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You’re brave, but it too takes courage
To sit lonely at home and think ;
There’s a cup filled with anguish
That it’s only the women drink ;
For when they part with their menkind,
It’s the best of the life that they give ;
They’re not on the Roll of Honour
Who give all that their land may live.
It’s an aching heart that’s hidden
At the back of those proud brave eyes,
It’s out of an unknown blackness
That a woman’s whole being cries.
Sitting alone in the darkness,
With time for thoughts tearful and sad,
Its then that her uncaged being
Vainly cries to her soldier lad.
Sitting alone with head bowed low,
Heart cried to heart, deep calls to deep,
Tracing forms in the ember glow ;
Then the tears long pent
May at length be spent,
When the children are asleep.
When the last sun sinks down fiercely red,
Casting its glow o’er the faithful dead,
When the end of strife,
Is the end of life,
For brave who’ve fought, and brave who’ve bled ;
When the Angel on the sable steed
Has bade his grim grey minions reap,
When they have done what God decreed,
And palls of death o’er heroes creep ;
Widowed, bereft, too torn to weep,
O Lord how long ?
God makes us strong,
Women whose men sleep their last sleep.
K.D. Knowles <16-4-1915
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The following works are by the Rev.
K. D. Knowles and were
written to commemorate the
unveiling of the war memorial in the Marker Square
Huntingdon.
The copies are taken as a true extract of an original
dedicated copy signed
by K. D. Knowles and dedicated to EOS.
It is copied here with the permission of his daughter Ursula
Knowles of St. Ives.
November 1998.
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A RHYME OF THE
THINKING SOLDIER
OF HUNTINGDON.
MARKET HILL
HUNTINGDON.
11th November, 1923.
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ONE night in November when passing the square
Folk saw what it seemed was a spirit there,
A strange apparition in khaki clad
Like the homing wraith of some soldier lad,
Where the gray shadows crept from the churchyard trees,
Whose boughs creaked and shuddered and groaned in the
breeze.
But when the night’s shadows had stolen away
And the sun had dawned on "Remembrance Day."
That appearance of such a mysterious mien
Was no longer the spirit some thought they had seen,
But one of those men whom all hearts adore
A British "Tommy" come back from the war.
Now this self-same soldier they were to know
Had been born in a sculptor’s studio, *
And disciplined under her cunning hand
Had attained to a manhood, majestic and grand
In endurance, and courage, and everything
That hallowed those men who fought for the King.
* Mrs. Hilton Young (Lady Scott).
He’s the man whom men can never forget,
An immortal crown on his brow is set,
For fired by his faith in the fight that he fought
He rescued the world through the deeds he wrought.
* * * * * * * *
IN this "Thinking Soldier of Huntingdon"
Ten thousands of men are embodied in one;
He’s somebody’s husband, or brother, or son,
For he’s all the men who carried a gun,
Who got into khaki and followed the drum
When the herald of war had trumpeted "Come."
So the sculptor who cast him in finest bronze
Had brought her material from Arras, and Mons,
The Somme, and Gallipoli, every place
Where Britain upheld the pride of her race.
Now it happened the artist’s own little son
Was born on the day that her work was done,
And something akin to the life that flowed
Through her baby’s veins, in the soldier glowed,
And a soul and a heart look out from the face
Of the soldier who sits in the Market Place,
A quickening soul that underlies
A heart breathing service and sacrifice.
Generations of men shall pass away,
But he’ll still sit there, let come who may.
In the radiant sun of the brightest noon,
Or elusive light of the pallid moon,
By day, by night he’ll be watching the throng
Of war-weary folk as they pass along;
With chin upon fist, and elbow on knee,
His face an inscrutable mystery,
He’ll guard his secret from everyone
This unsearchable soldier of Huntingdon.
But the sculptor’s work in effect shall be
To make other folk think as well as he
And, maybe, her labour will not be in vain
If men will but weigh war’s values again.
"THE THINKING SOLDIER."
HE came to the town on Armistice Day,
But whence he had come there was no one to say,
And no one could guess what he was before,
Or whether or no his job had been war,
Or what his profession, or business, or trade,
If he’d driven a quill, or wielded a spade,
If he’d printed a paper, or stood at a loom,
Or was he mechanic, chauffeur or groom?
This is a tale that will never be told
A riddle the Soldier will not unfold.
But here was the man who at England’s call
Instantly, eagerly, gave up his all,
And set forth with purpose to overawe
The spirit of those delighting in war;
Who to savage music of many a gun,
Like ten thousand thunders all rolled into one,
Through enveloping clouds of battle smoke,
Had forged his way on till the enemy broke.
So lord lieutenant, council and mayor,
Soldiers, civilians and clergy were there;
All the folk had flocked to the Market Square
To welcome the man from no one knew where.
And tributes of laurel and flowers they brought,
To place at the feet of this man who fought;
And they solemnized his arrival there
With dedication, thanksgiving and prayer.
As the clock struck eleven each bowed his head
In silent communion, living with dead;
And for twice sixty seconds the world stood still ,
And a deep hush fell on the Market Hill.
Then the " Last Post" sounded ; it seemed to
say,
"Come home, come home, ‘tis the end of the
day."
And in homage to him who sat silent and mute
Each guide, scout and soldier stood at "salute."
The echoes died, and they left him there
To his watch and ward in the Market Square,
To remind all the townsfolk that pas that way
That every day is "Remembrance Day".
* * * * * * * *
NOW with pensive face he sits all day long,
His eyes scarcely heeding the passing throng.
Of what he is thinking no one can tell;
Of Ypres, where he looked through the gates of hell;
Of the tragic carnage at Delville Wood,
Of a handful of men where battalions stood;
Of Cambrai, where hosts of his comrades fell
Mown down by rifle, machine gun and shell;
Of water-logged dug-out and bog-like trench;
Of consuming thirst he’d no water to quench -
Such as drove men mad on the Dardanelles,
And the countless horrors no soldier tells?
