The Times Great Letters: A century of notable correspondence

Only by treating married women properly, i.e., by leaving them the freedom of choice allowed to all other individuals, can innumerable unexpected evils be avoided.

Yours faithfully,

MARIE C. STOPES

Dr Stopes was at the time seeking to have her marriage annulled. Married Love, the work which made her name, in part by openly advocating that women practise birth control, was published in 1918.

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NOT A MANLY GAME

6 June 1914

Sir, The sooner it is realized that golf is merely a pleasant recreation and inducement to indolent people to take exercise the better. Golf has none of the essentials of a great game. It destroys rather than builds up character, and tends to selfishness and ill-temper. It calls for none of the essential qualities of a great game, such as pluck, endurance, physical fitness and agility, unselfishness and esprit de corps, or quickness of eye and judgment. Games which develop these qualities are of assistance for the more serious pursuits of life.

Golf is of the greatest value to thousands, and brings health and relief from the cares of business to many, but to contend that a game is great which is readily mastered by every youth who goes into a professional’s shop as assistant (generally a scratch player within a year!) and by the majority of caddies is childish. No one is more grateful to golf for many a pleasant day’s exercise than the writer, or more fully recognizes the difficulties and charm of the game, but there is charm and there are difficulties in (for instance) lawn tennis and croquet. It certainly seems to the writer that no game which does not demand a certain amount of pluck and physical courage from its exponents can be called great, or can be really beneficial to boys or men.

The present tendency is undoubtedly towards the more effeminate and less exacting pastimes, but the day that sees the youth of England given up to lawn tennis and golf in preference to the old manly games (cricket, football, polo, &c.) will be of sad omen for the future of the race.

I am, yours, &c.,

B. J. T. BOSANQUET

Bosanquet was himself a cricketer, for Middlesex and England, and noted as the inventor of the googlie – of which more later (see page).

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The German people and the war

7 August 1914

Sir, May I add my testimony to that of Lady Phillips published in your issue of to-day? I started from Germany at 3 o’clock p.m. on Saturday last, with my wife and sister-in-law, and during the whole of our trying and anxious journey we experienced nothing but the utmost kindness and courtesy from both people and officials.

Perhaps I may add one thing more. It is too late to believe in the bona fides of the German Government; but in that of the German people I still believe. During my short visit I had conversations with many Germans of various classes. All believed that Russia had provoked the war in order to establish the Slav hegemony over the Germans, and that France was an accomplice in the spirit of revanche. All hated the idea of war — the look in their faces haunts me yet — but accepted it with a high courage because they believed it to be necessary for the safety of their country.

The German people, believe me, are better than their Government. We have to fight them, but let us do so in the spirit of gentlemen, giving them full credit for the admirable and amiable qualities to which those who know them best bear loudest witness.

W. ALISON PHILLIPS

Phillips was formerly a foreign correspondent with The Times. War between Britain and Germany had been declared three days earlier.

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old soldier

5 September 1914

Sir, I have, before the war was declared, offered my services as an old soldier in many regiments and as one who has been in service in South Africa (victory and disaster), to the authorities, but no acknowledgment has ever been received.

I have got over 100 men to recruit willingly in Fife.

I have had my three servants refused as “unfit” to-day — one for chest measurement, a well set up young man of 22; another very naturally, for varicose veins; a third because at some time he injured his knee and does not work well. The latter is a chauffeur, and long ago offered his services for transport service, and is a good driver. All these men are under 25 years of age. If the medical authority are not allowed to enlist such men for various services how can they render service to their country?

In my own position I consider it scandalous that I cannot fill a position in a cavalry regiment instead of a boy of 17 who has seen no service.

Yours faithfully,

ROSSLYN

The Earl of Rosslyn

P.S. — Of course I want to go to the front after a week’s drill.

Lord Rosslyn, the 5th Earl, was then in his mid-forties.

