Every Book Tells a Story

This year marks the 110th anniversary of the first use of chemical warfare, and by coincidence, I recently revisited an article I wrote in 2015, its centenary. I just wish the date was marking something less evil.
 
Preface
 
I’ve always loved old books; one of my fondest childhood memories was trawling the junk shops with my dear old dad, looking for unusual literary treasures. Years later, I inherited several boxes of his books, and found amongst them the complete, seven volume, set of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon, that I was soon to discover, held so much more than pages filled with writings on ancient history. 
 
The book covers were in perfect condition, no fading to evidence being left in the sunshine, or ring marks from a carelessly placed glass. The only hint as to their age were the slightly rough edges of the pages and the odd liver spot that marred the otherwise unblemished leaves.
 
But it was the Edwardian elegance of the inscription on the inside cover, that spoke to me. There was something very distinctive and self-assured in the signature, and the bold diagonal line under the name, and the words ‘English Essay’ gave it a purposeful air.
 
It felt like I had been given a personal invitation to join an exclusive private party, with this briefest of introductions to Rycharde Haythornthwaite. I wanted to get to know him.
 
Was he an academic who’d planned to write a thesis on the Roman Empire? Or simply someone who had an interest in the subject? Would he have read the books by gaslight, or the newfangled electric light? What kind of man was he, or for that matter, given the First World War was well underway by 1915, had he started to read them before being called to the frontline?
 
Many of my old books have pencilled notes in the margins, or a dog-eared corner to mark the reader’s place, but the only indication this time, was a ‘Law Union & Rock Insurance Co Ltd’ bookmark between page 64-65 of Volume IV.
 
(According to the London Metropolitan Archives, the Law Union & Rock Insurance Co Ltd existed between 1857-1919, and could be found on Chancery Lane)
 
I wondered if that was the page he had reached before heading off to war, or if he managed to start his essay? There was something strangely familiar about it all, as if I knew him. That if we bumped into each other on the street one day, it would be like meeting an old friend.
 
Thus my search began.
 
I managed to trace the Haythornthwaite family who helped piece together the life of a young man whose promising future was stolen by the savagery of war, and as I will reveal, by the actions of a priest in the same year Rycharde was born.
 
My story starts with his birth at a time of strict Victorian values, into a family that held deep religious beliefs.
 
Chapter 1
 
January 1894. Rycharde Meade Haythornthwaite, born 4 January 1894 in Agra, Utta Pradesh, India.
 
The late 19th century was a time of social, economic, and industrial revolution; the 75-year-old Queen Victoria had been on the throne for fifty-seven years, and Britain’s oldest and longest serving Prime Minister was 84-year-old William Gladstone.
 
Utta Pradesh, in India’s northern territories, formed a major part of the British Empire, and the Indian Civil Service (ICS), also known as the Imperial Civil Service, was an elite employer during British rule from 1858-1947. Members or ‘civilians’ were appointed under the Government of India Act 1858, and almost all the 1,000 members were British educated in the top schools of the time. Each civilian working for the ICS was in charge of 300,000 indigenous people, and every aspect of the lives of those people was directed by that one civilian.
 
Unsurprisingly, there was growing hostility towards British rule as India started to recognise the importance of nationalism.
 
Two notable reactionaries also born in January 1894, were Satyendra Nath Bose, and Prem Krishna Khanna.
 
Rycharde’s parents who lived and worked in the region, would no doubt have witnessed the growing unrest, including the mutiny in May 1894, when the 17th Bengal Native Infantry stationed at Agra, objected to the inclusion in the regiment of men from a different caste.
 
His parents were heavily involved with the Church, and his mother, Zettie, was also a qualified doctor and missionary. John, his father, was appointed by the Church Missionary Society to act as Principal of the Agra College between 1890-1911. Rycharde was baptised on 30 January 1894 at St Paul’s Church in Agra, when he was just twenty-six days old.
 
Official records show John sailed from Liverpool to Bombay aboard the SS Hispania on 26 September 1894, by which time Rycharde would have been nine months old. It is possible that this journey to the UK was made to leave Rycharde with family relatives, as there is no mention of him remaining in India during his early years.
 
Rycharde’s parents went on to have four more children, Hilda May b. 13 February 1895, Grace b. 10 June 1897, Reginald Arthur b. 22 October 1898, and Constance Lucy b. 11 April 1903. Sadly, Constance died when she was just four years old.
 
It seems likely Rycharde’s parents were career minded people, leaving both marriage and children until later in life. Zettie was thirty-four when she gave birth to her first son, Rycharde, and forty-three when Constance Lucy was born. Records indicate the family did return to Britain several times, perhaps this was to leave their other children with their UK based relatives: Rycharde’s birth is recorded at Godstone in Limpsfield, Surrey. Reginald was born in Cumbria, Constance died in Gloucester, and Grace was registered as a ‘scholar’ in Northwood, Middlesex on 2 April 1911 aged thirteen.
 
Interestingly, Rycharde’s middle name, Meade, is Zettie’s maiden name, suggesting she was of a strong character who wanted her name to be continued. A woman ahead of her time.
 
With the increased hostility both at home and abroad, perhaps Rycharde’s parents saw themselves as important cogs in the disintegrating wheel of the Empire. But even a single cog has a part to play, and I wonder how other events that were taking place in 1894, would impact on Rycharde’s life, or, if they had not occurred, how different a place the world might be now.
 
January 1894: A young boy is playing with his friends near the frozen River Inn that flows through Passau, Germany. As with all four-year-old boys, he is having fun, oblivious to any danger. However, the ice sheet is very thin, and the boy falls through to the icy water below and would surely have drowned had it not been for a local priest, who without any thought for his own life, dived in to save the struggling child.
The priest was Johann Kuehberger, the little boy he saved was Adolf Hitler.
 
Other events that happened in January 1894, when Rycharde was born:
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• The Manchester Ship Canal opens; at 36 miles long, it is the largest river navigation canal in the world.
• Blackpool Tower opened.
• Tower Bridge, London opened for traffic.
• The first motion picture experiment of comedian Fred Ott who was filmed sneezing.
• Joseph Conrad returns to London after years at sea and starts to write his first novel Almayer’s Folly.
• Arthur Conan Doyle’s anthology The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes was published.
• Rudyard Kipling’s story collection The Jungle Book was published.
• Edward VIII (who later abdicated to marry American Wallis Simpson) was born.
• Michael Marks forms a partnership with Thomas Spencer, and they open their first store in Manchester.
• The Great Horse Manure Crisis: 50,000 horses in London were producing nearly 7kg of manure and 2 pints of urine each day, and given a life expectancy of 3 years, their bodies were often left on the roadside to rot so the carcass could be more easily sawn into pieces for removal.

​(Chapter 2 will be available shortly)

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