As he sits there watching with wistful eyes
Is a phantom procession crossing the skies;
Is he looking forward, or looking back,
Trying to find some lost end of the track;
Or seeking a future born of the past
Wherein shall be peace that shall live and last;
Or unweaving the web of which war is knit,
Sifting the glory and pity of it?
The thoughts of the soldier of Huntingdon
Bewilder the minds of everyone,
And nobody yet has ever made out
The things that soldier is thinking about.
But every person that passes there
Silently questions the man in the Square.
THE Merchant crossing the road to his shop,
At sight of the man is constrained to stop
And unload his heart in soliloquy,
In his craving for human sympathy.
"They never could say where my own boy fell,
If you know, then it’s surely for you to tell.
Where you there, my lad, when they killed my son?
Was the job worth while, you and he have done?
He was flesh of my flesh, and bone of my bone,
The one loved living thing I could call my own.
‘Twas in his young life that I lived again,
I shared in his joys and I felt his pain.
Every time my boy took part in a game,
Sent me back to the days when I did the same.
He played all his games for the games’ own sakes,
He was just like me, without my mistakes.
He fell in France, but they never knew where;
If there was a hot place my boy’d be there.
Time came when my letters came back to me,
"Dead letters " they were, just as dead as he!
And alongside my son I died in the war
For life’s dead when there’s nothing worth living for;
Ah: David’s lament and my own are one:-
"Would I had died for thee, my son, My son"
Yet the Thinking Soldier of Huntingdon
Said never a word concerning that son
But he knew that no English boy would stop,
When the order came sternly for "Over the top,"
And he pictured this lad from an English Shire
War-stained, bespattered, and covered with mire,
Fearlessly facing the curtain of shell
And filling the gap where a comrade fell
Until, in his turn, by an act of grace,
Another stepped forward and took his place.
* * * * * * * *
His worship the Mayor came riding by *
And reined up as the soldier caught his eye.
He’d scouted the Veldt and fought on the Somme
And knew more than most men of rifle and bomb.
The Mayor was one of the hunting sort
With a love for the field and a passion for sport,
He’d known the music of hound and horn
And loved them both since the day he was Born.
* Lt. Col. M.D. Barkley.
Some declared he’d no ear for other sound
Than toot of a horn and cry of a hound,
And the hissing of grooms in the morning hush
Plying the curry-comb, rubber and brush;
And hunters crunching their corn and hay
Rugged warm at the end of a rousing day;
He reveled from morning till eventide
In the fanfare of farmyard and countryside.
Now he fixed his monocle in his eye
And studied the Soldier curiously
In minute inspection as on parade,
Then such observations as these he made:-
"They say that no one can ever make out
All the things that you are thinking about,
Why, it seems to me a matter of course
You can’t think why the artist has left out the horse.
The Army got hold of my favorite mare
And I never knew what became of her.
She was just the keenest lady to go
And I wager she’d merit her D.S.O.
With a grace and a courage all her own
She’d take the last hedge to the great unknown,
For in at the death she was sure to be,
But most likely her own, that’s what troubles me.
Yet I feel that for her there’ll be something more,
Some life to make up for the one before;
I can’t believe all has come to an end
For that brave little mare, my faultless friend;
And I’d very much like to know that she
Was turned out to grass for eternity
In a paddock where there comes slinking by
A sly old vixen and pack in full cry;
I warrant she’d often be over the fence
Be it to-day or a thousand years hence.
Soldier, to me it does not seem fair
That there’s no memorial to that little mare."
So making his protest and saying his say
He caught up his reins and went on his way.
But the Soldier saw visions across the sky
Of limbers and guns go dashing by;
The sudden shock of a shell - and then
The writhing bodies of horses and men.
Together they died as together they fought,
And alongside each other deliverance wrought.
* * * * * * * *
THERE passed by a tramp who was well nigh spent
And who growled in a voice of discontent:-
"I can see old pal you can’t get demobbed;
You’re another of us whom the Country’s robbed.
But such chaps as you needn’t be annoyed,
For you’re not in the ranks of the unemployed.
I’d some rat-strewn billets back in the war
But I hadn’t to doss on a workhouse floor.
In Flanders I foot-slogged it mile upon mile,
And sang ‘Tipperary’ and ‘Smile, smile, smile’!
But there’s no ‘smile’ now as I march alone,
And no ‘ silver lining ‘ ; I’m out and done.
‘A country for ‘eroes’ was what they said ;-
Or ‘The boys would come back to a feather bed.’
But the ‘ casual’ and ‘ skilly’ is what we’ve got
And nobody cares a brass cent if we rot.
You think of them profiteers, fat, overfed!
Do you wonder that fellows like me see red ?
Say, matey, let’s know what you’re thinking about
Is it us poor blokes as is down and out?"
He waited in vain for responsive grouse,
Then he trudged up the road to "Walnut Tree
House." **
Yet the Soldier looked back and there he saw
This pauper facing the horrors of war,
Giving everything up that he had to give,
Just giving it all that his land might live,
And he prayed that England had help in store
For these, jobless men who had won her war.
** (Walnut Tree House is the official Huntingdon Workhouse.)
A MOTOR-BUS stopped at the Grammar School gate
And discharged its juvenile human freight
Of boys and girls, who rushed off to the Square
To see the unusual sight that was there.
In the School’s great hall they had read each name
Of the boys who had won undying fame.
Was he one of the boys, who, they had been taught,
Had for man such a great deliverance wrought?
And whose names were enrolled in the old School Hall
And enscrolled on the School Memorial?
So they gazed at his bayonet, rifle and hat,
Passed various comments on this and on that,
And all in a youngster’s inconsequent way,
Then, linking their arms, they hurried away.
But, maybe, their hearts bade them carry on
And replace the lives of the men who had gone.
For that is a School’s unwritten law
That each age does as well as the one before.
But the master who numbered them all in his care, ***
Stood thinking awhile in the Market Square:-
"The old School has harboured some men of fame -
Cromwell and Pepys, and some more I could name,
But no generation has turned out more,
Or greater, heroes than fought in the war.
