Trafalgar School - Echoes Yearbook (Montreal, Quebec Canada)

Page 31 text:

TO THE EMPRESS OF BRITAIN O mighty steel-wrought form! and art thou dead? And art thou lying useless in the deep? Full fifty fathoms down thy noble head Is resting on the sand as though asleep. With fishes darting o ' er thy slumbering form. Quite unaware of all thy majesty And power and strength, O wondrous to behold! As when thou rode the angry surging sea. Thy sister ships are mourning thee for lost But some hour soon thy awesome bulk, O queen! Will graceful rise from out the foamy deep. Will rise again, and once again be seen Proudly, more steadfast yet, riding the waves . . . Those waves unceasing, tireless, never still. Beating like life-blood on our country ' s shore On the proud cliffs, that flank the southern strand. The clifl s of Albion, Beachy Head, and more Of those great rocks, impregnable and firm. Guarding our England, earning a country ' s love Love that is rooted deep in all English hearts Thankful for strong protection — England ' s love. See, what thou hast to live for, mighty queen. Live for old England, come in thy might once more. Aid that great Empire, help her in hour of need, Lend her thine aid as thou didst in the days of yore. Marigold Charlesworth, Form IVb, Ross House. THE FREE FRENCH FORCES LAST June 18th, just before France asked for an armistice. General Charles de Gaulle broadcast an appeal to all Frenchmen saying: France ha s lost a battle, but France has not lost the war! . . . That is why I ask all Frenchmen, wherever they may be, to unite with me in action, in sacrifice and in hope — Our country is in danger of death — Let us fight to save it! At this call, thousands of men flocked to join him and began to form the essen- tially democratic army known as the Free French Forces. In this army are representa- tives of all creeds and parties, united by the common aim of helping England to win the war, thus living up to France ' s glorious tradition of fighting for democracy against overwhelming ambition which o ' erleaps itself , and kicking the Boche out of France. General Charles de Gaulle, the head of this movement was the one superior officer in France who really understood what this war was going to be like. As early as 1934, [29]

Page 30 text:

time novelists and historians may find their most valuable information in the letters of our period. How true it is that letters reveal human lives at their most characteristic, their most glorious, and their most terrible moments . Our thoughts go back to some of the memorable letters that have come down to us, written in the dark hours of other days. We recall the letters of the Apostle Paul in his captivity at Rome to the early Christians of Corinth and Philippi, especially the one written just before his death — I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. There is the letter of Mary Queen of Scots, written in a steady hand to her brother-in-law, Henry III of France, two hours after midnight before Elizabeth ' s soldiers took her to her death in the Hall of Fotheringham. There is the letter of Raleigh, written in the Tower of London, bidding farewell to his wife a few hours before he expected to be executed. Yours that was, but not now my own, he signs himself. There are the historic letters of Abraham Lincoln, particularly the one of consolation to the American mother on her loss of five sons in the Civil War — how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine in the face of such sacrifice for a great cause . Then there is the letter found beside the frozen body of the Antarctic explorer. Captain Scott, in which he declared that these rough notes and our dead bodies must tell the tale of an heroic adventure to the Souh Pole. Reading these letters again one seems to see the pages of history silently and swiftly turning. So it will be: the letters of today are the history of tomorrow. For at a time when literature itself has almost vanished from Europe obscure people are writing with their blood and tears a story for the ages. Mary Mitham, Form IVb, Ross House. PARADES Flags flying, bands playing, the tread of marching feet, Row upon row of Empire men swinging down Regent Street; Englishmen, Canadians, and brave Australians too. Going to fight, and die, and win for the old Red, White and Blue. Guns booming, carts creaking, faces pale and still. Long trains of refugees winding up a hill; All bewildered, hardly caring where they have to go. Hatred deep and lasting the only thing they know. Winds blowing, sand stinging, all so hot and dry. Lines of desert prisoners slowly shuffling by; Faces haggard, shoulders drooping, Italy ' s Empire lost. Never knowing why they fought, not questioning the cost. Some day our flags will wave on high, and we will shout and sing. Bands will play, our soldiers cheer, and all the bells will ring. Forgetting all we had to do, the sacrifices we made, O how proudly we will join the victory parade ! Harriet Anderson, Form IVa, Barclay House. [28]

Page 32 text:

he published a book in which he stated that the army of the next war would be a fast moving unit made up largely of tanks and armoured cars, and he pointed out where the weak points in Frances ' defence-line lay and how it could be remedied. General Guderian, a German officer, understood his theory and put it into execution under the name of the Panzer division. Although he acknowledged many times his indebtedness to General de Gaulle, nobody in France took it seriously, and people went on thinking that there was nothing to fear because the Maginot line was there. Later, in January 1940, he sent a memorandum to the same effect to Messrs. Daladier, Reynaud, Gamelin and Weygand, but this again was disregarded. General de Gaulle ' s personal courage is as remarkable as his foresight. In the 1914- 1918 war he was wounded twice and captured by the Ger mans. And in this war it is, I think, significant that the very General Weygand who had condemned his theories and who is now one of the most important men in the Vichy regime, cited General de Gaulle in his order of the day of May 31st, 1940 as this admirable, audacious and energetic leader. Many men of valour and repute have rallied to General de Gaulle ' s side, too many to enumerate here, but this would be no true picture of the Free French Forces if I did not mention Vice-Admiral Muselier, head of the Free French Navy and Air Forces. To serve under these officers men escape every day from France by all possible means. The tale of each new escape shows more courage than that of the previous one and I want to relate two which are particularly noteworthy. One concerns a young man who for months stole parts from the neighbouring aeroplane factory and built himself a ' plane. Then, choosing a stormy night so as to be less easily spotted by the German patrols he took off and managed to reach England without even having tested the machine before. The other is about some men who lived in the Ardeche, and had never seen the sea in all their lives. Yet they achieved the feat of passing from unoccupied to occupied France, escaping from the jail into which they were thrust by the Germans for not having the proper papers, stealing a sailing boat and reaching England after a ten-day sea-voyage. These men sound brave, yet this kind of adventure is not really the difficult part for most of them; the true hardship is that they must leave their families without even the consolation of an occasional letter; for the Nazis have issued a decree that they will seize and torture the wife or child or a close relative of any man who keeps up the fight against them. Even the Vichy government condemns as traitors those who join the British and General de Gaulle has been sentenced to death for rebelling against the defeatist orders and continuing the fight. For this reason most of them sign up under the name of the French Free Forces, although knowing that if they are killed, their family will never know when or where. A few months ago these men numbered 35,000 soldiers and sailors and 1,000 airmen. They have tanks, armored cars, 80 naval units and 50 merchantmen. To this is daily added the various boats in which the people of the coastal regions escape to England. A great many of these are fishermen who know the Channel waters better than any one else and are therefore invaluable for the obscure but dangerous task of mine-sweeping. [30]