The Characters of "Moral Fibre" - Reverend Edwin Reddings
One of the most important secondary characters in "Moral Fibre" is Rev Edwin Reddings, the father of the female protagonist. Given the fact that both Kit and Georgina are still very young during the events described, Georgina’sfather is frequently the only “adult in the room.” As an Anglican priest and a veteran of the last war, Reddings provides a mature and (usually) wise point-of-view and his observations give the reader some of the most important insights.
Excerpt 1:
“Daddy?”
“Hm?”
“You get these visions sometimes…”
Edwin spun about sharply. How had she known? He lookedat Amanda with an unspoken question. She just shook her head bemused.
Georgina was continuing, “But they’ve always involvedstrangers, haven’t they? Or, well, people you only know distantly. You’ve neverhad them about someone close, have you?”
“What do you mean?” He handed her a mug of steamingalcohol.
“Well, Gerald, for example. Or Don?”
“Gerald is fine,” her father answered firmly, causingeven Amanda to raise her eyebrows.
“And Don? I mean since he passed away is there any waythat you —”
“Georgina, your father’s tired. You shouldn’t—”
“It’s all right, Amanda,” Edwin told his wife beforelooking intently at his daughter. “I’m not a medium, Georgina. I can’t contactthe dead, and they do not speak to me. It’s true that I sometimes have thesevisions — fortunately not too often. And sometimes I sense things that aren’tentirely tangible. That’s all. I have never had contact with those who havealready gone on before us.”
Georgina nodded solemnly. “I understand, Daddy. It’sjust…”
“What’s bothering you, child?” He encouraged her.
“Well, Kit and I visited Don’s grave on theanniversary of the crash—”
“You’ve seen Kit again?” Edwin was so pleased hecouldn’t help interrupting.
“I — I rang him. He was planning to visit the grave onthe anniversary anyway, and he offered to drive me there.”
“So that’s why you didn’t ask me to take you. I’d keptthe day free and even had the car serviced. When you didn’t ring, I assumedMiss Townsend hadn’t given you the day off.”
“Thank you for thinking of me, Daddy,” she reached outand squeezed his hand once, but then continued with her thoughts. “When I wasthere, I had this powerful feeling that Don wanted me to move on. Do you thinkthat’s possible? I mean, is it possible that it was something real, not just memaking excuses for what I want to do?”
“Georgina, if there’s one thing I believe, it is thatDon wanted you to be happy. You can’t be happy by dwelling on the death of awonderful young man. You can’t be happy by denying yourself a future. Seeinghow you grieved must have hurt Don terribly.”
Georgina caught her breath. She had never thought ofDon seeing her grieve. What a frightening thought! After being soselfless and brave himself, Don must have been disgusted with her lack offortitude and courage. “Do you think…”
“Go on,” her father urged her.
Georgina took a deep breath. “Do you think he’d beupset to know that Kit and I have fallen in love with one another?”
“That’s splendid news, my dear!” Edwin proclaimedbreaking into a broad smile. “I’m very fond of that young man and so is yourmother.” He glanced towards his wife, realising that this was the secret she andGeorgina had already shared before his arrival.
“But what would Don think?” Georgina asked her fatherseriously, evidently still unsure.
“My dear, I can’t imagine anyone Don would approve of more.Together you will never forget him, and that is the most the dead have a rightto ask of the living.”
The Reverend Edwin Reddings was a Yorkshireman from a solid, respectable but not terribly wealthy family. His father was a solicitor, and he enrolled in university expecting to study and eventually practice law. Although not swept up in the initial enthusiasm at the start of WWI, patriotism and a sense of duty were deeply inbred, and so in 1915, he volunteered in the Duke of Wellington's Own West Riding Regiment. He served on the Western Front, was wounded twice, and against the odds survived the war. His plans were to resume his studies as soon as he was demobilized.
Instead, while driving drunk on a country road late at night, he has an encounter with the supernatural. The vivid, life-saving experience causes him to abandon his career plans and study theology instead. At the end of the arduous training, he is ordained and finds a living in a rural Yorkshire parish. Meanwhile he has married a practical and supportive young woman, Amanda, and they have two children together, Gerald and Georgina.
Only after Edwin has settled in his new role, does Edwin experience another supernatural vision. He sees the child of a parishioner drowning in a lake in his mind. By the time he reaches the child's home, his body has already been brought home from the lake where he drowned. Edwin continues to have visions sporadically and unpredictably. He cannot summon these messages, and they appear to be simultaneous with the events he sees, precluding the possibility of preventing the events. As a result, Edwin hates them. They are an extreme emotional burden, whose use he cannot fathom, but he accepts them as a divine gift nevertheless.
Reddings grows into his role as vicar and pastor. His parishioners increasingly turn to him for advice and comfort. Yet while his parish is removed from the conflicts and crises gradually consuming Europe, he is not ignorant of them. Reddings actively follows world events and reads voraciously -- about Ghandi and his arguments and methods for Indian independence, about Bolshevism, collectivization, and the kangaroo trials that devour the leaders of the Russian Revolution, and about Hitler and how German revanchism has awoken a sleeping monster. He is deeply disturbed by the colliding political currents and disgusted with domestic politics and inaction. When the war finally comes he is not surprised and he supports the new Prime Minister's determined opposition to Hitler.
His son Gerald enlists and in due time obtains a commission in the Royal Navy as an engineering officer. Georgina leaves her horsey childhood behind and earnestly pursues training as a teacher. Although she falls in love young, Edwin understands the pressures of wartime and does not try to dissuade her from an engagement. Furthermore, he likes her young man very much and is devastated when he is killed before the year is out. The depth of his daughter's grief distresses him, and he worries she will be scarred for life, even warped by bitterness. His relief is great when she finds the courage to love again, this time to a young man he likes even more than her first fiance.