And the old town School still holds its own,
For its boys are as brave as any I’ve known.
I taught them to play a man’s part in life.
But these were the playthings and sport of strife.
"Yet I’m sure that these boys are numbered among
The loved of the gods who, they say, die young,"
And wrapped in his thoughts he passed through the gate
Musing upon the vagaries of fate.
And the Soldier’s face was sorrow and ruth
As he thought of the flower of England’s youth
Culled, ere it bloomed, by the fingers of Death,
Withered and scorched by his blasting breath,
And lying like swaths in a field of hay.
Was their never a soul to say him nay?
*** Mr. J.H. Howgate (Headmaster).
ONE night as the soldier sat dreaming there,
In the dark gray fog, in the market square,
Where the flickering lamps with white halos crowned
Lit the wheelmarked snow that covered the ground.
A sorrowful figure draped all in black,
Was pacing the pavement, now forward, now back;
Forward and backward, her step never ceased,
Like the purposeless prowl of a captive beast.
As she passed and repassed he seemed to trace
The premature age on her sad young face,
And each time that she turned and came his way
Had he listened, maybe, he’d have heard her say:-
"He died for his country,’ but all that I know,
For thousands of times they have told me so;
And they said that ‘A man must do his share’
Yet it’s cold consolation that I find there!
He was killed before half of his years were run;
And our married life had but just begun.
For such wasted lives what have we to show
But lamentation, and weeds, and woe?
Is there no other road to God’s peace but War?
Will it come again soon as it did before?
Some twenty years hence will they kill my boy,
The only pledge left of our short lived joy?
In my darkness and doubt, oh ! I try to see,
That God still has pity on women like me,
And that Christ will return to us women again,
The Martha’s, and Maries, and Widows of Nain."
The man gazed at her there with her tragic eyes;
In his heart he could silently sympathize,
For well he knew that in war’s great scheme,
Though the arm of the man may be supreme,
That in all the travail of England’s heart
Wives, mothers and sweethearts had played their part.
* * * * * * * *
THERE’S a time to laugh and a time to mourn,
And in varying moods the folk passed in turn,
Some tawdry damsel perhaps thought fit
To make him the butt of her scanty wit:-
"Come, cheer up, Tommy, don’t took so queer
Just give us yer ‘at as a souvenir."
* * * * * * * *
NEXT the visionless loon, whom the years of war
Had failed to teach what he was fighting for,
And whose dwarfed intelligence never awoke
Beyond thinking the war some aimless joke,
Said : "I often sat just like that, my friend,
Asking when that vermilion war
would end"
* * * * * * * *
THEN a poor little nursemaid; her thought no doubt
Was, this was the lad who had walked her out;
He’d courted her for a week or a day,
Then the bugle blew and called him away.
If he’d ever come home they might have been wed,
But in a dark hour she learned he was dead.
She’d never the right to call him her own.
So she’d hidden her grief and mourned alone.
* * * * * * *
THEN a mother would come who thought to see
The son she had offered so grudgingly,
And yet proud she was she had urged him to go
In the hour when England wanted him so.
But blind with the tears of her love’s distress
She beheld not a soldier in khaki dress,
For a mother as many a woman knows
Always pictures her son in his swaddling clothes,
With his wee baby form hedged round from harm
In the crook of her all protecting arm.
And the gallant soldiers who man the guns
Are for ever and always their baby sons.
Each day the bell summons the passing throng
To eucharist, matins and evensong,
And the parish priest as he takes him to prayer ****
Often thinks of his new parishioner.
And proud is the priest of parish and town,
For his ancient church has earned much renown
As being the first of those hallowed spots
Which sheltered the corse of the Queen of Scots.
(When they brought her body from Fotheringhay
Up to Westminster they journeyed this way).
And there in its peaceful and somber light
Lies Sir Henry Cromwell. " the Golden Knight,"
And his nephew, Robert, was buried there
And O1iver came to this House of Prayer.
Saint Edward, too, may have stopped to pray
On his way to the wood of Higharthay.
And William the Norman, certainly took
Some stock of the town for his Domesday Book.
Earl David of Huntingdon built the School
Before he accepted the Scottish rule,
And when from the North, James Stuart came down
He rested at Hinchingbrooke near to the town.
It was here Prince Charles, and Nolly, one day
Had their far-famed quarrel when boys at play.
It was here the Earl, Edward Montagu,
Paraded his valiant yeomanry through
The narrow streets of the quaint old town,
In the days when Parliament fought the Crown
And Samuel Pepys added much to her fame
By linking his diary with her name.
And many such things that are handed down
Are found in the records concerning the town,
But the proudest deed that ever was done
Was that of the Soldier of Huntingdon,
And no one was more deserving of fame
Than this lad in the square who hasn’t a name.
**** The Rev. H.G.D. Latham, Rector of All Saints’ Church.
So, often the priest came to meditate
And ponder the meaning of man’s estate,
For long years of war with its vibrant shock
Had robbed him of many a youth of his flock,
And he wondered what peace would ever suffice
For such glorious service and sacrifice.
Yet many a man who had paid war’s toll
Though he’d lost his life, yet had gained his soul;
And the greatest love God has sealed and signed
Is the love that gave all for the love of mankind.
* * * * * * *
IN his grim night vision the Soldier saw
The fierce holocaust of consuming war;
An Emperor playing the rôle of Fate,
Unlocking the prisons of havoc and hate;
And stately citadels, turrets and spires,
And mansions and homesteads devoured by fires
Lighted and kindled by bursting shell
Relentless and cruel as fires of hell,
With their racing flames pursuing their track
And sweeping men, women and children back,
Driving them homeless in rabble retreat,
Seeking some refuge from blistering heat,
With fierce-flung curses, and piercing screams;
(All passed in the Soldier’s pageant of dreams)
Then charred desolation-and then,-nothing more!
And on chaos rings down the red curtain of war.
So, surrounded by shop, and office, and stall,
By club, bank, and hostel, and old Shire Hall,
The Thinking Soldier sits watching the throng
Of war-weary townsfolk passing along.
