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'Wully' Field Marshal Sir William Robertson Bart : GCB, KCVO, (Part I)
World War I Articles
'1917' - using the Pension Records to track down the characters in the film (if they'd been real!)
The Infamous Dutch Lady And Other Famous Espionage Agents of the Great War
Identifying the Dead: a Short Study of the Identification Tags of 1914-1918
Handbook of the 18 Pounder Field Gun
Truth in the Telling: A Review of 1917
The father and son killed on the same day
1917: Right Story, Wrong Location
The Action at Rafa
Some instances of the award of the Albert Medal in the First World War
Hooge Tunnel, Essex Farm (and other) drawings
Sentenced to Death. The Public Record Office Court Martial Files.
The Sinking of the Anglia
The Zion Muleteers of Gallipoli
British Divisional Commanders During the Great War - First Thoughts
'The Black Man', 'The Brat' and Londoners on the Somme
(Lecture delivered by John Terraine at the Western Front Association's Annual Seminar at Abergavenny in June 1991 and published in Leadership & War, a WFA publication for members, in 1998)
The title of this essay is 'Wully' - the Army nickname for a man. There should really be a sub-title too, and it ought to be 'The Making of a Chief'. This is the background story of one of the most important British officers of the Great War - indeed, in our whole history. I shall try to show you what kind of a man it was who went to France with the BEF in August 1914, on his way to duties and burdens beyond previous experience and honours beyond his dreams.
Nowadays the once-great names of that war are mostly quite unknown - bar one. The exception, of course, is Field-Marshal Lord Haig, who continues to attract some of the most sickening and mendacious essays in biography ever to reach public print. We would be better off without such travesties, and such ridiculous concentration on one man, who is made the scapegoat for all the War's evils. By contrast, there is one name that we hear and remember much too rarely, that of 'Wully' Robertson.
Field-Marshal Sir William Robertson Bart., GCB, KCVO, DSO deserves rescue from oblivion for two compelling reasons: who he was, and what he was.
Who was he? He was the only man in the Army's history to enlist as a private soldier and end as a Field-Marshal - the whole long haul from bottom to top. He was unique.
What was he? For two hard years in the hardest part of the war he was the Army's top soldier, Chief of the Imperial General Staff. He was to the field commanders, to Haig in France and Murray and Allenby in Palestine, Maude and Marshall in Mesopotamia, Smuts and van Deventer in East Africa and Monro in India, what Field Marshal Lord Alanbrooke in the next war was to Wavell and Auchinleck and Maitland Wilson in the Middle East, to Montgomery in north-western Europe and to Leese and Slim in Burma. Robertson and Alanbrooke were the masters of the field generals. Men with such responsibilities as those should not be forgotten. What sort of a man was William Robertson?
He was born on 29 January 1860 and christened William Robert. His birthplace was Welbourn, a quiet little village not far from Lincoln - and only those who knew Lincolnshire before it became part of the great Anglo-American aircraft-carrier in the 1940s can appreciate just how quiet that could be.
There was nothing whatever of the military in his family connections. His father - Thomas Charles Robertson - was the Welbourn postmaster and also the village tailor. William's mother, Ann Robertson, had a strong firm character, she was a deeply religious person who profoundly influenced her son (and I would imagine his four sisters and two brothers also). William was devoted to her, though he did not always do as she would have wished.
All of the Robertson children went to the village school. Wully liked school; he was an avid reader; he particularly liked maps and geography; he had a certain aptitude for drawing and he wrote well. He left school when he was thirteen years old - that was normal for a village boy; by that time he was a monitor, which meant keeping a sharp eye on the younger children and even teaching some of them for the princely salary of sixpence a week.
The biographers of people of humble origin - I only know of one biography of William Robertson, Victor Bonham-Carter's Soldier True published by Frederick Muller in 1963, which I heartily recommend - these biographers usually face a very serious difficulty: the sheer absence of information about lives which it never occurred to their families or friends to record, even if they had known how to set about doing such a thing. So we don't know much about the next part of William Robertson's life. We do know that his first job was as garden boy to the clergyman who ran the school; this enabled him to push his education a little further, a chance he was not likely to miss. He then went to work for another cleric, but in what capacity we do not know. But two years after leaving school we find him quite definitely serving as a footman at Deene Park in Northamptonshire, the home of the Brudenell family, whose most famous member was the 7th Earl of Cardigan, the one who had led the celebrated charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava in 1854 and who died in 1868. But all we know about Robertson's life at Deene is his own remark in later years: 'I was a damn bad footman'. On 13 November 1877 he joined the Army, and after four unsettled years his story became one of steady, continuous progress along a single road.
The Victorian Army, the army of the red-coats (with some very fancy variations, especially in the cavalry), an army of rigid class division, rigid discipline, rigid drill, rigid administration, seems a world away from us now. Change worked slowly, and is at times hard to perceive, but in fact the Army that Robertson joined was an army in transition. British history seems to tell us that the normal pattern for the Army is to stagnate and decline between wars until some disaster wakes everyone up and restores life to the organism. The Crimean War, coming just about the middle of the nineteenth century, was such a disaster.
Indeed, it was so much of a disaster that reform began even while it was still being fought - far-reaching, administrative reforms in 1854 and 1855 which at last gave Britain a properly responsible War Department. This laid a sound foundation, but it hardly touched the character of the Army itself - its ability to carry out the tasks required of it. In fact, there was considerable confusion as to what those tasks were. It was Mr. Edward Cardwell, who became Secretary of State for War in Gladstone's first administration in 1868, who first tackled these questions. He was a brave man. Can you imagine the ferocious resistance which must have arisen to abolishing the old numbered regiments and replacing them by territorial designations? To this day there are officers who still refer to the numbers, and they live on even in the present amalgamated formations. Not content with this hornet's nest, Cardwell also abolished the notorious purchase system, by which commissions could be obtained by men of no military experience or quality - some of them mere boys - for regulated sums of money. Every intelligent soldier knew that this must be a fatal barrier to professionalism, but Cardwell had to fight every inch of the way - including a royal warrant - to drag the Army out of the eighteenth century to achieve this essential progress in 1871.
When Will Robertson took the Queen's shilling six years later the Army was still in the process of digesting - with some difficulty - Mr. Cardwell's reforms; in any case.a seventeen-year-old recruit was not much concerned with officers and their affairs. Yet the greeting he received does not at all match the general picture of harsh reaction that is often presented as the Victorian Army. He enlisted in Worcester , but to join his regiment he had to go to Aldershot, and this involved a delay of four days; the War Office paid him two shillings and a halfpenny a day for boai;d and lodgings - an odd sum, but as he says in his autobiography, it was 'no doubt arrived at by Her Majesty's Treasury after careful calculation', and he goes on:-
The recruiting sergeant, a kindly disposed individual, took possession of the whole sum, giving me in return excellent, if homely, accommodation and food at his own house.
Robertson's book has a title which no-one else can match : From Private to Field Marshal. It came out in 1921, and it tells us a good deal about the man he later became, though not as much as we should like about the boy he had once been. Yet even that one sentence, precise in detail, displays the dry stone-faced humour which was characteristic of the 'other ranks' of his day, and which he never lost. The regiment he had selected to join - sadly, we know not why - was the 16th (the Queen's) Lancers; he presented himself accordingly at the West Cavalry Barracks, Aldershot, on a 'wet and dreary November evening'. Forty years later he recalled that
the first people I met were the 'orderly officer' and the regimental sergeant-major, both of whom showed a sympathetic interest in me.
It was a good start, and it continued; he was at once posted to 'G' Troop, commanded by a Captain Henry Graham who was, he says,
one of the most kind-hearted men under whom it has been my lot to serve. His subaltern, Lieutenant 'Freddy' Blair, was somewhat of a terror to all shirkers and wrong-doers in the troop, but I have no recollection of having been on his blacklist; and I am sure that neither of us then thought that forty-one years later .... he would be my military secretary . But so it turned out.
Robertson was no doubt lucky - but how lucky? Was the 16th Lancers an exceptional regiment? If so, what made it exceptional? He speaks just as warmly of his next regiment, the 3rd Dragoon Guards. Others speak of their own regiments in the same way - but 'others', of course, were different: they were officers themselves; Robertson was a ranker, and his impression of the officers h encountered - the men who could make or break a regiment - therefore has a special value. Discipline being as stern as it was -
Cardwell had succeeded in abolishing flogging in peace time, but not until 1881 was it done away with altogether - even as dutiful a soldier as Robertson was hauled up for what the Army called 'crimes'. Captain Graham was an officer with enough good sense to distinguish between a bad hat with a criminal disposition and mere youthful inexperience, and so, just over a year after he joined the 16th Lancers, says Robertson, the captain
took advantage of the temporary absence of the colonel to recommend me to the acting commanding officer for promotion to lance-corporal, thus obtaining for me the first step towards the rank of Field-Marshal.
Within a few months, just over nineteen years old, he put up a second stripe. He was on his way.
