OSAmag80

More documents

Recommendations

Info

T h e O l d S t a t i o n e r - N o 8 0 It would be impossible to describe all the horrors he experienced during the three and a half years he was serving in France. Indeed, many accounts are available of others who went through the same. Yet, my father wrote his story in a very personal, factual way without showing much emotion or embellishing the details. The Imperial War Museum have not kept a copy on film and my daughter managed to get his story into book form (Blurb.com and go to Wal's War). He fought in the Battles of Festubert and Loos in 1915; at Vimy Ridge in 1916; In 1917 he endured the fighting at the Hindenburg Line, Ypres, Poelcapelle and Bullecourt. At the latter battle he acted as a stretcher-bearer and won the Military Medal for outstanding bravery in rescuing a soldier under heavy fire and through shell holes and barb wire. In 1918 he was at Barisis and at the start of the great German offensive (which failed) in March he was captured. This happened when he was taking a stretcher across a corn field to the First Aid post and discovered that the Germans were on two sides of the field, almost to where he was heading. He threw himself down under a hail of bullets, but decided, in the end, that he would make a run for it. Immediately, a bullet hit the side of his helmet and came out on the side, miraculously missing his head. Putting his hand up to hold his head, he had a bullet in the hand and knew the game was up. He writes, " Strangely, I felt quite calm and said to myself, 'at last'." The Germans ran towards him with bayonets fixed, but thankfully were not used and he had no alternative but to surrender. He, with many others, was taken to a Prussian coal mine, many miles away and put to work half a mile down extracting coal. Not being a miner and with bullying Germans whose language he did not understand, he endured a most miserable time and was badly injured on two occasion, but just had to keep on going. He writes "In many ways the mines were worse than the trenches because at least you had rest days at times, but never down the mines." My father, Walter, was an extremely shy, quiet and reserved man, so everything he went through was an ordeal, but, at the Prussian mines, his heart of compassion went out to all the other prisoners, French, Belgium, Russian and English who seemed as he put it "Like sheep without a shepherd," quoting the words of Jesus when He met the crowds. Life was sheer misery, hopeless and aimless as there was nothing to do except work. As a Christian he felt he should do something to give them some hope to help them in their deep depression. So, going against all his natural reserve to stay in the background, he asked for permission to hold a Christian service. This was granted, but the only place was the washroom where there was little light and a noisy hissing sound. When the day came, in great trepidation, he wondered if any would turn up. Strangely, one prisoner had a violin (how did he preserve that?) and offered to play the hymns. There were no hymn books, so my father read the verses from one copy he was given. About 40 turned up and it must have been one of the strangest scenes one could ever imagine, but he did it and writes, "I think I said a few words," meaning that he talked about the love of God to all men, whoever they were and in whatever situation. He does not record the reaction, but simply said that further services were held. Dad certainly lived out the New Testament teaching -"My power is made perfect in weakness." for it was the last thing he wanted, or felt able to do. This untold story in all the books that have been written, have moved me more than anything showing what the human spirit can achieve when obeying God's call to love one's fellowmen. Not long afterwards, the war ended and prisoners repatriated. Dad was taken through Holland, across the North Sea to Yorkshire and then by train to King's Cross. His home was nearby, but no details are given as to how his family received him back. (When a prisoner, he was described as 'missing' on many notices that were sent out by the War Office). They must have been overjoyed and, I am sure, made a great fuss of him. In 2014, I have had the pleasure and honour of talking about my father's experiences on Radio 4; Radio 2 with Clare Balding and local radio. My daughter has spoken on radio Oxford. Last August I also had the honour to lay a wreath at a service organised by the Post Office to commemorate the part played by the Post Office Rifles in the Great War. This was held at St. Botolphes Church in Aldersgate Street, again a stone's throw from Stationers' Hall. This was a moving occasion, after which I and my family went on to see the poppies placed around the Tower of London. Some of those poppies represented those my father knew and worked with who had given up their lives, some blown to pieces almost next to him. (He was buried alive when the trench was blown in on one occasion, but quickly rescued.) The publishing firm - Hudson Lion will be publishing another version of my father's story. It will be called "Walter's War" and should be out sometime this year. John Young A request from myself. If there are any Old Stationers' who went to one of the Cholmeley Camps which I ran from 1954 to 1974 and would like to make contact I would be very pleased to hear from them. (audjohn@hotmail.com) John Young with Clare Balding 30