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Old Socks Wanted

12 December 1914

Sir, Mittens are wanted badly by the troops and they are scarce. A sock only wears out in the foot part, and if this is cut off (thrown away) and a hole made in the other part for the thumb to go through, an excellent mitten can be made without any expense. I am paying unemployed typists to sew them over, but in three months I have exhausted my circle of friends. May I ask your readers to send me all the old (clean) socks they can collect, in order in this way to provide more work and more comforts without cost and without interfering with the living of any other class?

Yours faithfully,

GEORGE PRAGNELL

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Colonel Cornwallis-West

12 January 1915

Sir, Lieutenant-Colonel George Cornwallis-West, who has been in continuous command since September of one of the battalions of the Royal Naval Division which were present at Antwerp, has been much annoyed and feels justly indignant at persistent rumours which have been going round to the effect that he has been “shot in England as a spy.”

Colonel West desires us to say that he is alive and well, and he will be much obliged if you will accord him the favour of publishing this letter.

We write as Colonel West’s solicitors. He was with us this morning.

We are, yours faithfully,

ROOPER AND WHATELY

Rooper and Whately, Solicitors

Cornwallis-West was primarily known to readers of The Times for his marriages. His first wife was the former Lady Randolph Churchill, thus making him stepfather to Winston Churchill — albeit the two men were the same age. He had recently wed the actress

Mrs Patrick Campbell, who first played Eliza Doolittle on stage.

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More Leeches needed

28 January 1915

Sir, Our country has been for many months suffering from a serious shortage of leeches. As long ago as last November there were only a few dozen left in London, and they were second-hand.

Whilst General Joffre, General von Kluck, General von Hindenburg, and the Grand Duke Nicholas persist in fighting over some of the best leech-areas in Europe, possibly unwittingly, this shortage will continue, for even in Wordsworth’s time the native supply was diminishing, and since then we have for many years largely depended on importations from France and Central Europe. In November I made some efforts to alleviate the situation by applying to America and Canada, but without success. I then applied to India, and last week, owing to the kindness of Dr. Annandale, Director of the Indian Museum at Calcutta, and to the officers of the P. and O. Company and to Colonel Alcock, M.D., of the London School of Tropical Medicine, I have succeeded in landing a fine consignment of a leech which is used for blood-letting in India. It is true that the leech is not the Hirudo medicinalis of our pharmacopœias, but a different genus and species, Limnatis granulosa. Judging by its size, always a varying quantity in a leech, we may have to readjust our ideas as to a leech’s cubic capacity, yet I believe, from seeing them a day or two ago, they are willing and even anxious to do their duty. They have stood the voyage from Bombay and the changed climatic conditions very satisfactorily, and are in a state of great activity and apparent hunger at 50, Wigmore-street, London, W.

It is true that leeches are not used to anything like the extent they were 80 years ago — Paris alone, about 1830, made use of some 52 millions a year — but still they are used, though in much smaller numbers.

It may be of some consolation to my fellow-countrymen to know that our deficiency in leeches is more than compensated by the appalling shortage of sausage-skins in Middle Europe. With true German thoroughness they are trying to make artificial ones!

I am yours faithfully,

A. E. SHIPLEY

The zoologist and Master of Christ’s College, Cambridge, Arthur Shipley, an expert on parasitic worms, was knighted in 1920 for his war work, which included letting the Master’s lodgings be used as a convalescent home for the wounded.

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Intelligent Passports

17 February 1915

Sir, A little light might be shed, with advantage, upon the high-handed methods of the Passports Department at the Foreign Office. On the form provided for the purpose I described my face as “intelligent.” Instead of finding this characterization entered, I have received a passport on which some official utterly unknown to me, has taken it upon himself to call my face “oval.”

Yours very truly,

BASSETT DIGBY

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Racing in Wartime

5 March 1915

Sir, I am afraid I cannot follow your reasoning with regard to Epsom and Ascot as set forth in your brief leading article to-day. I put aside the remarks about the affair of the Epsom Grand Stand, as to which there has been both misstatement and misapprehension, which I should have thought the matter-of-fact statement of the Stewards of the Jockey Club would have finally cleared away.

