Sir John Arkwright
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YOUR MEMORY HALLOWED
IN THE LAND YOU LOVED
SOUTH AFRICA
SECOND LIEUTENANT ERROL SIDNEY PLOWES
Like yesterday's inscription, Errol Sidney Plowes' comes from the first verse of Sir John Arkwright's poem, which later became a hymn, O Valiant Hearts:
O valiant hearts who to your glory came
Through dust of conflict and through battle flame;
Proudly you lie, your knightly virtue proved,
Your memory hallowed in the land you loved.
Plowes' parents chose the last line, which is more usually quoted than the line above. However, unusually, they have identified 'the land he loved' - it was South Africa, the land where he was born and brought up and where his father, Sidney Arnold Plowes, worked for the Union Castle Shipping Line in Cape Town.
Born in Rondebosch on 22 February 1898, Plowes joined the 1st South African Infantry as a private in 1916 when he was just 18. On 8 April 1917, just after his 19th birthday, he received a commission into the Royal Field Artillery, serving with the 379th Battery, 169th Brigade. He was killed in action during the fighting for Hangard Wood, part of the German's Spring Offensive, a year and a day later when he was just 20.
YOU, YOUR KNIGHTLY
VIRTUE PROVED
SECOND LIEUTENANT WILFRED SPENCER BOWLES
Wilfred Bowles was killed in action on 10 July 1916 in the Welsh Division's attack on Mametz Wood. He was shot by a sniper. A theology student at King's College London, Bowles gave up his studies in June 1915 to join the Inns of Court OTC. Five months later he was commissioned into the 5th Battalion, Essex Regiment and three months after this he transferred to the Machine Gun Corps. He went to France on 4 June 1916 and was killed five weeks later.
William Spencer Bowles was the son of Tom and Alice Bowles of Les Rochettes, Pontac, St Clements, Jersey. His father was a house painter and his mother a school mistress who by 1911 was the head teacher of a church school on the island. This makes her one of the very few mothers in this project to have an independent career, least of all one with three children and a living husband.
Bowles' father signed for his inscription. It comes from the first verse of Sir John Arkwright's famous hymn, 'O Valiant Hearts', once a stalwart of Remembrance Day services before its sentiments went out of fashion:
O valiant hearts who to your glory came
Through dust of conflict and through battle flame;
Proudly you lie, your knightly virtue proved,
Your memory hallowed in the land you loved.
TO SAVE MANKIND
A WIDOWED MOTHER'S ONLY SON
GUNNER WILLIAM JOHN DANIELS
'To save mankind' seems like rather an unequal task for one widowed mother's son to achieve; where did the idea that this was the cause for which William John Daniels died come from?
The Mrs Maude Turner who chose his inscription - she was not his mother whose name was Catherine - was quoting a line from verse two of Sir John Arkwright's famous hymn, O Valiant Hearts:
Proudly you gathered, rank on rank, to war
As who had heard God's message from afar;
All you had hoped for, all you had you gave,
To save mankind - yourselves you scorned to save.
You can imagine the comfort such words would have given to the bereaved. They provide not only meaning for the deaths of their loved ones but the assurance that having fought in God's cause these men are assured of their place in heaven:
These were His servants, in His steps they trod,
Following through death the martyred Son of God.
Victor, He rose; victorious too shall rise
They who have drunk His cup of sacrifice.
I haven't been able to find out any personal details about William John Daniels, only that he was born in Landrake, Cornwall, enlisted in Saltash and wasn't entitled to the 1914 or 1915 Star. He served originally with the 4th Battalion York and Lancaster Regiment, transferred to the 260th Battery Royal Garrison Artillery, and was killed in action on 18 September 1918 when the battery was in support of the 4th Australian Divisions attack on the Hindenburg Line.
TRANQUIL YOU LIE ...
YOUR MEMORY HALLOWED
IN THE LAND YOU LOVED
LIEUTENANT COLONEL RICHARD CHESTER CHESTER-MASTER, DSO AND BAR
Lt. Colonel Chester-Muster's inscription comes from the first verse of the once very popular and highly emotional Remembrance hymn O Valiant Hearts, written by Sir John Arkwright in 1917.
O valiant hearts who to your glory came
Through clouds of conflict and through battle flame;
Tranquil you lie, your knightly virtue proved,
Your memory hallowed in the land you loved.
Chester-Muster was a professional soldier who had served in the South African War. In 1914 he was on the reserve list; he was also Chief Constable of Gloucestershire. He rejoined his regiment on the outbreak of war and went with it to France. He was shot by a sniper on 30 August 1917. His DSO and Bar bear testament to his qualities as a soldier and the Acting Chief Constable's tribute, distributed to all the police stations in Gloucestershire to notify them of his death, bear testament to his qualities as a man:
"In him the country has lost a brave and experienced soldier; the county of Gloucestershire has lost a valued and high-minded official; the Police Force has lost a head who had devoted the best energies of his life, since he became Chief Constable, to their official and private welfare; and a great many people have lost a friend whom they had learnt to honour and love. He has passed away in the midst of what promised to be a brilliant military career, leaving behind him a memory which will never bee forgotten of a "gallant gentleman" in the best and noblest sense of the word."
Richard Chester-Master's wife, Geraldine, chose his inscription. Born Geraldine Mary Rose Arkwright, she was the sister of Sir John Arkwright, the author of 'O Valiant hearts'.
ALL YOU HAD HOPED FOR
ALL YOU HAD YOU GAVE
LIEUTENANT WILFRED EVELYN LITTLEBOY
On their own, extracted from the rest of the poem, these are very bleak lines. Within the context of the rest of the poem the words carry a certain nobility, but not on their own:
Proudly you gathered, rank on rank to war
As who had heard God's message from afar;
All you had hoped for, all you had you gave,
To save mankind - yourselves you scorned to save.
This is verse two of Sir John Arkwright's famous poem 'O Valiant Hearts', which, set to music by Gustav Holst, was for many years a staple of Remembrance Day services. It assures the dead that with their "knightly virtue proved", their memory will be "hallowed in the land you loved", since they too have drunk Christ's "cup of sacrifice".
But Wilfred Littleboy's parents chose none of these comforting lines for their younger son who had left school in December 1914 - two terms early - in order to volunteer. Prevented by a knee injury from getting to the front until July 1917, he lasted three months before he was killed in an attack on Polderhoek Chateau near Gheluvelt.
Littleboy's father, Charles, was a wealthy ship builder in the North East of England. After Wilfred's death, the family gave land in Thornaby-on-Tees for the creation of a public park in their son's memory; set up a bursary fund at Rugby School where he had been educated, and gave money to a church near Polderhoek Chateau where the priest had helped Mrs Littleboy find her son's grave.