Meanwhile, the Allies are winning the war, and Edwin knows that victory is not the end of history. There will be serious challenges -- indeed more complex challenges -- to face after the guns stop.
Excerpt 2:
“ReverendReddings? It’s Kit Moran, here. You asked me to ring you?”
“Kit!Thank you for getting back to me. I just wanted to check…that you’re allright.”
“Yes,I’m fine,” Kit sounded slightly amused. “I’m about to have a cream tea at themess after spending a pleasant morning shooting hares with some of the otherchaps. Howard and Sayers asked me to go shooting with them.” Edwin could tellthat Kit was pleased about that. “We bagged two. I hope to see Georgina aftershe gets home from school this evening. Is there some reason you wanted me to ringyou?”
“I— um — I was wondering. Did you fly last night?” Edwin wanted to be sure hehadn’t misunderstood.
“No,they’re still refitting the mid-upper turrets and replacing the armour platingafter our last op.”
“Butthere was a raid, wasn’t there?”
Therewas a pause and then Kit admitted. “Yes, rather a large one. It will probablybe on the BBC soon enough, I suppose.” Edwin could hear Kit’s reluctance totalk about operations.
“Doyou know anything about it?” Edwin prompted. “Anything you can share?” He knewthat although information about an impending raid was shrouded in the strictestsecrecy, once an operation was complete details were usually released to thepress and broadcast on the BBC.
Kithesitated for a second, but then answered. “Apparently at the request of theSoviets, we and the Americans sent over three waves of bombers. Close to eighthundred RAF aircraft took part and I believe the Americans put up another fivehundred. So thirteen hundred bombers altogether. I don’t know anything aboutfighter escorts.”
“But617 squadron didn’t fly on it?”
“No,none of us—”
“I’mso relieved.”
“Why,sir?”
“Somethingterrible happened. I saw it in a dream, and it terrified me like nothing I’veever seen before. It was all so pointless and — how do I explain this? — soimpossibly arrogant. Destruction just for the sake of destruction. Sheerhubris. Do you know where?”
Again,Moran hesitated, clearly uncomfortable, but the BBC would name the target soonenough. “A place I’ve never heard of before,” he admitted. “Dresden.”
“Dresden,”Edwin echoed the name in a whisper, more shattered than ever. Reddings didknow Dresden. He had been there as a student between the wars. It was abeautiful baroque town strung along the banks of the gentle Elbe. A minuet instone, he had thought at the time of his visit.
“Pilotsof 627, which did take part, report there was quite a fire storm,” Moranadmitted.
“Whatwe did was wrong, Kit.” Edwin had no doubt in his mind, and he spoke with theconviction of his profession. “There was no legitimate military target there —not like Hamburg. And it was full of helpless refugees with nowhere to go.”
“I’lltake your word for it,” Kit answered respectfully. “Maybe we can discuss itwhen we next meet.”
“Yes,we must talk about it. I want to hear what you think. For now, I’m just gladyou weren’t part of it. Take care. You are in my prayers daily.”
“Thankyou. Give my regards to Amanda.”
“Gladly.”
Theyhung up, but Edwin remained standing in the hallway, unable to face hissisters. Throughout the last five years of war, he had sustained himself withthe justice of their cause. He had made excuses again and again for actions hefound questionable. He had even conceded the need for ‘saturation bombing’ onthe strength of the simple technical impossibility of precision strikes. Yetnow, on the very cusp of victory, the Allies were starting to behave like theirenemies — smashing things and killing people simply to demonstrate theirability to do so. They were destroying their shared European cultural heritagewhich they should have been striving to rebuild together.
Andas if that weren’t bad enough, sitting only a few feet away was anEnglishwoman, his own flesh and blood, who, despite everything this appallingwar should have taught, was just as bigoted as any Nazi. His own sister wasready to insult, isolate, and discriminate against people purely on the basisof their race. He was acutely aware that in less than a decade the Germans hadgone from the Nuremburg Laws, that inhibited Jewish participation in theeconomy, to full-scale genocide. While the reports of Auschwitz underlined theneed to eradicate Hitler and his ideology of hatred and racism, Edwin knew thatJews had been more integrated into German than English society. The fact thatthe persecution of Jews could happen in Germany was, therefore,particularly shocking — and telling. Far from being a specifically Germanproblem, Auschwitz illustrated the fact that all societies and nations couldcommit acts of gross inhumanity when manipulated by evil leaders. Which, Edwinconcluded, meant that the most dangerous ‘Nazis’ were those at home.
MORAL FIBRE IS THE WINNER OF THE HEMINGWAY AWARD FOR 20TH CENTURY WARTIME FICTION
IT WAS ALSO A FINALIST FOR THE BOOK EXCELLENCE AWARD 2023
Riding the icy, moonlit sky, they took the war to Hitler.
Their chances of survival were less than fifty percent.
Their average age was 21.
This is the story of just one bomber pilot, his crew and the woman he loved.
It is intended as a tribute to them all.
or Barnes and Noble.
"This is the best book on the life of us fighter pilots in the Battle of Britain that I have ever seen.... I couldn't put it down."-- RAF Battle of Britain ace, Wing Commander Bob Doe.
Winner of a Hemingway Award for 20th Century Wartime Fiction, a Maincrest Media Award for Military Fiction and Silver in the Global Book Awards.
Find out more at: https://crossseaspress.com/where-eagles-never-flew
For more information about all my books visit: https://www.helenapschrader.com
Disfiguring injuries, class prejudice and PTSD are the focus of three tales set in WWII by award-winning novelist Helena P. Schrader. Find out more at: https://crossseaspress.com/grounded-eagles
