Acknowledgments
While it may sound cliché, it is nonetheless true that this book is the product of a tremendous amount of generous support and encouragement from many people. My greatest thanks will always go to Dr. Stephen D. White, who took a chance on me as a graduate student at Emory University. His kind guidance, lengthy conversations, and constant support went well beyond what a graduate student could expect, much less deserved. His mentorship has never ceased. I truly cannot thank him enough, and these words are inadequate in that regard. I was also very fortunate to have many other wonderful teachers and fellow graduate students, not to mention financial and institutional support, to help me during my dissertation, a part of which forms this book.
I am also tremendously grateful to my many wonderful current colleagues and academic friends. The people in my department have always been there to help me both professionally and personally. It has always been a wonderfully supportive and collegial environment. I am always very grateful to friends I have made in the profession, from those local who listen to me vent to those further away who I’ve known over a decade and can help me celebrate each small victory. Thank you.
Finally, I want to thank my family. My parents clearly did a tremendous amount right; how many can boast that all three of their daughters ended up with PhDs? While you do not get to pick your family, I would pick each one of them again and again. Thank you especially to my husband. You have carried much of the weight of this project from trips away to late nights. I could not have done it without your constant love and support.
The love of God unutterable and perfect, flows into a pure soul the way that light rushes into a transparent object. The more love it finds, the more it gives itself; so that, as we grow clear and open, the more complete the joy of loving is. And the more souls who resonate together, the greater the intensity of their love, for, mirror-like, each soul reflects the other.—Dante
AbbreviAtions
EH Chibnall, Marjorie, trans. and ed. The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis. 6 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
GG William of Poitiers. The “Gesta Guillelmi” of William of Poitiers. Edited and translated by R.H.C. Davis and Marjorie Chibnall. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998.
GND Van Houts, Elizabeth, trans. and ed. The “Gesta Normannorum Ducem” of William of Jumieges, Orderic Vitalis, and Robert of Torigni. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992.
GRA William of Malmesbury. Gesta Regnum Anglorum. Edited and translated by R.M. Thomson, R.A.B. Mynors, and M. Winterbottom. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
HA Henry of Huntingdon. Historia Anglorum. Edited and translated by Diana Greenway. Oxford Medieval Texts. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996.
HN Dudo of St. Quentin. History of the Normans. Edited and translated by Eric Christiansen. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1998.
HNov William of Malmesbury. Historia Novella. Edited by Edmund King. Translated by K.R. Potter. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998.
PL Patrologia cursus completes, series Latina. Edited by Jacques-Paul Migne. 221 vols. Paris: Petit-Montrouge, 1844–1864.
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
During the Norman rebellions led by Robert Curthose (c. 1051–1134) and Robert Bellême (c. 1056–c. 1130), Orderic Vitalis (1075–c. 1142), an Anglo-Norman chronicler of the monastery of Saint-Évroul, tells us that Bishop Serlo of Sèez (d. 1123) used Easter services to address King Henry I (r. 1100–1135) of England.1 In front of the other worshipers, Orderic claims that Bishop Serlo began to complain quite publicly and dramatically about all the harm that the rebels were causing his parishioners. Orderic writes, “Sighing long and sadly, he said to the king, who had humbly taken his seat with some of his magnates at the end of the church among the boxes of the peasants, ‘All Christians should mourn in their hearts to see the Church trodden underfoot and the wretched people destroyed. … [I]ndeed, all Normandy, dominated by godless bandits, is without a true ruler.’”2 Orderic notes that Bishop Serlo proceeded to describe several specific acts that he thought were particularly egregious, such as the burning of churches and killing of unarmed peasants. In the speech Orderic has constructed for him, he attributes these outrages to Robert Curthose’s lack of effective rule. According to Orderic, he exclaims, “When the ruler is foolish the whole province is in danger and the wretched people suffer utter deprivation.”3 Orderic then ends this scene by having Serlo issue a final, desperate plea. “‘I address them too, my lord king, to your ears,” Serlo said, “so that your spirit may be kindled by the zeal of God to imitate Phineas [Numbers 25:7–8] and Mattathias [Maccabees 2:24] and his sons.
© The Author(s) 2019 K. McGrath, Royal Rage and the Construction of Anglo-Norman Authority, c. 1000-1250, Palgrave Studies in the History of Emotions, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11223-3_1
K. MCGRATH
Rise up boldly in the name of God … Just king, in this dire distress of your native land, ‘become angry’ [irascere] to some purpose and as, David, prophet and king, teaches, ‘sin not’ by taking up arms not for lust of earthly power but for the defense of your country.”4 By quoting Psalm 4, Orderic confirms the view that humans could get angry without sinning, provided they conformed to models of Biblical anger. He is suggesting that if Henry took action, in this case violent action, to suppress the rebellion that he would be following the model established by the great kings of the Bible, and thereby, demonstrating the righteousness of his rule.5 Orderic Vitalis has constructed an elaborate justification for Henry to not only experience anger but also to display his anger in violence. By doing so, Orderic implies that Henry would be restoring royal leadership to Normandy, as Serlo’s speech suggests that Henry’s failure to display his anger would confirm that Normandy currently lacked a true ruler.6
This story is just one of many in Anglo-Norman and Northern French historical writings by ecclesiastical authors who represented anger as an essential element in the politics of eleventh- and twelfth-century England and Normandy. Ecclesiastical historians, such as Orderic, Dudo of St. Quentin (c. 960–1026), William of Jumièges (d. c. 1070), William of Poitiers (c. 1020–1090), William of Malmesbury (c. 1095–1143), and Henry of Huntingdon (c. 1088–1157), repeatedly explained why conflicts broke out, how they were conducted, and by what means they were ended by reference to the anger of the participants.7 In fact, they consistently refer to these episodes in a manner that has the effect of constructing a cycle for the expression of anger in which kings get angry, act out in anger, and then release their anger to make peace. In the story related above, Orderic seems to be offering King Henry broad authority to take military action as part of his exercise of kingship. Such references to anger in medieval stories about conflict are ubiquitous. In surveying Latin and Old French texts, scholars have noted how frequently anger is treated as a motivating force in politics in histories, royal biographies, saints’ lives, episcopal letters, and other kinds of Latin texts, as well as in French epics and romances.8 The common attribution of anger to kings in eleventhand twelfth-century Anglo-Norman texts surely suggests that their authors valued it as an important component in characterizing royal decisionmaking and royal actions.9 Lindsay Diggelman suggests referring to this as “emotional kingship.”10 Scholars, then, need to understand what role anger rhetoric plays in the construction of models of kingship in these narratives.
This work seeks to understand how eleventh- and twelfth-century Anglo-Norman ecclesiastical authors attributed emotions to kings in the exercise of their duties and how such attributions related to larger expansions of royal authority. It posits that ecclesiastical writers used their works to legitimize certain displays of royal anger, often resulting in violence, while at the same time deploying a shared emotional language that also allowed them to condemn other types of displays. The theological ambivalence toward anger made it a useful tool for ecclesiastics to use to evaluate royal actions. Its classification as one of the so-called Seven Deadly Sins meant that it could be used to condemn blameworthy or excessive behavior; at the same time, its attribution to the saints—and even God— made it possible to also characterize kings as wielders of divine vengeance in other contexts.11 As a result, the examination of how these authors attribute the emotion of anger to royal actions allows us to better understand contemporary ecclesiastical responses to the growth of royal authority and centralization in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.
I argue that attributions of anger were used as important markers in Anglo-Norman historical narratives in order to distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate displays of violence and ultimately the exercise of royal power.12 Anger was used by ecclesiastical historians to provide greater legitimacy for the exercise of royal prerogatives by labeling their actions as not only just but even often righteous.13 At the same time, however, ecclesiastical historians also used it to comment on what they saw as necessary restraints and limits on royal power. I argue that appropriate and inappropriate displays fit a pattern in that these historians consistently mark similar displays as either appropriate or inappropriate, and, therefore, they reveal underlying social norms for honorable royal behavior.14
Ecclesiastical writers do not discuss royal anger in a political vacuum, as many of the episodes for appropriate or inappropriate anger occur in situations dealing with the contemporary aristocracy. As we see in the example above, Orderic Vitalis has Bishop Serlo demand royal actions against what he sees as the out of control behavior of Robert Curthose and Robert of Bellême. These texts, then, also focus on the appropriate relationships between kings and their nobility. Such attention is, perhaps, not surprising, as royal expansion often came at the expense of aristocratic privileges. What is noteworthy, however, is that in constructing these episodes, ecclesiastical historians provide insight into the relationship between kings and nobles. Moreover, they comment on whether kings are models of the behaviors and sentiments expected of a ruler. Understanding how and
K. MCGRATH
why ecclesiastical historians attributed anger to kings, then, allows important insight into the development and contestations of models of kingship in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, as well as into larger discussions of the evolution of norms for aristocratic feuding and warfare.