And yet not a soul has ever made out
The things that Soldier is thinking about.
* * * * * * *
MARKET HILL, HUNTINGDON.
CHRISTMAS EVE.
HUSHED was the patter of hurrying feet,
And still silence reigned in square and street.
Except for the sough of the midnight breeze,
And the hum of the wind in the churchyard trees,
Or a distant carol’s monotonous drone,
The Soldier was left to his thoughts alone.
When suddenly, out from each lofty tower
The clocks re-echoed the midnight hour,
And the bells rang out their immortal lay,
The old message of peace and Christmas Day.
From a starlit night and an angel choir,
From an Infant born in a cattle byre,
From the World - Child, now, as in years ago,
The message is wafted across the Snow:-
"Mankind is asking when wars shall cease,
And the world is seeking a lasting peace;
But the cause of war is lust and greed
And man’s heedlessness of his neighbour’s need.
And the secret the Christ unfolded then
Is that peace lies in changing the hearts of men.
And peace is the offspring of men’s goodwill."
‘Twas the answer then; ‘tis the answer still.
It will ever remain while the ages run,
As the message of God’s Incarnate Son.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The above poems about the Thinking Soldier were originally
printed by
T. M. Parker, Printer, Kimbolton and is reproduced here by
kind permission of his daughter Ursula Knowles, November 1998.
Soldier lad gone away to war,
Where may your billet be to-night ?
Are you out on some wind-swept moor,
Waiting the onrush with the light ?
Or are you on some flat, bleak plain
In some sodden and storm - thrashed trench,
Body drenched by unceasing rain,
But with spirit no pain can quench ;
Flushed by excitement of battle,
And buoyed by your craving to fight,
Urged by the cause that you strive for,
The cause of the truth and the right,
Life on the long Roll of Honour,
And place in the Temple of Fame ?
Is that the goal which you strive for,
The prize that shall crown your fair name ?
Soldier lad gone away to war,
Facing in death your death-less fate,
Remember woman gains no prize,
Her fate it is to think and wait.
Soldier lad gone away to war,
As night’s shadows o’er you creep,
Give to the woman the honour that’s due,
Though she can only think and pray for you,
When the children are asleep.
Think you of this as you struggle,
Woman’s weary and lonely part,
Keeping her tears for the night - time :
For the day - light a proud brave heart ?
Surely it takes a real courage
To keep always a face that’s bright.
To laugh and play with the children,
While obsessed by that phantom fight ?
We watch them use their mimic guns,
Their little quarrels, who shall be
The British - who must be the Huns.
We hear them say their prayers to God
That He will bring you home once more,
Then smilingly go off to bed.
That’s all, thank God, they know of war.
But when their rosy faces lie
Pillowed so snugly in white,
Innocents sleeping - then we turn
To face the terrors of the night.
Then think of this in your trenches,
The watches lone women must keep,
And give to the women the honour that’s due,
Though they only can think and pray for you
When the children are asleep.
NEW POEM
A RHYME OF THE
SILENT SOLDIER
OF HUNTINGDON.
TO THE MEN OF 1914 - 1918 WHO WROUGHT FOR MANKIND A
GREAT DELIVERANCE"
By the Ven. Kenneth D. Knowles,
D. D. Archdeacon of
Huntingdon.
[ Second and revised edition of a Rhyme of the Thinking
Soldier of Huntingdon ]
Printed and published by Thomas M. Parker Kimbolton,
Hunts.
HE came to the town on Armistice Day,
But whence he had come there was no one to say,
And no one could guess what he was before,
Or whether or no his job had been war,
Or what his profession, or business, or trade,
If he’d driven a quill, or wielded a spade,
If he’d printed a paper, or stood at a loom,
Or was he mechanic, chauffeur or groom?
This is a tale that will never be told
A riddle the Soldier will not unfold.
IN this "Silent Soldier of Huntingdon"
Ten thousands of men are embodied in one;
He’s somebody’s husband, or brother, or son,
For he’s all the men who carried a gun,
Who got into khaki and followed the drum
When the herald of war had trumpeted "Come."
So the sculptor* who cast him in finest bronze
Had brought her material from Arras, and Mons,
The Somme, and Gallipoli, every place
Where Britain upheld the pride of her race.
* Mrs. Hilton Young (Lady Scott).
For here was each man who at England’s call
Instantly, eagerly, gave up his all,
And set forth with purpose to overawe
The spirit of those delighting in war;
Who to savage music of many a gun,
Like ten thousand thunders all rolled into one,
Through enveloping clouds of battle smoke,
Had forged his way on till the enemy broke;
And fired by his faith in the fight that he fought
Had rescued the world through the deeds he wrought.
So lord lieutenant, council and mayor,
Soldiers, civilians and clergy were there;
All people had flocked to the Market Square
To welcome the man from no one knew where.
And tributes of laurel and flowers they brought,
To place at the feet of this man who fought;
And they solemnized his arrival there
With dedication, thanksgiving and prayer.
The clock struck eleven; each bowed his head
In silent communion, living with dead;
And in homage to him who sat silent and mute
Guide, scout, nurse and soldier stood at "salute."
And for twice sixty seconds the world stood still ,
And a deep hush fell on the Market Hill.
Then the " Last Post" sounded ; it seemed to say,
"Come home! come home! ‘tis the end of the day."
It’s echoes died, and they left him there
To his watch and ward in the Market Square,
To remind all the townsfolk that pas that way
That every day is "Remembrance Day".
* * * * * * * *
There with pensive face he sits all day long,
His eyes scarcely heeding the passing throng.
His chin on his fist, his elbow on knee,
His face an inscrutable mystery,
Guarding his secret from everyone,
This unsearchable soldier of Huntingdon.
Of what he is thinking no one can tell?
