The Penguin Book of First World War Poetry

by Various Contributors

  mustard gas A heavy yellow poisonous gas and blistering agent, dichlorodiethylsulphide, first used by the Germans against the Russians at Riga in September 1917. Its effects on the eyes, throat and lungs were devastating, and it possessed an unfortunate tendency to remain in shell holes and then be dispersed by later shelling.

  NCO Non-commissioned officer – anyone above the rank of private, and below the rank of second lieutenant in the British army.

  no man’s land The space between opposing trenches, so called because it belonged to ‘no man’.

  Old Contemptibles The survivors of the regular army who fought in the earliest battles of the war, before the introduction of volunteers or conscripts. So called because of the Kaiser’s alleged comment that he was being opposed by a ‘contemptible little army’.

  Ovillers A village on the Somme battlefront approximately four kilometres north-east of Albert, used mainly for soldiers’ billets.

  parados See trench.

  parapet See trench.

  Passchendaele A wood and village eleven kilometres east-northeast of Ypres. The ridge at Passchendaele was the last objective taken in the Third Battle of Ypres, and has since been used as a synonym for this battle.

  phosgene Carbonyl chloride, an extremely poisonous and colourless gas, first used by the Germans on 31 May 1915 against Russian troops in Bzura and Rawka in Poland. Only a small amount was needed to render a soldier ineffective, and it killed its victims within forty-eight hours.

  Picardie/Picard/Picardy An area of France that includes the Aisne, Oise and Somme regions, and the scene of the majority of the fighting by the British Expeditionary Force during the war.

  private The lowest rank in the British army.

  redoubt A temporary fortification, typically square or polygonal in shape, without flanking defences.

  respirator A gas mask.

  rifle The bolt-head is the sliding piece of the breech mechanism of a rifle, into which a cartridge – a metal case containing propellant explosive and a bullet – is placed. The foresight is the front sight of the rifle, through which the user must look in order to pinpoint his target accurately. The rifle-thong is the strap attached to the rifle, used to carry it over the shoulder. The stock is the butt of the rifle.

  rum ration A tradition adopted from the navy, whereby soldiers were issued with a daily quantity of rum.

  Saint-Eloi A town in Flanders, four kilometres south of Ypres on the Ypres–Messines Road.

  salient An area where the line bulges out towards the enemy and therefore often has to be defended from three sides at once. The most famous salient surrounded the town of Ypres in Belgium, which was destroyed during the war.

  sap See trench.

  Senlis A village on the river Nonette, a tributary of the Oise, fifty-one kilometres north of Paris and ten kilometres east of Chantilly, frequented by troops on rest.

  shell An explosive projectile, fired from a large gun and often containing the high explosive lyddite. Shells were often known by their size or weight, as in the case of ‘five-nines’, ‘twelve-inch’, ‘six-inch’ and ‘eighteen-pounders’, or were given nicknames such as ‘whizz-bang’ or ‘crump’ because of the noise they made. ‘Jack Johnsons’ were named after the African-American boxer Jack Johnson (1878–1946), because of their power and the black smoke they made on detonation.

  shell shock First diagnosed in 1914, shell shock was the generic name given to the psychological disturbance caused by prolonged exposure to active warfare. Frequently expressed through physical symptoms such as muteness and paralysis of the limbs, it was so called because it was believed to be caused by exposure to the vacuum created by shells exploding nearby.

  shot A coarse, non-explosive lead bullet.

  shrapnel Shell fragments thrown out by an explosion.

  six-inch See shell.

  Somme The river Somme flows through northern France to the English Channel and is 240 kilometres long. Concentrated on the eastern part of the river, the Somme Offensive took place between 1 July and 18 November 1916 and is remembered for the 60,000 British casualties sustained on the first day, of which 20,000 were fatalities. The battle was the largest and most sustained offensive by the British Expeditionary Force during the war.

  stock See rifle.

  tank Tanks were first used during the latter stages of the Somme Offensive, at Delville Wood on 15 September 1916. Also called ‘landships’, they were supplied by the British navy and were given the code name ‘tank’ because of their resemblance to water carriers.