It is quite clear from what he writes that his problems in those early days did not stem from his officers (the colonel was not over-keen on him, but he did not make an issue of it, and in any case he left in due course). The soldiers among whom young Will Robertson served were a different matter. The old soldiers, enlisted for twenty-one years, still predominated in the regiments, and they were, generally speaking, a rough lot of men, addicted to heavy drinking and hard swearing. Robertson tells us:
They could not well be blamed for this. Year in and year out they went through the same routine, were treated like machines - of an inferior kind - and having little prospect of finding decent employment on the expiration of their engagement, lived only for the present ... These rugged veterans exacted full deference from the recruit, who was assigned the worst bed in the room, given the smallest amount of food and the least palatable, had to 'lend them articles of kit which they lost or sold, 'fag' for them in a variety of ways and, finally, was expected to share with them at the regimental canteen such cash as he might have in the purchase of beer sold at threepence a quart.
Faced with an existence which could easily become fairly brutal and a discipline which was always close to the borderline of cruelty - both somewhat eased by the two bright stripes on his arm - there was something far worse for young Will Robertson to bear in those early days. His first letter from the mother he loved and so greatly respected ran as follows:
My very Dear Boy, .. you never could Mean what you put in your Letter on Sunday ... and what cause have you for such Low Life ... you have as Good Home as anyone else in our Station ... you have kind and Loving Sisters ... you know you are the Great Hope of the Family ... if you do not like Service you can do something else ... there are plenty of things Steady Young Men can do when they can write and read as you can ... [the Army] is a refuge for all Idle people ... I shall name it to no one for I am ashamed to think of it ... I would rather Bury you than see you in a red coat ..
It is a powerful letter, full of true grief and at the same time boiling over with the fixed beliefs of a large majority of working-class people. It must have hurt him a lot, to read it. Some soldiers, when their families responded like that to their enlistment, just cut themselves off and never had anything further to do with their mothers and fathers.
Robertson did not react in that manner; he never lost his devotion to his mother She, for her part, became at first reconciled and then actually proud of her determined so as, with the aid of sympathetic and helpful officers, he continued his long, slow clim Corporal in April 1879, Lance-Sergeant in May 1881 (thus, as he says, 'becoming member of the sergeants' mess and terminating my barrack-room life with the men' - was a milestone), then full Sergeant in January 1882 ('by far the youngest of that rank the regiment', he says, 'both in age and service'), and in March 1885, only 25 years old ai with seven years' service behind him, he became Troop Sergeant-Major. That left on one more non-commissioned rank to be gained: Regimental Sergeant-Major - and obtain that he would have to wait for a dead man's shoes. Alternatively, he could become a Riding-master or a Quartermaster, both of which carried commissions, but both we dead-end jobs. He had reached a moment of decision.
He continued as Troop Sergeant-Major for three years, well esteemed by his officers, by the other members of the sergeants' mess and, as far as we can tell, by the troopers too. But what of the future? One thing comes over quite clearly from his story and must have been equally clear to him at the time: he was cut out for a soldier. There no suggestion anywhere that he thought of leaving the Army. But his own ability ha brought him very early to a full-stop; the only way forward from it was the hardest of all.
Normally, in the 1880s, there were fewer than half a dozen promotions from the ranks to commissioned status each year. The chief obstacle, of course, was money. The lowest commissioned rank - 2nd Lieutenant - pulled a salary of just under £100 a year, that is, below £2 a week. For many of the working classes, that would be considered not a bad sum. Even 40-50 years later, when I was a boy, £5 a week was considered very good pay: £10 a week was a far-off ambition, and £1,000 a year was wealth that one scarcely dare to dream about. Of course, on paper the 2nd Lieutenant's pay compared well with the private soldier's average of £18.0.5d a year (with £7.3.3d deducted that meant under £1 month - Field-Marshal Lord Carver says that 'The only wage-earner worse off in real terms was the Irish farm-labourer' - but in fact the officer's unavoidable expenses made him bankrupt before he started. This distressing fact was disguised by private income William Robertson told his father that this would have to be a minimum of £300 a year: which many would describe as a very conservative figure, but was, in any case, quite out of reach. Cavalry regiments were the most expensive of all (including the Guard because their officers were expected to provide at least one charger - i.e. a horse of high quality which would have to be kept in that condition - for themselves, and would also generally require at least two hunters and probably three polo ponies. There was also what Robertson calls 'an absurd amount of costly uniform to be purchased'. Officers had make substantial contributions to the regimental band, and there was a constant round entertainment by the Officers' Mess. Even in a line infantry regiment, Mess bills alo would be at the very least £10 a month, which already added up to a good deal more than a full year's pay. But Robertson did not waste any time thinking about infantry because, he says, 'I could not entertain the idea of leaving my old arm, the cavalry.' So, taking this into account, he 'decided that I must give up all idea of realising my ambition, an did.'
This also must have been a bitter moment, like reading that first letter from his mother. But once more there was a happy sequel; and once more it was much assisted by his officers, now including a new CO, Colonel Maillard, who all gave him encouragement. Robertson obtained the necessary First Class Certificate of Education without much difficulty, and Maillard promised to get him posted to a regiment serving in India, where the pay would be higher and the expenses less than at home. 'Thus,' says Robertson, 'the die was cast.' On 27 June 1888, 28 years old, he was gazetted Second Lieutenant in the 3rd (Prince of Wales's) Dragoon Guards. Colonel Maillard presented him with a sword, one of his troop officers fitted him out with saddlery, the Sergeants' Mess gave him a silver-mounted dressing-case, and many who could afford nothing more gave their best wishes. He wrote of this momentous break with his past:
The 16th Lancers had become a home to me, and I am proud to think that I once had the honour of serving in so distinguished a regiment.
I wonder what Welboum made of it all.
There now remained one, more hurdle to clear: the class system and the purgatories that it could inflict in those days, especially in a tradition-bound institution like the Army. As he told his mother, the new world that he now entered could have a chilly look. His first posting was to Hythe, while he waited for a passage to Bombay, and there he filled in time with a refresher course at the School of Musketry. He described his arrival - one day early - in a letter to his mother:
Well I could not pluck up sufficient courage to go to the Officers' Mess that night, so I took up my abode in the town until the next night when I had to go. Well I got on middling but wished myself home a good many times, indeed I never remember leaving home more depressed than this time. You see it's all amongst strangers - strangers in more ways than one. The next day I got on better and am now very fairly settled and comfortable. The officers who now know me are very nice, but it's a difficult business because you see I feel I am acting under a false flag if they do not know my previous life. However I always out with it if occasion demands, so it will soon be known throughout the school and then I shall be all right because of knowing to whom they are talking ... Of course I should like a bit more companionship during my walks but that will come in time, anyway, it does not much matter as I do not care much about it at any time, only one is liable to despondency with too much of one's own company.
It is a very revealing letter - a good deal more revealing than his autobiography in matters of personal feeling. That generation, particularly, in the Services, was usually fairly tight-lipped about its feelings. But this letter reveals a well-established 'loner', a young man used to going his own way in his own company except when involved in the community of the regiment. The quality must have been in him from schooldays and is an explanation of the restless four years between school and Army, when the lad was finding his way. It also explains why, in his otherwise informative and reflective first chapter on life in the ranks, there is no mention of any special friend or 'chum', which is unusual. Soldiers normally went in pairs; they were encouraged to - it was a safety precaution in foreign parts, and gave reassurance in battle. But not for Will Robertson. And the commission emphasised, rather than diminished this characteristic; elsewhere in the letter I have just quoted he says:
I have just been asked by a very nice officer to go over to Folkestone with him this afternoon, on the impulse I assented. Well that was wrong. If I go there, money will be spent and a Sunday spent wrong, so I have made escape and do not intend going.
Even in India, the Promised Land of 'ranker' officers, where as long as they behaved themselves they could just about live on their pay, and where Robertson arrived at the end of that year (1888), these restrictions and solitude accompanied him. When he joined his new regiment, the 3rd Dragoon Guards, he received , he says,
a most friendly welcome from all members of the officers' mess, which at once dispelled the- anxiety I had felt as to the nature of the reception that would be accorded me ...
However, a letter survives which he wrote to his father, conveying a rather different impression of his new surroundings:
Let me hear soon how you all are, it is so miserable out here - you don't know - to be wondering how you all are. I'd much rather be sure of hearing the bad news as well as the good as not to know whether you are all right or not ... I'm afraid I do not remember how often I must feel cut off from all friendship. So far as I know, not once has any one in my present sphere taken offence at being in my company, but there is much difference between this and sincere mutual interest; this cannot naturally be between a born gentleman and one who is only now beginning to try to become one. In the midst of the highest society one's thoughts fly back to far off Welbourn and its well remembered little bits of domestic life of my early days. There I see real love, whilst here amid all the gaiety and apparent friendship I feel that were I not an officer tomorrow, there would be perhaps none to recognise me.
Perhaps that was just a bad day. But there are some things that are difficult to put right out of mind and which make themselves felt in a very acute manner, he tells us:
Water was the only drink I could afford, while for smoking I had to be content with a fixed amount of tobacco and cheroots at two shillings a hundred. It was not altogether agreeable to be seen drinking water at mess when others were drinking champagne, or to defer smoking till leaving the mess because pipes were not allowed, but it had to be done.
