Miss Mary Curtis – her cousin was previously the owner of number 5

17 is now owned by Benjamin Holloway, a Bank manager. He and his family came from Staffordshire.

Gwenllian Best spent some time visiting with her mother-in-law to be, Caroline Day. Because Una was busy with her having her new baby, Peter, and Muriel had her own newborn, Mark, Muriel asked Gwenllian to look after her little boy Jan, who is about seven. Muriel told Gwenllian to make sure he always washed behind his ears, and it became a joke between them. He would come up to her and show her his ears before she even asked.

May and John Stinton have had their new child, a girl whom they have called Joanna. May is already planning her ballet career.

And we have some sad news from the neighbourhood too, our very good friend Dot – or officially known as Eveline Mary Duncan, died this autumn. She was only 45. She died of influenza which has taken such a toll in our country. As if losing our men in the war was not bad enough.