  Tommy The traditional nickname of the British soldier, derived from ‘Thomas Atkins’, the name used in specimen official forms in the nineteenth century.

  traversing Firing a rifle or shelling horizontally in a sweeping motion.

  trench A model trench was just under two metres deep, with duckboards of narrow slatted wood covering the ground. The sides of the trench were known as breastworks, the side facing the enemy being the parapet and the rear side being the parados. The parapet had a raised fire-step on which a soldier stood to fire his weapon. The trench was protected by barbed wire and by walls of sandbags containing loopholes, narrow slits through which soldiers could fire or look. Saps were narrower trenches which extended into no man’s land and were used primarily for communication. A dugout was a roofed shelter dug into the sides of the trench, and was also known ironically as a ‘funk-hole’.

  twelve-inch See shell.

  Vlamertinghe A village five kilometres west of Ypres which suffered many heavy bombardments throughout the war.

  whizz-bangs See shell.

  wire Work in the trenches often consisted of repairing or laying barbed wire in no man’s land, usually at night.

  Yp r e s A Belgian town on the Western Front, heavily contested by both sides and eventually destroyed as a result. The three battles of Ypres took place between 31 October and 17 November 1914, 22 April and 25 May 1915, and 31 July and 10 November 1917. Known as ‘Wipers’ in soldiers’ slang.

  Biographies

  [Arthur] St John Adcock was born in London in 1864. After working as a lawyer, he became a full-time writer in 1893. He was made acting editor of The Bookman in 1908, and succeeded to the editorship in 1923. He died in 1930.

  ‘The Silence’ first appeared in Collected Poems of St. John Adcock (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1929).

  Richard Aldington was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, in 1882 and was educated at Dover College and at University College, London. He volunteered in 1914, but was rejected on medical grounds. He successfully enlisted in May 1916 and served in France from November 1916, initially in the ranks of the 11th Devonshire Regiment before becoming an NCO in the 6th Leicestershire Regiment. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 3rd Royal Sussex Regiment in November 1917, only to be severely gassed and shell-shocked in the following year. One of the founders of the Imagist Movement in poetry, he had a successful post-war career as a poet, novelist and biographer, and Death of a Hero (London: Chatto & Windus, 1929) and Roads to Glory (London: Chatto & Windus, 1930) are fictionalized accounts of his war experiences. He died in 1962.

  ‘Bombardment’, ‘In the Trenches’ and ‘Soliloquy II’ were first published in Images of War (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1919). ‘Reserve’ appeared in Images of Desire (London: Elkin Matthews, 1919).

  Martin Armstrong was born in Newcastle upon Tyne in 1882 and was educated at Charterhouse and at Pembroke College, Cambridge. A writer before the war, he enlisted as a private in the 28th (County of London) Battalion of the London Regiment (The Artists’ Rifles), was commissioned in the following year in the Middlesex Regiment, and went on to serve on the Western Front. After the war he worked as a literary journalist, short-story writer, novelist and anthologist. He died in 1974.

  ‘Before the Battle’ appeared in The Bird-Catcher and Other Poems (London: Martin Secker, 1929).

  Herbert Asquith was born in London in 1881 and was educated at Winchester College and at Balliol Colleg
e, Oxford. The son of Herbert Henry Asquith, Prime Minister between 1908 and 1916, he was called to the Bar in 1907. Receiving a commission in the Royal Marine Artillery at the end of 1914, he served as a second lieutenant with an anti-aircraft battery in France before being wounded in June 1915 and sent home. In June 1916 he joined the Royal Field Artillery and returned to France, ending the war with the rank of captain. He died in 1947.

  ‘The Volunteer’ appeared in The Volunteer and Other Poems (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1915).

  Maurice Baring was born in London in 1874, the fourth son of Lord Revelstoke, and was educated at Eton and at Trinity College, Cambridge. He joined the diplomatic service and then became a foreign correspondent for The Times and the Morning Post. During the war he worked in military intelligence as a secretary and interpreter and was attached to the Royal Flying Corps headquarters in both France and England. At the close of the war he had achieved the rank of major, and he was awarded an OBE for his wartime services. He had a successful post-war career as a novelist, dramatist, translator and critic. His R.F.C. H.Q., 1914–1918 (London: G. Bell & Sons, 1920) is an account of his wartime experiences. He died in 1945.

  ‘August, 1918’ appeared in Poems: 1914–1919 (London: Martin Secker, 1920).

  Pauline Barrington was born in Philadelphia in 1876 and worked for most of her life as a secretary, while at the same time contributing poetry, short stories and reviews to various magazines. The date of her death is unknown.

  ‘Education’ appeared in Poems Written During the Great War 1914–1918: An Anthology, ed. Bertram Lloyd (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1918).