There were rewards for this enforced virtue, as he discovered, though he claimed no credit for it. One was physical fitness in a climate that could easily do great damage to Europeans - soldiers not least. He won prizes in competition with the whole Army - British and Indian - for tent-pegging, swordsmanship and fencing, and in 1894 the chief prize of all, for 'best officer-at-arms'. -And at the same time he worked hard to increase his pay by obtaining language certificates, no fewer than six of them: Hindi, Urdu, Persian, Punjabi and Pushtu. Pushtu presented a problem, because the munshi who tested him in conversation insisted on discussing the nature of the Holy Trinity. Even a sound religious upbringing left him somewhat at a loss in a case like this, and he had to take that exam again, fortunately with a new munshi. So that made five languages, and he added a sixth - Gurkhali - while travelling with a Gurkha orderly on the frontier. It was not long before he stood in for the adjutant when that important man fell ill, and this appointment carried with it the duties of station staff officer and cantonment magistrate so has he says, he 'learned something of the native customs of the country'. His reputation for hard work and good sense must have been spreading, because not long afterwards he became supervisor of the 11,000-acre government grass farm which was, I should say, a good deal more important for a horse-drawn army than practising cavalry charges. And in addition to all this he was put in charge of the regimental signallers (following a specialisation in the 16th Lancers) and from a very poor annual report when he took them over he carried them to first place in the whole Army in India the next year.
It is pleasant to record that bit by bit the sense of being an odd man out, an outsider, dropped away. All the officers of the 3rd Dragoon Guards, he says,
were particularly pleasant and helpful, and on the whole I felt, and still feel [this is in 1921] that I was fortunate in being posted to the regiment.
In 1925 he would become Colonel of the Regiment - which it is fair to say was an honour for both.
Service in India brought a deep sorrow and a great compensation. In 1893 he took six months' leave in England, intending to see his mother who, he knew, was now very ill, and to whom he remained always devoted; she died before he could get home, and he writes: 'To that extent the trip to England was a bitter failure.' Two years later, however, he married; this relationship was very close and affectionate and continued so to the end of his life. His wife was Mildred Palin, the daughter of a Lieutenant-General whose family was not best pleased with the choice she had made - but as his career advanced they became reconciled to it. William and Mildred passed through a bad time, capped by the loss of their first child, and in the early stages always short of money, but they came out of it together triumphantly.
Meanwhile Robertson was making his way up his new ladder: he became a full Lieutenant in 1891, and in that year he also had his first experience of active service on the North-West Frontier. In 1892 he was selected, among a very small number from the whole army, to join the Intelligence Branch at Army Headquarters in Simla - the reward for his five languages. This was his first introduction to staff work, which remained his occupation until 1918, so it can be truly said that he had now found the work that suited him. And at this stage, too, we begin to hear of friendships which ripened in later life - one being his new chief, Colonel Elles, and also his wife, 'a lady of gentle and kind disposition', both of whom gave him what he calls 'many proofs of sincere friendship'. Their son, Major-General H. J. Elles, was the first commander of the Tank Corps, and led it into action at Cambrai in 1917.
Robertson was posted to the North-West Frontier section, dealing with an area which extended from Tibet at one end to the Arabian Sea at the other - a distance of about 2,000 miles. During his first year in Intelligence most of his time was taken up with the compilation of a Gazetteer and Military Report on Afghanistan, in five volumes containing some 3,000 pages. His comment is characteristic:
It was a stupendous task, and I was glad when it was finished, but the knowledge I gained of the country was some compensation for the drudgery involved.
He then went on the sad leave to England that I have already mentioned, and returned to find the frontier in a very unsettled state, and considerable alarm at the possibility of a Russian attack on India through Afghanistan. He comments pretty sharply on this:
It is incomprehensible why those who held this view never seemed to appreciate the tremendous topographical difficulties to be overcome.
It is indeed. One route by which Russian invasion was feared in the 1890s led through the Pamirs, that range of great lofty peaks known as 'The Roof of the World'. (The word 'Pamir', he informs us,
signifies a more or less level valley of considerable width, and as the lowest of them is 12,000 feet above sea-level, the climate is severe; in a few favoured spots only is there much grass; trees there are none, and even bushes are scarce; strong, biting winds are common, and on the whole the Pamirs cannot be recommended as a cheerful or comfortable country in which to live.
In 1894 his task was to make a personal reconnaissance of this spectacular region and report on its military possibilities.
His now dead mother's farewell letter to him when he was sent out to India had been brief, expressive and entirely in the Victorian manner:
My Dear William Good bye and May God Bless you and Keep you is the constant Prayer of your Loving Mother Ann Robertson. Deuteronomy Ch 4 Verse 9.
Deuteronomy 4 Verse 9 yields up the following:
Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life ...
This text served him well on his journey to the 'Roof of the World' with only his Gurkha orderly and a dozen or so assorted Indian servants and followers for company. His account of it, nearly thirty years later, runs to only nine pages in his book, but every one of them is fully deserving of the old-fashioned adjective for many a tale of discovery and adventure - 'gripping'. As he pressed further and further on, he says,
As far as the eye could reach, gigantic peaks, clothed in perpetual snow, soared proudly up into the blue heavens at heights of 25,000 feet and more above sea-level, and this incomparable array of mountain majesty was rendered the more impressive by the apparent total absence of life of any kind, and by the great stillness which everywhere prevailed ... I remained absorbed and appalled by the magnitude of Nature's world , feeling but a very small atom in the Universe ...
These were 'things which his eyes had seen' which did not readily depart from him. And one day this experience of the silence and solitude of the high mountains would stand Robertson in good stead.
These were lively times in India: before 1894 was out there was a 'regrettable occurrence' when a British camp was surprised at dawn by enterprising tribesmen; the next year saw a rising in Chitral and the isolation of a British garrison calling for a major Relief Expedition - you will find the history of all this in Churchill's book The Story of the Malakand Field Force (1898) , based on his despatches as a war correspondent. Robertson was involved in the planning, much helped by the local knowledge he had so recently obtained, and was then appointed to the Intelligence Staff of the Force. This was very much more 'active' service than his previous experience of it, and included a ferocious attack on him by a religious fanatic which left him severely wounded. When the Chitral affair was over - the fort was relieved after a prodigious march over snow-blocked passes - Robertson received a 'mention in dispatches' and a Distinguished Service Order which was, he says, 'then a rather rare decoration'. He also reached the rank of Captain, which brought the princely pay of about £200 a year; he was, he says, 'unusually lucky in reaching that rank in less than seven years after being commissioned .' From the starting point of private soldier, he was even luckier to have come this distance in eighteen years, but is it really to be called 'luck' when the chief ingredients· are hard work and unflagging perseverance?
But there was a snag: once more the serious question arose, where did he go from there? He came to the conclusion that unless he could graduate at the Staff College at Camberley, and put the magic letters 'psc' after his name, his future prospects would be very dubious. And a further realisation had come to him: that just as he was cut out to be a soldier, he was also cut out to be a staff officer. So here was another hurdle, once more to be surmounted by hard work and perseverance. Some thirty officers were admitted annually to the Staff College, three quarters of them by competitive examination, the rest by selection. It was not, he says, a difficult examination.
but it embraced many subjects - mathematics, military engineering, military topography, tactics, military history, strategy, military geography, military administration, military law, and a knowledge of two foreign languages, of which one must be either French or German.
He chose Hindustani as one of his languages, and French as the other, and settled down to the hard grind of examination preparation, helped by his wife, who 'showed exemplary patience in hearing me recite the propositions of Euclid'. He was almost entirely self taught, which made progress slow and doubtful, because, as he says, having no one to guide me I approached my tasks by the most roundabout way, and when completed there was often no certainty that the results were correct.
The exam lasted ten days, and in the event Robertson qualified in all subjects, but he just missed one of the competitive vacancies; since he would have been over age by the next time it came round, this might have been fatal, but he was saved by the Commander-in Chief, India, who recommended him for a vacancy by selection, this being then approved by the Commander-in-Chief at the War Officer, Lord Wolseley. He believed he was the 'first officer promoted from the ranks' to enter the Staff College as a student, and it appears likely that this was true. ·
Robertson spent two years (January 1897 to December 1898) at the Staff College; among the other students during that time were Haig, Allenby, Murray (that is Sir Archibald Murray, in whose footsteps Robertson followed for the next eighteen years), Milne (who became C-in-C at Salonika in 1916 and was later CIGS for two successive terms), Capper (a very fine divisional commander, killed at Loos), Ha.king (a reliable corps commander), Barrow (who commanded a cavalry division in Palestine under Allenby) and Forestier-Walker (Smith-Dorrien's chief of staff in 1914). Robertson comments:
this personal acquaintance was very useful to me, as no doubt it was to them, when I was Chief of the General Staff in France in 1915, and still more so when I became Chief of the Imperial General Staff.
The most notable of the instructors at the Staff College in Robertson's time as a student was Lieutenant-Colonel G. F. R. Henderson, whose biography of the famous Confederate leader, General 'Stonewall' Jackson (1898), is the standard work and a military classic to this day. His teaching and his personality - what Robertson calls 'his loveable and unselfish companionship' - left a lasting mark on all his pupils. Yet at that time, and for long after, even wise and penetrating teachers like Henderson looked chiefly for the supposed attributes of 'Great Captains' delivering 'thunderstrokes of war' - which the Industrial Revolution with its mass armies supported by mass production was increasingly turning into romantic delusions. A great - and sad - awakening was at hand.
Looking back on his Staff College days, Robertson says that on leaving,
Rightly or wrongly, we felt ourselves capable of competing with whatever task the future might have in store for us; and the same self confidence would not have been lacking had we known that in less than sixteen years some of us would be among the chief actors in the greatest drama the world has ever seen - the Great War.
It is another way of saying what one of Haig's biographers said about him:
From the Staff College he carried away with him a belief in the 'educated soldier' which never afterwards faltered.
