Plenty has been written and said over the last fortnight about the horrors and sacrifices that the men of Britain and her colonies made during the First World War. For Britain, of course, you can read France, Germany, Russia, the United States, Turkey and so on. Nationality no longer seems to be important when it comes to counting the cost of the dead.
The one thing missing from much of this eve of centenary talk, though, is context. And perhaps the daily human side of life in the trenches as well. And this is the strength of Lyn Macdonald’s book 1915 The Death of Innocence (John Hopkins University Press, 1993).
As with all things historic, context is king. How can we hope to understand the mechanics and the machinations of the First World War simply by looking at the numbers of the fallen? We can’t. We get an idea of the scale of the slaughter but not of the movements that led to the strategies and the stalemate.
And how can we understand events of 1916 through to the end of the war without first getting to grips with what happened in 1915, the year when the gloves really came off with a vengeance, when trench warfare set up shop on the Western Front and a lack of planning and realism turned an imaginative plan to snatch the Dardanelles and topple the Ottoman Empire into a bumbling botchjob that cost thousands of lives?
We need to understand why they were there, the forces that were at play, and how the various actions intertwined to create the canopy of carnage.
Macdonald does this superbly. Using the voices of some of the participants as well as diaries, letters and reports, she offers the personal source of individual actions. That gives us a framework of day to day life in the trenches.
Macdonald is never boring; nor is she a dry textbook. Amid the moments of adrenalin-charged terror as the troops piled over the top only to stumble in the hailstorm of enemy machine guns are the moments of tedium which every soldier from every conflict knows. There are also the quirky moments of lightness, if not actual comedy – a night patrol, for example, taking a gramophone into No Man’s Land for no other reason than to give the Germans an unusual surprise.
On top of that, though, she strings together the actions of 1915 in a way that provides a logic and a rhythm. Ypres, Neuve Chapelle, Aubers Ridge, Loos, Hill 60, Hill 70, Anzac Cove and so on were not just one-off actions but part of a much bigger picture.
Macdonald provides the context with which we can get a grip of what happened not just in 1915 but in the three years of war that followed.
This story begins with a map which used to hang in our hallway when I was a small boy. To be honest, I don’t remember it at all but it made a big impression on my elder brother Felix who recalls it vividly, particularly the red-brown smears and the X.
The smears, so the story went, was our grandfather’s blood or perhaps that of his brave, unfortunate batman, Bain, the X marking the place where they were shot by the Germans during an attack on the Butte de Warlencourt in the Battle of the Somme in October 1916.
When the family moved house in 1976, the map went to live with our uncle Ned in Cumbria and was largely forgotten. When he recently sent us a PDF of it, though, along with a brief account of his father’s – our grandfather’s – record in the First World War, Felix and I decided to find out more.
So, here is the tale of how Grandpa Cookson lost his eye on the Somme.
EARLY DAYS
For many years the Cooksons were known as a military family. The most celebrated of them was Major-General George Cookson who served in the Napoleonic Wars. His diaries, which also remain within the family, speak of adventures against Napoleon, dinners with the Duke of York and a fondness for beautiful young ladies.
By the time Reginald was born in 1895, the family had taken a step down the social ladder. His father had made a career in the railways, starting off in the 1870s working at Peckham station which still exists in slightly modernised form in Rye Lane.
This, of course, was an exciting time for the railways; the kernel at the centre of the industrial revolution which promoted and helped expand the supremacy of the British Empire across the globe and which, in due course, contributed to the outbreak of the Great War.
St Mary Cray station, circa 1905 when James Thomas Cookson was the station master
When Reginald appeared, an unexpected younger brother perhaps for Archibald who was 11 years his senior, his father James Thomas Cookson was the stationmaster at St Mary Cray in Kent, some 14 miles to the south-east of London.
It was good middle-class stock, a family which had to work for a living. Reginald went to the City of London School from 1904 to 1908 before heading to The Skinners’ School in Royal Tonbridge Wells.
The first verse of the school song – The Leopards’ Song – written by Percy Shaw Jeffrey in 1894 hints at the shadow that was to fall across Europe 20 years later.
Now hands about, good Leopards all, And sing a rousing chorus,
In praise of all our comrades here And those who went before us; For to this day all hearts beat true, The gallant hearts that love us, So fortune ‘fend each absent friend While there’s a sun above us.