I should be clear that this study only examines the attribution of anger to kings. Like most aspects of medieval history—and society more broadly—much of the experience and expression of emotions were certainly gendered.15 While this work will touch on these considerations in the context of specific episodes and examples, the focus, however, is directly on the masculine construction of anger and its call for the appropriate masculine displays of prowess and violence in response. While the construction of queens’ anger is certainly important and needed, it is not in the purview of this analysis. As a result, we will only be looking at the history of the emotions of Anglo-Norman kings.
To that end, I argue that ecclesiastical writers of eleventh- and twelfthcentury Anglo-Norman and Northern French historical narratives imputed anger of one kind or another to kings for the purposes of explicitly characterizing and evaluating their conduct and of implicitly commenting on the expansion of royal authority during the period. As Geoffrey White argues, “Emotions glossed as anger frequently encode judgments about violations of person and moral order. In light of these understandings, talk about anger becomes an idiom for moral argumentation: it signals the perception of transgression and the possibility of corrective action.”16 Though there are many ways in which Orderic’s depiction of the call for anger in the opening passage can be interpreted, I will argue that we should pay attention to both the language and imagery used to represent anger and to the way in which anger encoded customary conventions for social behavior. The ubiquity and consistency of the terminology and rhetoric used to signify anger across this whole body of ecclesiastical texts suggests that we should consider passages that represent anger as not merely descriptive of a given subject’s emotional state or mood. Instead, eleventh- and twelfth-century ecclesiastical authors imputed anger to the subjects of their histories in such a way as to bring out their moral character and to evaluate their actions, and they did so by following conventional language for the discussion of anger. They portrayed individuals in their narratives who displayed anger in ways that they implicitly characterized as honorable and righteous in a favorable light, but they condemned individuals who displayed anger in ways that they
characterized as shameful or unrighteous or whose anger drove them to excessive violence.
I argue, moreover, that by distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate displays of anger, ecclesiastical authors implicitly constructed formulaic scenarios of exemplary social behavior, which show how these authors expected kings to express their emotions in disputes. Ecclesiastical authors, whether implicitly or explicitly, inscribed in their narratives what we may call the cycle of anger—stimulus, experience, expression, action, response, and reconciliation—in what are surely model episodes. Such stories about appropriate and inappropriate displays of anger served both to instruct people by stating what they should and should not do and to show people how they should or should not act by presenting them with examples of good and honorable displays of anger and bad and shameful displays of anger. Ecclesiastical authors, therefore, emphasized how people expressed their anger through action; by doing so, they provided evidence from which modern scholars can infer the existence of models of righteous kings acting in ways that ought to be emulated and models of bad kings acting in ways that should be shunned. Therefore, we should interpret representations of anger as more than transparent descriptions of mood; they were assessments of people and of behavior that were based on established or emerging social conventions.
In this work, I am particularly interested in how ecclesiastical historians imputed anger to kings to legitimize or condemn acts of violence for which they were responsible.17 As Catherine Peyroux notes, “Many researchers further include in anger’s essential definition a prerogative over the moral domain. This framework of understanding attributes to anger an inherent claim about some sense of ‘ought,’ so as to capture the aspect of anger that stems as a response to some sense of what is felt to be ‘unjustifiable’ harm.”18 Because ecclesiastical authors distinguished between acceptable and unacceptable expressions of anger, it is possible to surmise some of the implicit norms for how ecclesiastical authors expected kings to behave. In other words, when Orderic has Bishop Serlo exhort King Henry I to take actions against his brother and the other Norman rebels, we may reasonably conclude that Orderic believed that this was how Henry ought to have responded to the bishop’s pleas. This work, in short, will infer some of the social conventions surrounding how ecclesiastical authors imputed anger to contemporary kings through the representation of their, often violent, behavior.
K. MCGRATH
Framework For InterpretIng emotIons
Before turning to the texts themselves, it is important to first address the framework for interpreting the use of emotions in historical texts.19 Some of the earliest historians to discuss emotions in medieval Europe read these texts as windows into medieval interiority, as transparent descriptions of what medieval individuals actually felt. Scholars such as Johan Huizinga and Marc Bloch concluded that medieval people were highly emotional— indeed, too emotional—that they were like children who could not repress their own anger or the violent impulses with which it was associated. Their approach has been labeled by scholars as the hydraulic model of emotions, because it assumes that emotions are always trying to burst out of oneself, and they must be tightly reined in by self-control. In this model, premodern people were not as readily able to do so. In his famous study, The Autumn of the Middle Ages, Huizinga characterized the emotions of fifteenth-century nobles as “both starkly polarized and highly unstable.”20 Moreover, he notes that “the contrast between suffering and joy, between adversity and happiness, appeared more striking. All experience had yet to the minds of men the directness and absoluteness of the pleasure and pain of child-life.”21 Bloch speculatively identified various reasons for what he saw as the overemotional sensitivity of medieval people, noting that “the irrational is an important element in all history.”22 For him, the main cause was the poor standard of living at this time, which made medieval people easily susceptible to passions and woes. Their poor diet, bad hygiene, and close and constant proximity to random acts of violence produced “perpetual insecurity.”23 According to both scholars, medieval culture imposed few constraints on the expression of emotions, which served as the motivating force for politics and behavior.24
Arguments such as these about the emotionalism of medieval society served as a basis for Norbert Elias’s later contention that early modern court culture civilized society and led to the repression of the emotionalism that characterized medieval societies.25 In short, Elias posited that the rise of early modern court society and its elaborate social etiquette served to restrain the uncontrolled impulses of medieval people.26 According to Elias, “Rapine, battle, hunting of men and animals—all these were vital necessities which, in accordance with the structure of society, were visible to all. And thus, for the mighty and strong, they formed part of the pleasures of life.”27 This gratuitous anarchy and violence were possible, he claims, because there was no “punitive social power” to stop their force,
except perhaps through those who were stronger and still more barbaric.28 Ultimately, the failure of Elias’ argument is that it rested on a false dichotomy between mind/body or emotions/reason. Damien Boquet and Piroska Nagy argue that the problem for historians of Elias’ generation was that they had internalized the hydraulic model of emotions, and they had linked the development of states, liberal democracies in particular, to the application of reason and science. For them, states demonstrated their authority and legitimacy by removing emotions from governance. These historians, then, failed to understand how the state is also part of the production of emotions and regulation of what William Reddy has called “emotional regimes,” or the sponsorship and policing of certain emotions and certain types of emotional displays.29
J.E.A. Jolliffe was one of the first to argue that royal anger was more than excessive emotions and was an important component of Angevin kingship. Royal anger, he maintained, was an extension of the king’s will, as the monarch simultaneously withdrew his benevolentia—that is, his favor and protection—from a subject or group of subjects and in its place, expressed ira et malevolentia—that is, his anger and enmity. According to Jolliffe, the phrase “anger and ill-will”—which is found in many different kinds of legal texts, political narratives, and literary works—did not simply designate an emotional state, though Angevin kings were certainly famous for their rages; the king’s anger and ill-will constituted a political tool for effective rule that always involved a threat of violence and sometimes violence itself.30 Anger and ill-will “would be less worth attention,” he writes, “if they had not an active, punitive, counterpart, which had as really and still more deeply its share in the inner craft of Angevin kingship.”31 The king’s expression of anger and malevolence at his enemies was so effective because contemporaries regarded its expression, within certain limits, as a just manifestation of the king’s will.32 In Angevin England, royal anger became more formalized with the regular payment of fines by individuals wishing to avoid or pacify the malevolentia regis and regain the king’s protection from lawsuits or violence from their enemies.33 Instead of expressing the king’s true feelings of rage and hostility, then, Jolliffe argues that this kind of royal anger was a political instrument that the king used in forging political alliances, undermining the position of adversaries, dispensing and withholding patronage, and executing other political policies.
In recent years, there has been an explosion in the scholarship on the history of emotions in general. Several journals have even dedicated whole volumes to exploring its history, and publishers have commissioned series
K. MCGRATH
for its study, such as this Palgrave series.34 There has also been the establishment of major academic centers for the study of the history of emotions, such as the Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions or Ute Frevert’s project on history of emotions at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development. Much of this recent work has sought to refute the view that people in the past were less equipped to process or repress their emotions. These scholars argue instead that we need to understand how people in the past understood emotional experiences and expressions in their own terms. In general, scholars tend to take one of three approaches to analyzing the history of emotions: universalist, constructionist, and a hybrid that combines biology and sociology.
Some favor the universalist approach that uses neuroscience to argue the biological basis for emotions and their expressions as part of a shared humanity.35 Starting with Paul Ekman’s work with facial expressions in New Guinea, this approach argues for the evolutionary development of emotions, and as such, the universality of emotions and emotional displays across human societies.36 Since emotions evolved early in the development of Homo sapiens, according to advocates, they are, therefore, similar across time and space, and it is possible to use research from modern neuroscience and psychology to understand emotions in the past. And so, these scholars do not believe that emotions have changed significantly over time.