Such a belief, says Robertson,
was merely an illustration of the saying that 'knowledge is power' , and showed that the training received by the Staff College officer gives him a measure of self-reliance which he probably did not possess before, and which, if appropriately used, should be of great value to him in the future. The Staff College does not aspire to make wise men out of fools, or to achieve any other impossibilities, and, like other educational institutions, it has had its failures. It can, however, and does, make good men better, broaden their views, strengthen their powers of reasoning, improve their judgement, and in general lay the foundations of a useful military career.
For Robertson, says Victor Bonham-Carter, the Staff College 'was the turning point of his career'. He still had a long way to go, and much hard work ahead, but the slopes would never be quite so steep again, though they might be slippery, as he found out. After the Staff College - two years of close proximity to the intellectual cream of the Army - Bonham-Carter says he 'bothered no longer about social origins'. ' At that time probably well over 75% of officers were from public schools, and among them would be a fair proportion of aristocrats and even royalty; this composition would be to some extent reflected at the Staff College also. In his second year Robertson was called upon, as part of his instruction, to help in umpiring the annual manoeuvres, in which one side was commanded by the Duke of Connaught, who was a son of Queen Victoria and brother of the Prince of Wales. The Duke was a serving officer, and the Prince, especially after his accession as Edward VII, took a close and informed interest in Army matters. They would now become familiar figures to Robertson, increasingly frequently encountered , and in the case of the next Prince of Wales, later George V, even friends. In 1898, as Robertson left the Staff College, all this was just beginning, and he was still only a Captain, but fortune was smiling.
From the Staff College he came away with a 'very favourable' report which. coupled with his experience of staff work in India, led to his being immediately appointed to the Intelligence Branch at the War Office. When Robertson joined it, the Branch numbered only some sixteen officers; together with the Mobilisation Section, with another three or four officers, to which it was closely linked, this was, he says, 'the only semblance of a General Staff then in existence.' It is revealing of British attitudes that Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, who had been Secretary of State for War from 1892 to 1895 and would shortly become Prime Minister in the· great Liberal landslide of 905, was one of many who thought a General Staff to guide military policy was quite unnecessary. 'In this country,' said Sir Henry, 'there is in truth no room for a "general military policy" ... We have no designs against our European neighbours.' Robertson remarks:
It seems to have been overlooked, or was too inconvenient to be admitted, that these same neighbours might have designs against us ...
In the Intelligence Branch his first duty was in the section dealing with Asia - a large enough parish in all conscience - and he greatly impressed his immediate superior. Captain Waters , who wrote : 'I soon found that he was the very man required, a great worker, and absolutely reliable.' Robertson's appointment was at first only temporary, and there was a threat to remove him to what would very probably have been another dead-end job - the Army seemed to have quite a few of these - but Waters put up such a fight that the posting was made permanent, and he was transferred to the Colonial Section. This new post also covered a wide parish; Robertson tells us:
Our Colonial Empire comprised some forty distinct and independent governments, and in addition ... there were a number of dependencies which had no formed administrations, as well as large territories controlled by certain British Companies, and the protectorates, such as Somaliland and British East Africa, under the supervision of the Foreign Office. All military questions concerning these possessions found their way into my section, their number being exceeded only by the variety of their character.
It was rare for there not to be some military operation on foot somewhere in this great imperial sprawl, but one area in particular now claimed attention: South Africa, where as he says, 'trouble with the Transvaal had been brewing for some two years past and was daily becoming more acute.' In October 1899 this 'trouble' became open war with the two Boer Republics, the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. This was the great, sad awakening to which I have just referred - a war full of bad shocks and unpleasant episodes after 40 years during which Britain had faced no major enemy. It is a measure of the shock that one can call the two Republics, which never fielded more than 50-60,000 men at any time, a 'major enemy'. Yet they kept a total of over 450,000 troops of the British Empire well occupied for over two and a half years. This was largely due, says Robertson, to
the weakness of our military position as compared with the Boers when hostilities commenced ... in consequence we were penalised with the greatest of all handicaps in war - a bad start.
The British forces were , in fact , as General Buller said, 'like a man who, with a long day's work before him, overslept himself and so was late for everything all day.' Sometimes one concludes that this is, nationally, our favourite position; but real professional officers like Robertson don't like it at all, and it is one of the reasons for the enmity between them and politicians. It is here, in his Intelligence experience, that we discover Robertson's first stirrings of acute distrust of the political animal.
As in 1914, at the coming of war the Whitehall cupboards were almost swept bare of staff officers, who went off happily to join the forces overseas. Robertson was left behind in charge of the Colonial Section, though he had only been in it for six months, and before the end of the year five different assistants had come and gone, leaving him to grapple with six men's work and a sixteen-hour day. As news of one disaster after another arrived, a major task was dealing with the flood of brilliant ideas that poured in for reversing this depressing state of affairs and overthrowing the enemy. This was a phenomenon that he would encounter again and again, and he never shifted from the view that he took on very first acquaintance, saying:
Practically all of them suffered from the defect common to other amateur prescriptions, in that while they clearly and often quite cleverly showed what it was desirable to do - a comparatively easy task - they failed to be so convincing as to how this could be done - which is never easy, especially for those responsible for doing it.
Sixteen years later the welter of bright ideas which finally emerged as the Gallipoli Expedition drew from him a succinct restatement of this verdict - which would also be repeated:
There is seldom any lack of attractive-looking schemes in war. The difficulty is to give effect to them ...
Robertson was not left at home for long. In December 1899 Field-Marshal Lord Roberts was sent out to South Africa to take hold of operations and defeat the Boers. He took with him Robertson's Staff College tutor, Henderson, as Director of Intelligence, and on 27 December Henderson sent for Robertson. He arrived in Cape Town on 20 January 1900 and was given the duty of collecting and studying intelligence concerning Boer movements. This, also, could hardly fail to have an educational value, but probably what he chiefly learned from South Africa was the unfortunate consequence of misuse of staff, even by such able generals as Lord Roberts. This, also, was something that he would meet again.
In October Robertson was ordered back to the Intelligence Branch at the War Office. He was now a Major , in the ordinary course of regimental promotion, and a year later became a Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel for his South African service . Already there were perceptible stirrings of reform to put right the faults so acutely felt in the war. The Directorate of Mobilisation and Intelligence, as it was now called, was reorganised into three Sections: a Special Section dealing with security and counter-espionage, an Imperial Section, and a Foreign Section under Robertson himself, with nine officers under him. He took up his new post on 1 January 1901; he could not have chosen a better time to return to the centre of affairs.
The Boer War ended in 1902 and Rudyard Kipling wrote its epitaph: 'We have had no end of a lesson. It will do us no end of good!' Robertson was only acknowledging this when he observed twenty years later:
It is perhaps not too much to say that the Empire was saved from disaster by the small community of Boer farmers who, a few years before, had fought against us.
Robertson remained at the War Office from 1901 until the end of January 1907, a period which covered what I may call the 'groundwork' for the final touches of Mr. Haldane which gave Britain the splendid professional Army of 1914. The Royal Commission on the South African War carried out an amazingly searching investigation of every aspect of the Army's performance ; its report (with two large volumes of Minutes of Evidence) came out in 1903, and provided a firm foundation for all that followed. In 1903 Mr. Brodrick, the Secretary of State for War in Balfour's government, made a start by setting up the Committee of Imperial Defence to survey the military needs of the Empire on a regular basis - for the first time. In 1903 the Esher Committee was set up, and in February and March 1904 it announced a complete overhaul of the War Office, the creation of the Army Council and a properly constituted General Staff, with a Chief who was to be the Government's sole military adviser. In this year also the new field artillery, the 13- and 18-pounders, began to be introduced. Training manuals also made their appearance. In 1905 Haldane became Secretary of State. In 1906 the Expeditionary Force was organised; Staff talks with the French began; in 1907 the Territorial Army came into existence; the Imperial General Staff was created; and the Short Magazine Lee-Enfield rifle started to be issued. It was a tremendous performance, a transformation of what had always been a slow-moving, traditional organisation, and all done in very short order.
Nothing, of course, was more fundamental than the question, what was it all about? What was it for? Robertson had no doubts. In November 1902 he produced a paper discussing the pros and cons of an alliance with Germany - a proposal that was being officially discussed. He said this:
It is not an exaggeration to say that in no other European country is hatred of England so general or so deep-rooted as in Germany ... [a] most potent cause [of this] is the rivalry in trade and colonial enterprise, and in this respect Germany is the aggressor. Indeed, the hope' of superseding us in the commercial and naval supremacy is the governing idea of the national imagination. It may be argued that this is a perfectly laudable ambition, but it should be remembered that the fact of one nation being engaged, with every right and remarkable efficiency, in undermining the foundations of another, is not in itself an aid to good relations bf tween them, and certainly not to a reliable alliance ...
This paper, lengthy and powerfully argued, was written three years before the first Morocco crisis, brought about by Germany, opened a number of important eyes. Robertson's conclusions in 1902 were prophetic:
... that the alliance is not practicable; that even if it were, it would not be worth the price we should have to pay for it; that instead of regarding Germany as a possible ally we should recognise her as our most persistent, deliberate and formidable rival.
