As I read more and more of these stories, I began to have a nagging doubt in the back of my mind. As I finished one title I started to think ‘What if I’ve read all of the escape books out there? What will I do if there are no more?’. Amazingly though these stories have kept appearing right through the late twentieth century, well over fifty years from the end of the war.

An elderly gentleman with what looked like crippling arthritis in his hands bought several Italian Language books one day 4 or 5 years ago. I asked him if he’d lived in Italy and he told me that he’d been captured in North Africa and had been a POW in Italy until he’d walked out of his Camp when Italy withdrew from hostilities in 1943. He had then gone on the run from the Germans(like Eric Newby in his classic ‘Love and War in the Apennines’) and survived in the mountains until the Allies fought their way up Italy and he was able to cross the lines. He told me that he had nearly finished his memoirs and they were due to be published before long.

So these books are still being published and I’m always delighted when another turns up in the shop.
Just last month, in an auction lot, I came across one called ‘Open Road to Faraway – Escapes from Nazi POW Camps 1941-1945′ by Andrew S. Winton (Cualann Press, Dunfermline, 2001).

From the Biographical Note – ‘Andrew Winton, from the small village of Woolfords near Lanark, was a student at the Edinburgh College of Art before enlisting with the RAF soon after the outbreak of the Second World War. Shot down over Germany on 30th September 1941, he spent the next four years attempting to escape back home to his beloved Scottish moors. Each escape was, however, short-lived. Following one escape of seventeen days, he experienced the horrors of Buchenwald Concentration Camp – the worst few days of his life. The final stage of the war was fraught with hazards in the chaos that followed the German retreat.

Andrew’s love of [Robert] Burns’ poetry frequently sustained him in captivity.’
On the run after his final escape which involved being buried alive in a shallow grave, Andrew and his escaping companion managed to cross the fluctuating battle lines and link up with the Russians.

Sometimes amazing things happen in war such as the Christmas Truce on the Western Front in 1914 and Andrew Winton tells of a remarkable evening he experienced on the banks of the River Oder in July 1945. The following is an extract from Chapter 21 of his book.

Burns’ Night on the Oder

On and on we went, allowing nothing to hinder the drive to Berlin. Two days later, the only large obstacle on our way was the River Oder which was partly frozen over in places, with many of the bridges mined. The weather was atrocious; an inch of snow on side of our coats helped to keep us warm, but still it came, almost horizontally, driven by a very strong wind. We reached the river and drove into a large State farm where six tanks took up places on the open side, facing outwards, ready to move. We were inside a large courtyard with out-houses on each side for vehicles and storage for hay and straw. We slipped into a corner in the section of straw and booked a bed. Fired were being lit all round the open yard and clothes and coats were hung up on makeshift hangers to unfreeze and dry out. A large boiler of very thick soup arrived and we were allowed to fill up dixies. This was indeed very satisfying. We settled back in the straw, a bit drowsy and then a voice, a girl’s voice was heard.
‘Where is the Scotsman?’
I felt the hair on my neck rising, and wondered, ‘What next?’ I struggled to my feet, and there she stood, second-in-command of a Russian Women’s Tank Unit, a round muff hat on her head and looking very neat and official in a dark green uniform. She addressed me directly.
‘Do you know what week this is?’
Just a little bewildered, I shook my head.
‘This is Robert Burns’ week, and tonight you will recite his poetry and sing his songs. I will translate for all these people.’
My mind flashed back to my primary school. I was, for the first time, thankful for that ‘old Cooke’, the headmaster there, had driven me by fear of his tawse to learn and sing Burns’ works.
‘I do not know,’ I started to say, but was stopped by an imperious wave of a hand.
‘All my relations in Scotland can recite and sing our national Bard – where do you begin?’
Between twenty and thirty had gathered round our fire, and were told, ‘Andrew from Scotland will entertain.’ I took a step forward, dropped on one knee, scraped around as if I was catching something, picked up a handful of hay and stood up smoothing it in my hand into a small ball and started.

‘Wee, sleekit, courin’ tim’rous beastie,
O, whit a panic’s in thy breastie.’