In the case of anger, scholars have highlighted its role in communicating threats and, therefore, survival. As Daniel Lord Smail suggests, “moral sentiments of hatred and anger evolved in the ancestral environment of Homo sapiens for specific reasons having to do with the formation of groups, the punishment of non-cooperative freeloaders, and the pursuit of status.”37 Some neuroscientists have labeled this the “Anger Superiority Effect.”38 It suggests that people have an inherent tendency to notice people who are exhibiting angry facial expressions in a crowd or other public setting to a greater extent than other facial expressions. Jennifer Lerner and Larissa Tiedens explain, “Angry faces are spotted quickly and mistakes are rarely made regarding them, as compared with other emotion expressions. … Angry expressers are implicitly perceived as threatening, competent, powerful, and dominant, while sad expressers, by comparison, are perceived as likeable, submissive, and in need of help.”39 This model might suggest why medieval authors scripted anger in certain ways; it suggests they delineated emotions in ways that all
humans readily processed and understood.40 By appearing angry, the king would have elevated himself into a position of power; by appearing sad and mournful, the petitioner would have emphasized his or her submission and need.41 As a result, the “motivational aspect of anger readies the individual to act in order to change the situation, remove the problematic components, and re-establish the situation that existed prior to the offense.”42 In other words, expressions of anger from a biological standpoint are an impetus for action to remedy the source of the displeasure. The somatic features of anger, including elevations of adrenaline level in the body, then, serve as convenient explanations for aggression and violence. In Daniel Smail’s view of emotions, anger was an essential element in early human survival, and as such, it was hardwired in the body, often unconsciously. He contends, “Recent work in neuropsychology and neurophysiology has shown that [emotions] are physiological entities, characteristically located in specific parts of the brain and put there by natural selection. Some of them, including emotions, are relatively automated, no different from the other areas of life governance— basic metabolism, reflexes, pain, pleasure, drives, motivations—that are routinely handled by the brain in all hominoids.”43 He continues, “The existence of brain structures and body chemicals means that predispositions and behavioral patterns have a universal biological substrate that simply cannot be ignored.”44
One problem with this approach, however, is that it fails to explain difference in emotional expressions. If humans across time and space all exhibit one set of universal emotions, then how do we explain differences in how these emotions are displayed or what precipitated the experience of certain emotions? The universalist approach, then, removes historical change from the study of emotions altogether.45 The evidence from countless studies in the history of emotions demonstrates clearly the vast diversity in the expression of emotions across time and space. The way in which emotions are described and emotional displays are characterized varies widely between different cultures; even what is an emotion varies across different societies.
Moreover, Paul Ekman, one of the strongest advocates for the universality of human emotions, waivered on what should even be considered a basic, core emotion. He originally argued for six basic emotions—anger, disgust, fear, sadness, surprise, and happiness—and five additional possible emotions—contempt, guilt, embarrassment, awe, and shame. He then later advocated for five basic emotions—anger, disgust, fear, sadness, and
K. MCGRATH
happiness—and three additional possible emotions—shame, contempt, and surprise.46 Other scientists have also strongly questioned and rejected Ekman’s conclusions. J. van Brakel proves a cross-cultural analysis of studies on emotions to show how highly contextual they are. In particular, he highlights the variability of the expression of anger across different cultures. He also discusses the criticism of others about the design and execution of Ekman’s work. Specifically, they critique Ekman’s work based on the variability of other studies, failure to prove a biological or evolutionary basis, the problems of using still photographs, the forced-choice nature of the experiments, failure to understand the Fore language, and the ethnocentric bias of the studies.47
In addition, William Reddy in his recent work on the development of romantic love in different medieval contexts is able to demonstrate conclusively that the relationship between love, sex, desire, and marriage were not normalized across different cultures. In his comparison of the understanding and experience of love in medieval Europe, Japan, and Southeast Asia, it is clear that there was no one universal emotion shared by all people. Medieval European aristocrats developed a conception of romantic love to resist the Church’s insistence on the sinful nature of sex as what Reddy calls “desire-as-appetite.” Without this pressure, the concepts of love and desire developed very differently in Japan, where the emphasis was on stylized sex and courtly courtesy, and in Southeast Area, where sex was linked to ecstatic experiences with the divine.48 While the human capacity to experience certain emotions may be universal, it is one’s culture that ultimately determines how and why they are expressed. We may all have the capacity to feel rage, but it one’s own cultural context that will determine what might provoke that feeling and condition on how one displays the experience of anger as an emotion.
Damien Boquet and Piroska Nagy also make an important final point about studies that focus too much on the universality of emotions, namely that not only do we experience emotions differently, but similar situations can evoke different emotional responses in different people for different reasons.49 For example, someone who experiences uncomfortable fear from watching horror films, like me, is going to react differently to viewing Nightmare on Elm Street than someone who enjoys the adrenaline rush of being scared. How, then, can we explain this variation in emotional responses to the same movie? If emotions are both universal and a product of evolutionary survival, then should not the response to a scary film be the same regardless?
Because of the importance of cultural context, other scholars approach the history of emotions from a more social constructionist view.50 These scholars point to the limitations of biology in deducing how people understood their own emotions and how emotions could be displayed. They instead use many of the methods developed by anthropologists and sociologists to understand emotional displays in particular settings. In the case of displays of anger, Stephen D. White has argued that these displays are frequently situated in formulaic sequences of actions that he calls “scripts.”51 He argues that medieval authors fitted descriptions of men getting angry into narrative scripts that typically began with a man hearing about something or seeing something that injured and shamed either him or someone associated with him; that it continued with the man expressing anger of one kind or another; and that it concluded with the man instigating violent retaliation for the injury against the person or persons responsible for it. He also demonstrates that both Latin and Old French narratives include similar formulaic sequences of this kind.52 By describing displays of anger in highly conventional terms, these authors, he concludes, took it for granted that anger was an element of politics and the exercise of lordship and other kinds of power in medieval society.
Likewise, Jehangir Malegam has demonstrated how useful categorizing and analyzing these scripts can be for understanding medieval social interactions.53 He specifically calls for examination of the sequence of emotional processing. In accounts of the experience of medieval emotion, especially of anger, Malegam notes that people are usually described as experiencing more than one emotion in a particular sequence or pattern. He argues, “Anger and the feelings that appear alongside it offered medieval audiences templates of acceptable emotional transition: rage to grief instead of rage to envy; remorse to love instead of remorse to despair. Recognizable within particular ‘emotional communities,’ (see Rosenwein, Emotional Communities) these templates also redrew the lines of community, assigning membership to those who had supposedly participated in these culturally meaningful choreographies of emotional change.”54 It is important, then, to not only examine the expression of anger in these texts, but it is important to also understand the expression of anger in relation to other emotions.
In addition, Gerd Althoff has suggested ways that these scripts could have also reflected the actual practice of political rituals.55 In his view, “All of these signs [i.e., ‘customs governing communication’], sometimes bundled together in rituals and stage performances, had the goal of
K. MCGRATH
transmitting a clear and unmistakable message. These customs bestowed a certain security on public interactions.”56 He highlights the use of the language of grief and anger in the petitioning of nobles for aid and assistance. As part of what he labels the “rules of the game,” dependents were expected to petition kings by appearing sad and humble, while kings were expected to respond by displaying public anger in support of their dependents’ causes.