The first Morocco crisis, testing the strength of the new Anglo-French Entente, erupted in March 1905, and in April Robertson, now an Assistant Director of the Intelligence Division, and his friend Major-General Grierson, now Director, conducted a war game based on the supposition of war between France and Germany, with part of the German army advancing through Belgium and Britain going to Belgium's aid. Robertson 'commanded' the German side, and as the game developed Grierson's decisions as Umpire showed, he says,
that there would be little chance of stopping the German turning movement unless the British forces arrived on the scene quickly and in considerable strength.
Pondering on this, in the following year he argued that
we ought to be prepared to send to France as a first contingent a force of 500,000 men.
Haig, in the same year, is reported wanting Britain
at the end of twelve months to place an army of 900,000 men in the field and keep it there for five years.
This was 1906 and it is precisely this kind of foresight that General Staffs are for; if politicians pay no attention, they have only themselves to blame for the results. But one can imagine the soldiers' feelings when the birds come home to roost.
When Robertson left the War Office after what Victor Bonham-Carter calls 'a long and momentous tour of office', he was a marked man, obviously destined for high position. He was now a full Colonel, with twenty officers under him. His character was fully formed - after all, he was 47 years old. He walked with a slow, measured tread, planting his feet firmly on the ground - like his thoughts; he gave the impression of being always deep in thought, his manner was reserved, he wasted few words, he could be disconcertingly gruff and his dismissive grunts were famous. To a long discourse with which he totally disagreed he would usually reply, not by argument, but by a grunt and a phrase which was also famous: 'I've 'eard different' - and that was that. To the end of his days he dropped his 'Hs' - which may have been affectation as much as habit - and spoke with a roughish intonation which has sometimes been described as cockney, but I doubt that; his manner and his sayings seem to me to be pure Lincolnshire. They belong to the boy from Welboum. He was regarded by most of those who knew him with respect and affection. His nickname (not often used to his face) was 'Wully' (which also has a Welbourn ring) and as Victor Bonham-Carter says, 'It suited him somehow'.
Robertson left the War Office in January 1907, and his immediate reward for six years of hard, successful work was to be put on half-pay , an iniquitous system which another CIGS would call 'a miserable dole designed to enable the War Office to keep up a cheap pool of senior officers.' In his case it did not last long - just over three months - and his next post took him back to Aldershot , where it had all begun thirty years before. He spared some wry glances, he says, for 'the old barrack room where I first lived, and its neighbour the guard-room of evil memory.' Now he was an important personage , first of all Quartermaster-General , and then Chief of Staff to the commander of Britain's only army corps, Horace Smith-Dorrien. Smith-Dorrien was another reformer, this time of the conditions of service of the soldiers under him; he taught officers that their men must be their first care - in Robertson's words 'to identify themselves in peace with those upon whom they have to depend in war' - while soldiers were at last encouraged to show initiative; in general, says Robertson,
the aim of all was to try and bring out what was best in the men and not everlastingly be thinking of the worst.
He would know the full meaning of those words.
In June 1910 he received a letter from the CIGS inviting him to return to the Staff College - as Commandant. The drawback was, he says,
that the post was greatly underpaid. However, I determined not to be balked of a promising opening on that account, but to have a try at filling what was one of the most important positions which an officer of my standing could in peacetime be called upon to hold.
His teaching was down-to-earth and totally practical. He condemned outright what he called the 'objectionable habit' of
craving to employ high-sounding phrases such as 'pivot of manoeuvre', 'interior lines', 'offensive-defensive' and so on, all of which were right enough in their way, on paper, but in actual war do not greatly assist the ordinary commander in the thing that really matters, the defeat of the enemy. There is only one road to victory, given a capable opponent, and that is the road of hard fighting, of which there is usually a great deal.
Every idea was put to the practical test, and his students were warned above all against
conclusions which, however attractive they may appear on paper, have little or no connection with the rough and bloody work of masses of men trying to kill each other.
As regards who these 'masses of men' might be, there was little. doubt. He told the 1911 leavers that all their studies were intended to prepare them for fighting 'the most probable and formidable adversary for the time being', and he adds:
It was well understood between me and the students who 'the most probable and formidable adversary' was. We had often discussed him, and there was no need to mention him by name.
By October 1913, when he left the Staff College, Wully from Welbourn was a Major-General and a Knight Commander of the Victorian Order. His training abilities were evidently known, because he was now summoned back to the War Office to be Director of Military Training - with the promise of command of the 1st Division at Aldershot to follow: a Major-General's dream commarid. But it was not to be; within a year the 'probable adversary' had become a real adversary, the 1st Division was part of the Expeditionary Force, and in the late search for Staff officers, Robertson became Quartermaster-General of the BEF. And that, too, would only be a stepping-stone; even higher posts and higher ranks awaited the gardener's boy, Sir William Robertson KCVO, DSO.
IMAGE: General Sir W Robertson ("Wully") (IWM Q69626) from the collections of the Imperial War Museums.


The end is nigh for cash, or so a wide range of academics, fintech venture capitalists and futurists would have us believe. Soon we will pay for goods and services with some combination of smartphones, biometrics and tiny chips embedded in our bodies. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies may even replace government-backed forms of money, or so the story goes.
That may be the future, but it's not present-day reality, where individuals still see real utility in holding paper currency for both day-to-day transactions and as a store of value and hedge against another financial crisis.
Physical cash in circulation in both the US and Europe is growing at a healthy clip, even with all the new technology. This is not solely due to the dramatic increase in US$100 bills or high-denomination euro notes over the last decade. There's been a big increase in workhorse denominations — $1 through $50 bills and €1 to €50 coins and notes.
Take the humble $1 bill. According to US Federal Reserve data, there are a record $11.7bn of such notes in circulation. Compounded annual growth of $1 bills in outstanding since 2010 is 3.2%, well above the 0.7% annual growth rate of the US population. The dollar bill is so popular that the Federal Reserve is sitting on more than $1bn of dollar coin inventory — those gold-coloured Sacagawea pieces — that consumers clearly do not want.
The same holds true for other denominations, from the rarely seen $2 and $50 bills to the ATM-favourite $20 note. Total "transactional cash" (excluding $100 bills) in circulation was $308bn at the end of last year, and the compounded annual growth rate since 2010 is 4.5%. There's enough such money in circulation to put $1 000 into the hands of every man, woman and child in America.
This isn't only an American phenomenon. Data from the European Central Bank shows the same growth trends in the euro zone, where there are even higher levels of cash in circulation. Total transactional cash (€1 coins to €50 bank notes) in circulation totaled €585bn at the end of 2016, or more than twice the notional amount used in the US. The compound annual growth rate since 2010 is also higher than in the US at 7.6%.
If you want to see proof of the increasing digitisation of commerce in these developed markets, don't look at the physical cash statistics. It isn't there.
The funny thing about cash is that it is cheap to make but expensive to manage. The typical Federal Reserve note costs about $0.12 to produce, but once it leaves the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing, it has to be guarded 24/7 until it goes into a wallet or a cash register — and that gets very expensive.
The upshot is that neither the Fed nor the European Central Bank nor private banks has any incentive to order or distribute more cash than they need to meet organic demand. If transactional cash in circulation is rising, then this is a function of consumers' preference to hold and use paper money. As an aside, it also puts to rest the notion that central banks are conspiring with the "deep state" to ban cash.
The data tells such a different story about cash than the one that captivates futurists and informs common wisdom that it demands a rethink of not only the nature of "money" but also our understanding of the long-term effects of the financial crisis.
Take the notion of cash as a "store of value". Simply put, it shouldn't be. The threat of inflation is supposed to encourage savers to invest their capital and keep it circulating in society. There is little sense shoving $1 000 in cash under a mattress only to see its purchasing power erode to $500 over a generation if inflation runs at 3-4% annually.
Yet the data suggests that there is some level of cash hoarding at play. Cashless transactions are growing, after all, so there is less need for pocketbook consumer cash. Where is all this money going? The financial crisis may have taught consumers that having a few hundred dollars or euros stashed away is a good idea. The low-inflation environment only reinforces the notion that such a strategy is not as costly as thought.
Another important point relates to the costly nature of cashless transactions. The best example here is the purchase of petrol in the US. Since petrol stations work on thin margins and desperately want you to come into the store to buy snacks or drinks, they commonly give enticing discounts for cash. This avoids the 2-5% charge from a payments processor and drives foot traffic. That makes cash a win-win for these retailers.
The growth in transactional cash holds valuable lessons for all the cashless solutions that aim to replace the humble bank note. The growing interest in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, for example, speaks directly to the desirability of holding "store-of-value" cash outside the traditional financial system similar to cash under the mattress. But transaction fees are a persistent problem, even in many cutting-edge solutions. Scale will solve this over time.


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Odiham's important role in Magna Carta history
PUBLISHED: 10:04 26 May 2015 | UPDATED: 10:04 26 May 2015
Steve Brown cycled 1200 miles around Britain to promote the Magna Carta anthem
Odiham is poised to celebrate its part in the 800th anniversary of the world's most famous legal document. Graham Price finds out more about the village's role in Magna Carta history and some of the exciting events taking place to celebrate
Handover of the Magna Carta Anthem at Westminster
Did you know that the village of Odiham in north east Hampshire is linked to King John and the signing of Magna Carta? Not only did King John stay in Odiham Castle in the days before Magna Carta was negotiated and agreed, but the vernacular version was issued from Odiham on June 27 1215.