It may well have been that a life in the railways or in government service stretched out ahead of young Reginald until, on June 28, 1914, in the faraway city of Sarajevo, Gavrilo Princip wrote his name into the history books by gunning down the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Britain declared war on Germany on August 4 and four days later Reginald joined the London University OTC (Officer Training Corps).
PRIVATE COOKSON
I have a photograph of my grandfather on my bookcase. It is a picture typical of the era, a studio work just after he was commissioned. Looking every inch the officer, with the trademark clipped moustache, he appears to stare out across No Man’s Land, into the teeth of the German guns.
This was to come later, though. To begin with he was plain old Private Cookson, five foot eight inches in his socks, who joined up on November 18, 1914.
Sadly, the records for privates are never as complete as those for officers – and there appear to be no diaries or letters – so we don’t know much about his early war. My mother, who was the second eldest of the six children that followed after the war, insists he never talked much about the war so there is also little in the way of anecdotal reference.
For two months, he held the rank of Lance Corporal before voluntarily reverting to Private on February 19, 1915, three days before leaving to join his new regiment, the 19th Battalion, Royal Fusiliers (2nd Public Schools).
Again, there appears to have been more training than anything else, first at Woodcote Park, Epsom and then when they had joined 98th Brigade, 33rd Division at Clipstone camp near Mansfield in Nottinghamshire.
The first troops arrived in 1915 in driving rain following a march from Edwinstowe. What the men of the University and Public School Regiment made of this is unknown. However their first impression of the camp must have been poor due to the lack of constantly working electricity and adequate food.
Reg Carter’s postcard take on life at Clipstone Camp
Questions were even raised in parliament about the poor food quality. The MP for mid-Derbyshire enquired with the Secretary of State for War about “the scarcity and inferiority of the food and the conduct of some of the officers.” Presumably, men had complained about the food and been robustly dealt with by their superiors. No further action was taken and the arrangements were deemed to be of an acceptable standard.
Rifles were still in short supply in the ealry part of 1915 which meant that much of the men’s training centred on physical fitness. Reginald may not have been tall but he was solidly built with a chest expansion of three inches and he enjoyed his sport – he later became a matchday doctor for the two Bristol football teams and Gloucestershire CCC. So perhaps he relished the eagerness with which Kitchener’s Army embraced the ethic of physical fitness.
In early August they moved to Salisbury Plain for final training and firing practice before crossing for France in November
Once across the Channel they were again held in reserve, the 33rd Division concentrated near Morbecque.
The 19 Royal Fusiliers served in a quiet area of Flanders from December 1915 to April 1916.
They were greeted on their first night in the lines by the Germans who detonated a mineunder part of their trench. During that time they incurred a steady flow of casualties from artillery attacks but took no part in offensive action.
Administrative restructuring, though, and the chronic losses of officers in the trenches meant that the battalion was then disbanded in April 1916. The soldiers, public schoolboys, were seen as a natural source of officer material and hence the various parts were distributed across the army.
For Reginald, who had been bounced back up to Lance Corporal in May while they were at Clipstone, it meant a commission. Having just turned 21 in February, he was posted to the Officer Cadet Battalion on March 25, 1916.
As a Second Lieutenant, Reginald Cookson joined his county regiment the Royal West Kents and arriving on the big stage on September 4. His arrival at Brucamps, some way behind the front line, is noted in the war diary for the 11th battalion.
04/9/16 Battalion took part in tactical exercises (medical). 2nd Lieuts. Lindsay, Kerr, and Cookson, arrived.
There was already a Second Lieutenant Cooksey in the battalion so perhaps there were a few jokes along the lines of “too many Cooks…”
The next day was spent training before the battalion moved out on the sixth, taking the train to Méricourt where they arrived just after midday. Now on foot, they marched to Dernancourt, a little to the south-west of Albert.
More training as the RWKs prepared to take part in their first major offensive of the war, the attack on Flers which was to land major significance to historians as the first occasion on which tanks were employed in battle.
In fact the tanks did not make a terribly good first impression on the men around them but the message that “a tank is walking up the High Street of Flers with the British Army cheering behind” caused outbreaks of cheering in London.
Perhaps still too recently arrived, Reginald was not one of the officers selected to go into a battle that saw the RWK smash through the German defences only to find that the the strong German artillery fire was preventing reserves from getting forward to consolidate the success – par for the course on the Western Front.
