Last week I wrote a post about how my Mary tin collection
has now been augmented by a Queen Victoria (2nd) Boer War Chocolate tin.
I said in that post “the Boer War was not, in my opinion, Great Britain’s
finest hour as a country and it’s certainly not a part of our shared history
that I would personally celebrate.” I will certainly stick by this. If you need
reasons, well, the British invention of concentration camps, in which a
conservative estimate of 26,000 died of disease and starvation ought to be
enough. Add that to the fact that the grounds for war were extremely shaky, and
the end of the war saw the annexation of the two Boer republics, to which the British Empire had no legitimate claim other than by right of conquest.
So as I say, it’s not in my opinion something to remember
with pride. But then war is not. War is not always a case of good against evil,
nor right against wrong. I think Siegfried Sassoon put it in a nutshell when he
spoke of writing about ‘the pity of war’. Sassoon, of course, was writing about
the First World War. The first World War left a lasting and definitive mark upon
the UK, partly because it was the first war which put citizens at home in
danger and partly because there must have been few, if any families who did not
lose someone to death of injury. According to the Imperial War Museum there are
over 100,000 memorials to the fallen of the two World Wars throughout the UK.
Not all of these are public statues or significant monuments, but there’s still
probably not many towns of any size that don’t have some form of memorial. I
wondered if there are any memorials to the Boer War. According to Google, there’s
between 1000 – 2000. Now, I would still imagine that a significant proportion
are plaques of different sizes in Parish churches, but nonetheless it
surprises me that there are that many.
I’ve made two sketches on the subject. This first one, made
in the Leuchtturm 1917 book as one of the last sketches in it, is based on a
photograph from the time.
I imagine that this shows the kind of scene which would
have occurred when the Tommies received their New Year chocolate gift tins.
Incidentally, I did read that it cost Queen Victoria 3d (three old pence) to
have each tin manufactured and sent to South Africa. Many of the soldiers
wanted to send their tins home to their families, and when they did so they
found that they would have to pay five shillings – a very significant amount of
money back then.
Which kind of tells you a lot about how the soldiers were
treated. Consideration was given to introducing conscription into the British
Army for the Boer War, but this was rejected. Every man was a volunteer, and
what really interests me is the way that the soldiers were treated. The finest Local
Education Advisor for English for the old West Glamorgan as was, Phil, once
suggested to me that we shouldn’t be only concentrating of the poetry of the
Great War, and he introduced me to Kipling’s Barrack Room Ballads, in
particular this poem, Tommy, from 1890 –
TOMMY.’
I went into a public-’ouse to get a pint o’ beer,
The publican ’e
up an’ sez, ‘We serve no red-coats here.’
The girls be’ind the bar they laughed an’ giggled fit to
die,
I outs into the street again an’ to myself sez I:
O it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Tommy go away’:
But it’s ‘Thank you, Mister Atkins,’ when the band begins
to play,
The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play,
O it’s ‘Thank you, Mister Atkins,’ when the band begins to
play.
I went into a theatre as sober as could be,
They give a drunk civilian room, but ’adn’t none for me;
They sent me to the gallery or round the music ’alls,
But when it comes to fightin’, Lord! they’ll shove me in
the stalls.
For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Tommy wait
outside."
But it’s ‘Special train for Atkins’ when the trooper’s on
the tide,
The troopship’s on the tide, my boys, etc.
O makin’ mock o’ uniforms that guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them uniforms, an’ they’re starvation
cheap;
An’ hustlin’ drunken sodgers when they’re goin’ large a bit
Is five times better business than paradin’ in full kit.
Then it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Tommy, ’ow’s yer
soul?’
But it’s ‘Thin red line of ’eroes’ when
the drums begin to roll,
The drums begin to roll, my boys, etc.
We aren’t no thin red ’eroes, nor we aren’t no black-guards
too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An’ if sometimes our conduck isn’t all your fancy paints;
Why, single men in barricks don’t grow into plaster saints.
While it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Tommy fall
be’ind’;
But it’s ‘Please to walk in front, sir,’ when there’s
trouble in the wind,
There’s trouble in the wind, my boys, etc.
You talk o’ better food for us, an’ schools, an’ fires, an’
all;
We’ll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don’t mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our
face
The Widow’s uniform is
not the soldier-man’s disgrace.
For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Chuck him out,
the brute!’
But it’s ‘Saviour of ’is country’ when the guns begin to
shoot;
An’ it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ everything you
please;
An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool — you bet that Tommy sees!
RUDYARD KIPLING.
Isn’t that wonderful? Makes you think again about Kipling,
who’s often seen as the fully paid up, jingoistic poet laureate of Imperialism. Mind you, Kipling did write Britain’s favourite poem (according
to a BBC poll) ‘If’ as a tribute to Leander Starr Jameson. Jameson led the eponymous
Jameson Raid, a private military excursion into the Transvaal Boer Republic.
This was a spectacularly catastrophic fiasco, and one of the events leading up
to the Boer War. Kipling is believed to have written the poem for his young son
John, as advice on navigating the complexities of life. On the outbreak of the
Great War, father and son both saw this as a great opportunity for heroism in
the name of the Empire. John, like his father, was very shortsighted and was
rejected for combat. Rudyard was an active member of the War Propaganda Bureau,
hugely influential in his own right and a personal friend of Lord Roberts,
incidentally the successful British commander in chief in the Boer War. John
was promptly commissioned into the Irish Guards. John arrived in the front line
during the 1915 Battle of Loos. He had lost his identification disc. He was
undoubtedly killed, but his body was not identified until the 1990s.
Rudyard would not accept that John was dead rather than
missing until 1919. The guilt he felt throughout the rest of his life is
clearly seen in two bitter lines he wrote,
“If any question why we died,
Tell them, because our fathers lied.” Two lines, which, in
their own way, are every bit as powerful as Wilfred Owen’s revered “Dulce et
Decorum Est”, in which he gives the truth about the old lie that it is sweet
and proper to die for your country.
As I said, there are quite a few Boer War Memorials
throughout the country. I like this one, from Darlington and made this sketch
of it in the Crawford and Black sketchbook:-
I really like this because it’s an ordinary soldier, not
some walrus-moustached pompous stuffed shirt on horseback. Thank you Mr.
Atkins.