King John ruled England for 17 tumultuous years from 1199 until his death in 1216. Much of his reign was marred by an ongoing, expensive war with France – a war paid for by levying huge taxes on his people and exploiting feudal rights, which caused civil unrest and acrimony among his barons.
The barons rebelled and forced King John to sign a charter to limit his arbitrary rule and attempt to avoid the descent into civil war. The attempt ultimately failed – within weeks John had disowned it and was at war with his rebellious barons. But the document still holds an incredibly important place in history.
King John stayed in Odiham Castle in the days leading up to the important meeting with his barons, and rode to Runnymede, near Windsor from there on June 10 1215 to agree to the Articles of the Barons (a draft of Magna Carta). On June 15 1215, after five days of intense discussion and negotiation, the two sides came to an agreement and Magna Carta was signed and sealed.
The master document was issued in Latin, but the main language of the ruling classes on both sides of the Channel was French. The Anglo Norman (vernacular) Magna Carta was issued from Odiham on June 27 1215, along with a writ addressed to the Sheriff of Hampshire and the twelve elected knights of the county, authorising them to seize the property of those who refused the oath to the 25 barons who had gathered at Runnymede days earlier to agree the charter with the King.
For the last three years, the Odiham Society have been busy planning a full schedule of events to celebrate the village's role in Magna Carta. "Our project is all about bringing heritage and history alive to inform and involve the community of Odiham and surrounding Hampshire as a whole," says chairman, John Champion. "All of our activity has been undertaken by volunteers, and the number involved has been growing steadily as the 800th anniversary of 1215 approaches."
One event which has really captured the imagination is the Magna Carta Anthem. The brainchild of Michael Drayton, and composed by Malcolm Archer, the anthem was completed in 2014. John explains: "Steve Brown volunteered to cycle 1200 miles around England to deliver it to churches and cathedrals particularly associated with Magna Carta, thus creating the Magna Carta Trail which has now been adopted as a national cycle trail and brought more positive publicity for a daunting undertaking that Steve accomplished with quiet modesty."
The programme of events were inspired by the interests and enthusiasm of a small group of people.
"An embroidery was proposed at an early stage and an organising team found a superb artist and designer, Mary Turner. This inspired more than 50 local stitchers to become involved in a project that has resulted in a lasting legacy in the form of a beautiful embroidery that will hang in Odiham Library for all to view and learn about our history," says John.
Odiham Castle. Photo: Natalie French
"Elements of our programme are very different, yet mutually reinforcing, so that we hope many people will enjoy them all and gain much more from actively entering history."
What is the Magna Carta and why is it important?
The Magna Carta ("Great Charter" in Latin) outlined some basic rights for the first time, many of which we now take for granted. It chartered that no-one was above the law (including the King); that no free man shall be imprisoned without the lawful judgement of his equals (a jury) and placed limits on taxation without representation. It inspired other great documents including the US Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Just three clauses remain on the statute book today: the clause confirming the privileges of the City of London and other towns; the clause guaranteeing the liberties of the English Church and the famous clause that gives everyone the right to a fair trial in front of a jury of their peers.
How to get to Odiham Castle
The ruins of 'King John's Castle' sit at the junction between the Basingstoke Canal and the River Whitewater. Access is on foot (or by bike) along the canal towpath. Drive through Odiham to North Warnborough, down Tunnel Lane (just off North Warnborough Street) and find a parking spot close to the canal, which is buggy and bike friendly. If you want to make a day of it, why not explore a longer route along the canal? A map of the towpath can be found at www3.hants.gov.uk/basingstokecanal-leafletmap.pdf
John's Event Highlights
1 Unveiling of the Odiham Embroidery on May 16 by the High Sheriff of Hampshire will begin a programme of events stretching into June, and flags flying along all approach roads and the parish as a whole will signal that everything is underway.
2 The Festival and Parade in the centre of Odiham on May 22 is being managed by Jane Pratt and will see the community come together, dressed in the spirit of 1215, to celebrate Magna Carta. It promises to be an afternoon and evening that schools and families will long remember.
3 Living History at Odiham Castle promises to bring many people into the parish and will serve the wider community of Hampshire as a whole. Up to 100 people from Feudals Living History and other groups will come together to involve and inform through our 1215 Village and Arena Re-enactment, and it will be a great relief when they are all assembled and everything is going to plan.
4 The journey to Runnymede on June 7 will see 1000 or more people picnicking beside the Thames in remembrance of June 1215. The Air Forces Memorial at Runnymede, which records the names of more than 20,000 air personnel who died in WW2 with no known grave, has particular relevance for RAF Odiham and we anticipate many of our number at the picnic will also visit it as well as the Magna Carta Memorial there.
5 Singing live in All Saints Odiham congregation for Sunday Worship on Radio 4 on June 14 and listening to the start of the cascade of bells from Odiham to Runnymede (Egham, Windsor & Runnymede) at 12.15pm will be unusual events that capture the imagination of everyone, and provide a natural lead into our LiberTea at 3pm - when it will be marvellous to see everyone celebrate the liberty, freedom and democracy that we usually take for granted. It will be a relief to relax after the last major event in our programme. To find out more about the full programme of events, visit www.odihammagnacarta.com
• Everything you need to know about Odiham - With a castle once fit for a king and a picturesque High Street lined with Georgian houses and independent shops, Odiham has long been a popular place to live and visit.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Midrash Esther IV: Was Achashveirosh Capable of Change?
in Purim	by	admin on 22 Feb, 2011 0 Comments
"Achashveirosh, this is Achashveirosh." Rabbi Isaac and the Rabbis explained differently. Rabbi Isaac said: he was that Achashveirosh in whose days trouble came, as it says, "there was great mourning among the Jews." This is Achashveirosh: in whose days all blessings came, as it says, "the Jews had gladness and joy, a feast and a good day."
The Rabbis say: Achashveirosh before Esther went in onto him: "this is a Achashveirosh," after Esther went into him, he did not have relations with women in the period of their separation.
I understand this debate between Rabbi Isaac and the rabbis as the question of whether Achashveirosh was capable of change. Rabbi Isaac insists that he was not called the same one who caused great trouble, was the one who allowed great happiness and blessings. He was no different when he was causing problems than he was when he was allowing his Jewish subjects to be happy. Rabbi Isaac reads this as a story of the king incapable of change. He is warning us not to judge a ruler by whether he allows us joy or whether he causes terrible suffering. Neither the joy nor the troubles will define the ruler. When dealing with a ruler we must always understand his essence. We should not look only at immediate results.
The Rabbis, on the other hand, find a hint in the text to the fact that Achashveirosh was actually capable of change: he was different after Esther went into his throne room then he was before. He lived at a higher moral level. He was changed by Esthers influence.
The Rabbis are saying that whatever followed the scene of Esther entering the king's throne room was a result of a change caused by Esther's influence. Achashveirosh agreed to the first party because he was a changed man. He agreed to the second party because he was further changed by exposure to Esther at the first party. It was Esther's influence that caused Achashveirosh to grant Mordechai the great honor of being led through the city on the King's horse by Haman. It was Esther's influence that made the king take another look at Haman and perceive the risk he really was.
The Rabbis read the Book of Esther as dealing with a different Achashveirosh after each exposure to Esther. They seem to be arguing for the influence that good, righteous, and pious people can have on a king who is capable of change. They are not declaring every ruler as so capable; however, if we sense that someone in power is truly capable of change, we must use our goodness and piety to, step by step, influence him in for good.
Book of Esther, Esther, Holidays, Megilat Esther, Purim, Rabbi Simcha Weinberg, The Foundation Stone


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Public Citizen v. FERC (ISO-NE)
This case challenged a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) action refusing to review the lawfulness of an increase in rates for wholesale electric capacity, which resulted from a noncompetitive auction conducted by the New England Independent System Operator. At the time, FERC had a vacancy and, therefore, only four commissioners. The four sitting commissioners deadlocked: Two would have set the issue of the rates' lawfulness for a hearing, but two would have dismissed the challenge to the rates because of their view that FERC could not consider whether the actual rates resulting from an auction conducted under rules approved by FERC were lawful. Because FERC required a majority vote to proceed, the deadlock resulted in the rates' going into effect.
Public Citizen, as well as Connecticut agencies and officials, filed petitions for review in the D.C. Circuit. FERC challenged the court's jurisdiction, arguing that it issued no order and took no action subject to judicial review. Public Citizen's briefs argued that the agency's deadlock was a reviewable action because it effectively rejected the challenge to the rates, and that the rationale of the Commissioners who blocked the agency action—namely, that the agency lacked authority to review the lawfulness of the rates—was contrary to law.
The court ruled that it lacked jurisdiction because the FERC deadlock meant that the rates had gone into effect without any final order of the Commission and that a final order was required for the court to have jurisdiction. The court acknowledged that the interpretation of the Federal Power Act underlying the votes of the commissioners who found the rates reasonable "seems questionable at best" but stated that the court "lack[ed] the power to assess its validity." The court stated that because its lack of jurisdiction was based on the text of the Federal Power Act's jurisdictional provision, "it lies with Congress, not this Court, to provide that remedy."
Because of its dissatisfaction with the outcome of this case, Congress subsequently amended the Act to provide the courts with jurisdiction over future challenges to rates resulting from FERC deadlocks.
Petitioner's Brief (09/04/2015)
Petitioner's Reply Brief (12/02/2015)


What foods are the most challenging for you to shoot? I think this varies for every food photographer, but for me it's definitely sandwiches. Today I'm facing the challenge and sharing this delicious Garden Greens Sandwich with Green Goddess Dressing as well as Five Easy Food Styling Tips for Sandwiches.