Of Ypres, where he looked through the gates of hell;
Of the tragic carnage at Delville Wood,
Of a handful of men where battalions stood;
Of Cambrai, where hosts of his comrades fell
Mown down by rifle, machine gun and shell;
Of water-logged dug-out and bog-like trench;
Of consuming thirst he’d no water to quench -
Such as drove men mad on the Dardanelles,
And the countless horrors no soldier tells?
As he sits there watching with wistful eyes
Is a phantom procession crossing the skies;
Is he looking forward, or looking back,
Trying to find some lost end of the track;
Or seeking a future born of the past
Wherein shall be peace that shall live and last;
Or unweaving the web of which war is knit,
Sifting the glory and pity of it?
The thoughts of the soldier of Huntingdon
Bewilder the minds of everyone,
And nobody yet has ever made out
The things that soldier is thinking about.
But every person that passes there
Silently questions the man in the Square.
THE Merchant crossing the road to his shop,
At sight of the man is constrained to stop
And unload his heart in soliloquy,
In his craving for human sympathy.
"They never could say where my own boy fell,
If you know, then it’s surely for you to tell.
Where you there, my lad, when they killed my son?
Was the job worth while, you and he have done?
He was flesh of my flesh, and bone of my bone,
The one loved living thing I could call my own.
‘Twas in his young life that I lived again,
I shared in his joys and I felt his pain.
Every time my boy took part in a game,
Sent me back to the days when I did the same.
He played all his games for the games’ own sakes,
He was just like me, without my mistakes.
He fell in France, but they never knew where;
If there was a hot place my boy’d be there.
Time came when my letters came back to me,
"Dead letters " they were, just as dead as he!
And alongside my son I died in the war
For life’s dead when there’s nothing worth living for;
Ah: David’s lament and my own are one:-
"Would I had died for thee, my son, My son"
Yet the Thinking Soldier of Huntingdon
Said never a word concerning that son
But he knew that no English boy would stop,
When the order came sternly for "Over the top,"
And he pictured this lad from an English Shire
War-stained, bespattered, and covered with mire,
Fearlessly facing the curtain of shell
And filling the gap where a comrade fell
Until, in his turn, by an act of grace,
Another stepped forward and took his place.
* * * * * * * *
His worship the Mayor came riding by *
And reined up as the soldier caught his eye.
He’d scouted the Veldt and fought on the Somme
And knew more than most men of rifle and bomb.
The Mayor was one of the hunting sort
With a love for the field and a passion for sport;
He’d known the music of hound and horn
And loved them both since the day he was Born.
* Lt. Col. M.D. Barkley.
Some declared he’d no ear for other sound
Than toot of a horn and cry of a hound,
And the hissing of grooms in the morning hush
Plying the curry-comb, rubber and brush;
And hunters crunching their corn and hay
Rugged warm at the end of a rousing day;
He reveled from morning till eventide
In the fanfare of farmyard and countryside.
Now he fixed his monocle in his eye
And studied the Soldier curiously
In minute inspection as on parade,
Then such observations as these he made:-
"They say that no one can ever make out
All the things that you are thinking about,
Why, it seems to me a matter of course
You can’t think why the artist has left out the horse.
The Army got hold of my favorite mare
And I never knew what became of her.
She was just the keenest lady to go
And I wager she’d merit her D.S.O.
With a grace and a courage all her own
She’d take the last hedge to the great unknown,
For in at the death she was sure to be,
But most likely her own, that’s what troubles me.
Yet I feel that for her there’ll be something more,
Some life to make up for the one before;
I can’t believe all has come to an end
For that brave little mare, my faultless friend;
And I’d very much like to know that she
Was turned out to grass for eternity
In a paddock where there comes slinking by
A sly old vixen and pack in full cry;
I warrant she’d often be over the fence
Be it to-day or a thousand years hence.
Soldier, to me it does not seem fair
That there’s no memorial to that little mare."
So making his protest and saying his say
He caught up his reins and went on his way.
But the Soldier saw visions across the sky
Of limbers and guns go dashing by;
The sudden shock of a shell - and then
The writhing bodies of horses and men.
Together they died as together they fought,
And alongside each other deliverance wrought.
* * * * * * * *
THERE passed by a tramp who was well nigh spent
And who growled in a voice of discontent;
"I can see old pal you can’t get demobbed;
You’re another of us whom the Country’s robbed.
But such chaps as you needn’t be annoyed,
For you’re not in the ranks of the unemployed.
I’d some rat-strewn billets back in the war
But I hadn’t to doss on a workhouse floor.
In Flanders I foot-slogged it mile upon mile,
And sang ‘Tipperary’ and ‘Smile, smile, smile’!
But there’s no ‘smile’ now as I march alone,
And no ‘ silver lining ‘ ; I’m out and done.
‘A country for ‘eroes’ was what they said ;-
Or ‘The boys would come back to a feather bed.’
But the ‘ casual’ and ‘ skilly’ is what we’ve got
And nobody cares a brass cent if we rot.
You think of them profiteers, fat, overfed!
Do you wonder that fellows like me see red ?
Say, matey, let’s know what you’re thinking about
Is it us poor blokes as is down and out?"
He waited in vain for responsive grouse,
Then he trudged up the road to "Walnut Tree
House." **
Yet the Soldier looked back and there he saw
This pauper facing the horrors of war,
Giving everything up that he had to give,
Just giving it all that his land might live,
And he prayed that England had help in store
For these, jobless men who had won her war.
** (Walnut Tree House is the official Huntingdon Workhouse.)
A MOTOR-BUS stopped at the Grammar School gate
And discharged its juvenile human freight
Of boys and girls, who rushed off to the Square
To see the unusual sight that was there.
In the School’s great hall they had read each name
Of the boys who had won undying fame.
Was he one of the boys, who, they had been taught,
Had for man such a great deliverance wrought?
And whose names were enrolled in the old School Hall
And enscrolled on the School Memorial?
So they gazed at his bayonet, rifle and hat,
Passed various comments on this and on that,
And all in a youngster’s inconsequent way,
Then, linking their arms, they hurried away.
But, maybe, their hearts bade them carry on
And replace the lives of the men who had gone.
