Looking Up The Noses of the Dead and Dying

Once upon a time, newsreaders sat at desks and, decked in the nattiest tweeds and with the crispest hairdos, would tell the story of the world's ills. Their deportment was often graver than the news reported, but that was to be expected. 

But not no more. 

It seems to be that since television channels have proliferated (and with little effort I have 80 or 90 channels that I never watch instead of just two or three) that the programmes that they broadcast have had to try very hard to stand out from the pack. New programmes are no different. 

No more Angela Ripon. No more Alistair Burnett. No more that bloke who went on to present Treasure Hunt with Anneka Rice's bum. Even the lovely Moira Stewart is relegated to early-time radio (though seems to have far more fun with Mr Evans et al than ever she did before a camera). Things changed and Terry Lloyd became the first symptom of this new style or reporting the news. 

Now me, I am happy to take the word of the Orla Guerins and Fergal Keanes of this world when they say that terrible things happened in the far flung places of the world. I am happy at that. They tell me a tale, I will take it as reported (foolishly perhaps, you may say), but that is no longer sufficient for the world's audience. 

A little while ago, some vile people blew up some innocent people in their cars. There was all the carnage that you might expect, with some hapless TV news reporter reporting it to the world, flak-jacket adorned, mid-carnage, stepping over smouldering bits of metal and rubber and dead people. I have seen enough mid-cremated human bodies to know what they look like, and at 6pm (or a similarly early hour in the evening) I beheld the smouldering and hard-to-identify remain of three separate people. The reporter stated the obvious - that people died - and did so treading on and pushing past their remains. 

Then you get the other phenomenon - the reporter dodging actual 'murder-death-kill' bullets so that the news is coming from the armpit of the local militia. Not satisfied with being close enough to the action to hear it, they become part of the problem and a person needful of bodily protection, so that they can assume the physical space of the purported victims. "Look at me, I am going to be shot at now...". Why? Why? Why?

Is it me? Is it my fault (as a member of the news consuming public) that apparently sensible people have to actually risk actual life to tell me a story. Only recently a eye-patched reporter was atomised out of existence to the consternation of many praying Christians who seemed to want to hold vigils and the like for her. Why was she in harm's way? She was a reporter, not a peace-keeper. Are reporters required to be action heroes?

Terry Lloyd's daughter (whom I have met, and she is very pleasant) lost a father because of what? The news headlines that I have long forgotten! Is it me? Watch this space as we prepare to have Coffin-Cam and the dishevelled figure of a journo descending into the ground as s/he sits atop the descending casket of a famous dead person. Mark my words, it'll happen.

What Did You Do Today?

As a man of 38 years of age, the World Wars are part of my history, the subject of pages in books. For reasons that I can't fully grasp, the events that cause us all to remember today are now a part of my present for the first time.

At 11 o'clock I was with my family, in a public place, where we all observed the two-minute silence. For me it was the right place to be with the right people - my family; my loved ones. I held my daughter tight as I gave thanks to countless lost youngsters for the sacrifice upon which my freedom and my family are now built. 

I pondered those youngsters who, like my great-granadad, went over the top at the Somme. I am probably twice the age that they were then. I remember war films where the actors  portrayed war heroes as rugged men who even now seem older than me - but I am not convinced. The lads who today would be the hoodies that so many deride were the kids who were given a gun and a duty to defend something. They were scared, fighting against other youngsters who were scared too. Many had left girlfriends behind, and many families that should have found life like mine has were never given that chance. Babies that should have been born to happy couples were never concieved; futures evapourated in the squalor and mud of a field.

I looked at my brown-eyed girls today and dedicated that very moment to the men and women whose lost lives guaranteed mine, whose own futures were sacrificed that my own family had that gift. I realised in that moment too that I had a price to pay - and that was to ensure that as far as I could, the generation of little ones among whom my children number remember too. I pray that wars may cease, that the lessons of countless millions of needless deaths be learned, that war be something only a history teacher should teach. 

Always remember and never forget - that is our job. That is our price and our children's price, to acknowledge what you did today and know that it came at a great cost.