The misleading thing about sandwiches is that they are so easy to put together when we're making them for lunch, but they are incredibly difficult to make look good for a photo shoot. It can take several tries and definitely requires some patience.
This may seem obvious, but I've tried grabbing what's on hand in the fridge and it just doesn't work out. It's very obvious when ingredients are not fresh in food photo shoots. And, if the food doesn't look good, the images won't look good. Whether I'm shooting a sandwich or something else, I get up extra early on the day of the shoot to buy the freshest ingredients. For sandwiches, be selective in the type of bread you choose to use. I chose a multi-grain bread (for texture) with thicker slices (for height).
First, I chose a thick slice of bread for the base and placed it on top of a small cutting board for additional height. Second, I added room temperature goat cheese so it was easy to spread towards the front of the sandwich. Third, I layered in some curvy greens and avocado slices. Fourth, I added a thick slice of tomato and a slice of fresh mozzarella. Fifth, I added thinly sliced cucumber (I used my mandoline) for some additional curvy layers. Sixth, I added some green pepper slices. Seventh, I added some pickled red onions making sure their color was visible. Eighth, I added more curvy greens and finally topped it with some broccoli microgreens. Ninth, I used an eye dropper to carefully add the dressing.
Lighting the sandwich is really important to make those pretty layers and colors actually show up. For my shoot, I used natural light. I set up my sandwich next to a large window when there was lots of natural light pouring in. I used a diffuser on the window to soften the light and avoid glare and hot spots on the ingredients. The window was on the left and I used a white piece of foam core on the right. The natural light would softly highlight the left side and would also bounce off the white foam core to soften the shadows on the right.
Tweezers are an important tool to have on hand for food styling. It allows you to move little pieces without disrupting the other pieces. As I was shooting, I wanted to add one curvy broccoli microgreen for some additional texture in the front. You can see it in the picture below. If I used my fingers, I would have accidentally touched or moved other ingredients and would have had to start over with my layering. Tweezers help you be much more precise and careful.
Like I mentioned earlier, sandwiches are a challenge to make look good for the camera. I have struggled with styling them for a long time and they rarely make it on my blog because of it. But, it's important to not be too hard on yourself, be patient and keep practicing.
This recipe has been a nice change from our typical ham and turkey sandwiches. The veggies are crunchy and fresh and the green goddess dressing, goat cheese and pickled red onions add so much delicious flavor amongst all the greens. It leaves me feeling satisfied without being overly full and bloated. Win!
What foods are the most challenging for you to shoot?
To prep the dressing, mix the dressing ingredients together in a bowl and set aside.
To prep the red onions, whisk first 3 pickling ingredients and 1 cup of water in a small bowl until sugar and salt dissolve.
Place sliced onion in a jar and pour mixture over.
To prep the sandwiches, slice the cucumber, green pepper, tomato, avocado and mozzarella.
Spread the goat cheese on one slice of multi-grain bread and layer with cucumber, green pepper, tomato, avocado, mozzarella, green goddess dressing and a sprinkle of microgreens.
Top with the other slice of multi-grain bread and enjoy!
* This post may contain affiliate links which means if you click or make a purchase through my site, I might make a small commission. I only promote products that I actually use and support.
All images ©Regan Baroni 2018.


Home › democracy › Commons Network selected for Idea Camp on Urban Commons !
Commons Network selected for Idea Camp on Urban Commons !
Commons Network has been selected by the European Cultural Foundation for the 3 day Idea Camp 'Build the City' on the Urban Commons in Sweden in September 2015. We will have the opportunity to further develop the idea on 'a set or rules' for the urban commons: rules and principles to protect and facilitate the flourishing of commons, in their many different appearances, in the city.
"Build the City is about people creating sustainable cities through social cooperation and active participation with culture at its heart. It is about applying the principles and ethics of the commons to the transformation of the city, its communities and its economy.


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Site Home News ArchiveRoberts isn't making a concerted impact
Roberts isn't making a concerted impact
21 Oct 2021 07:31 am, by Ellandback1
Good Morning. It's Thursday 21st October, and here are the latest headlines from Elland Road
'Roberts isn't playing well', 'he isn't making a concerted impact' and 'Leeds don't get a lot from him'! These are the words from Leeds Utd journalist Phil Hay discussing everyone's favourite scapegoat!
Roberts isn't playing well but I was making the point on the podcast recently that the attention on him seems to be ignoring the fact that numerous other players aren't playing well. Granted, some of them have much more credit in the bank than Roberts but still, I do feel like we get bogged down in Roberts chat. The same with Cooper from time to time.
At the same time, Roberts isn't making a concerted impact. That's not in dispute. He can be quite effective in helping Leeds progress up the field but in a purely attacking sense, they don't get a lot from him.
Do you think Tyler Roberts is playing well or is he a scapegoat? Does he offer enough creativity and end product or should we be looking more at the big money signings such as Rodrigo to deliver. Roberts can be a frustrating player, he shows moments of brilliance but more often than not he is not quick enough with his decision making for the Premier League. There is a good footballer there, can he make that final step to become a great one?
There's nothing wrong with Leeds fitness
Leeds may have appeared sluggish, especially in pre-season, but as we know perception can be deceiving. Recent data shows that Leeds have covered more ground than any other team in the top fight. Interestingly, one player who stands out in the Premiership is Jack Harrison. When distance and speed were calculated across the top flight, it was revealed that the Leeds winger would run the distance of a marathon in circa 363 minutes! In their first seven games this season, Leeds have run over 18 marathons as a team (764km).
Not only do they cover the most distance, but their anaerobic stamina (quick bursts of energy like sprints) are 21% more efficient than second place Southampton. We know there's nothing wrong with the fitness of Bielsa's squad, and reassuringly, their anaerobic levels have not dropped either. Where are Leeds going wrong this season? We can't blame it all on injuries!
Next two matches are crucial
Phil Hay believes Leeds are going to be heavily reliant on their big guns over the next few games, and has stressed the importance of not losing to Wolves or Norwich. Whilst the Canaries are in free fall, Bruno Lage's team have hit a rich vain of form with three wins in a row, including coming back from 2-0 down to win at Villa Park with three goals in the last ten minutes! According to Hay...
I do feel like they'll be fine this season but I'm not sure there's been a time under Bielsa when this squad were more reliant on their most key men. There was very little way of changing that game on Saturday and when you're in a spot of bother, that's far from ideal. They need to make something of these next two matches.
mentalcase wrote on 23 Oct 2021 09:29 am
Cjay wrote: ↑Sat Oct 23, 2021 8:54 am We are down on every stat.
Shots per game, chances created, expected goals, chances conceded, goal conceded.
We are having our worst start to a season in decades (we had more points the season we were relegated)
No manager will get praise after that and neither should they.
If a manager chooses to change nothing and a team keeps losing then of course people will criticise, tiz to be expected.
Worst start to season since 1935 -36, says it all to me.
1964white wrote on 23 Oct 2021 09:05 am
rab_rant wrote: ↑Sat Oct 23, 2021 8:36 am Last season we were so proud that we could run everybody off the pitch. Now the very same trait that we took pride in is being despised and counted as worthless as though we were running around like headless chickens.
This seems to be an ongoing trait that the things that were worthy in the past are now being despised, and Bielsa seems to be the main focus and the brunt of the attack. The man who has been our savior is now being crucified. (alright that analogy is a bit too much but you catch my drift)
Sent from my Redmi Note 8 Pro using Tapatalk
You are obviously turning a blind eye if you haven't noticed our lack of creativity, shooting & defensive woes this season. Even more concerning, we are not playing well with the same zip, pace & flair of previous Bielsa seasons.
I'm expecting an improved performance today, even though we are a few men down!
Cjay wrote on 23 Oct 2021 08:54 am
We are down on every stat.
rab_rant wrote on 23 Oct 2021 08:36 am
1964white wrote: How about practising our shooting or how to defend efficiently in training as opposed to running our ar*es off?
Last season we were so proud that we could run everybody off the pitch. Now the very same trait that we took pride in is being despised and counted as worthless as though we were running around like headless chickens.
LeeBrook wrote on 21 Oct 2021 06:00 pm
We haven't a snowflake in hell's chance of beating Wolves. I just wonder how much longer the management will tolerate Bielsa or if they're willing to let him take us back down.
West Ham Utd v Leeds Utd Match Thread - Struijk starts, Rodrigo makes the bench


Looking to create a statement in your kitchen? Then this stunning white island chimney hood from Caple is sure to impress. Teaming style with performance, the CR750WH boasts a superb 550m³ per hour extraction rate with 4 speed settings and features a 20W LED light to really put the spotlight on your cooking. As well being operated by remote control, you'll love the handy auto-timer feature which switches off the hood after 10 minutes, so you can get on and eat your food whilst it clears any last bits of steam and cooking smells. Designed to be suspended from the ceiling above the cooking surface, this stylish island hood is suitable for recirculation only and comes with charcoal filters.


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An Garda Síochána
Italy is the first country making climate change lessons compulsory
Melissa Carton
Do you think Ireland should do the same?
Italy is to become the first country to make climate change lessons compulsory for all schoolchildren.
From the start of the next academic year, all state schools will dedicate almost one hour per week to climate change issues.