For that is a School’s unwritten law
That each age does as well as the one before.
But the master who numbered them all in his care, ***
Stood thinking awhile in the Market Square:-
"The old School has harboured some men of fame -
Cromwell and Pepys, and some more I could name,
But no generation has turned out more,
Or greater, heroes than fought in the war.
And the old town School still holds its own,
For its boys are as brave as any I’ve known.
I taught them to play a man’s part in life.
But these were the playthings and sport of strife.
Yet I’m sure that these boys are numbered among
The loved of the gods who, they say, die young,
And wrapped in his thoughts he passed through the gate
Musing upon the vagaries of fate.
And the Soldier’s face was sorrow and ruth
As he thought of the flower of England’s youth
Culled, ere it bloomed, by the fingers of Death,
Withered and scorched by his blasting breath,
And lying like swaths in a field of hay.
Was their never a soul to say him nay?
*** Mr. J. H. Howgate (Headmaster).
ONE night as the soldier sat dreaming there,
In the dark gray fog, in the market square,
Where the flickering lamps with white halos crowned
Lit the wheelmarked snow that covered the ground.
A sorrowful figure draped all in black,
Was pacing the pavement, now forward, now back;
Forward and backward, her step never ceased,
Like the purposeless prowl of a captive beast.
As she passed and repassed he seemed to trace
The premature age on her sad young face,
And each time that she turned and came his way
Had he listened, maybe, he’d have heard her say:-
"He died for his country,’ but all that I know,
For thousands of times they have told me so;
And they said that ‘A man must do his share’
Yet it’s cold consolation that I find there!
He was killed before half of his years were run;
And our mated life had but just begun.
For such wasted lives what have we to show
But lamentation, and weeds, and woe?
Is there no other road to God’s peace but War?
Will it come again soon as it did before?
Some twenty years hence will they kill my boy,
The only pledge left of our short lived joy?
In my darkness and doubt, oh ! I try to see,
That God still has pity on thousands like me,
And that Christ will return to us women again,
The Marthas, and Maries, and Widows of Nain."
The man gazed at her there with her tragic eyes;
In his heart he could silently sympathize,
For well he knew that in war’s great scheme,
Though the arm of the man may be supreme,
That in all the travail of England’s heart
Wives, mothers and sweethearts had played their
part.
* * * * * * * *
THERE’S a time to laugh and a time to mourn,
And in varying moods the folk passed in turn,
Some tawdry damsel perhaps thought fit
To make him the butt of her scanty wit:-
"Come, cheer up, Tommy, don’t took so queer
Just give us yer ‘at as a souvenir."
* * * * * * * *
NEXT the visionless loon, whom the years of war
Had failed to teach what he was fighting for,
And whose dwarfed intelligence never awoke
Beyond thinking the war some aimless joke,
Said : "I often sat just like that, my friend,
Asking when that vermilion war would end."
* * * * * * * *
THEN a poor little nursemaid; her thought no
doubt
Was, this was the lad who had walked her out;
He’d courted her for a week or a day,
Then the bugle blew and called him away.
If he’d ever come home they might have been wed,
But in a dark hour she learned he was dead.
She’d never the right to call him her own.
So she’d hidden her grief and mourned alone.
* * * * * * *
THEN a mother would come who thought to see
The son she had offered so grudgingly,
And yet proud she was she had urged him to go
In the hour when England wanted him so.
But blind with the tears of her love’s distress
She beheld not a soldier in khaki dress,
For a mother as many a woman knows
Always pictures her son in his swaddling clothes,
With his wee baby form hedged round from harm
In the crook of her all protecting arm.
And the gallant soldiers who man the guns
Are for ever and always their baby sons.
* * * * * * * *
Each day the bell summons the passing throng
To eucharist, matins and evensong,
And the parish priest as he takes him to prayer ****
Often thinks of his new parishioner.
And proud is the priest of parish and town,
For his ancient church has earned much renown
As being the first of those hallowed spots
Which sheltered the corse of the Queen of Scots.
(When they brought her body from Fotheringhay
Up to Westminster they journeyed this way).
And there in its peaceful and somber light
Lies Sir Henry Cromwell. " the Golden Knight,"
And his nephew, Robert, was buried there
And O1iver came to this House of Prayer.
Saint Edward, too, may have stopped to pray
On his way to the wood of Higharthay.
And William the Norman, certainly took
Some stock of the town for his Domesday Book.
Earl David of Huntingdon built the School
Before he accepted the Scottish rule;
And when from the North, James Stuart came down
He rested at Hinchingbrooke near to the town.
It was here Prince Charles, and Cromwell, they say
Had a childish quarrel when boys at play.
And hereto the Earl, Edward Montagu,
Paraded his valiant yeomanry through
The narrow streets of the quaint old town,
In the days when Parliament fought the Crown
And Samuel Pepys added much to her fame
By linking his diary with her name.
And many such things that are handed down
Are found in the records concerning the town,
But the proudest deed that ever was done
Was that of the Soldier of Huntingdon,
And no one was more deserving of fame
Than this lad in the square who hasn’t a name.
**** The Rev. H.G.D. Latham, Rector of All Saints’ Church.
So, often the priest came to meditate
And ponder the meaning of man’s estate,
For long years of war with its vibrant shock
Had robbed him of many a youth of his flock,
And he wondered what peace would ever suffice
For such glorious service and sacrifice.
Yet many a man who had paid war’s toll
Though he’d lost his life, yet had gained his soul;
And the greatest love God has sealed and signed
Is the love that gave all for the love of mankind.
* * * * * * *
IN his grim night vision the Soldier saw
The fierce holocaust of consuming war;
An Emperor playing the rôle of Fate,
Unlocking the prisons of havoc and hate;
And stately citadels, turrets and spires,
And mansions and homesteads devoured by fires
Lighted and kindled by bursting shell
Relentless and cruel as fires of hell,
With their racing flames pursuing their track
And sweeping men, women and children back,
Driving them homeless in rabble retreat,
Seeking some refuge from blistering heat,
With fierce-flung curses, and piercing screams;
(All passed in the Soldier’s pageant of dreams)
Then charred desolation-and then,-nothing more!