Such studies, therefore, are very useful in understanding how medieval authors narrated episodes of displays of anger. They cannot, however, tell us much about what medieval people might have actually felt. Damien Boquet and Piroska Nagy raise two important cautions in this regard. They are concerned that by limiting studies strictly to rituals or scripts that we fail to try to understand how medieval people actually experienced their emotions and the emotions of others. They are careful not to see medieval descriptions of emotional expressions as transparent, but they wish to explore a methodology that might clear some of the opacity of medieval emotional displays.57 After all, for a text to make sense to its readers it must in some way translate into their reality. This is especially true in the case of our Anglo-Norman historical narratives. Many of these ecclesiastical writers were writing relatively recent contemporary history, and if they coded or represented emotions in inauthentic ways then surely their readers would be less able to believe or even to follow their accounts. The other caution they raise is to question the implicit assumption that because emotions are ritualized that they are not authentic and actually felt by the participants. The highly ritualized nature of displays of emotions may have been to stimulate the authentic experience of the desired emotions. In addition, they note that feigned emotions are still emotions and worth exploring.58 It is one of the reasons that they call for more examinations of the role of emotions in public settings. By looking at the function of emotions in public contexts, it is possible to reevaluate the benefit of our sources and incorporate more narrative sources with their rich descriptions of emotions displays, especially in the actions of kings and nobles.59
More recently, some scholars have developed a middle ground between viewing emotions in terms of either evolutionary biology, which sees emotions as universally experienced in similar ways as part of a shared humanity, and constructionism, which sees emotions as inherently structured by socialization and unique to each culture.60 As Nicole Eustace argues, “A historical approach can eschew such extremes.”61 This approach recognizes the role of biology in the experience of emotions, while remaining
mindful of the profound role of culture in the expressions of emotions. As Barbara Rosenwein defines it, “there is a biological and universal human aptitude for feeling and expressing what we now call ‘emotions.’ But what those emotions are, what they are called, and how they are evaluated and felt, and how they are expressed (or not)—all these are shaped by ‘emotional communities.’”62
One of the best strategies for bridging the divide is to consider emotion talk as what William Reddy calls “emotives.” For Reddy, emotives are statements of emotion, which reflect one’s feelings, but that also have an important ability to reshape one’s feelings through their expression. Reddy’s use of emotives retains both the power of the interior experience of emotions while at the same time recognizing the power associated with the process of expressing one’s emotional experience in cultural settings. He explains that emotions “are themselves instruments for directly changing, building, hiding, intensifying emotions, instruments that may be more or less successful.”63 As such, they are also part of a process of evaluating and assessing our emotions. By looking at how these texts, then, make use of emotives it is possible to not only have a better understanding of medieval understandings of anger as an emotion, but also a better understanding of how they evaluated and assessed the experience of anger. Barbara Rosenwein likewise argues for a connection between emotion talk and emotional feelings. She argues, “‘performed emotions’ are also felt: this was already the conclusion of Arlie Hochschild’s 1983 study of the emotional training of airline flight attendants: the successful trainees internalized the emotional norms they were told to perform. They learned to really mean the smiles they gave to rowdy passengers; they learned to suppress feelings of fatigue and irritation.”64 While passages that represent anger, therefore, should not be read literally, they still provide clues into the emotional worlds of medieval people. As Barbara Rosenwein notes, even if they are only pretending to have these emotions, this, nonetheless, can tell us something about emotional norms.65 This interpretation relies on previous studies that have highlighted the importance of analyzing emotions in their specific social, political, and cultural contexts, instead of situating them in the grand narrative of the history of emotions.66 As Barbara Rosenwein argues, “The job of the historian is to discover the particular norms adhered to at a given time and to understand the complex of social, political, religious, and cultural forces responsible for or at least influencing those norms.”67 Otherwise, she fears that historians will make the mistake of previous scholars, such as Elias, of assuming that
K. MCGRATH
medieval emotions were totalizing and universally experienced across time and place. Rosenwein argues for analyzing emotional displays in the context of discrete and/or overlapping “emotional communities.”68 She argues that people express their emotions in ways that are determined by their particular audience and constructed to fit their particular context. For example, I might get angry and yell at my sister, but I would never yell at my boss no matter how angry I got. This is because the emotional community of my workplace would view yelling in response to anger to be inappropriate, while the emotional community of my family allows for less restraint on displays of anger in yelling. The work of the historian, then, is to first reconstruct emotional communities in the past so that we can understand how they understood the experience and expression of emotions.
One challenge, however, is to make sure that we do not reduce medieval people to discrete and separate boxes. In response to Rosenwein’s work, Peter Stearns has cautioned against compartmentalizing and isolating emotional communities from each other. He writes, “Some attention to the interplay between larger emotional patterns and particular emotional communities and subgroups offers an essential counterbalance. Too much focus on variety at any point in time may well distract from bigger changes, as well as providing more complexity and detail than is desirable where historical work on emotion encounters the concerns and interests of other relevant disciplines.”69 This work looks at one type of emotional community, namely Anglo-Norman ecclesiastical historians, but it also looks at how this community was interacting with the secular world around them. As is clear from their writings about each other, these men did form a community of shared writings and vocation. At the same time, many had at least the hope that their writings would find value outside their own monasteries, as seen by some of them dedicating their work to important members of the laity. What then is the emotional community we need to reconstruct to understand their views on anger? The community of ecclesiastical writers? The community of aristocratic readers? Both? One of the goals of this work is to demonstrate the overlap between the emotional communities of the lay aristocracy and clerics. In their descriptions of appropriate and inappropriate displays of anger, these ecclesiastical writers were implicitly arguing for how aristocrats should and should not behave, and they were utilizing a shared emotional language to do so. While medieval people surely did experience some of the emotions attributed to them, it ultimately does not matter in terms of this study.
After all, if the only evidence that medieval people—or any people—experienced specific emotions is from the evidence of their expression, we arrive at a tautology. It is more important to understand the discourse used by ecclesiastical writers—their emotives—in constructing these episodes in which they attribute anger to kings. As Thomas Roche argues in relationship to emotions in Orderic Vitalis, “Even if the motives Orderic suggests in his emotional narrative most likely do not reflect actual words or thoughts of the protagonists, the norms they referred to are not mere monkish fancies. Orderic attributes to some thoughts they did not have; he bears testimony less to actual inner motives than to the way one could justify one’s rancor.”70 So even if these episodes are entirely fictional, they still reveal how their authors imagined and labeled certain experiences of emotional expressions as appropriate or inappropriate. As such, they at least provide insight into their “emotional community,” and they allow us to explore monastic responses to the growth of royal authority in the High Middle Ages.71
At best, they also contribute to what Sarah Ahmed calls “emotional economies.” As affective words are applied in similar ways in different contexts, certain figures take on an affective identity because of shared “objects of feeling.”72 Kings who are repeatedly characterized as agents of divine anger are arguably more likely to be perceived as such, and conversely, repeatedly attributing blameworthy anger to kings surely had the function of condemning their actions, at least to the audiences of these texts. All of this suggests how important it is to consider the scripts developed by eleventh- and twelfth-century ecclesiastical historians to frame the emotional expression of kingship.73 To do so, one needs to consider all aspects of these scripts from the scenarios discussed to the characterization of subjects to the actual language chosen for expression. By studying these episodes across multiple texts from different authors, it is possible to reconstruct a larger framework for the relationship between emotional expressions and expressions of power. As William Reddy notes, political regimes have a vested interest in creating stable “emotional regimes,” or ideals for “emotional equilibrium.”74 This study, then, seeks to outline how ecclesiastical authors used their histories in order to express their views on the ideal emotional equilibrium of kings by lauding expressions of just anger and condemning expressions of blameworthy anger; these authors, then, are implicitly expressing their understanding of the balance between too little and too much anger. I interpret textual references to the experience and/or display of emotions as an index of customary
K. MCGRATH
expectations and social conventions about how people should experience and/or display emotions in particular settings and how they should exercise political power. While the focus of this work is on how ecclesiastical authors imputed anger to their contemporaries so as to characterize and evaluate them, my research also suggests that the expression of anger was part of the rational exercise of power in Anglo-Norman territories during the eleventh and twelfth centuries. For Latin historians such as Orderic, the depiction of anger was a critical part of the process through which they either demonstrated or undermined the legitimacy of political action and authority in the Anglo-Norman world.75
emotIons, VIolence, and FeudIng
In a similar way, by focusing on how ecclesiastical authors imputed anger, this book highlights some ways in which the representation of anger intersects with the representation of honor and shame and the legitimatization of violence.76 The consistency with which eleventh- and twelfth-century ecclesiastical authors used the language of anger to explain subsequent violence suggests that they composed their descriptions of the display of anger in certain ways that linked its experience to acts of violence.77 This study, then, also contributes to recent scholarship on feuding and violence, specifically the attempt by ecclesiastical historians to implicitly and explicitly make distinctions between so-called public and private violence.78
One of the biggest debates in the historiography of feuding is over how to define “feud” itself. It is a bit of a Goldilocks problem; one wants to make it large enough in scale to distinguish it from isolated and individual violence like homicide, but one does not want to make it too large in scale that it is not distinguished from conflicts like war.79 Most scholars, such as Paul Hyams and William Miller, have resorted to describing various characteristics of feuds rather than trying to develop an exclusive definition. Most of these working definitions include an exchange of violence, similar social status among participants, giving of offense and taking retaliation, enmity between the principal actors, and finally peace-making to satisfactorily end the feud.80 In the end, most scholars are more concerned about the dangers of trying to impose a narrow definition on medieval feuding that will artificially conceal the diversity and significance of feuding in medieval society, and they prefer to examine feuding as a process.81 In fact, Stephen D. White calls for scholars to stop even trying to define feuding.