I stopped, and the girl translated, and so I carried on, one line or two at a time. I missed out a verse here and there, but I finished the last two:

‘But mousie, thou are no’ thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain,
The best laid schemes o’ mice and men
Gang aft agley.’

The reception shook me. There was clapping and smiling and nodding: a complete understanding, and so I gave t hem ‘To a Daisy’. Next, the girl did some explaining before a cook came in with a large sausage.. I addressed the ‘haggis’, cut it into slices. Many came up, took a slice and went back and sat down facing me – they obviously wished for more. I walked round the front row, stopped beside a fair-haired girl, put out my hand and asked her to come forward. She assented (without knowing what was wanted) and we walked back to my stance. We turned round. I nodded to my interpreter, and began:

‘O, my luve is like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June.’

Line for line I said it, and slowly walked her back to where she had sad and then, in a very quite voice I began to sing.

‘And fare thee weel, my only luve,
And fare thee weel, a while!
And I will come again, my luve,
Tho’ it were ten thousand mile.’

Well, the applause was terrific. If this is what they want, I’ll be here all night, I thought. I’d better give them something else, and so I began again with the translation continuing until the last verse.

Is there for honest poverty
‘For a’ that, an a’ that,
That man to man the world o’er,
Shall brithers be for a’ that.’

Everybody stood up, shaking hands. Given a signal, they all sat down.
‘I will sing a song of Robert Burns,’ announced the second-in-command whose relatives had lived on the banks of Loch Ness, and who until this point had been translating the poems.
A trained voice sang out ‘Ye banks and braes o’ bonnie Doon’ in a language they all understood. On the second verse I joined in quietly, ‘la, la, la’ to the end, then she added, ‘We will sing it as Burns wrote it.’

‘Ye banks and braes. . .’

I sang the words in a low contralto, as I had heard it sung in the Hall at home. On the second verse, she took my hand and we wandered dreamily across the front. I smelled the briar and heard the birds singing. She pulled a rose and I pretended to put it into her hair and we finished the song in unison. There was a second or two of complete silence before everyone jumped up, clapping and chattering, touching each other, moving around us and trying to shake our hands. The numbers had doubled and they were all milling around and laughing with pleasure. I was completely shattered. Here was I, shut in which a group of people who had travelled hundreds of miles in tanks fitted with guns, with the sole intention of wreaking vengeance on a country that had dared to destroy them; and a freezing wind blowing snow from the Baltic ocean bringing everything to a standstill and kindly covering the dead and dying women and children lying in groups along the roadsides. And a sad little song with a Scottish air and words by Robert Burns, written two hundred years before, had changed the world around us!
I was uplifted and a bit dazed, and yes, I was proud – a sort of humble pride, pleased and delighted – and then two hands on my shoulders turned me round and my hands were taken in hers and an emotional voice spoke, ‘Tonight I am your Jean: tonight you are my Robert.’

Andrew Winton died just a few years after his book was published. Thanks are due to Cualann Press and Mr. Winton’s family for permission to publish this extract.

Clarence.

Bookshop

I attempt
to avert my eyes,
gazing I hope
in another compelling direction,
Or accelerating
with quickening pace
to purposefully stride
so briskly past.
Proceeding as if
some pressing appointment
were commanding
immediate attention.
A useless armour
that excuse
will prove to be
against those arrows,
For she is there
a temptress in full splendour
her windows
winking knowingly.

Nearhaund the Son o God

(Frae the Gaelic o Donnchadh MacRaoiridh, bard tae MacDonald o Sleat, sum tyme round about saxteen-ten)

Tak me wi Ye the Son o God
Tae be richt at Your side
And tae follow efter Ye,
Ma hert and luve sall byde.
For tae incaw* that throu-out tyme
Forenenst** Ye I sall be,
Nae mair tae brak Your Halie Law
Our sins Ye maun foregie.
Anither handsel† we wauld speir‡
The pouer tae grant Ye hae
That sauf our saul sad gang wi Ye
When corp is smoored i clay.
May saul until thon heich throne win
Tae tryst wi thaim that did it mak,
Sin Ye dae ken hou weil I staund
Lord tak me nou, o Lord please tak.