RWK losses were catastrophic. The bold statement is that 343 of 610 all ranks became casualties. The more important fact was that of these the highest proportion of casualties was amongst the leaders, officers, warrant officers and NCOs.
Among the fallen, their commanding officer, Lt Col AF Townshend and four other officers wounded or missing. A number of others, including Cooksey, were wounded and evacuated to field hospitals. Cooksey would return to action but was killed on April 8, 1917 at Souchez. He was 21.
Instead Cookson was in reserve in Carlton Trench where he would have witnessed a large number of stretcher cases, both dead and wounded. Perhaps this was where he had the first inkling that he wanted to become a doctor so he could help to mend these broken bodies.
Back to the regimental diary:
16/9/16 Battalion in reserve in Carlton Trench. Reinforcements of all available fighting strength, except draft, together with remaining officers i.e. Capts. Stone & Richardson, Lieuts. Puttick, Fraser, & Purver, 2 Lieuts. Prior, Knott, Yorke, Russell, Edmunds, Kerr & Cookson, were called up to the Battalion. 2/Lieuts Knott, Yorke, Russell and Edmonds, were attached temporarily to the K.R.R.C (18th), while Lt. Fraser, 2/Lieuts Morley, Cookson & Kerr were returned to Transport Lines.
18/9/16 (Dernancourt) Weather very wet. Battalion was relieved by the 2/5th Lancs. Fusilliers at 8.30 a.m., and marched to bivouacs at E.15,a. Draft of 75 N.C.O’s and men arrived.
19/9/16 (Dernancourt) Strength:- amended to Officers 30, Other Ranks 639
20/9/16 (Dernancourt) Reorganisation of Battalion commenced.
Following the battle of Flers and the subsequent losses it was necessary to reshuffle the pack. Officers and men were drafted in from other battalions which had likely suffered equally bad losses. Major Arthur Corfe had taken over from Townshend, being given the temporary rank of Lieutenant Colonel, new company commanders were appointed and training continued.
The Queensland team that beat the 1899 British Isles tourists. Arthur Corfe (standing, second from right) was then picked to play for Australia.
Corfe, incidentally, was one of the many rugby players to fight in the First World War. Born in Christchurch, New Zealand, he scored two tries in Queensland’s 11-3 win over the 1899 British Isles team, earning himself a place in the line-up for the second Test in Brisbane. This time the British side won 11-0. It was his only Test.
At the front, he went on to win the DSO with two bars and the Croix de Guerre. He was wounded in Ypres in 1917 and taken prisoner in March 1918. But he survived the war, dying in 1949 at the age of 72.
Sunday October 1 was a rest day for the 11th but the next day they were on the move again, heading back towards the fire of the front line, their strength now showing 38 officers and 738 men from other ranks.
2/10/16 (Mametz) Battalion moved by Route March to bivouacs 8.10d, south of MAMETZ WOOD; via DERNANCOURT, MEAULTE, FRICOURT road.
3/10/16 (Eaucourt L’Abbaye) Battalion, less Transport and Details, relieved 1st New Zealand Rifle Brigade in the Line. The following officers went into action:- Lt.Col. A.C.Corfe, Capts. LV.Stone, P.Clarke-Richardson, & S.L.Simmonds., Lieuts. A.W.Puttick (Adjt), B.A..Purver, A.J.Heath, F.G.Fraser, & W.S.Lacey (M.O.)., 2nd Lieuts. H.G.Redmond-Prior, G.D.Henderson, A.V.D.Morley, R.Watson, R.J.Gibbons, R.G.Cookson, S.A.Wheeler, H.C.Edmunds, O.Radclyffe, & F.J.Argent.
7/10/16 Battalion strength:- Officers 41, Other Ranks 737. Battalion attacked the German trenches, on the right the 15th Hampshire Rgt., on the left the 1 40th Infantry Brigade, ona two Company front. The Battalion was only able to advance 100/150 yards from our front line, being held up by intense machine gun fire, coming both from flanks and direct front. Heavy casualties were incurred in this advance. The following Officers became Casualties. Killed:- Lieuts. Purver,, 2nd Lieuts Prior, Gibbons & Watson. Died of wounds:- Lieut.Lacey (M.O.). Wounded:- Capts. Clarke-Richardson, Stone, Simmonds., Lieuts Fraser, 2nd Lieuts. Cookson, Edmunds, Argent, Morley & Radclyffe. Missing:- Lt. Heath. Casualties in Other Ranks 323.