He observes, “Because the conflicts to which medievalists have applied these terms could take different forms and cannot be routinely distinguished from other sorts of disputes and because at least one of the most common medieval terms for ‘feud,’—namely werra or guerre—covered such a wide and variable field of meaning, no rigorous definition of the medieval French feud for our period can now be formulated, or, perhaps, should ever be proposed.”82
Beginning with E.E. Evans-Pritchard, the majority of scholars are quick to point out that feuding culture was not necessarily one of ceaseless violence and anarchy.83 Most scholars emphasize the mechanisms for negotiation and peace-making in the process of feud.84 One of the seminal works on feuding in general is Max Gluckman’s 1955 Custom and Conflict in Africa, which introduced the concept of the “Peace in the Feud.”85 Rather than seeing feuding as a recipe for anarchy, Gluckman highlights the way that the process of feuding actually helped to reinforce mechanisms for peace and compromise. He argues that it did so in two principal ways. First, the threat of a feud surely served as a deterrent to potential violence. If you know that your powerful neighbor is likely to retaliate, you might be more careful about giving reasonable offense. Second, the nature of feuding involves extended networks of kin, friendship, and dependents. As more and more individuals are made party to a conflict, there is mounting social pressure to make peace and end the bloodshed. These parties, then, serve as useful mediators and peace-makers.86 Moreover, Hillary Zmora adds that the close personal, social, political, and economic ties between participants in feuds would have surely also worked to prevent the outbreak of violence, or at least applied pressure to both parties for the speedy ending of conflict. If you rely on profit from trading with your neighbors, you are not likely to feud with them for long.87 William Miller also raises an important point. The conception of a feud could only exist between social equals; the idea of feuding with social inferiors was a foreign concept.88 While there were certainly acts of violence by inferiors to their superiors or vice versa, they would not have been understood as constituting a feud, as one only feuded with someone for whom one had the possibility of gaining honor. Miller concludes, “For the continuing hostile exchanges that constitute feud, each party had to consider the other worthy of giving offense and worthy of retaliation.”89
While feuding culture is sometimes identified only in the early Middle Ages, recent work, especially by Paul Hyams, has demonstrated its continued influence on post-Conquest England.90 He notes, “We possess
K. MCGRATH
anecdotes and enough other evidence to argue that full feud action persisted as a possible option for some and to suggest that it was not so rare that prudent men could afford to omit it from their calculations.”91 Feuds may not have been pervasive in the High Middle Ages, but they, nonetheless, remained a possibility, and therefore, a potential focus for concern. It surely did not take a large number of such conflicts for it to affect the conduct and behavior of the lay aristocracy.92 Moreover, scholars dismiss the idea that feuding declined as a direct result of the rise of the state and its ability to demand a monopoly on violence. They argue instead that the two processes worked together to their mutual benefit. Feud, then, can be seen as an additional form of litigation.93 The rhetoric of royal anger provides further evidence of the connection between the expansion of royal authority and the continuation of aristocratic violence. This study, then, provides additional insight into the role of emotions in feuding and the role of violence—or restraint from violence—in dispute processing. While Orderic’s narrative implies that medieval ecclesiastical authors expected kings to use violence when their anger was provoked, as we will see, they nonetheless did not grant kings unlimited power in the manner of displaying their anger.94 As Steve D. White points out, there is sometimes a tendency to overemphasize the role of emotions in feuding to such an extent that one forgets the underlying strategic and political aspects of the use—or the threat to use—violence. We must be careful to avoid reducing emotions in feuding to the hydraulic model discussed earlier in which anger is assumed to be an emotion fighting to burst forth from offended parties. In other words, medieval writers’ descriptions of the role of anger in feuding suggest that there was a time to get mad, but also a time to let one’s anger go.95 By examining and comparing different historical narratives from the eleventh and twelfth centuries, one can conclude, as subsequent chapters will show, that in ecclesiastical texts the use of violence to avenge an injury was acceptable, although it should be proportional to the initial injury. Kings should single out only the guilty parties, sparing the innocent and doing no more than what would be sufficient to restore their honor. Ecclesiastical authors portray favorably those who respond with anger to those who are oppressing dependents, ecclesiastical communities, or the innocent populace. By attributing anger to kings when such groups are oppressed, these authors are also implicitly linking the protection of these people to the king’s personal honor, thereby calling for royal action. Moreover, they condemn those who fail to respond to provocation or who take their fury too far. Ecclesiastical authors attribute
to kings concern about their honor or the honor of their family as motivating displays of anger. By lauding some individuals for their expression of anger and condemning others, ecclesiastical authors reflect social conventions of how to get honorably angry, and how to legitimize the use of violence when feuds or conflicts arose.96
sources
Anglo-Norman Latin histories form a coherent body of texts, for they come from a distinctive political and cultural region.97 The large number of histories composed in this area during the eleventh and twelfth centuries is the outgrowth of one of the most well-developed prose traditions in Europe before the early modern period.98 By comparison, historical writings in Southern France are virtually non-existent until after the reign of Philip II Augustus (r. 1179–1223).99 Anglo-Norman and Northern French writings thus provide scholars with a unique opportunity to investigate the context for meaning and function of medieval anger, because emotional discourse is so ubiquitous in these texts.100
Some scholars have tied these literary traditions to the attempt of monastic communities to “remember” their past when confronted with the changes and challenges posed by the Conquest.101 They argue that the composition of these texts was a response to the expansion of royal authority and consolidation of the Conquest. In contrast, John Benton argues that this ubiquity arose because the Church’s focus on confession and penance caused the laity to be more introspective and more concerned with their internal state; this focus, in turn, translated into a greater focus on people’s emotional states and their motivations for action in general.102 This cultural change, which affected the laity and ecclesiastics alike, was possible only after Gregorian reforms allowed for greater dissemination of Church teachings, especially teachings on lay confession and penance developed by theologians associated with Peter the Cantor (d. 1197) in Paris.103 Marc Cels sees parallels in this process in the new style of penitential literature being composed and disseminated which focused more heavily on priestly interrogation to uncover human sin.104 In analyzing emotion talk in these tests, then, it is important to remember the shared ecclesiastical culture—or emotional community—in which they were composed and disseminated. This is especially important when we consider the uniquely ambivalent interpretation of the emotional expression of anger. As will be discussed further in Chap. 2, early Christian theologians were conflicted by how to
Another random document with no related content on Scribd:
From East to West railway grow mile by mile, and their interest in it was almost that of a proprietor, but this was the first time they had ridden upon it for any distance.[9] Most of the units halted for a day or two at Kantara, a station with which they were familiar enough. Here the only subject for comment seems to have been the remarkable number of gulls that swarmed overhead at meal times. The mention of these birds will remind many officers and men that the 42nd Division made very useful contributions both to the knowledge of the fauna of the Sinai Peninsula and to the supply of animals to the Cairo Zoo. Many desert mice and rats, lizards and tortoises reached the Zoo alive, and one rat was so exalted by the prospect of introduction to Cairo society that it gave birth to a healthy litter while in the parcel post. Insects of great interest and rarity, and of peculiarly local distribution, were sent to the Ministry of Agriculture at Cairo twice a week for six months; and species entirely new to science were discovered. A battalion of the Lancashire Fusiliers, from the R.S.M. and the CookSergeant down to the sanitary men, took to collecting and nature study with great ardour and much success.
Divisional Headquarters and the Signal Company arrived at Moascar on February 4. On the 6th, 7th, and 8th the various units (less the 2nd Field Company, R.E., which proceeded direct by rail to Alexandria) set out from Kantara on the two-days’ march to Moascar along the new road by the side of the Canal. The change from the soft sand of the desert to the hard road was a sore trial to the feet, and a big proportion of the men limped rather than marched into Moascar. All ranks now knew what most had suspected for some time, that the Division was bound for France, and there was general enthusiasm. The prospect of a change from the sand, the glaring sun, the discomfort of intense heat, the monotony and isolation of the desert, was hailed with joy by the majority. A number of officers and men had not been home since September 1914, and knew that there was little chance of home-leave while the Division remained with the Egyptian Expeditionary Force. Yet there were some among those who had been out longest upon whom the spell of the East had fallen, and who were disappointed that, having accomplished so
much of the preparatory work, they, like Moses, could only see the Promised Land from afar, and were not allowed to go forward into Palestine.
While at Moascar the Division was inspected by Lieut.-General Sir Charles Dobell, commanding the Eastern Force, and it also marched past General Sir Archibald Murray, Commander-in-Chief of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force. An event of even greater moment for men who had been nearly twelve months in the desert was a week’s visit from Miss Lena Ashwell’s Concert Party. The troops were grateful and appreciative, and they showed it unmistakably.
FLASHES OF UNITS IN THE 42ND DIVISION.
In view of the impending change every man now required serge clothing, winter underclothing and service cap. The field-gun batteries were established on a six-gun basis, and two artillery brigades, the 210th and 211th, were formed out of the three existing brigades of four-gun batteries. The 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Field Companies, R.E., were re-numbered as the 427th, 428th, and 429th Field Companies respectively. Many details left behind during the advance across the desert rejoined the Division, as did also the R.A. Base at Ballah, and the instructors and staff of the Divisional School at Suez. This school had done most useful work, a large number of officers and other ranks having been put through a series of short courses, and much progress had been made in bombing and in the use of the Light Trench Mortar, or Stokes Gun.
To the great disappointment of all ranks it was decided that the A.S.C. should remain in the East, as a new 42nd Divisional Train had been formed in England to join the Division on its arrival in France. There was sincere regret on both sides at the severing of comradeship. The Divisional Train left Kantara early in March to join the 53rd Division, to which it was attached during the operations against Gaza. On the formation of the 74th (Yeomanry) Division it became the 74th Divisional Train, took part in all operations with that Division in Palestine, went with it to France, and remained with it until disembodied. The Divisional Squadron, now with the 53rd Division, was engaged in the first and second battles of Gaza. Later, it was attached in turn to the 60th and 52nd Divisions in Palestine and Syria; it took part in the third Battle of Gaza, in numerous skirmishes, outpost affrays, and pursuits, and shared in the honour of the great campaign that brought Turkey to her knees.