And on chaos rings down the red curtain of war.
So, surrounded by shop, and office, and stall,
By club, bank, and hostel, and old Shire Hall,
With chin upon fist, and elbow on knee
His face an inscrutable mystery,
The Thinking Soldier sits watching the throng
Of war-weary townsfolk passing along.
And yet not a soul has ever made out
The things that Soldier is thinking about.
* * * * * * *
It was Christmas Eve, and he still sat there
In the light of a gas-lamp’s flickering flare;
Hushed was the patter of hurrying feet
And still silence reigned in square and street.
And still silence reigned in square and street.
Except for the sough of the midnight breeze,
And the hum of the wind in the churchyard trees,
Or a distant carol’s monotonous drone,
The Soldier was left to his thoughts alone.
When suddenly, out from each lofty tower
The clocks re-echoed the midnight hour,
And the bells rang out their immortal lay,
The old message of peace and Christmas Day.
From a starlit night and an angel choir,
From an Infant born in a cattle byre,
From the World - Child, now, as in years ago,
The message is wafted across the Snow:-
"Mankind is asking when wars shall cease,
And the world is seeking a lasting peace;
But the cause of war is lust and greed
And man’s heedlessness of his neighbour’s need.
And the secret the Christ unfolded then
s that peace lies in changing the
hearts of men.
And peace is the offspring of men’s goodwill."
I
‘Twas the answer then; ‘tis the answer still.
It will ever remain while the ages run,
As the message of God’s Incarnate Son.
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-
The above two works were by the Rev.
K. D. Knowles and were
written to commemorate the unveiling of the war memorial in the
Market Square at Huntingdon.
The first copy is taken as a true extract of an original
dedicated copy signed by
K. D. Knowles and dedicated to EOS.
Both are copied here with the permission of his daughter
Ursula Knowles of St. Ives. November 1998.
Local newspaper entries relating to K. D.
Knowles.
23/10/1914 The Rev. K. D. Knowles, R. D.,
of Brampton, has been appointed chaplain of the Yorkshire Mounted Brigade as
well as of the Hunts. Cyclist Battalion.
25-9-1914 "THE
BISHOP OF ELY AT BRAMPTON" "
On the 13th Sunday after Trinity the Lord Bishop of Ely preached at the evening
service in the Parish Church from phil iv 6 and 7. In referring to the absence of the Rev. K. D. Knowles who is
serving his country as Chaplain to
the Hunts. Cycle Battalion, his Lordship said that the Rector had gone, not only
with his ( the Bishop's) consent, but with his most cordial approval.
Upon those left behind who were unable to serve in the defence of the
country at this crisis, was laid the duty of continual daily prayer that God's
help and blessing might be with our sailors and soldiers in their difficult and
dangerous task."
25-9-1914 – Ref.
10 - “CYCLISTS CHAPLAIN ON LEAVE.” - “ The Rev. K. D. Knowles, rector of
Brampton and Chaplain to the Hunts. Cycle Battalion, reached home on Tuesday
night on 48 hours leave returning on Thursday. The rev. gentleman, who was
looking remarkably well, said the Hunts. boys are doing splendidly in
Yorkshire, their all-round conduct having gained for them the high respect
of all classes. The men are wonderfully fit and are proving themselves
handymen in many respects. The weather last week was bitterly cold, but no
grumbling was heard. Mr. Knowles came across an instance where some of the
men who were doing duty at a coastguard station, where the coastguards had
been called away as Naval Reservists, had rendered good service by digging
up the potatoes and placing them in pits. Mr. Knowles has night stations to
visit which he does regularly each week. He says nothing is more highly
prised by the Cyclists than copies of the “Hunts. Post,” all being eager to
learn the news from home. “
Ref 349 & 5/87 +
photo 25-12-1915 – “A Chaplain and his War Sermons” “ In another column
we review the excellent little volume of War Addresses by Rev. K. D.
Knowles, the Rector of Brampton and Chaplain with the Forces, having from
the first days of the war been associated with the 1st Hunts.
Cyclist Battalion. “
= look for a
copy of the review mentioned in papers around the 25-12-1915.
23/10/1914
The Rev. K. D. Knowles, R. D., of Brampton, has been appointed chaplain
of the Yorkshire Mounted Brigade as well as of the Hunts. Cyclist Battalion.
22-2-1915 " To
conclude we shall quote some extracts from the notes of the Chaplain, the Rev.
K. D. Knowles, R.D. :- The Huntingdonshire Cyclist Battalions were mobilised on
August 4th and entrained for Grimsby on the morning of August the 6th.
In spite of our arrival in Grimsby being unexpected we secured excellent
billets for the men in Little Coates Schools.
Our first services were held on the following Sunday in a Mission Church
lent to us by the Vicar of the parish. During
the week we were ordered to Hornsea on the Yorkshire coast, about forty-five
miles further north, and bicycled there on August 16th, crossing the Humber by
ferry. Our Battalion was soon
broken up and companies or detachments placed at various stations along the
coast, covering a line that at one time extended from Scarborough town boundary
down to Spurn Point, a distance of about seventy five miles.
As the weather at the time was warm, and for the most part fine, the
services at different stations were in the open - air.
At Filey they were in an open field near the billets: at Flamborough on a
common, surrounded partially by the quaint whitewashed cottages of fishermen,
and in the midst of lobster and crab pots and fishing nets.
Here, with a table covered by a Union Jack for desk and pulpit, with a
borrowed harmonium played by a khaki-clad organist, with numerous weather-beaten
fisherfolk sitting on the outskirts, with donkeys, geese and fowls feeding on
the common, and the sound of the incessant wind and waves dashing on the great
white cliffs humming in our ears, we held our services - the setting was
certainly quaint and unconventional, but for all that they were amongst the most
impressive we have ever taken part in.