But that is a side, and I may add a false, issue. You say that our Allies “cannot understand how Englishmen can go to race meetings when their country is engaged in a life and death struggle.” With all submission I think our Allies understand us better than this. They know that Englishmen do not think it necessary to put up the shutters whenever they are engaged in war. They know that we are paying two millions a day for this war, and do not think that we shall add the sacrifice of our thoroughbred horses, which are so invaluable for the future of our Army. For, make no mistake, if our races are to cease our thoroughbred horses must disappear. No man can afford to keep bloodstock for the mere pleasure of looking at them in the stable. You hope that there will be no attempt to hold meetings at Epsom, and, “above all,” at Ascot this year. Of what nature, may I ask, is the original sin attaching to these meetings? You record races of a very inferior character almost daily in your columns, sometimes in impressive print. Why do you sanction these and select for special reprobation the two noblest exhibitions of the thoroughbred in the world?

But you say our Allies will misunderstand us. There are many, however, of our French allies who will remember that the winner of the Derby was announced in General Orders during the Crimean War.

Why, indeed, should we embark on the unprecedented course which you indicate, and condemn all our historical practice? Once before our country has been “engaged in a life and death struggle,” at least as strenuous and desperate as this; I mean that against the French Revolution and Napoleon. All through that score of bloody years the Epsom and Ascot Meetings were regularly held, nor indeed does it seem to have occurred to our forefathers that it was guilty to witness races while we were at war. I remember asking the late Lord Stradbroke which was the most interesting race that he had ever witnessed for the Ascot Cup. He replied (I am almost sure, though it is outside my argument) that for 1815, which was run on June 8, eight days before Quatre Bras, 10 days before Waterloo, when Napoleon and Wellington were confronting each other to contend for the championship of the world.

I am and desire to remain remote from controversy, but am anxious to remind you of our history and tradition with regard to this question, and to ask you to pause before you condemn not merely Epsom and “above all” Ascot, but also the principles and practice of ancestors not less chivalrous and humane than ourselves.

ROSEBERY

The 5th Earl of Rosebery — prime minister from 1894–95 — won several classic races as an owner, including the Derby twice.

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No Profits from War

14 September 1915

Sir, It is becoming plain to the average observer of events that there is only one thing which can cause us to lose this war, or can force us to conclude an unsatisfactory peace, and that is the suspicion between different classes in the nation. It is not my purpose to discuss the question whether this suspicion is justified; it is enough that it exists, and that is a statement which you, Sir, are under no temptation to deny.

So far as one can see the suspicion rages mainly round two topics, the rise in the price of necessaries and the amount of war profits; but these two are really one, for the rise in prices would lose half its sting, but for the idea that it is caused by the undue profits of middlemen. The real question before the Government is, therefore, that of the abolition of all war profits; till that is done suspicion will inevitably continue.

And what is the obstacle? It is not undue sympathy on the part of the Government with profit-makers; Mr. Lloyd George’s speech at Bristol has made that plain. It is not the fear of protests in the Press; you have, if I am not mistaken, repeatedly supported such a measure. It is most assuredly not the fear of public opinion, which would be overwhelmingly on the side of such legislation. The professional classes have borne their own burdens as best they could, but they have no more sympathy than the working classes with the abnormal profits made out of the country’s need.

It is time, in fact, to ask the plain question, Who does want to make profit out of the crisis? When that question has been answered it will be time for the nation to decide what shall be allowed, but I am much mistaken if the demand will be either loud or clear. When every class has given of its own flesh and blood with such splendid readiness, it is impossible to believe that any will haggle over money. We are told that the Government have already dealt with profits in munition factories, and it is no doubt their intention to deal with other war profits by way of taxation. The purpose of this letter is to implore them to make their actions and their intentions plain beyond the possibility of mistake. Vague assertions do not quiet vague suspicions.

When once a clear principle is laid down, be it abolition or curtailment, the question resolves itself into one of fact, and suspicion will die for lack of food. There can be no objection to the fullest representation of working-class opinion on the committee which is to carry out the principle into action. The present situation of half-hearted promises and forced concessions is both humiliating and demoralizing, and to the average man it seems frankly intolerable that a Government in which we all have good reasons to believe should be unable to give expression to an elementary principle of political morality and should allow us to drift, as we are drifting, into a great and needless danger.