Before the end of February all preparations had been completed, and units had entrained for Alexandria. On March 2, 1917, the last transport left the harbour, and, after two and a half years of service in the Near East, the 42nd Division was at last on its way to the Western Front.
CHAPTER V FRANCE
(March-August 1917)
The voyage westward across the Mediterranean was made under conditions widely different from those of the outward journey of September 1914, when “glory of youth glowed in the soul,” and the glamour of the East and the call of the unknown had made their appeal to adventurous spirits. Familiarity with war had destroyed illusion and had robbed it of most of its romance. The Lancashire Territorials had a very good idea of what to expect in France or Flanders, and were prepared to face minor discomforts and worries with the inevitable grousing which proclaims that all is well, and real privations, perils, and horrors with steadfastness often masked by levity. Though the Mediterranean was at that period infested by enemy submarines, the vigilance of the British and French navies proved a sure shield. One torpedo only was fired at the troopships, and this passed between the log-line and the stern of the Megantic. A call was made at Malta, and on March 1 the first transport anchored in the magnificent harbour of Marseilles, and D.H.Q. at once entrained for the North of France.
The railway journey of sixty hours to Pont Remy, near Abbéville, will not be forgotten. Men who had at much cost become acclimatized to the intense heat and dryness of the Sinai Desert, were suddenly plunged into the opposite extreme of an arctic climate. The winter of 1917 was one of the most prolonged and severe on record, and throughout the tedious journey in French troop-trains the men shivered and trembled with the bitter cold. But if France greeted them freezingly there was no mistaking the warmth of the welcome of her sons and daughters. Wherever the trains stopped the inhabitants gathered round to cheer them on their way. The news of the fall of Bagdad had preceded them, and the French
women and girls, old men and children, knew that these were victorious British reinforcements from the East, and Bagdad and Sinai were equally remote.
The troops detrained at Pont Remy in a storm of snow and sleet, and marched through deep, freezing slush to the villages in which billets had been prepared. After six months’ experience of open bivouacs wherever the day’s trek ended, the barn billets were something of a novelty. Reorganization and re-equipment were, of course, the most urgent matters to be dealt with, and the refit was carried out expeditiously. The short Lee-Enfield rifle displaced the longer rifle with which the Division had been armed; and the issue of two strange items, the “tin hat” and the box respirator, provoked some hilarity. Baths, each capable of washing sixty men per hour, were erected by the R.E., and henceforward the Division left its mark in the shape of new or remodelled baths in every area in which it was located. The Divisional Cinematograph and Canteen were also inaugurated here. The last troops from Egypt, the 5th East Lancashires and the 9th Manchesters, arrived on March 15. A new Divisional Train joined from England. This train had already had considerable experience of France, as it had been formed to join the Lahore Division in September 1914. Motor ambulances were supplied to the three Field Ambulances, and a complete train of motor-lorries was attached to the Division. The 42nd Divisional Ammunition Column was formed from a nucleus of the former Brigade Ammunition Columns with the addition of a large draft from the R.A. Base in France. A Heavy (9·45-inch) Trench Mortar Battery and three Medium (6-inch) T.M. Batteries were also formed here, and these became a part of the Divisional Artillery. Three Light T.M. Batteries were attached to the Infantry Brigades.
General Douglas’s Farewell
On the arrival of the Division in France MajorGeneral Sir William Douglas left for England in order to give evidence before the Royal Commission appointed to inquire into the Dardanelles Campaign. Temporary command of the Division was taken over by Brig.-General H. C. Frith, C.B. (125th Brigade), until the arrival of Major-General B. R. Mitford, C.B., D.S.O., who assumed command about the middle
of March. Much regret was felt by officers and men that the general, who had been responsible for the training and organization of the Division in time of peace, and under whose leadership during two and a half years of war it had served with distinction in two campaigns and had “made good,” should be unable to lead them to the gaining of fresh laurels on the most important of all fronts. They had been fortunate in a commander who had ever taken a personal interest in the welfare of all ranks under his command, and who had identified himself with the Lancashire men and was jealous of their good name. That General Douglas regarded his officers and men with affection is clearly shown in his farewell message—
“In bidding the 42nd Division good-bye I wish to express my heartfelt thanks to my Staff Officers, Commanders, and Regimental Officers for their loyal and whole-hearted support and superb work during the period of my command. My admiration for the conduct, fighting qualities, grit, and endurance of all ranks is profound. Never have I met a more responsive, willing and lovable lot of men than these Lancashire lads, and, to my last days, I shall remember with affection and pride the three and three-quarter years that I have had the honour to command them. I know how well you, officers and men, will add to the great name you have already earned for the Division, I wish you the best of good fortune and a rich reward.”
Towards the end of March the Division moved to an area some ten miles east of Amiens, D.H.Q. being established at Mericourt. The 42nd was now a veteran Division in war and in travel, but in the trenches of France it was in the position of a new boy at a strange school. It had learnt much in the old school, and the experience would be useful. Each unit had a record and tradition of which it had good reason to be proud, and the commanders knew that their officers and men could be relied upon. Endurance and courage had been severely tested, but the endurance required for slogging through deep sand under a tropical sun was of a very different
nature from that which would now be demanded, and the intense heat of the desert was a poor preparation for the bitter winds, the snow, sleet and freezing mud of the trenches of France. Much had to be learnt in the new school, and much unlearnt.
In Gallipoli the opposing trenches had often been only a few yards apart, and rifle-fire had continued all day and increased in violence at night. In that sector of the Western Front taken over by the Division the recent withdrawal of the enemy had created a No Man’s Land, which might be anything from 10 yards to 1000 in width, and unaimed rifle-fire was uncommon. Here, too, patrolling was a matter of nightly routine, whereas in Gallipoli more than an occasional patrol had been impossible. Two of the most novel features were the gas and the amount of H.E. shelling. It was the Division’s first experience of gas, and on rare occasions only had it witnessed annihilating shell-fire. Never before had any of the original members been in billets, and they found them and their inhabitants a source of interest and comfort. Some felt hurt that the bits of Arabic picked up in the East were of no use here, and they resolutely refused to learn any French. “I’ve learnt Gyppo, and I’m not going to bother with any more foreign languages.” Imagine their delight when on leave in Amiens they found that the paper-boys (who had come into contact with the Australians) knew the meaning of “Imshi!” This word, being the imperative of the Arabic verb “to walk,” did duty for “’op it!” Possibly the most striking differences of all were that the Division got reinforcements after suffering casualties, and was able to get back into “rest” of a real kind after a trying time in the line.
The strength of the Division on April 1 was 727 officers and 16,689 other ranks.
New Experiences
Advance parties had been sent ahead of the Division, and now other parties of officers, N.C.O.s and men were attached for short periods to battalions and units of the 1st Division in the front line trenches that they might see and understand the conditions of warfare on the Western Front, before the Division should be called upon to take its place in the line that stretched from the Belgian coast to Switzerland. The enemy’s retirement from the Somme and the Ancre to the Hindenburg Line
had upset the plans of the Allies for a spring offensive. The recentlyvacated German trenches were visited, and the scenes of appalling devastation, the shattered remains of what had once been flourishing villages and farmsteads, gave the troops their first impressions of France’s martyrdom, and filled them with indignation and loathing. They had heard and read of the ruin and desolation in Belgium and Northern France, but the half had not been told. The wanton destruction of fruit-trees and the desecration of cemeteries were acts dictated not by military necessity but by beastliness of mind.
Throughout this preparatory period the troops were kept busily employed upon the badly damaged roads, and—as occasional opportunity offered—in the attempt to make the entente still more cordiale. Feuillieres, Biaches, Herbecourt, Flaucourt, Dompierre, and Peronne were visited by various units, and the sappers constructed bridges to take heavy guns and lorry traffic over the Somme at Brie and elsewhere. Not only had the enemy blown craters at most of the cross-roads, but, east of Peronne, he had felled the trees that line the main French roads, and these had to be removed. This work of clearing up after the German retreat was of great importance, and the Division gained an insight into conditions on the Western Front as the troops approached the line. Where possible the ruins of farms and houses, swarming with rats, were used as billets, but the roadmakers usually slept in cellars, dugouts, and holes. The wretched weather continued and there was heavy snow in April. The horses, so long accustomed to an eastern climate, suffered greatly and began to deteriorate, some succumbing to pneumonia. The boots which had been issued just before leaving Egypt were quite unsuited to a bad winter in Northern France, and they fell to pieces quickly. Each day a number of men had to remain in billets until new boots could be obtained from Ordnance Stores. A number of officers and men, however, refused to be worried by such insignificant details as boots, for were they not going home for the first time since September 1914? During the month batches of these veterans departed for fourteen days amid the rousing cheers of their comrades.