* pray
** facing
† gift
‡ ask

Both of these poems can be found in ‘Portrait of a Calvinist’ by Neil R MacCallum. Published by ‘Scots Independent’, Stirling 1991.

- Clarence

By page 4, Alice has met the Dodo(Liberal Prime Minister Asquith) and the following conversation takes place -

” Might I ask what sort of a bird you are?” Alice inquired.

“You might, and on the other hand you might not,” said the Bird very slowly. “As a matter of fact, I am a Dodo. I used to call myself a Liberal, some other people used to call me a Radical, and plenty of others used to call me everything they could lay their tongues to.”

“But I thought the Dodo was extinct,” said Alice.

“So it is,” said the Bird, “for the present, quite extinct. And there’s another extinct party somewhere about the garden. He’s called a Lory or a Tory, I forget which, and at the present moment he’s over there doing spade work. He’s busy burying the hatchet. We’re very friendly you know?”

“Indeed!” said Alice politely, “I thought you were great enemies.”

“So we were, so we were,” said the Dodo. “But now everything is different; we have no time to quarrel.”

“Not even about Ireland?” asked Alice.

“Ireland – now let me see,” said the Dodo. “Ah, yes,” he added after a pause; “now you mention it, there was some slight bickering in that quarter. I don’t clearly remember what the trouble was; but, anyhow, it’s all right now.”

“How is that?” asked Alice.

“It’s because of the war,” the Dodo explained. “I will tell you all about it in the simplest possible language. Listen carefully, and don’t interrupt -

“‘Twas dertag, and the slithy Huns
Did sturm and sturgel through the sludge;
All bulgous were the blunderguns,
And the bosch bombs outbludge.

“‘Beware the Ulsterman, my son -
The jaws that bite at kin and kith;
Beware the Carsonclan, and shun
The frumious Ridersmith.’

“He put his vetal schemes in hand;
Long time the welcome end he sought;
So rested he by the Redmond Tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

“And as in uffish thought he stood,
The Kaiserhog, with eyes of flame,
Came prumpling through the tulgey wood,
And blasphied as he came!

“One, two! Quick, quick! In half a tick,
The vetal schemes split far and wide.
Orange and green were promptly seen
Advancing side by side.

“‘And is the Kaiserhog at large?
Then show him to your blarney boy!
Oh, frabjous day! Hurroo! Hurray!
They chortled in their joy.

“‘Twas dertag, and the slithy Huns
Did sturm and sturgel through the sludge;
All bulgous were the blunderguns,
And the bosch bombs outbludge.”

“Thankyou very much,” said Alice; “it was kind of you to explain it to me. But it’s just a little difficult to understand, isn’t it?”

“Perhaps so,” said the Dodo.

The other bird was, of course, the Conservative leader Andrew Bonar Law.

A source no less than the head of British History at Edinburgh University tells me that ‘Ridersmith’ referred to at the end of the second verse …

"is F.E. Smith, later Lord Birkenhead, who (opportunistically) fell
in with his fellow lawyer, Edward Carson in 1912-14:  he was
nicknamed 'Galloper Smith' at this
time."

This little extract amuses me for two reasons.

The first , obviously, is that I am a Veda eating water buffalo from Ulster.

The second is that, at school, Jabberwocky(upon which the above poem is based),  was one of my favourite poems. My friends and I used to time each other to see who could recite Jabberwocky in the shortest time. Guess who holds the record – a tongue-tying 17.1 seconds?

Yours in Wonderland,

Clarence.

Jabberwocky

So, my story will begin with the iconic words ‘on a dark and fateful morning in the Savanna.’ I think that ‘once upon a time’ is a beginning appropriate for nitwits and girls with a deplorable princess fantasy. ‘As I walked out one Midsummer morning,’ is just about acceptable although promises a bucolic idyll which makes me want to sneeze.

So, I begin darkly as the sun is engorging the horizon and I find myself staring into the red face of a maniac with a gun. I stop to think, ‘he looks like a walrus with that moustache.’ That is my fatal mistake.