I am, &c.,

C. A. ALINGTON

Headmaster of Shrewsbury School

Cyril Alington subsequently became Head Master of Eton and later Dean of Durham.

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The Voice of a Schoolboy

Rallies the Ranks

14 December 1915

Sir, May I say one word in reply to the letter of a “Public School Master,” which appears in The Times of to-day (11 December). As an old headmaster, I am not likely to underestimate the value of school discipline. But long experience has convinced me that we keep our boys at school too long. And, as to the commissions to boys, Clive sailed to India at the age of 17; Wolfe, “a lanky stripling of 15”, carried the colours of the 12th Regiment of Foot; Wellington was ensign in the 73rd Regiment at the age of 17; Colin Campbell gained his commission in the 9th Regiment of Foot at the age of 16. We keep our boys in leading strings too long.

I am, Sir, your obedient servant,

JOSEPH WOOD

The writer had been headmaster of Tonbridge and Harrow schools.

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Body Armour or shields

28 July 1916

Sir, it is a year now since you were good enough to allow me to express some views about body armour in your columns. Since then, so far as I know, nothing has been done, but now we have got so far that the Minister of War admits that something of the kind may some day come along. To me it seems the most important question of any, and I earnestly hope that you will use your influence to keep it before the notice of the authorities.

Upon July 1 several of our divisions were stopped by machine-gun fire. Their losses were exceedingly heavy, but hardly any of them from high explosives. The distance to traverse was only about 250 yards. The problem, therefore, is to render a body of men reasonably immune to bullets fired at that range. The German first-line trenches were thinly held, so that once across the open our infantry would have had no difficulty whatsoever.

Now, Sir, I venture to say that if three intelligent metal-workers were put together in consultation they would in a few days produce a shield which would take the greater part of those men safely across. We have definite facts to go upon. A shield of steel of 7/16 of an inch will stop a point-blank bullet. Far more will it stop one which strikes it obliquely. Suppose such a shield fashioned like that of a Roman soldier, 2ft. broad and 3ft. deep. Admittedly it is heavy—well over 30lb. in weight. What then? The man has not far to go, and he has the whole day before him. A mile in a day is good progress as modern battles go. What does it matter, then, if he carries a heavy shield to cover him?

Suppose that the first line of stormers carried such shields. Their only other armament, besides their helmets, should be a bag of bombs. With these they clear up the machine-guns. The second wave of attack with rifles, and possibly without shields, then comes along, occupies and cleans up the trench, while the heavily armed infantry, after a rest advance upon the next one. Men would, of course, be hit about the legs and arms, and high explosives would claim their victims, but I venture to say that we should not again see British divisions held up by machine-guns and shrapnel. Why can it not be tried at once? Nothing elaborate is needed. Only so many sheets of steel cut to size and furnished with a double thong for arm-grip. Shields are evidently better than body armour, since they can be turned in any direction, or form a screen for a sniper or for a wounded man.

The present private contrivances seem inadequate, and I can well understand that those who could afford to buy them would shrink from using a protection which their comrades did not possess. Yet I have seen letters in which men have declared that they owed their lives to these primitive shields. Let the experiment be made of arming a whole battalion with proper ones—and, above all, let it be done at once. Then at last the attack will be on a level with the defence.

Yours faithfully,

ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE

The first tanks had been demonstrated to the Army command in great secrecy five months earlier and made their first appearance on the battlefield in September 1916.

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Russell in chains

5 September 1916

Sir, Mr. Bertrand Russell’s view of pre-war diplomacy is not mine, and it is very far from yours; nevertheless, I hope The Times will allow me to protest against the military edict which forbids him to reside in any part of Scotland, in Manchester or Liverpool, or on the greater part of the English coast. Such an edict is obviously aimed at a man who may justly be suspected of communicating with the enemy, or of assisting his cause. Mr. Russell is not only the most distinguished bearer of one of the greatest names in English political history, but he is a man so upright in thought and deed that such action is, in the view of every one who knows him, repugnant to his character. It is a gross libel, and an advertisement to the world that the administration of the Defence of the Realm Regulations is in the hands of men who do not understand their business. Incidentally, their action deprives Mr. Russell, already debarred from entering the United States, of the power of earning his livelihood by arranged lectures on subjects unconnected with the war. The Times is the most active supporter of that war; but its support is intelligent, and it speaks as the mouthpiece of the country’s intelligence as well as of its force. May I therefore appeal to it to use its great influence to discourage the persecution of an Englishman of whose accomplishments and character the nation may well be proud, even in the hour when his conscientious conclusions are not accepted by it?