At Peronne, where D.H.Q. was opened on April 14, every building was badly damaged except the Town Hall, which was at once placed out of bounds because of this immunity, as any place that appeared to invite occupation was regarded with suspicion, owing to the typical Boche habit of leaving delayed-action mines and other “boobytraps.” Peronne Town Hall did not, however, go sky-high, as was daily expected. In the village of Peiziere some officers of the 126th Brigade took up their quarters in a house that had been left in good condition. Fortunately one of them took the precaution to explore and found a quantity of high explosive hidden under the beams. They cleared out. Next day a shell dropped on the building and it vanished. An R.A.M.C. orderly in the vicinity was lifted several feet in the air by the force of the explosion. “Eh, that wur a near do!” he said, as he picked himself up carefully and resumed his journey.
The Division now formed part of the 3rd Corps of the Fourth Army. On the 8th of April the 125th Brigade took over a portion of the line from the 48th Division at Epéhy, in front of Le Catelet, and a few days later the 126th Brigade also went into the line, in order that as many battalions as possible might have a short experience of frontline conditions before the Division as a whole assumed responsibility for a sector. The front here had become practically stationary, and as neither side had a continuous trench system the connecting of posts proceeded nightly, and patrolling and digging were the chief diversions. The 7th Lancashire Fusiliers was the first battalion to go into the line, which they advanced, after a sharp skirmish, to a copse about half a mile ahead. They were relieved on April 12-13 by the 6th L.F., and during the relief Malassise Farm, in which were a number of men of both battalions, was heavily shelled. The building was destroyed, and the fall of the roof buried about fifty of these men in the cellar. Though the shelling continued with great violence, admirable courage was shown in extricating the buried men, and for this the Military Medal was awarded to a private of each battalion. The Division’s first trench raid on the Western Front was made by the 4th East Lancashires at Epéhy. On April 28 the 126th Brigade advanced their line successfully, but the 4th and 5th East Lancashires suffered rather heavily.
Throughout April the wintry weather continued, but the unfailing spirit of the British soldier under depressing conditions is shown in the following anecdote related by an officer of the 4th East Lancashires: “The rain was pouring into my dugout, and the water slowly rising, so to avoid a fit of the blues I went along the line to see how the men were faring. A sentry was standing in mud half up to his knees, his hands numbed and wet, and a stream of water ran from his tin hat. By way of comparing notes I asked this pitiable spectacle what he really felt like. ‘Like a flower in May, sir,’ was the cheerful reply, and I was cured of the blues.”
On May 3 the Division took over from the 48th Division a sector in the neighbourhood of Ronnsoy, south-east of Epéhy. As Brig.General Ormsby was engaged in marking out the new front line of his Brigade near Catelet Copse, the enemy suddenly opened a bombardment, and he was struck in the head by a piece of shell and killed. General Ormsby had been in command of the Brigade for more than twelve months, and during that period he had become very popular with his men and had gained their respect and admiration. Lieut.-Colonel H. C. Darlington, 5th Manchesters, once more assumed temporary command until the arrival of Brig.-General the Hon. A. M. Henley, who remained in command of the 127th Brigade until the end of the war.
Two brigades were in the front line and one in reserve, with a system of four-day reliefs. The long winter was over at last; summer had arrived without any introduction by spring, and the weather was now gloriously hot. There was a good deal of local fighting, especially around Guillemont Farm, an enemy post which more than one division had found by no means difficult to capture, but exceedingly difficult to hold. Several night attacks were made by companies and platoons, in one of which, on the night of May 6-7, the 9th Manchesters established forward posts in the face of heavy machine-gun fire, and Private A. Holden was awarded the Bar to the M.M. for volunteering to bring in the wounded, and afterwards going out into the open to make sure that none had been missed. He found a wounded officer and helped to carry him 400 yards on a heavily shelled road, and went out again to assist another injured man to
safety He succeeded in this, but was himself wounded. The enemy artillery was generally active, and on one occasion some men of the 126th Brigade were quite grateful to the German gunners. A heavy shell, which fell among some ruined cottages, threw up a number of gold and silver coins, dated a hundred years ago and evidently a long-buried hoard.
Epéhy and Ytres
On May 23 D.H.Q. moved to Ytres, about eight miles north-west of Epéhy, the Division relieving the 20th Division on a newly-captured sector running from the Canal du Nord, south-west of Havrincourt, to a point south of Villers Plouich, through Trescault and Beaucamp; and here the Division remained until July 8. This was a fairly quiet sector, and during the first few weeks there was no event of any importance to vary the daily round of digging, wiring, and strengthening the trench system and the patrolling of No Man’s Land. Havrincourt Wood in the spring of 1917 remained a very beautiful spot amid the chaos of war. Though the “hate” of the Boche was less demonstrative than in many sectors his trench-mortars and machine-guns were generally busy at night, and considerable annoyance was caused on the right of the line by a trench-mortar which—so it was conjectured—was brought up every night on a light railway, and taken back after a few shots had been fired. At sunrise the clamour of the guns ceased and the birds at once “took over,” the cuckoo being particularly active. Nightingales were common here and in the copses in the line, and as they seemed to regard machine-guns as rival vocalists, they would sing in competition. The bell-like whistle of the black and yellow golden oriole was often heard, and in the centre of the wood the war at times seemed far enough away. The A.S.C. turned their hands to hay-making, and helped to cut and harvest some acres of excellent clover, rye, and lucerne. The 3rd Field Ambulance were more envied by their fellows, as they harvested—for their own consumption—the crop of a very prolific strawberry bed in the garden of the ruined villa which they inhabited at Ruyalcourt.
A quartermaster of the 127th Brigade had chosen the ruins of a farm at a cross-roads near Havrincourt Wood for his dump. He was warned by the Town Major that this spot had probably been mined by
the enemy, and particularly warned not to make use of the cellar, which was a likely place for a “booby-trap.” However, nothing happened, and of course his men not only went into the cellar but took planks and bricks therefrom to improve their quarters in the rooms above. One evening the Q.M. returned from the line to find his staff in a state of nervous collapse. As soon as he had prevailed upon them to sit up and take a little nourishment they related this painful story: The former owner, armed with documents and accompanied by gendarmes and British Military Police, had visited the old home, descended into the cellar, and dug up jars containing jewellery, coins, and banknotes, within a few inches of the spot from which the storemen had taken the planks. The butcher had even held a candle to assist the search, and his reflections on “what might have been,” as the jars of buried treasure were brought to light, completely unnerved him, especially when the owner handed him a couple of francs with thanks for the trouble he had so kindly taken. For some time after this these storemen displayed a rabbit-like tendency to burrow in any old corner, but luck was not with them.
One night when the Brigadier of the 127th Brigade was in the front line the enemy put down a fierce bombardment of gas shells and H.E. The night was dark, but calm and clear, and large working parties were out wiring and digging. These came back “hell for leather,” and General Henley found his passage through the trench cut off by the crowds. Colonel Dobbin, deeming the scene unseemly for a Brigadier, suggested a dash over the top. Unfortunately fresh wire had just been put down, and, close to the support line where the long-range shells were dropping, both fell heavily into a double apron-fence. They extricated themselves painfully, leaving portions of clothing and some blood on the wire, and eventually arrived, “improperly dressed,” at Battalion Headquarters, to be met by the adjutant with the tactless remark: “There has been a bit of a bombardment, sir, but it doesn’t concern our front.” The Brigadier, who limped for several days, suggested that his companion should write a sketch of the episode under the title, “Young officers taking their pleasures lightly.” Though the Colonel did not take advantage of the suggestion, another officer did.
Brig.-General H. C. Frith, C.B., returned to England in June to assume command of a Home Service Brigade, and Brig.-General H. Fargus, C.M.G., D.S.O., took command of the 125th Brigade until the end of the war. General Frith was the last of the General Officers who had served with the Division from the outbreak of war. For three years he had commanded the Lancashire Fusilier Brigade, which had become much attached to him, for he was quick to recognize and give credit for good work, and he possessed a remarkable memory for faces, invariably knowing each officer by name after the first meeting. The 6th Manchesters learnt with regret that their popular M.O., Captain A. H. Norris, M.C., who was home on leave, had been retained by the War Office for duty at home. A betterknown and better-liked Medical Officer never served with any battalion, and the regret was not confined to officers and men of the battalion, for the sick and wounded of many units were grateful for the energy, solicitude and complete disregard of self—and of red tape—which he had displayed in looking after their comfort and welfare in Egypt, Gallipoli, Sinai, and France.
