The Secret Battle - A.P.Herbert

[Chris_B]

I'd interested to hear from any Forum member who has read A.P.Herbert's book "The Secret Battle" and can offer a review.

Two illustrious readers have described it as:

Field Marshal Montgomery

'The Secret Battle is the best story of front-line war I have read'

Winston Churchill

'[The Secret Battle] should be read in each generation, so that men and women may rest under no illusion about what war means'

Publisher hype or ?

[Simon_Fielding]

No. I found this an excellent read and very well written. It's the thinly fictionalised story of a young officer being crushed by shell shock. I think it was based on the infamous Dyett (?) case. Herbert was a literary figure so the quality of his prose is well above average. Covers a chilling descriptionof Gallipoli before moving to the Western Front. Herbert served at Gallipoli with the RND I believe. Robert Rhodes James does it the honour of quoting it in his history 'Gallipoli' which I still think remains to be bettered. Not sure if it's still in print - mine's an old OUP paperback c.1982 which I bought on www.abebooks.co.uk.

Enjoy!

Simon

[Chris_B]

Simon,

Thank you for your information. It is available at Amazon as paperback with a new edition printed in 2001.. It happens to have IMHO a very smart front cover. But I'll give my library first refusal!

Chris

[Kate Wills]

Chris,

Buy or borrow it, you won't be disappointed. It is as Simon says, beautifully written, and gives an intimate portrait of how a simple clash of personalities, misfortune and misinformation can lead to an enexpected tragedy. It is also a good read from a purely historical perspective, as Herbert draws on his own army experiences on Gallipoli and the Western Front.

[Simon_Fielding]

I seem to remember reading somewhere about AP Herbert's scathing opinion of 'Oh What A Lovely War' when it first came out on stage in the 1960s. It was something along the lines of "I was always in some confusion about my own reasons for joining up in 1914 - according to this play I seem to have been talked into it by blousy women"....

His sarcastic tone and sexist reference, not mine!

If anyone has the correct phrasing, I'd be glad of an accurate reference!

Cheers

Simon

[Waddell]

This is an old thread, but as this book does not seem to have been mentioned since I thought I might add some thoughts as well.

This is the second book I have read this year that was written by a soldier shortly after the war (1919 in this case) that appears more autobiographical than fiction. You get the sense that A P Herbert was purging his thoughts and experiences when he wrote this book.

The strength of this book is the narrator’s observations of his good friend falling apart under the constant stress of combat. This must have been one of the earliest novels to deal with shell shock, and I gather that this may have been one of the reasons that the book didn’t sell too well on its initial release.

As mentioned in the previous replies there are gritty descriptions of Gallipoli- the heat, the dust, the flies, the dysentery and the musty smell of the dead. These are followed by good descriptions of scouting, life in the trenches and working parties on the Western Front. And then there are the relationships and conflicts between the officers and men that lead to the situation that the hero finds himself in at the end of the book.

This book is a sad story that succeeds in the author’s aim, that being to make “people think about these things”. And I think the things that A P Herbert is talking about are how the war tore apart this young man’s life and how military justice could on occasions be anything but that.

As a contemporary reader it is difficult to accept that a man would accept his fate as willingly as the hero does in this book. I think that this is the point of the book.

Poor old Harry Penrose. An old book worth finding.

Scott

[AlanCurragh]

Currently available free on Kindle -

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Secret-Battle-A-Herbert-ebook/dp/B00FPNUZES/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1384863298&sr=8-1&keywords=secret+battle

[Stoppage Drill]

I've just pulled down my copy from the shelves, and been reminded that Winston wrote an introduction to the 1928 edition (it was originally published by Methuen in 1919).

WSC's intro amounts to a review - it runs over 3+ pages of my copy - may I quote the first page verbatim ?

"This story of a valiant heart tested to destruction took rank when it was first published a few months after the Armistice, as one of the most moving of the novels produced by the war. It was at time a little swept aside by the revulsion of the public mind from anything to do with the awful period just ended. But on re-reading it nine years later it seems to hold its place, and indeed a permanent place, in war literature. It was one of those cries of pain wrung from the fighting troops by the prolonged and measureless torment through which they passed; and like the poems of Siegfried Sassoon should be read in each generation, so that men and women may rest under no illusions about what war means. In 1919 it was first and foremost a chronicle valued for the sober truth of its descriptions and its narration of what might happen to a gallant soldier borne down by stresses incredible to those who have not endured them, and caught in the steel teeth of the military machine.

The tale is founded on fact. Nevertheless, as the writer has been careful to make clear it is not an authentic account . . . ."

It is transparently based on Dyett's case, and in those days prior to the release of the SAD files it was frequently quoted in such books and articles as sought to throw some light onto the still-secret events. William Moore had to refer to it, to an extent in writing "Thin Yellow Line" in 1974. He mentions that Herbert had to disguise some aspects of his novel in order to avoid suits for libel.

[KizmeRD]

It’s been a long time since anyone has posted to this thread, but having just read the book, I can only concur with what has already been said. A truly astonishing piece of writing and a must read for anyone interested in RND, Gallipoli, ‘Shell Shock’, or ‘Shot at Dawn’.

The point made that A.P. Herbert had to disguise some aspects of his ‘novel’ in order to avoid lawsuits is perhaps most evident in his description of an ‘Old Dud’ of an officer imposed on the RND following the wounding of their former Colonel during operations on the Ancre.

Herbert describes the new Colonel’s arrival in the following terms…

And now Colonel Philpott comes into the story. I wish to God he had kept out of it altogether. He was one of a class of officer with which our division was specially afflicted… We had peculiarly few Regular officers, and so perhaps were inclined to be extra critical of these gentlemen. Anyhow, at one time they came in swarms, lazy, stupid, ignorant men, with many years of service — retired, reserve, or what not — but no discoverable distinction either in intellect, or character, or action... Lieutenant-Colonel W. K. Philpott (Substantive Captain after God knows how many years) out-dudded them all, though, to give him his due, he had more staying power than most of them… 

while he said things about the Brigadier which no colonel should say before a junior officer, he positively cringed when they met. And though he bullied defaulters, and blustered about his independence before juniors, there was no superior military goose to whom he would have said the most diffident ‘Boo’. He was lazy beyond words, physically and mentally, but to see him double out of the mess when a general visited the village was an education. It made one want to vomit..

Any analogy to the real Col. Shute purely unintentional - of course it was!

MB