T h e O l d S t a t i o n e r - N o 8 0 Robert E. Howard's Rarest Book A priceless piece of Howard history comes home to Cross Plains by Leo Grin The Herbert Jenkins edition of A Gent From Bear Creek was the very first book Robert E. Howard ever had published. Although Howard had been writing for magazines for his entire writing career, by 1935 he still hadn't been published in book form. He had come close several times, but something always happened at the last minute to spoil the deal. But finally, in 1936, a small British publisher named Herbert Jenkins purchased the rights to publish a book of Howard's rip-roaring Breckinridge Elkins tales. All of these humorous-hillbilly westerns had originally appeared in a pulp magazine called Action Stories. In fact, Ol' Breck Elkins was so popular with that magazine's readers that for several years every single issue of the magazine featured a Breck story from Howard, a streak which continued from the character's inception in 1934 all the way until their backlog of stories finally ran out a year after Howard's death. After learning that Herbert Jenkins wanted to publish his Breck Elkins stories in book form, Howard sat down and rewrote them slightly, adding textual "bridges" between them that tied the individual stories together into one complete novel. Howard then sent the finished manuscript off to be published, but tragically he died before seeing the finished book in print. The book was published a year after Howard's death, in 1937, with Dr. Howard receiving the complimentary copy intended for his late son. One can imagine the great joy and pride Howard would have felt if he had lived to see his very first book published. The book was being sold only in England, and a few years later, as World War II engulfed the world, huge paper shortages in Britain prompted wide-scale pulping of books to fill wartime needs. As a result of this mass destruction of books, by the end of the war virtually every one of the copies of the Jenkins A Gent From Bear Creek had vanished from the face of the earth. Because of this, in the sixty years since the end of World War II a mere six copies of this book have been found, making it by far the most rare and priceless of all Howard collectibles. Two are in libraries in England under lock and key. One is owned by an elderly Howard collector in Memphis, Tennessee. Dr. Howard's copy is now in the library of Ranger Junior College in Ranger, Texas. A fifth copy has been passed around from collector to collector several times throughout the 1990s, each time selling for thousands of dollars. And the last and best copy is owned by none other than Howard scholar Glenn Lord of Pasadena, Texas. That's it. For sixty years even fans with thousands of dollars to spend have been unable to add this book to their collections, because it simply was not to be found anywhere. This scarcity has made it the Holy Grail of Howard Collecting, the one book that every Howard aficionado dreams of owning. A Miracle from the South ... the truly deep South .... South Africa, that is. In Forest Town, South Africa, within earshot of the roaring lions of the famous Johannesburg Zoo, a man named Ian Snelling owns a rare bookshop. An ex-soccer player, Ian has for the last twenty years collected rare first editions of books and made a career out of buying and selling them. Because of this, Ian often goes to a local charity thrift shop and pokes through their "to be pulped" bin, looking for rare treasures about to be sent off as garbage to be destroyed. As he explains it: "This is a place where bitter experience has taught me that I better look through their throwaways before looking on their shelves. I'm sure you must have similar places in the USA ...little old ladies working for charity who know that old tatty books have no appeal and just take valuable shelf space away from the Danielle Steele's and Jonathan Kellerman's that are nice books that the public will buy. "For example, I found a rare copy of Evelyn Waugh's Scoop in their throwaway bin two years back. It was brand new, but with no dust jacket. So new, in fact, that I asked "where's the jacket that must have been on this?" The old lady answered: "Nobody would have bought it with that scruffy old thing ...we binned it!" Finding the dust jacket on that book would have made it far more valuable. That time I was four days too late. "But it taught me the lesson that searching their garbage bin prior to the shelves was a must. No amount of pleading to keep back old books has had any effect, they always think they know best. Even the payments I give them for discarded "rubbish" makes them think I'm eccentric. Of course I'm eccentric ... I like finding diamonds in seas of mud!" Ian Snelling 31
Page 1 and 2: No 80 /February 2015 The Old Statio
Page 3 and 4: T h e O l d S t a t i o n e r - N o
Page 17 and 18: 70th Anniversary of Operation Marke
Page 29: T h e O l d S t a t i o n e r - N o
Page 35 and 36: WHY WE SPEND NEARLY HALF THE YEAR I
Page 39 and 40: My first excursion to Norway was pr
Page 45 and 46: PETER BULLEN 1927-2014 A Service of

OSAmag80

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?