The Front Advanced, June 1917
On the 1st of June the order was received to advance the divisional front by about 300 yards, the operation to be completed by 6 a.m. on the 10th. The order indicated that strong opposition might be expected, and details were left to the Brigadiers. The 126th Brigade on the right adopted the orthodox method of sapping forward each night, making a T-head at each sap to connect and form a continuous line later. The expectations of opposition were realized. Photographs taken by enemy planes brought heavy trench-mortar and machine-gun fire on the working-parties, and serious casualties were inflicted. A position near Femy Wood was occupied at night by the enemy, who were thence able to harass the working-parties. On the evening of June 3rd Corporal A. Eastwood, 9th Manchesters, took a patrol of three men to this point and lay down to await events. At 9.30 p.m. a German patrol emerged from the wood. The corporal ordered his men to hold their fire until the enemy were within thirty paces, when they opened fire with good effect, and remained until 2.30 a.m. covering the work and silencing a machine-gun and snipers. The hard and rocky nature of the ground in this part of the line was a
further obstacle, but in spite of all difficulties good progress was made, and the troops were complimented upon their work by the Chief Engineer of the Corps. On the left, Brig.-General Henley, profiting by the experience of the 126th Brigade, decided to complete his part of the operation at one bound. On the night of the 8th-9th he advanced his line the full distance, and all four battalions of the 127th Brigade began to dig in furiously. The covering party was in position at 10.30 p.m., and digging began at 11 p.m. under the supervision of the 427th Field Company, R.E. Before dawn twelve outposts on a front of 1500 yards were linked up by a continuous trench, and, leaving a skeleton garrison in the new trench, the companies returned to their positions practically unharmed. The finishing touches were added next night, and the new line was completed by the stated hour. This good work was rewarded by a Special Order of the Day from the Corps Commander.
The night patrolling in No Man’s Land furnished admirable opportunities for testing and training officers and men. These patrols appealed to many adventurous spirits, while others looked forward to their first experience with natural apprehension. Many patrols were therefore sent out with the primary object of giving the men confidence and experience, and this policy was completely successful. There was also a considerable amount of sniping, especially in the vicinity of Havrincourt Wood, where German snipers for a time had the advantage and made the most of their opportunities. They were, however, beaten at the game by Sergeant Durrans, 6th L.F., who on June 14 crept 450 yards into the long grass in No Man’s Land and patiently bided his time. When the snipers disclosed their positions by firing he gave a fine display of marksmanship for two and a half hours and picked off half a dozen of them. He was wounded in the right knee.
On the night of June 12 an officer of the 5th Manchesters, who were then holding the “Slag Heap,” was detailed to reconnoitre Wigan Copse, in No Man’s Land, examine the wire—concealed by the long grass—and find the gaps. He led a party of six men to the copse, but could find no gaps, the wire being apparently uninjured. He crawled round it to the back of the copse, and eventually
discovered an opening through which he crept, accompanied by a corporal, the rest of the party being posted outside. A narrow trench and some rough shelters were located, but there was no sign of life until the officer, desiring to take back a souvenir of his visit, disturbed a pile of stick-bombs. A tarpaulin then moved and a voice challenged them. The officer fired several shots with his revolver, and yells indicated that at least one of the Germans had been hit. The fire was returned, and in a moment the wood seemed alive with the enemy. As the exit was too close to the German front line for comfort the patrol crept away and lay in the long grass until the noise died down, when they withdrew untouched. On the following afternoon the enemy guns registered on the copse, and in the evening bombarded the British line and put down a box-barrage, under cover of which a company of the enemy charged the copse, yelling “Hands up, the English!” They suffered severely from rifle and Lewis-gun fire. Information was obtained later from prisoners that the garrison of the copse had been so scared by the sudden appearance of Englishmen in the wood that they had bolted, and had reported that the British were in possession of the post. Hence the elaborate counter-attack of the empty copse.
In the afternoon of June 22 a particularly daring raid was carried out by Sergeant J. Sugden (later Lieutenant) of the 10th Manchesters. Annoyance had been caused by a small trench-mortar, and as it was suspected that this was fired from a derelict elephant hut a few hundred yards from our most forward post, Sugden—a born scout—resolved to make sure. He found that there was a sentry guarding a dug-out near to the elephant hut, and that the man seemed inclined to take his duties easily. Returning, he chose two companions, whom he posted on a flank, while he crawled unobserved to within a few yards of the dug-out. He then quietly informed the sentry, in fluent German, that he was covered, and that he would be shot if he showed the slightest hesitation in obeying orders. He showed none, so Sugden ordered the other occupants of the post to come out with their hands up. At first they seemed inclined to dispute the matter, until told that they were surrounded and that unless they obeyed promptly they would quickly find themselves blown into a region even lower than their dugout. The
threat had its effect; they meekly obeyed, and Sugden had the satisfaction of bringing four very sullen Germans, carrying a trenchmortar, across No Man’s Land in broad daylight. The Corps Commander sent a complimentary letter to the Battalion Commander praising the initiative and the aggressive tactics of his men, and congratulated Sugden personally, and also gave him special leave for fourteen days.
Night Patrols and Raids
At the end of June the 7th Manchesters were instructed to supply a party to raid Wigan Copse and bring back three prisoners. Lieutenant A. Hodge (later Lieut.-Colonel, commanding 1/8th Manchesters), who was chosen to carry out the raid, gave his men some realistic preliminary training. At 11 p.m. on July 3 the guns opened on the enemy’s lines behind the copse, and Hodge’s platoon, after a crawl of more than half an hour, rushed the copse. Its occupants tried to bolt, but the box-barrage hemmed them in and they had to choose between fighting and surrender. One young German, who had been lying in the grass on outpost duty, was so scared that in his fright he rose and attached himself to the Manchesters, until Hodge took him by the scruff of the neck and flung him to the man behind. But no one wanted the Boche, so he was flung from one to another until finally one of the covering party held him captive. After five minutes’ rough-and-tumble, in which none of the 7th was hurt, though a number of the enemy had been bayonetted, or shot by the officer’s revolver, Hodge returned with the three prisoners indented for. It had been a model raid.
On the 8th of July the Division was relieved by the 58th Division, with the exception of the artillery, which remained in the line with the 58th Division, and later with the 9th Division, at Havrincourt Wood until the end of August, when they rejoined their own Division in Belgium. The artillery’s periods of “rest” were infrequent and uncertain. Whenever the divisional infantry was relieved the guns would remain in the line for a time, attached to the relieving Division. From the artillery point of view the work at Havrincourt consisted mainly of concentrated fire at night on back areas of the enemy line and in artillery duels. Corporal Charles Gee, “B” Battery, 210th
Brigade, twice won distinction during this period. On July 22, near Hermies, a hostile shell set a gun-pit on fire, and Gee, with Bombardier W. Pate, disregarding the explosions, succeeded in covering the burning material with earth, and so saved a considerable amount of ammunition. On August 13, during a heavy bombardment of the battery position, a shell burst in a dugout occupied by one man, blowing off one of his legs. Accompanied by Gunner W. Armitstead, Gee went to the injured man’s assistance, and while they were removing the debris a shell burst near and knocked both over They managed to extricate the man, bandage his wounds, and convey him to safety, being all the time under heavy fire and suffering from fumes.
The Ytres sector was looked back upon as a “bon” front by comparison with others with which acquaintance was made later. Here the Divisional Concert Party, which afterwards achieved fame under the title of “Th’ Lads,” was first organized. “Th’ Lads” soon became a feature which the Division could ill have spared, and the delightful entertainments given under the fine trees of Little Wood are recalled with genuine pleasure.
From July 9 to August 22 the Divisional Headquarters were in the Third Army reserve area at Achiet-le-Petit, where the 127th Brigade was stationed, with the 125th Brigade at Gomiecourt and the 126th at Courcelles. This area, which was visited by the King on July 1213, had been wholly devastated. What had once been a village was now a heap of broken bricks and rubble; a few stark walls standing grimly against the skyline and a name painted in bold black lettering on a white ground informed the passer-by what village had once stood here. The fields were scarred with trenches and shell holes, and all the indescribable debris of an abandoned battlefield was spread around. Most of the troops were under canvas, but as there were not enough tents for all a number had to live in little “shacks” made of odd bits of corrugated iron and any other scrap material available. The fine weather continued and the six weeks in this area partook of the nature of a holiday, though the days were fully taken up by intensive training, special attention being paid to training in attacks upon fortified posts and strong points. Instructional visits
were made to the scarred battlefields of the Somme, Brig.-General Henley taking a number of his officers to Thiepval and giving his personal experiences of the fighting there. The various training stunts—battalion, brigade, and divisional—enabled the troops to gain a thorough knowledge of the ground in this area, and this familiarity with the topography stood them in good stead when seven months later they were called upon to withstand the German onrush on this very ground. Time was found for divisional and brigade sports, interbattalion football and cricket matches, boxing contests in the large crater at Achiet-le-Petit; and the visits of “Th’ Lads” to the Brigade Headquarters were keenly appreciated. There had never been such a time for sports as this, and it was hard to realize that “there was a war on.” Newly-painted vehicles, perfectly turned-out animals, bands playing, troops spick-and-span, all combined to lend a gala aspect to this period.
On August 22 the period of rest came to an end, and the Division entrained for the most detested of all fronts—Ypres.