In Remembrance

"When you see that old man walking a little bent, just think he was once a proud young matloe [the nickname for a sailor] swinging along, head held high. When you sit next to him in church and see tears in his eyes when he sings “oh hear us when we pray to thee, for those in peril on the sea” – his thoughts go out to the night he was torpedoed and still hears those cries for help – he survived, but he will always remember those cries.

The man down the road who tells you about his army days ay “Cassino” and the day he went back to the scene of the “battle” [otherwise known as the Battle of Rome, 1944] many years later – he remembers the shattered monastery rebuilt, how lovely it looks, how peaceful; now the organ playing; a place for prayer and outside just the song of the birds. He looks around at the hills and sees the Polish cemetery now so serene and peaceful and then he goes down the hill and sees the German cemetery – he says a prayer for them. They were only lads like himself doing their duty for their country. Then on to the British and Commonwealth cemetery where he sees a headstone that bears a name he knows. He stops to says ‘hello’ and on and on to see many more names and thinks what a lovely cemetery this is, we have done these boys proud – but with tears in his eyes – he thinks of his son and daughter, his grandchildren and then of the families of those boys and what might have been.

Perhaps, when you are walking the dog near that old airfield, you saw a man standing looking at the old ‘dispersal bay’ and then towards the old billets, now derelict. He thinks to himself ‘that was once my home’; he thinks of the good times and the sad times and of the empty beds (usually seven); he looks towards the control tower and can still hear the WAAFs voice calling them home. Now his eyes look to the skies, he is thinking of his old “Lanc” can hear the sound of the Merlins and a feeling of tense fear and excitement runs though his body – he is now on his way to Germany and now back again, sitting down to hot tea, egg and bacon. But he thinks of the last night he saw the dispersal bay – the night he lost six of his best friends. The target was Karlsruhe. One moment they were a crew – a team – and then fate stepped in and the Lancaster was just a ball of fire hurtling earthwards. He still can’t believe how, with his parachute still intact, he was thrown into the air. He is now thinking how lucky he was to be a P.O.W. as now he can come back and look at the old airfield, but now his thoughts go back again to Germany and the boys in that row of graves, and although he had known them only a short time, what a privilege it was to claim them as friends.

Let’s also think of the S.O.E. agents [Special Operations Executive], Odette, Violette Szabo and many more, the Special Duties Squadrons that took them into enemy territory. Theirs was a very silent war and so often forgotten.

As we remember of servicemen let’s not forget the man down the road. When asked what he did, he says “well, I was a firemen”: he didn’t tell you of the days and nights he spent away from home, fire-fighting in London, Portsmouth, Coventry etc. – the smell of death, the bombs still falling; the same goes for so many more unsung heroes who gave so much – the police, ARP, Home Guard, WVS, nurses, doctors, ambulance crews, Salvation Army, Church Army, the clergy, all transport workers, munitions, parachute and clothing workers, the Land Army and so many more. Let us also not forget the brave Merchant Seamen, the evacuees and those who took them in – so many brave people, so many more names. Not forgetting the people who were bombed out of their homes but still kept cheerful, the people who took them in, the refugees from Europe.

At remembrance time let us think of those men and women of all wars, past and present, the people maimed by war and still suffering to this day. Think of the widows and families, especially those too old to visit the graves of their loved ones. Also think of those people who work for the Commonwealth War Graves Commission who tend those graves so lovingly.

So, when some old “codger” takes a little longer to get on the bus, or pack his trolley in the supermarket, let’s not say, “come on granny or grandad”, but think: these were the same men and women who, when their country called said ‘here we are!’

...instead let us say “thank you, granny and grandad”

 This piece was written in the 1980s by Ricky Dyson and his wife Mavis. Ricky was a rear-gunner on the Lancaster Bombers during the Second World War, and was one of a very few who survived. He was decorated with the George Cross for his bravery. Ricky died some time after writing this piece, though Mavis is still a member of our church family. Ricky was a true hero of the War, and I dedicate this post to him, his friends, and all the fallen in our World Wars.