Yours, &c.,

H. W. MASSINGHAM

The philosopher, a grandson of the Victorian prime minister Earl Russell, was a pacifist. He had been fined £100 in June 1916 and compelled to resign his Cambridge fellowship because of his anti-war speeches.

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popular Representation

30 March 1917

Sir, there seems to be a very general failure to grasp the importance of what is called—so unhappily—Proportional Representation in the recommendations of the Speaker’s Conference. It is the only rational, honest, and efficient electoral method. It is, however, in danger of being thrust on one side as a mere fad of the intellectuals. It is regarded by many ill-informed people as something difficult, “high-browed,” troublesome, and of no practical value, much as science and mathematics were so regarded by the “practical” rule-of-thumb industrialists of the past. There are all too many mean interests in machine politics threatened by this reform, which are eager to seize upon this ignorant mistrust and use to delay or burke1 the political cleaning-up that Proportional Representation would involve. Will you permit me to state, as compactly and clearly as I can, the real case for this urgently-needed reform—a reform which alone can make Parliamentary government anything better than a caricature of the national thought and a mockery of the national will?

The essential point to grasp is that Proportional Representation is not a novel scheme, but a carefully worked-out remedy for universally recognized ills. An election is not the simple matter it appears to be at the first blush. Methods of voting can be manipulated in various ways, and nearly every method has its own liability to falsification. Take the commonest, simplest case—the case that is the perplexity of every clear-thinking voter under British or American conditions: the case of a constituency in which every elector has one vote, and which returns one representative to Parliament. The naive theory on which we go is that all the possible candidates are put up, that each voter votes for the one he likes best, and that the best man wins. The bitter experience is that hardly ever are there more than two candidates, and still more rarely is either of these the best man possible.

Suppose, for example, the constituency is mainly Conservative. A little group of pot-house politicians, wire-pullers, busy-bodies, local journalists, and small lawyers working for various monetary interests, have “captured” the Conservative organization. For reasons that do not appear they put up an unknown Mr. Goldbug as the official Conservative candidate. He professes generally Conservative view of things, but few people are sure of him and few people trust him. Against him the weaker (and therefore still more venal) Liberal organization puts up a Mr. Kentshire (former Wurstberg) to represent the broader thought and finer generosities of the English mind. A number of Conservative gentlemen, generally too busy about their honest businesses to attend the party “smokers” and the party cave, realize suddenly that they want Goldbug hardly more than they want Wurstberg. They put up their long-admired, trusted, and able friend Mr. Sanity as an Independent Conservative. Every one knows the trouble that follows. Mr. Sanity is “going to split the party vote.” The hesitating voter is told, with considerable truth, that a vote given for Mr. Sanity is a vote given for Wurstberg. At any price we do not want Wurstberg. So at the eleventh hour Mr. Sanity is induced to withdraw, and Mr. Goldbug goes into parliament to misrepresent us. That in its simplest form is the dilemma of democracy. The problem that has confronted modern democracy since its beginning has not been the representation of organized minorities, but the protection of the unorganized masses of busily occupied, fairly intelligent men from the tricks of specialists who work the party machines. We know Mr. Sanity, we want Mr. Sanity, but we are too busy to watch the incessant intrigues to oust him in favour of the obscurely influential people, politically docile, who are favoured by the organization. We want an organizer-proof method of voting. It is in answer to this demand, as the outcome of a most careful examination of the ways in which voting may be protected from the exploitation of those who work elections, that the method of Proportional Representation with a single transferable vote has been evolved. It is organizer-proof. It defies the caucus.