Lord Selsdon
Main Page: Lord Selsdon (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Lord Selsdon (Con)
My Lords, my contribution will be in two parts, if that is acceptable. I speak first as someone who—I was about to say, “was dropped in it”—was the sponsoring Peer for the great event we held, with students and others, in September last year. The theme was, “The Great War: Listening to the Past; Talking to the Future”. I have in my hand a collection of excellent photographs of students waving their hands with enthusiasm to speak, with my noble friend Lord Astor of Hever looking resplendent on the Front Bench, together with my noble friend Lord Gardiner of Kimble and, of course, the redoubtable noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead.
What I thought I should do, with your Lordships approval—or without it, because Hansard will publish this—is assemble some nice document, with a disc, and send it off to all those students who were here, because they are tomorrow’s members of the Armed Forces. At this present time, it would not be a bad idea to give people great encouragement.
I thought that maybe I should look back. I have already researched some of my family details, and thought it was surprisingly easy. I would say to the outside world that every family will have had someone who fought in the Great War. You may find that some died, and if you want to know where they are, the Commonwealth Graves Commission’s website, and its help, is absolutely magnificent. You may also find, if you have a fairly simple name, that you have a lot more relatives than you ever dreamed possible.
This is one of the suggestions. It is not to glorify war, but to encourage people in this particular year to look and see who their family and friends were who fought in the Great War. Your Lordships will know well that Members of this House died in that war—although, as I discovered in my research, not as many as I thought. Most noble Lords were past the age of being recruited by the time they got in the House. You will find in the note produced by the Library lists of members of the House staff who were killed and their various memorials.
I would like to suggest that people give a thought to what their families did. I had a look at my mother’s family. I wanted to know who had died when and where. I found there was an Uncle Maurice, who was killed two weeks after he entered the war. We found his memorial. We did not know he had other relatives. I then found that, in the same family, there was another Maurice who had been killed. I did not know that their father had tried to get in the war but was perhaps not suitable, so he managed to get in as a chef. That is perhaps why we knew that family had no abilities for cooking at all.
I will explain what I did. I asked my mother if she knew about the war. She did not, really, but we found that my great-grandfather had a daughter who wanted to marry an officer in the Indian forces. He did not like that, so he kindly suggested that the officer came back to England and he gave him a nice house and a commission. When the war came my great-grandfather wanted to fight, but he could not because he was too old. He wrote to the Admiralty—I have raised this in your Lordships’ House before—and suggested that his yacht, “Venetia”, might be pressed into service. The Admiralty duly accepted. “Venetia” went to sea, was fitted with depth charges, blew off her stern off Harwich fairly early on and failed to do very much. However, my great-grandfather got an award and a cheque from the Admiralty—we think it was for 100 guineas—which he put in a frame and hung in a downstairs place, so that when people sat on the seat they would for ever read and remember the historic meanness of the Admiralty. These are little things that help one to think and enjoy life.
My grandfather, Crossley Swithinbank, was in the Navy, as most of the family have been, and got Malta dog while in Malta, which is something that rather affects your insides. He was then told he would be invalided out. He wanted to go off to war but found that no one wanted him. He and his brother-in-law, my great-uncle by marriage, Stafford Cripps—who was also invalided out as unsuitable—took a double-decker bus and went to the front as stretcher-bearers. My great-grandfather thought that this was not good enough, so he commissioned his coach-builder to build a special ambulance, which he then sent out. They found that they had started almost a private ambulance operation, which, with all the destruction that took place at that particular time, caused great anxiety.
If we do our research, we will all find out things about families and wars. I have a habit of wanting to rewrite the history of each war, believing that most people do not understand what it was. I wonder why we talk about wars. We have the First World War and the Second World War, but maybe we would relate more to great battles. The other day I asked the Imperial War Museum whether it would give me a list of great British battles. They go: Naseby, Blenheim, Culloden, Plassey, Quebec, Lexington, Salamanca, Waterloo, Aliwal, Balaclava, Rorke’s Drift, Gallipoli, Somme and Megiddo. I had not realised that Megiddo is present-day Israel, Jordan and Syria—maybe there is potential of another conflict there.
If you write on battles, a bit more knowledge is difficult to find. At school we were always taught to remember battles with a phone number. The battles were BROM: Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde and Malplaquet—I think the number was 4689. I have forgotten which century they were—I think it was something-64, 74 or 89. You learnt about battles in history because they were important. Now, in a way, people steer away from war or battles.
I feel very enthusiastic about this debate. I hope that your Lordships will help in this initiative, to circulate to all the students who came on that day something that will encourage them to do more research. I also hope that we will encourage every family in the world to make inquiries. Local authorities are proving very helpful in this. It is not a matter of celebration, nor even of remembrance; it is a matter of family knowledge, which could be helpful in boosting the image and reputation of people’s families and friends.