SPECIAL ARTICLE

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume XXIV, 8 May 1928, Page 4

SPECIAL ARTICLE

BRITAIN'S WAR LIBRARY, fl th A GREAT LITERARY RECORD I THE EUROPEAN CONFLICT London does not parade the more •during work of its subjects; those, T labor for posterity do so in small - dies, in little-known laboratories, in the quiet studies of private hot, h So it is with the Library of the tl perial War Museum, which is hot Is in what still has the outward app. <3 ance of a select Queen’s Gate J| M sion. This Library, which is the w British national collection of books p voted to the European War, will to n born ages present a detailed diarv g i what was, when all is said, the gn w est event in the lives of the pres o generation Sir Charles Oman, M.P., first orj e ised the collection in 1917 with a . hundred books. Its increasing vj * was not overlooked in official ein. and soon it was augmented in sen |, interesting ways. The Foreign Of j, bequeathed a mass of. diplona papers and the Peace handbool ’ ■’dangerous” literature stopped in f post was handed over by the Q , Postal Censor of the War; the Ada j alty Marshal dealt similarly with bo and papers seized on the high so. while many thousands o f books and cords were passed to the Library the closing down of the Ministry of formation and other war department Thus a substantial nucleus > formed. This has been greatly intro, ed by later gifts from writers on > subjects, from the Carnegie End nient, by exchange with American ’ Continental libraries, and by purcli of British ana foreign works. To-d with the Library still in its infant d it comprises already some 40. ii ’ volumes and pamphlets. At least l.fi volumes a year are being received, inflow that shows no sign of dimiti dig. No Catalogue of the Works has k prepared owing to the unfinished sU of the collection; as soon as a mcast j of completeness is attained, this will done, hut in the meantime, for terested readers, there is an elabon card-index system which serves tt purpose. The books are classified subject, the main divisions being. I), liography: Military, Naval, and A History; Political and Social Histor Peace and Reconstruction; Neu papers; and Miscellaneous. Under these general headings hoi ever, there is hardly a phase of tl War which is not touched upon. a> ' the liooks are written in nearly eve language. There are books foretcllii the' catastrophe as indicated by tl . Pyramids and the early prophets, at the official history of the fall of Tsin; tan in Japanese. Other books wit such diverse topics as: The drink qua ,

' tion; food; the conscientious objector 1 espionage, ami secret service; Pres • and journalism of combatant coot ' tries; censorship and propaganda; tb part of women in the hostilities; Wi fiction, poetry, music, and art; at raids, prisoners of war; refugees banking; and insurance. One of the most interesting section is that demoted to Rolls of Honor These books, many being exquisite « amples of the printer’s and binder, arts, vary in size from the eight hup volumes containing the 50,000 name of Ireland’s dead to the slim record of a single Dorset family, all of who* members took active part in the War This latter has a foreword by Thoma. Hardy. Several wealthy families h.w thus recorded their sacrifice, and other ‘•personal ’ Rolls of Honor includf those of Scottish elans, public and secondary schools, universities, business houses, and banks. Similar to this is the section reserve for Local War Records and War Me morials. Although the Library |>or sesses 2,000 photographs of monument' erected throughout the Empire and ot various War fronts, it is estimate! that this number represent barely one fourth of the total. Many individual volumes have especial interest. One has grim associations, a book on navies of the world found in the possession of Robert Rosenthal, a Gennan agent who was executed in May, 1915. Others have an added value is being autographed by their donors; these include signed gifts from Princess Mary, Mr. Winston Churchill, and the late President Wilson. The war from the point of view of the “Tommy,” “Frenchie,” and “Fritz” is vividly preserved in a number of diaries and manuscripts given by the soldiers or their families. Trench and ship magazines form another serio-comic contribution. War humor is generously reflected. I* is a thrill for the visitor to reacquaint himself with the war cartoons of Wilton Williams, Bert Thomas, John Hassall. Bruce Bairnsfather, Raemakers, and others, and realise how vital was their part in bolstering our moral. Also, one can now laugh at the clever efforts of the Gennan humorists, who were equally merciless in their pictorial attacks on our Crown and Government. War-Slang Dictionaries, of course.

iiav ., an important .place in view of thar many permanent legacies to the lane ,:,ge of Peace. Britain. France, ■many, and America are all represenwl. Messrs Fraser and Gibbons on British war-slang, compiled fr<M> material supplied by the .Museum, wi| soon be rightly regarded as a classic n which the student of the future wi| be enabled to clear up the mystery oflow “something for nothing grew tngbe “buckshee” in the Army and ■shions” in the Navy. How, too, up” became a synonym for “drunk” ! ■ot the least interesting of the Libr»ry’s possessions are the musical retics of the War, consisting of gramopnßne record matrices, records, and shßet music, which preserve in material form those otherwise deathless sagas “Tipperary,” “Blighty,’ and that Hood-baptised epic which relates in versions that vary with the company story of a certain lady of Armen- ■»’