H. A. Jones

“ Only a handful of men laboured in whole-hearted enthusiasm for the cause of the air because they had vision and knew what it meant to the future of the world. But recognition forced itself on the nations of the world. Once interest was aroused it spread with amazing swiftness. People felt uneasy. The aeroplane was taken up as a weapon of national defence. The movement was under way and gathering increasing momentum. The progress of the art must have a share in the record of the war in the air, otherwise the story would not be understood. Sir Walter soon saw this. ”

“ There was talk of a large map of France to go into a pocket at the end of the book. Some sort of a map was necessary to illustrate the chapter dealing with the early days in France from Mons to Ypres. “I am still in favour of the one page map wherever possible—and I hate the pocket business. Map-makers care nothing about books. A book with a pocket is not a book.... The chart-makers who are admirable want a book to help the maps. I want maps to help the book. If stuff is good to read you don’t break it off repeatedly to look up places on a map.” ”

“ Before one realized the fact he was off up and down the room in martial stride showing his idea of the goose step, or else he would dive for his hat to show a type of headgear that his wife considered to be inadequate to the dignity of a professor about to visit Egypt. Through his eyes one could understand most things. His vision, his judgment, his sympathy and his experience were all at your service. He touched all the emotions and left you bewildered but infinitely grateful for his company. He loved his visits to London because he got talk with all kinds of people. ”

“ Every V.C. shall be clearly told that men who deserved as well or better than he did are forgotten, in large numbers, because they faced certain death without witnesses. The hero of the book is chosen and is the Air, not the stars. ”

“ At the time the Introduction was written the Air Force was in the throes of the disintegration which followed the armistice. There were criticisms in the press against the conduct of some of the members of the service. Sir Walter was impatient of these criticisms. “Critics who speak of what they have not felt and do not know, have sometimes blamed the air service because, being young, it has not the decorum of age. The Latin poet said that it is decorous to die for one’s country; in that decorum the service is perfectly instructed.” ”

“ So when after Chapter V had been written Captain Morris found new and interesting information on the use of wireless telegraphy in aircraft in the days before the war, the whole of this difficult chapter had to be reopened for new patching. “In regard to wireless,” he wrote, “I am like a blind man who has never talked to painters employed to write a critique of a picture exhibition. It’s paralysing. The only escape is to keep on broad lines. Every one knows that wireless sends messages. ”

“ They were like children, said Sir Walter, and knew what you meant when you told them that you didn’t want to play with them any more.
He spoke of his stay with the High Commissioner at Jerusalem. How he had gone over the road on which the Turkish 7th Army had been bombed from the air until it had become a rabble. The havoc of that day—September the 21st, 1918—was made clear to him. The Turkish armies were in retreat. Soon after dawn on the 21st a reconnaissance machine landed with the information that dense masses of men and transport were on the road running north-east from Nablus. ”

“ Dead were piled on dead. Drivers jumped from their motor-lorries. Motor-lorries ran amok. Horses stampeded, tramping soldiers to death beneath their hoofs. Guns were overturned. Every three minutes and every half-hour with demoniacal precision the aeroplanes appeared, did their job, and went. Every three minutes and every half-hour on the ground confusion worse confounded. The Turkish 7th Army a few hours before in orderly retreat, soon ceased to exist. Sir Walter inspected the road on a Scots Grey charger. ”

“ The world is a better place for his having passed through it. He left behind him books that will live, but he was not chiefly a writer. More than anything else he leaves behind his example. He touched and made brighter with his genius all who came into contact with him. ”

“ Courage, he says in his book, is found everywhere amongst English-speaking peoples. Originally he wrote that courage was an epidemic virtue among English-speaking peoples. Some people who were privileged to read his original manuscript, were a bit doubtful about this use of the word ‘epidemic.’ One distinguished air officer spoke rather roughly about “outbreaks of pimples.” Sir Walter altered the phrase and in a characteristic note, which shows the trouble he took to find a single correct word, he wrote to me on a postcard, “I find epidemic is used by Milton and Swift as I use it. ”

“ To strike from the air you must strike quick and strike ceaselessly. The attack was arranged so that two machines should arrive over the retreating enemy every three minutes. In addition a formation of six machines was sent over every half-hour. The attack started at 8 o’clock in the morning. At noon it was all over. The road is bordered by steep ravines. No cover for a rabbit. There was no escaping the pitiless rain of machine-gun bullets poured on to the enemy from a low height, or the bombs which soon reduced the head of the column to chaos. ”

“ But I devoted myself mainly to the cockle who (it is not generally known) is as cunning as sin, very mobile, and quick-sighted. There are also occasional hauls from wrecks. August and September have been a stale-mate, and I’m itching to write. I hope to come up on Oct. 19th when the term is started.”
When he returned from his holiday he found Oxford busier than ever. The last worrying chapter was put aside for the moment. “Oxford’s worse than ever. Not a bed or a perch anywhere.... I lead the life of a defaulting debtor, chivied by people who behave as if they had lent me money.” ”