  Laurence Binyon was born in Lancaster in 1869 and was educated at St Paul’s School and at Trinity College, Oxford, where he won the Newdigate Prize for poetry. He worked in the British Museum’s Department of Printed Books until 1916, when he went to the Western Front as a Red Cross orderly. After the war he returned to the British Museum, and in 1932 he became keeper of the Department of Prints and Drawings. He was a prolific author, publishing widely on oriental art and producing many collections of poetry. He died in 1943.

  ‘For the Fallen’ appeared in The Winnowing-Fan: Poems on the Great War (London: Elkin Matthews, 1914). ‘The Sower’ appeared in The New World (London: Elkin Matthews, 1918).

  Edmund Blunden was born in London in 1896 and grew up in Yalding in Kent. Educated at Christ’s Hospital and at Queen’s College, Oxford, he joined the 11th Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment (1st South Downs) as a second lieutenant on the outbreak of the First World War. He fought on the Somme and at Ypres, winning the Military Cross and eventually being promoted to full lieutenant. After the war he held several academic posts, including professorships of English Literature at Tokyo University, at the University of Hong Kong and at Oxford University, and he won the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 1956. His war experiences are recounted in Undertones of War (London: Cobden-Sanderson, 1928). He died in 1974.

  ‘Festubert, 1916’ appeared in The Shepherd and Other Poems (London: Cobden-Sanderson, 1922). ‘Illusions’ and ‘Vlamertinghe: Passing the Chateau, July, 1917’ appeared in Undertones of War (London: Cobden-Sanderson, 1928). ‘At Senlis Once’, ‘Preparations for Victory’ and ‘The Midnight Skaters’ appeared in Masks of Time: A New Collection of Poems Principally Meditative (London: Beaumont Press, 1925). ‘Report on Experience’ appeared in Near and Far: New Poems (London: Cobden-Sanderson, 1929). ‘Ancre Sunshine’ appeared in Overtones of War: Poems of the First World War , ed. Martin Taylor (London: Duckworth, 1996).

  Vera Brittain was born in Newcastle under Lyme in 1896, but spent her childhood in Macclesfield and Buxton. Educated at St Monica’s, Kingswood, and at Somerville College, Oxford, she had her studies interrupted by the outbreak of war, and in 1915 she joined the Voluntary Aid Detachment as a nurse and served in London, Malta and France. She was one of the first women to graduate from Oxford after the war, and throughout her life she was heavily involved in socialism and the feminist movement. Her wartime experiences are recounted in Testament of Youth (London: Victor Gollancz, 1933) and in her diary Chronicle of Youth (London: Victor Gollancz, 1981). She died in 1970.

  ‘Hospital Sanctuary’, ‘The Superfluous Woman’ and ‘The War Generation: Ave’ appeared in Poems of the War and After (London: Victor Gollancz, 1934).

  Rupert Brooke was born in Rugby in 1887, the son of a housemaster at Rugby School. He was educated there and at King’s College, Cambridge. His first book of verse, Poems (London: Sidgwick & Jackson), appeared in 1911. Two years later he became a fellow of King’s and then embarked upon a year-long journey around America and the South Seas. Enlisting in the Anson Battalion of the Royal Naval Reserve when war broke out, he saw action in Antwerp in October 1914. Transferring to the Hood Battalion for the Gallipoli Offensive, he contracted septicaemia from a mosquito bite and died on the Greek island of Skyros on St George’s Day, 1915.

  ‘1914: Peace’, ‘1914: Safety’, ‘1914: The Dead’ (both poems) and ‘1914: The Soldier’ appeared in 1914 and Other Poems (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1915). ‘Fragment’ appeared in The Collected Poems of Rupert Brooke: With a Memoir (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1918).

  May Wedderburn Cannan was born in Oxford in 1893 and was educated at Wychwood School. She joined the Voluntary Aid Detachment in 1911, training as a nurse and eventually reaching the rank of quartermaster. During the war she spent four weeks in France, working as an auxiliary nurse at Rouen, before returning to England, where she joined the Oxford University Press and became involved in publishing material produced by the government’s War Propaganda Bureau. She also worked for Military Intelligence in Paris for a short period. Her autobiography, Grey Ghosts and Voices (Kineton: Roundwood Press, 1976), did not appear until after her death in 1973.

  ‘Lamplight’ appeared in In War Time (Oxford: B. H. Blackwell, 1917). ‘Paris, November 11, 1918’ appeared in The Splendid Days (Oxford: B. H. Blackwell, 1919).