The Italian education minister Lorenzo Fioramonti has said that going forward all school children will take compulsory lessons on climate change.
Schools will be required to dedicate at least one hour per week to climate change issues as well as integrating the topic into traditional subjects such as geography, mathematics and physics.
According to The Independent UK, Fioramonti said;
"The entire ministry is being changed to make sustainability and climate the centre of the education model.
I want to make the Italian education system the first education system that puts the environment and society at the core of everything we learn in school."
Roma and AC Milan condemn 'Black Friday' front page headline
Fioramonti has been criticised previously for encouraging children to attend climate protests that often occur during school hours but it's clear that he's passinate about the subject.
With more and more scientists warning us to change our habits before climate change goes even further, I definitely think that the Irish education board should follow Italy's example.
Our children are the ones who will have to deal with the terrible environmental consequences if things do not change. It's crucial that they are educated on climate change and school is the best place to start.
Climate Change.
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You can play for a €176 million Italian lottery jackpot from Ireland, here's how
Baby dies following circumcision in Italy
Carl Kinsella
Italian children have been told not to show up to school unless they have been properly vaccinated
Mafia 'super fugitive' Marco Di Lauro arrested after 14 years on the run
An Italian town is selling homes for just €1, but there's a catch
Six dead in Italian nightclub stampede


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Quick Takes — Sounding Empathy in Aronofsky's Mother!
By Brooke McCorkle
The season of fall horror movies is upon us; It reigns the box office and a slew of Halloween slashers will soon follow, but it is Darren Aronofsky's Mother! that is generating the most debate. At once a psychological thriller and eschatological allegory, Mother! is perhaps more horrific than horror, though it brushes at the edges of the genre in several regards. The film dissects the relationship between "Mother" (Jennifer Lawrence) and "Him" or the Poet (Javier Bardem). As unexpected house guests arrive at their home, the poet nonchalantly and unceasingly undercuts Lawrence's character at every turn. In this respect, I believe Mother! serves both as a metaphor for human existence and participates in a lineage of horror films concerning marginalized, tormented young women that undergo some sort of supernatural transformation (Carrie, Rosemary's Baby, and The Witch come to mind).
The movie closely aligns audience members with the Mother. Over-the-shoulder, hand-held shots follow her throughout the home she has so lovingly restored for the Poet after a fire. Numerous extreme close-ups of Lawrence's face as well as point-of-view shots strengthen the audience's connection to the character. We share her sense of beleaguerment when Michelle Pfeiffer's character, one of many unwanted guests, brazenly leaves the kitchen filthy after making lemonade, teases the Mother about her underwear, and interrogates her about having children. Lawrence's character begs the Poet to dismiss the rude visitors, who multiply exponentially by the film's climax. The Mother, now heavy with pregnancy, inspires the Poet to write after a long stretch of writer's block. The success of the new work brings with it pilgrims hoping to meet the Poet. He refuses to turn the visitors away; he thrives on their adoration and abandons his wife's love for the blind devotion of strangers. What begins as fanatic fervor transforms into a violent mob of anarchic disciples seeking to steal, consume, and destroy the Mother's beloved creations: the home, and, eventually, her newborn son. Devastated and desperate, the Mother sets fire to herself and the home. All is char. Yet, she remains conscious in a black coal of a body while the Poet is unscathed. He carries her up to his study, where she bestows him with a final gift: her heart, now a crystal of flame. The Poet digs the crystal out of her chest and places it in a display stand. The world is renewed; the film "returns" to the beginning, with a new Mother.
Just as the narrative and cinematography work to generate audience empathy for the Mother character, so does the sound design. The soundtrack for Mother! exploits sound design to effectively arouse tension and fear. In this, it is hardly unique; horror films from Hitchcock's The Birds to Peele's Get Out utilize sound to heighten the cinematic sensorium. Mother!, however, pushes the boundary between sound and music in a specific way. I argue that not only can we consider sound as musical in the film (a Cagean approach to listening that befits many horror films), but that sound in Mother! does the semiotic heavy-lifting that is typically expected of an underscore. In other words, not only does sound seem musical, it acts like music in the film. The aesthetic of sound rendering along with a few key sound effects contribute to this phenomenon.
In Mother!, sounds are hyper-rendered; they are sweetened with reverb and raised to the foreground of the audio mix. From the very opening of the film, this super-sonicity is associated with the Mother. Throughout the film, it is as if auditor-spectators hear through her tinnitus-afflicted ears. The groans of the house reverberate through the auditorium thanks to Dolby stereo. The sounds emitted by the house envelop the audience; it is as if the structure replicates an in utero soundscape. External to the body, electric lights buzz like lightening, a broken teacup rings its destruction without decay, water, wind, crickets all are hyper-realized in the soundtrack. This effect is used most powerfully towards the climax of the film. The Poet steals the newborn son from the dozing Mother's arms and passes the crying babe to his thralls. Like a demented crowd surfer, the baby floats on the hands of the mob; at the doorway a disgusting thud, offset by a silent pause, reverberates through the soundtrack. I gasped at the shock of it; auditor-spectators, like the Mother, are attuned to the sounds of the newborn and horrified by the sound of his head being crushed. It is the sound of finality. Overall, the hyper-rendering of sound effects lead auditor-spectators to hear from the point of audition of the Mother; they are thus encouraged to empathize with her position in the narrative.
Two other effects work as narrative bookends for the film. The first appears during the opening credits; the sound of a nibbed pen echoes in synchronization with the animated scrawl of Mother! in the title credits. The scratching immediately informs auditor-spectators of writing's centrality to the story. Yet, the sound is sweetened with an effect reminiscent of the unsheathing of a sword. There is a violence to these handwritten words, a violence made apparent in the film's final half hour. The end credits complete this impression. After a haunting cover of "The End of the World," the sound of the slashing pen returns, illuminating the end credits. The ink blots splatter like the blood of the baby and the Mother that the audience saw destroyed a few minutes earlier. When natural sound effects like the chirping of crickets encroach on the sound effect of the pen during the end credits, it seems as if nature might remedy the world of violent logos.
Immediately following the opening credits with the metallic scratch of writing, the audience receives a sound advance. The screen remains darkened while the sound of fire blazes in stereo. A close up of Jennifer Lawrence's face aflame fills the screen a second later. The emphasis on the sound of fire before the film's visual narrative begins is a striking one. It indicates through sound the thematic relevance of fire to the story. Beyond this, the sound of the fire is deeply elemental—it is a giver and destroyer of life, ruinous and purifying at once. Over the course of the film, the audience discovers that it is the sound of the Mother, the cyclically ravaged and renewed muse to Him.
While Mother! is not a horror film in the traditional sense, in many aspects it functions like one; its story reveals humanity's deepest fears and dark desires. What is so haunting about the film is the accumulation of minor offenses into something of apocalyptic proportions. It can be read as allegories of humanity's relationship to nature, to gender politics, and to Christianity. However we choose to perceive Mother!, one thing is clear: the soundtrack invites us to listen to the marginalized and maltreated. It is in this act of listening that we might lay a foundation of empathy upon which a home can be rebuilt.
For more on this, see Kaja Silverman, The Acoustic Mirror: The Female Voice in Psychoanalysis and Cinema (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008), 101-140.
Brooke McCorkle is an opera and film music scholar. She is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of Musicology at SUNY-Geneseo. Her published and forthcoming works address topics as varied as Star Trek Concerts, Wagner reception in Japan, and ecological critiques in monster cinema. Please see here for more information.
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Merthyr Canal (Glamorganshire Canal)
Merthyr Tydfil and the other iron centers on the northern rim of the South Wales coalfield were badly placed with regard to the transport of their products to the ports, initially the pig iron was carried to the coast by packhorses bearing panniers. Roads were eventually built but, while a wagon drawn by four horses could convey two tons of goods, a canal barge was drawn by one horse and could convey twenty-five tons. In the 1800's, all the main valleys of the South Wales coalfield had been linked to ports by canals. It was the canals that truly launched the coalfields on its spectacular growth in the 1800's. The canals remained the dominant form of transport until the railways overtook them in the 1840s.
The Abercynon Sixteen Locks
The canal contained 52 locks on the Glamorganshire Canal, there were 16 at Abercynon within a space of one mile. The vertical fall from mountain terrace to valley floor was 207ft, almost enough to mark a change of climate. Bill Gomer, a retired boatman, once said, "There were waves there, top of the fives as big as blooming sea." Thomas Darford with his son, also Thomas, together with Thomas Sheasby, were the engineer-contractors involved in the canal project and work on the Steep Locks appears to have been completed in 1791. At the foot of the locks the canal was taken across the Taff on a single arched aqueduct whence it continued to Cardiff a distance of 25 miles from Cyfarthfa Ironworks at Merthyr.
The Glamorganshire Canal Company called them "The Steep Lock" the close packed groups of five and eleven locks that lowered their was from Merthyr to Cardiff waterway dramatically dropped down the Cefn Glas, a mountain spur lying between Quaker's Yard and Abercynon some fifteen miles north of Cardiff. The village of Abercynon a South Wales mining community of relatively modern origin stands where the river Taff joined by its tributary the Cynon.
Peculiar land information in the valley of the Taff at Quaker's Yard was responsible for the heavy lockage at this place where the river loops around a canyon-like horseshoe bend, and the canal builders and later railway engineers were forced to cross over the spur at high level.