GRGR(4) more on Sassoon WAS Re: GRGR(4) Re: One, only one

[Doug Millison]

At 10:42 AM -0400 6/22/99, Paul Mackin wrote:
[snip]
>But
>can't we also give a couple of cheers for the divided as against
>the integrated self. Sassoon was a case in point. Though he hated and
>denouced the war, at the front he was happy and anxious to get out on
>patrols and mix it up with the enemy. It was when he tried to integrate
>the two views with such notions that he was only there to protect his men
>that his mental  faculties would tend to come apart.

I don't know if this biographical material supports Paul's point or not
(Sassoon sounds rather more driven than "happy. . . to mix it up with the
enemy") but here it is:

"Sassoon enlisted on 2 August 1914, two days before the British declaration
of war, and initially joined as a trooper in the Sussex Yeomanry. However,
after a riding accident whilst doing some field-work (he had put his horse
at a fence blind with summer vegetation and a hidden strand of wire brought
the horse down on top of him, leaving Sassoon with a badly broken right
arm), Sassoon was commissioned in the Royal Welch Fusiliers (May 1915).
Between November 1915 and April 1917 he served as a second lieutenant in
both the First and Second Battalions R.W.F.

On November 1, 1915 Sassoon suffered his first personal loss of the War.
His younger brother Hamo was buried at sea after being mortally wounded at
Gallipoli. Sassoon subsequently commemorated this with a poem entitled To
My Brother (published in the Saturday Review, February 26, 1916). Then on
March 18, 1916 second lieutenant David C. 'Tommy' Thomas (the 'Dick
Tiltwood' of Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man) was killed whilst out with a
wiring party. He had been hit in the throat by a rifle bullet, and despite
the Battalion doctor being a throat specialist, had died of the wound.

These losses upset Sassoon and he became determined to "get his revenge" on
the Germans. To this end, he went out on patrol in no-man's-land even when
there were no raids planned. Such reckless enthusiasm earned him the
nickname "Mad Jack", but he was saved from further folly by a four-week
spell at the Army School in Flixecourt. Returning to the front a month
later some of Sassoon's desire for revenge had abated, and when his platoon
was involved in a raid on Kiel Trench shortly afterwards, his actions in
getting his dead and wounded men back to the British trenches earned him a
Military Cross, which he received the day before the start of the Battle of
the Somme, in July 1916.

During the first day of the Battle of the Somme Sassoon was "in reserve",
in a support trench opposite Fricourt. He was not involved in the Battle of
the Somme until July 4, when he went up to the front line from Bottom Wood,
to a captured half-finished German trench called Quadrangle Trench. The 1st
Battalion Royal Welch Fusiliers had a bombing-post established on the
battalion's right where a trench leading eastwards towards Mametz Wood came
to an end and after a gap, became another trench which in turn led into
Mametz Wood itself. Sassoon went across from the bombing-post to where the
one trench ended near Mametz Wood. He hoped to put a stop to the German
sniper that was in action nearby. When he got to the trench he threw four
Mills Bombs into it, and was surprised to see 50 or 60 Germans running
"hell for leather" into Mametz Wood. For this action Sassoon was
recommended for another decoration, but the repeated failure of the Allies
to capture Mametz Wood (it was not taken until July 12 by the 38th (Welsh)
Division who had 4000 casualties) lead Brigade HeadQuarters to consider it
inappropriate to make the award. Sassoon was sent home from France in late
July after an attack of trench fever (or enteritis). From Oxford's
Somerville College, he was sent home to Weirleigh for convalescence. He
also spent some time in London with Robert Ross. Ross (1869 - 1918) was the
literary executor of Oscar Wilde, and a literary journalist. He was a
patron of the arts & many artists and writers visited him during his life
in London. Sassoon was a frequent visitor to his London home. Ross
introduced him
to Arnold Bennet and H G Wells amongst others. Ross also encouraged
Sassoon's writing of the satirical war poems. Sassoon reported to the
Regimental Depot in Liverpool in December 1916, and returned to France in
February 1917.

Sassoon was only back in France for two days before going down with German
measles, which forced him to spend nearly ten days at the 25th Stationary
Hospital in Rouen. On March 11 Sassoon rejoined the 2nd Battalion Royal
Welch Fusiliers on the Somme front. He was "in reserve" during the Battle
of Arras before spending two days in the Hindenburgh Tunnel. Sassoon
participated in the Second Battle of the Scarpe where he was wounded in the
shoulder. This particular incident started a train of events which
culminated in Sassoon's "Declaration", for it was whilst on convalescent
leave after being wounded that Sassoon talked to several prominent
pacifists (including John Middleton Murry and Bertrand Russell). His
Declaration of "wilful defiance" was written during this time, and he
returned to the Depot in Liverpool having sent his statement to his
Colonel, miserably determined to take whatever punishment was meted out.
Fortunately for
Sassoon, his friend and fellow Welch Fusilier, Robert Graves. Graves
(1895-1985) got to know Sassoon while serving out in France. The two became
firm friends and spent hours discussing poetry. He was influential in
saving Sassoon from a court-martial, following the latter's protest against
the continuation of the War. Graves intervened, pulled strings with the
authorities and managed to persuade them to have Sassoon medically boarded
(or referred), with the result that in July 1917 he was sent to
Craiglockhart War Hospital, Edinburgh officially suffering from
shell-shock.

It was at Craiglockhart that Sassoon met the poet Wilfred Owen. Owen (1893
- 1918) was commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant in the 5th Battalion,
Manchester Regiment. His experiences in France left him in a state of
"shell-shock", and he was sent Craiglockhart War Hospital, Edinburgh where
he met Sassoon. (Owen was also diagnosed with shell-shock). Sassoon's
encouragement of Owen's writing has been well-documented. Sassoon himself
wrote a good deal of poetry whilst at Craiglockhart and the material he
wrote at that time later appeared in Counter-Attack and Other Poems. After
four months at Craiglockhart, Sassoon was again passed fit for General
Service abroad. He had spent many hours talking to his psychiatrist, Dr. W.
H. R. Rivers. Rivers (1864 - 1922) was transferred to Craiglockhart War
Hospital, Edinburgh in 1916 and the following year
Sassoon became his patient. Rivers's life was distinguished by work in a
variety of fields besides medicine. Sassoon eventually realised that his
protest had achieved nothing, except to keep him away from his men; his
decision to apply for General Service seems to have been based on his
perceived responsibilities at the front.

In November 1917 he was passed fit for General Service and returned to the
Regimental Depot, from whence in January 1918, he was posted to Limerick.
In February 1918, Sassoon was posted to Palestine with the 25th Battalion
of the Royal Welch Fusiliers. After three months in Palestine the Battalion
was posted to France and Sassoon eventually found himself in the Front Line
near Mercatel. From there he moved to St. Hilaire and the Front Line at St.
Floris where his old foolhardiness took over, despite the responsibility of
being a Company Commander. Sassoon decided to attack the German trenches
opposite them, and he went out with a young Corporal. His actions were paid
for with a wound to his head on July 13, 1918, and Sassoon was invalided
back
to England. That was the end of Sassoon's War. After a period of
convalescence he was placed on indefinite sick leave until after the
Armistice, eventually retiring officially from the Army in March 1919."

--from the biography at http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/8608/

d o u g  m i l l i s o n  http://www.online-journalist.com