  G[ilbert] K[eith] Chesterton was born in London in 1874. He was educated at St Paul’s School, going on to study simultaneously at the Slade School of Art and University College, London. He drifted into journalism, which he later claimed was his sole profession, but he also wrote novels, poetry, and religious and political essays. A Catholic apologist, he is probably best known for his popular Father Brown detective stories. He died in 1936.

  ‘Elegy in a Country Churchyard’ appeared in The Ballad of St. Barbara and Other Verses (London: Cecil Palmer, 1922).

  Margaret Postgate Cole was born in Cambridge in 1893 and was educated at Roedean and at Girton College, Cambridge. She taught Classics at St Paul’s Girls School in London for a short time, before taking up political work in the Fabian Research Department in 1917. In 1918 she moved to Oxford, where she taught evening classes and worked part-time for the Labour Research Department. In later life, when she was a Labour Party member of the London County Council, Cole was an important figure in the early experiments with comprehensive education. She wrote many books during her lifetime, including political works and detective novels. She was made an OBE in 1965 and a Dame of the British Empire in 1970. She died in 1980.

  ‘The Veteran’ appeared in An Anthology of War Poems, ed. Frederick Brereton (London: W. Collins Sons & Co., 1930).

  Lesley Coulson was born in 1889 in Kilburn, London. Well known as a journalist before the war, he rose to become assistant editor of the Morning Post. In August 1914 he enlisted as a private in the 2nd Battalion of the London Regiment (Royal Fusiliers). He was wounded at Gallipoli in 1915. Preferring not to seek a commission, he was promoted to sergeant and sent to France. Now attached to the 12th Battalion of the London Regiment (The Rangers), he was killed during a British attack on the German stronghold position of Dewdrop Trench on 8 October 1916.

  ‘War’ appeared in From an Outpost, and Other Poems (London: Erskine Macdonald, 1917).

  Nancy Cunard was born at Nevill Holt, Leicestershire, in 1896, the daughter of Sir Bache and Lady Cunard, and was ed
ucated privately in London, Germany and Paris. She settled in Paris during the 1920s and became involved in bohemian society, posing as a model for Oskar Kokoschka and Percy Wyndham Lewis. During the Spanish Civil War (1936–9), she went to Spain as a correspondent for the Manchester Guardian, and she worked for the Free French in London during the Second World War. She died in 1965.

  ‘Zeppelins’ appeared in Outlaws (London: Elkin Matthews, 1921).

  Walter de la Mare was born in Charlton, Kent, in 1873 and was educated at St Paul’s Cathedral School. At the age of sixteen he left St Paul’s to take up a career in accountancy with the Anglo-American Oil Company. Awarded a government pension of £100 per year for his imaginative writing in 1908, he took up writing full-time. He was made a Companion of Honour in 1948, and in 1953 was made a member of the Order of Merit. He died in 1956.

  ‘The Marionettes’ appeared in Motley and Other Poems (London: Constable & Co., 1918).

  Eva Dobell was born in Cheltenham in 1867. She spent most of her life in the Cotswolds, but travelled extensively in Europe and Africa. She worked as a nurse during the war, and was a children’s author and an active conservationist throughout her life. She died in 1973.

  ‘In A Soldiers’ Hospital I: Pluck’ and ‘In A Soldiers’ Hospital II: Gramophone Tunes’ appeared in A Bunch of Cotswold Grasses (London: Arthur H. Stockwell, 1919).

  Helen Parry Eden was born in London in 1885 and was educated at Roedean, at Manchester University and at King’s College Art School. A prolific poet, she contributed verse to Punch, the Pall Mall Magazine and other journals. The date of her death is unknown.

  ‘The Admonition: To Betsey’ appeared in Coal and Candlelight and Other Verses (London: John Lane, 1918).

  Geoffrey Faber was born in Malvern in 1889 and was educated at Rugby and at both Christ Church and All Souls, Oxford. Commissioned as a second lieutenant in the 3rd Glamorgan Battery of the Royal Field Artillery in November 1914, he transferred to the 2/8th Battalion of the City of London Regiment (The Post Office Rifles) in February 1915. After promotion to temporary lieutenant in September, he became a captain in March 1916 and served in France between January 1917 and January 1919. A publisher by profession, he was the founder and first president of Faber & Faber. He was knighted in 1954, and he died in 1961.