Clarence

[to be continued]

“To Claude S. Jackson. Coldstream Guards

From Archer Windsor-Clive
3rd Bn. Coldstream Guards
Windsor 1913

Killed in action with the 3rd Bn. at LANDRECIES.
August 25th 1914.“

The internet being the marvellous tool that it is, confirms some of these details and throws up more information.
Lt. Hon. Archer Windsor-Clive was born on 6 November 1890. He was the son of Robert George Windsor-Clive, 1st Earl of Plymouth. He attended Eton and played first class cricket for Cambridge University. The excellent Commonwealth War Graves Commission website gives more details of his death – http://www.cwgc.org/search/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=581548
Another site gives a quote from ‘Tommy Atkins at War’ by James Alexander Kilpatrick -

A sergeant of the Coldstream Guards, in an account given tothe Evening News, speaks of the death of CaptainWindsor-Clive. "We were sorry to lose Captain Clive, who,"he says, "was a real gentleman and a soldier. He wasknocked over by the bursting of a shell, which maddened ourfellows I can tell you."...........Many British soldierssuffered from the treachery of the Germans in wearingEnglish and French uniforms, and their letters home arefull of indignation at the practises of the enemy. It wasin the fighting following such a ruse at Landrecies thatthe Honorable Archer Windsor-Clive, of the ColdstreamGuards, met his death.

Tragically, another search on the CWGC site shows that the owner of the book and author of the inscription, Claude S.[Stewart] Jackson, was also killed in the Great War 3 years later in the mud of Flanders – http://www.cwgc.org/search/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=1633111

Clarence.

I come from Hevin to tell,
The best of Nowellis that ever befell:
To yow thir Tythinges trew I bring
And I will of them say and sing.

This Day to you is borne ane Childe,
Of Marie meike and Virgine mylde,
That blessit Barne bining and kynde
Sall yow rejoyce baith Heart and Mynd.

My Saull and Lyfe stand up and see
Quha lyes in ane Cribe of Tree,
Quhat Babe is that so gude and faire?
It is Christ, God’s Sonne and Aire.

O God that made all Creature,
How art thou becum so pure,
That on the Hay and Stray will lye,
Amang the Asses, Oxin, and Kye?

O my deir Hert, young Jesus sweit,
Prepare thy Creddill in my Spreit,
And I sall rocke thee in my Hert,
And never mair from thee depart.

But I sall praise thee ever moir
With sangs sweit unto thy Gloir,
The knees of my Hert sall I bow,
And sing that richt Balulalow*.

* Lullaby

This off-beat Edinburgh bookshop has a huge, wide ranging stock of second-hand and antiquarian books: just when you think you’ve scanned every shelf you find the stairs and realise there are four rooms in the basement. For the reader, there is a large stock of fiction and non-fiction; for the collector, a sizeable number of intriguing titles.

One basement room is rented by Alba Musick of Glasgow and is full of sheet music.

He who steals this book
may he die the death
may he be frizzled in the pan…

Steal not this book, my worthy friend
For fear the gallows will be your end;
Up the ladder, and down the rope,
There you’ll hang until you choke;
Then I’ll come along and say -
“Where’s that book you stole away?”

For him that Stealeth a Book from this Library,
Let it change into a Serpent in his hand & rend him.
Let him be struck with Palsy, & all his Members blasted.
Let him languish in Pain crying aloud for Mercy,
Let there be no Surcease to his Agony till he sink to Dissolution.
Let Bookworms gnaw his Entrails in token of the Worm that dieth not,
When at last he goeth to his final Punishment,
Let the flames of hell consume him for ever & aye.

Ouch!

Clarence.

Of course there’s one thing that takes priority over Radio 3, Radio 4, Van the Man, Dylan, Billie Holliday or whatever and that’s Test Match Special. What a joy work is when I can sit and listen to the wit and wisdom of Aggers, Blowers or Vic, the dulcet tones of Sir Vivian Richards, Colin Croft, Barry Richards,Brian Waddell et al.

now playing…..Sufjan Stevens “Come on feel the Illinoise“

p.s 5.01pm – ‘Hymns to the Silence ‘ has just been returned!

p.p.s. Check out – http://www.sambakermusic.com/