Bravest of the Hearts

[barkalotloudly]

After seeing two copies of this book sell for over £100.00 just recently it was great to obtain a copy at a third of the price, o loverly book a real labour of love, in the mould of "Leaving all that was dear" I take my hat off to people who undertake this research etc

best regards John

[Steven Broomfield]

Gordon Bennett! I bought my copy when it was first published (£17?) - please don't tell Mrs B I'm sitting on a burgeoning asset.

Mind, I'd probably say it's worth a hundred notes; it's an excellent book.

[Ian Riley]

Gordon Bennett! I bought my copy when it was first published (£17?) - please don't tell Mrs B I'm sitting on a burgeoning asset.

Mind, I'd probably say it's worth a hundred notes; it's an excellent book.

Sold originally at £30. It took be a year before I saw the significance of the publisher's name that the late Hal Giblin adopted, "Winordie", despite typing it innumerable times and wondering about the significance of 'Win-Ordie', 'Wi-Nordie and all sorts of phonetic combinations. I think I even tried it as an anagram.

The mention of the monumental Cheltenham (or should it be Cheltenham monumental) Leaving All That Was Dear is interesting and percipient.

Ian

[daggers]

If anyone wants to know the origin of the 55th West Lancs Division's motto, let me know.

Daggers

[CarylW]

I'm very very envious! I'd love to read/own this

Caryl

[daggers]

"THE RED ROSE"

Story of the 55th Division's Motto

When the custom arose, quite early in the late war,[i.e.1914-18] of adopting a device for the purpose of identifying the various divisions of the British Army there was no difficulty in deciding what the sign of the 55th Division should be. The Red Rose of Lancaster was, quite obviously, the proper device and, from the formation of the Division, the Red Rose within a white circle bordered with scarlet marked the vehicles, waggons, and other impedimenta of the 55th. Subsequently, after the first battle of the Somme, when it became the custom for all ranks to wear the distinguishing sign of their divisions upon the tunic, the officers and men of the 55th began to wear upon each arm just below the shoulder a red rose within a khaki circle, and this device was generally admitted to be one of the most effective of all the divisional signs. It is still worn by all ranks of the 55th Division at the present moment. [i.e.July 1939]

The story of the motto is as follows. Early in June 1917, a young officer of the 275th Brigade RFA was killed by a shell in a battery position at Ypres. He was Lieut. Leonard C.Wall, of Liverpool, who when the war broke out was a schoolboy at Clifton and who, despite his youth, had joined up forthwith and had received a commission in the 1st West Lancashire Brigade RFA. About a week after his death an officer of the divisional staff saw the announcement of Lieut Wall's death in a newspaper and beneath it the words "We win or die who wear the Rose of Lancaster." He mentioned the quotation next day to General Jeudwine [Divisional Commander], who was so impressed by it that he gave orders forthwith that the motto should henceforward encircle the divisional sign, and his orders were at once carried out.

It was generally believed at the time that the words were a quotation from Shakespeare, but, although most people were quite confident that Shakespeare was the author, no one could determine in which play the words were to be found, and many letters were sent home during the next few months to friends and relatives urging them to search their Shakespeare and solve the problem. But nothing resulted. Shakespeare was searched from cover to cover, but the words were not found. Scott's "Marmion" was then suggested, also other classics but without result. The origin of the motto remained a mystery.

In December 1917, it was at last discovered that Wall Had written some verses in his dug-out and had sent them home. Here are the verses as originally written:-

When princes fought for England's crown,

The House that won the most renown,

And trod the sullen Yorkist down

Was Lancaster.

Her blood-red emblem, stricken sore,

Yet steeped her pallid foe in gore,

Still stands for England evermore -

And Lancashire.

Now England's blood like water flows;

Full many a lusty German knows,

We win, or die, who wear the Rose

Of Lancaster.

It will be noticed that the concluding lines of the verses differ in one particular from the words of the motto. Wall wrote "We win or die"; the motto reads "They win or die." The mistake was not discovered until the spring of the following year, but it was too late to make the alteration; the motto by this time was in common use, it had been printed on the Christmas cards, had been painted on all the notice-boards, and had been stamped even in concrete in many dug-outs in and about the line.

Leonard Wall was an only son. At Clifton he was in the Army class preparing for a commission in the Regular Army. At seventeen he had received his commission in one of the Artillery brigades of his own city. At twenty, with three fierce years of active service to his credit, he was killed. But for his death the words he had written in that damp dug-out near Ypres, and which twelve months later inspired some 12,000 of his comrades in arms to perform one of the outstanding feats of the war, would never have come to notice.

Today the motto encircling the Red Rose is affixed to the grave of every soldier who fell in the ranks of the 55th Division; it is the conspicuous feature of the great cross which stands upon the site where Wall's comrades held the line intact; and it is carved for all time, for all men to see, beneath [Giles] Gilbert Scott's beautiful monument to the 55th Division in the Liverpool Cathedral.*

extract from "The Liverpool Scottish Regimental Gazette, Vol 10 No 3, July 1939, by courtesy of [the late] Major DS Evans TD, then Hon Secretary of the Liverpool Scottish Museum Trust

• I am told that the monument itself was not designed by Scott. D

D

[CarylW]

What is happening with the Liverpool Scottish Museum these days. I understand it is now closed?

Caryl

[daggers]

Caryl

In a word - Yes.

This site will tell the sad tale:

<http://www.liverpoolscottish.org.uk/>

D

[MBrockway]

However I understand Ian, Dennis and Donald are still maintaining a presence with the LS Archive at New Zealand House.

I hope to get up there soon myself in connection with a long-term project I have under way on three WW2 Liverpool Scots who served in No 2 Commando.

Cheers,

Mark