27/3/15
= The
Rev. K. D. Knowles, vicar of Woodwalton, is now Chaplain with the 1st Battalion
of the Hunts. Cyclist at Filey. He is an exceedingly popular "sky
pilot," as the men kindly call him. His activities are ceaseless.
25/12/15
= A Chaplain and his War Sermons. = In
another column of we reviewed the excellent little volume of War addresses by
Rev. K. D. Knowles, the rector of Brampton and Chaplain with the forces, having
from of the first days of the War been associated with the 1st Hunts. Cyclist
Battalion.
17/1/1916 The Chaplain
of the Hunts. Cyclists (the Rev. K. D. Knowles), has been laid up for two or
three weeks at Filey with a severe attack of influenza.
1/9/1916 We
hear that the Rev. K. D. Knowles, of Brampton, who has been acting as chaplain of
the Hunts. Cyclists, has gone to the front.
17-11-1916.
[H/P] "The
transport section of the 1/1st Huntingdonshire Cyclist battalion has forwarded
to the Rev. K. D. Knowles (rector of Brampton), who has now been some months
serving as a chaplain at the front, a very beautifully embossed silver cigarette
case, as a token of their esteem and a memento of the two years he was with them
as chaplain to their Battalion. Prior
to his departure last August the Captains of the Battalion also made him a
presentation of a silver Holy Communion set."
6-2-1917 "REV. K. D. KNOWLES RETURNING."
" The Rev
K. D. Knowles, Rector of Brampton,
is returning to Brampton shortly. He
was Chaplain to the County Battalion before the war, and mobilised with the
1/1st Hunts. Cyclists on August 4th. 1914, and was with then till the
summer of 1916. Then on the
majority of the Cyclists being drafted abroad, he applied to go to the front
with them. Though he was not
permitted to go with his own men, he was sent out to France and to the front
where he has done fine work. He has
now been gazetted out of the Army, having been obliged to relinquish his
commission owing to ill health, contracted on foreign service. After an operation in Cardiff Military Hospital, a Medical
Board pronounced him unfit for foreign and home service. He is now at Bath. As
the Red Cross Service is moving from Brampton Rectory, used by the Society as a
hospital to a larger hospital (Buckden Towers), the Rev. K. D. Knowles will
return to the Rectory."
One service that will always stand out in our memory was the "Lord
Roberts Memorial Service" we held at Filey. Throughout the reverence and attention of the men was
remarkable. Capt. Lowe had taken
infinite pains with the preparations. Among
the hymns was " For all the Saints" a hymn we can never sing without
thinking of all those brave men who have fought their last fight, and who go as
Lord Roberts himself, fearlessly to meet their God.
The service ended with the most beautiful rendering of the "Death
March" by the organist, Mr. Lowish followed by the sounding of the
"Last Post" by Bugler Barker, clear, resonant and thrilling , every
note thrilling and true.
While we still dwelling on the glorious memory of the great veteran
campaigner and warrior, we should not loose sight of the fact that even before
his service to his country he put his whole duty to his God.
To every man in this Battalion we would commend the task of in trying in
as far as in him is possible to copy the example of his noble soldier-life. K D
K."
10-2-1917 "A
DOUGHTY PARSON" The Rev.
K. D. Knowles, Rector of Brampton, is returning to Brampton at the end of
February or the beginning of March. He was Chaplain to the County Battalion
before the war, and he mobilised with the 1/1stHunts. Cyclists on August 4th,
1914, and was with them till the summer of 1916.
Then on the majority of the Cyclists being drafted abroad he applied to
go to the front with them. Though
he was not permitted to go with his own men, he was sent out to France and to
the Front , where he did some fine work. He
was gazetted out of the Army last week, having been obliged to relinquish his
commission owing to ill health, contracted on foreign service.
After an operation in Cardiff Military Hospital. a medical Board
pronounced him unfit for further foreign or home service.
He is now at Bath. As the Red Cross Society is moving from Brampton Rectory (
leant to the society as a hospital ) to a larger hospital (Buckden Towers),
the Rev. K. D. Knowles will return to the Rectory.
16-2-1917
[Ref 84] "
Monday's "Gazette" stated that the Rev. K. D. Knowles has relinquished
his commission as a Chaplain of the forces on account of ill-health contracted
on active service. The rector of
Brampton, as Chaplain to the Hunts. Cyclists, joined upon mobilisation, and
spent two years with the Battalion before going to the Western Front as Chaplain
to the regular forces. Mr. Knowles
is at present recuperating at Bath."
"The Rev. K. D. Knowles, R.D., of Brampton, has been appointed
Chaplain of the Yorkshire Mounted Brigade as well as the Hunts. Cyclist
Battalion"
1/9/1916 We hear
that the Rev. K. D. Knowles, of Brampton, who has been acting as chaplain of the
Hunts. Cyclists, has gone to the front.
====================================
Jenny Stocker is a relation of K D K who indicates that
the Knowles family originated from Eyam in Derbyshire. They were
related to the Talbots and they figure largely in the plague stories.
The wife of Kenneth D. Knowles with there two daughters. I had the
pleasure of speaking to Ursula over the last few months of her life.
====================================
Extract from Hunts Post 19th November 1936.
= Vicar as 'Unknown Soldier'
In mud-bespattered Khaki and steel helmet to represent the 'Unknown
Soldier,' The Rev. Vincent Howson, Vicar of Ratcliffe, Limehouse, E., who one
time resided in Buckden and joined the Hunts. Cyclist Battalion, stood
before a poppy covered altar on Sunday and gave a message of peace to the
congregation of St. Edmund's , Lombard Street. 'I am your son, your friend,'
he said 'I am the teeming myriads, yet but one where is the peace I fought
for, died to steal?' Mr. Howson, once an actor and a prisoner of war in
Germany for two years, was standing only a few feet from the spot where St.
Edmund's Church was hit by a bomb in an air-raid in 1917.
He stated that his impersonation of the 'Unknown Soldier' was not intended
in any way to be a stunt, but that he hoped to make a strong appeal to the
congregation.
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