It's Tommy this and Tommy that

Last week I wrote a post about how my Mary tin collection has now been augmented by a Queen Victoria (2^nd) 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.