“ In the meantime Sir Walter had sent the chapter to one or two people to read over the wireless portion. Sir Richard Glazebrook sent him some valuable notes.
“I have just got the proofs of Chapter V. I am an unnatural parent—I yawn over them. But I could do something to them while I am in the country and thus break the tedium of a holiday, if I might have the Glazebrook notes.” He could not take—what he badly needed—a real carefree holiday. “I am taking down Chapter VI for a week into the country, where American and other visitors to Oxford can’t call on me at 11 a.m. I hope to finish it.” ”

“ Through March he was deep in the last chapter. On the 22nd he wrote: “I am always unhappy if I find myself using an unexplained term. I fear I have sometimes mentioned types of machine with no explanatory comment. You might keep an eye open for this. It is a large comfort to me to have you goal-keeping.” And on the 27th: “You will think me hopeless, but I am really stuck in the naval part of Chapter VIII. You see I don’t know. If none of the questions that interest me are answered in the summaries I have, are not my readers likely to be in the same position?” ”

“ The soft roes on toast arrived and he ordered another beer. And then on to the desert. The aeroplane on which he was making the journey to Baghdad had a mishap and landed in the desert. For four or five days no relief arrived. The little party soon exhausted their stock of sandwiches and had to fall back on bully-beef and biscuits. They made tea in petrol tins. A wise friend had insisted on giving Sir Walter a present of a bottle of whisky just before he left for the East. At the time he thought the present superfluous. But during the stay in the desert, it was invaluable. ”

“ Sir Walter left London on March the 16th to take the Egypt at Marseilles. He stayed in London for a couple of days before he left and worked hard at the office putting in page headings on the latest proofs which had just come in from the Clarendon Press. We had to take a hurried lunch. Sir Walter liked a good meal to the accompaniment of beer. I suggested a tavern near Oxford Circus identified with the male domestic fowl. There is an excellent dining-room over the main bar. The food is as good as is procurable anywhere in London. ”

“ His personal influence has gone out quietly to a thousand different corners of the Empire. We may lament his death and the possibilities which died with him. There is no unmixed good on earth. We can rejoice at his life and be humbly grateful for his example. ”

“ This went on for a bit and then the conversation being rather one-sided Sir Walter got bored and walked away to sit at another part of the aerodrome. He was deep in thought. He looked up and there silently squatting around again were the Arabs with the sun gleaming on their rifles. He talked a bit with the Sheikh and then tiring got up and sought the officer in charge of the aerodrome.
“What do you do when you want to get rid of these fellows?” he asked.
“Do?” was the reply. “What do we do? Why, we take a big stick and tell them to hop it.” ”

“ Sir Walter accordingly sometimes got high fun out of the records. A pamphlet (a very able one) was sent to him mostly dealing with the supply of munitions. “I wonder,” he wrote, “in what language does the Munitions Man write to his wife? I shall set him to my classes to translate, e.g., ‘The output of light bombs was greatly in excess of that of the heavier natures’ = ‘The bombs made were mostly light bombs.”
“When he says ‘in the case of bombs,’ he doesn’t mean the case. When he says evolve, factors, evaluate, and the like, he doesn’t mean anything much. ”

“ The world which is often slow to recognize the significance of contemporary events, did not know that a new era in its history had already opened. Certainly the few years immediately following the flight over the Kill Devil sand hills were years of scepticism and witticism. ”

“ It’s the most difficult thing yet—wireless, I mean. It is coming into shape, but there is something absurd about sandwiching it in as an afterthought. It’s of first-rate importance, and I fear it may delay us a little.” Then on June the 12th:
“I shall come on Monday next week, latish morning, with Chapter V. Not content or pleased. That wireless insertion has put the chapter out of gear, and lots of small things, later on, seem clumsy. One can’t write a book backwards. But I think we can patch it to look all right. ”

“ He went to France at a time when the victorious Allied armies were driving the Germans back towards the Rhine. His journey lasted from August the 14th to September the 8th, 1918. He spent a great part of his time at the Royal Air Force Headquarters, but also visited many squadrons and was taken over the numerous parks which ministered to the wants of the service. He flew about the Ypres salient, and other parts of the line. The story is told of him that whilst staying with one squadron he was already dressed in flying kit and on the point of starting as a passenger on a night bombing raid. ”

“ Then to Cairo by aeroplane and from Cairo direct to Baghdad....
“It’s going to be tiresome to-night, but once I get to the R.A.F. I think things will be very easy....
“Baghdad seems to be a gay centre. I came on the boat with Major Lord Gough, a one-armed Irish officer, who has left home to escape the tax-collector, and is going to command Arab levies at Baghdad. He will do well, I am sure; he is cool, pleasant, practical, ready-witted and original. Indeed he shocked the Anglo-Indian officers on board, but the Arabs, I think, will take to him. ”

“ I must tell you when we meet.... The latter [2] is wonderful on any period or any incident, shake the tree and a plum falls off.... Brancker is as gay as a lark.”
Chapter VIII was finished at last and Sir Walter’s life-work was nearing completion. The next effort was revision. This effort was almost as worrying as the original writing. The records are often contradictory and sometimes a whole day was spent trying to check some small fact which eventually was cut out of the book.
Perhaps the greatest trouble when revising was given by the question of wireless. Sir Walter was a man of letters. ”

“ Talk is not so easily dealt with. But there are some decent people on board. I have talked with two sad, efficient, disgruntled Indian Colonels, going back to earn their pension. And of course there are social ladies. ”