These for Remembrance: Memoirs of Six Friends Killed in the Great War

by John Buchan, Peter Vansittart (Introduction)

Written immediately after the the Great War and privately printed in 1918, when it is thought just 7 copies were produced. One for the author and one for each of the 6 families of the men commemorated. This version is printed from the author's originals.

124 pages, Hardcover

First published November 11, 1987

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.

John Buchan was a Scottish novelist, historian, and Unionist politician who served as Governor General of Canada, the 15th since Canadian Confederation.
As a youth, Buchan began writing poetry and prose, fiction and non-fiction, publishing his first novel in 1895 and ultimately writing over a hundred books of which the best known is The Thirty-Nine Steps. After attending Glasgow and Oxford universities, he practised as a barrister. In 1901, he served as a private secretary to Lord Milner in southern Africa towards the end of the Boer War. He returned to England in 1903, continued as a barrister and journalist. He left the Bar when he joined Thomas Nelson and Sons publishers in 1907. During the First World War, he was, among other activities, Director of Information in 1917 and later Head of Intelligence at the newly-formed Ministry of Information. He was elected Member of Parliament for the Combined Scottish Universities in 1927.
In 1935, King George V, on the advice of Canadian Prime Minister R. B. Bennett, appointed Buchan to succeed the Earl of Bessborough as Governor General of Canada and two months later raised him to the peerage as 1st Baron Tweedsmuir. He occupied the post until his death in 1940. Buchan promoted Canadian unity and helped strengthen the sovereignty of Canada constitutionally and culturally. He received a state funeral in Canada before his ashes were returned to the United Kingdom.

Reviews

[Gerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Buchan produced this book in 1919 as a privately printed production for, presumably, the families of the six people within its covers plus one for his own family. He wrote an introduction aimed at his family to let them know why he had written it and why he wanted them to know the people within its covers, one of whom was one of his son's godfather. This edition has been published in 1987 with the original typeface and original tailpiece explaining its intention with a modern tailpiece that matches it. The only addition is a fascinating introduction by Peter Vansittart that tells much of Buchan's personality and background plus his relationship to the six people in the book.

The six who Buchan writes about were his contemporaries at University and in early business life and they all had that joie de vivre of pre-First World War Britain and they all had 'kindliness in voice and manner' and 'generosity of soul that shone like a light' in all their doings. And Buchan writes descriptively and lovingly about each of them. They were:

Tommy Nelson, born in 1876, Lothians and Border Horse, then attached to The tank Corps and killed in action at Arras on 9 April 1917;

Bron Lucas, born in 1876, Royal Flying Corps and killed in action over enemy lines, Western Front, 10 November 1916;

Cecil Rawling, born in 1870, Somerset Light Infantry, latterly commanding 62nd Infantry Brigade and killed in action at his Headquarters, Hooge, near Ypres, on 23 October 1917;

Basil Blackwood, born in 1870, attached to 9th Lancers 1914, latterly commissioned into the Grenadier Guards and killed in action near Ypres on 3 July 1917;

Jack Wortley, born in 1880, commissioned into the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), latterly commanding the 21st Battalion, Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment), then the 2/5th Battalion, the South Staffordshire Regiment (Territorial Force), finally the 2/6th Battalion of the same regiment and killed in action at Bullecourt, 21 March 1918;

Raymond Asquith, born n 1978, joined the Queen's Westminster Rifles 1914, then commissioned into the Grenadier Guards and killed in action near Ginchy, on the Somme, 15 September 1916.

Amazingly Buchan, through his own wanderings, met up with them all at various times after they left their studies and he was devastated by their loss.

To add to the charm, if we can use such a word in relation to the sad happenings, of the book Peter Vansittart provides an extremely well written analysis of Buchan's character and his Scottish background with appropriate quotations from his many and varied works.