And that is the last we hear of RG Cookson in the Battalion diary although that day, October 7, is etched in family folklore. His story, as passed down, and perhaps embellished goes like this.
The whistle blows and the officer leads his men into the teeth of the German machine guns. A still from the film of the Battle of the Somme: Sequence 31 ‘The Attack’
The whistles signalled the start of the attack, the officers and men climbing up the ladder and out of their trench to begin the slow and cumbersome trudge across No Man’s Land.
Many of the men were hit as they poked their noses over the parapet, the Germans, roused by the bombardment and given a helpful cue by the whistles, let rip with their machine guns.
Others stumbled on some yards before they too collapsed in a heap in the mud. At some point, this was the fate of 2nd Lieutenant Reginald Cookson.
Out in No Man’s Land he was hit by machine gun fire in his right leg and crumpled to the ground. His orderly, or batman – we believe his name was Private David Bain who coincidentally also had his roots in Peckham – initially dragged him into a foxhole.
Then, during a lull in the battle, perhaps even that evening, Bain picked Cookson up and began to piggyback him towards the British trenches.
No Man’s Land
Sadly, the machine gun fire started up again. A round hit Bain in the head, killing him instantly, a shard of his skull piercing Reginald’s right eye. Quite how he ended up back behind British lines we never knew. Presumably, amid the chaos and confusion of battle, he himself had little recollection of what exactly happened.
But he was recovered by the British and woke to find himself in a field hospital.
It was a Blighty wound, the end of his Western Front experience. Four days later, he was on the ship Western Australia heading from Rouen to Southampton and en route to convalescence at Watermouth. His knee would be fine but his right eye would never see again.
He wasn’t to know that on the same day as he was wounded, a few miles down the road at Bapaume, a young German lance-corporal, who was to play the key role in the next global conflict, was also nursing a wounded leg after being hit by shrapnel from a British shell – a certain Adolf Hitler.
Felix and I made the trip to the Somme in December 2012. We visited a number of the battlefields; we stopped for the setting of the sun at Schwaben Redoubt, where the Ulsters fought so bravely before being let down by the rest of the line, and walked the calm lines of new-sprung trees in what was once the infernal wasteland of Mametz Wood.
We ran our hands along the grass on the softly sloping curves of the trenches at Beaumont Hamel where the Newfoundlanders were all but wiped out and we parked beside a row of frozen turnips on the edge of High Wood where the young cricketer Percy Jeeves fell, later to find posthumous immortality through the pen of PG Wodehouse.
We threaded our along the windy road up to Thiepval – the awe-inspiring memorial to the British soldiers for whom there is no known grave – and there carved high into the white Portland stone walls we found the name of Jeeves and, more important to our story, that of Bain. We paused to offer a silent prayer of thanks for his courage and his sacrifice.
And finally, after brushing the first snow of winter of our car and stowing a flask of hot coffee and a bottle of Bushmills on the back seat, we took the map and went to find where Grandpa Cookson lost his eye.
We passed through the village of Flers and inspected the monument at Butte de Warlencourt, the objective that fateful day in October 1916.
This fortiifed feature which dominated the point of Cookson’s attack with multiple machine guns was never captured and only occupied when the Germans withdrew to the Hindenburg Line.
As the bright winter sun broke through, we found the D11 and turned off on to an even smaller road, coming to a stop in a raised lay-by beside a massive pile of horse manure.
“This is it,” said Felix.
We climbed out, watching our feet carefuly as we slid down the bank, crossed the road and then climbed the frozen ground opposite. We stood by the side of a field of turnips. Row upon row.
Less than a kilometre away to the west the village of Le Sars, to the north-east the same distance away La Barque; silence hanging in the air apart from the occasional car flying past oblivious to the personal significance of the place, probably wondering why two middle-aged men were standing on the edge of a field with binoculars and a map, a copy of the blood-smeared map that used to hang in our hall. And a bottle of Bush.
Halfway up the gently rising hill, a farmer.
“I reckon about 100 yards along here,” said Felix, a man used to reading military maps, as he marched off along the verge of the road.
We walked. We stopped. We stamped our feet against the cold and squinted into the low December sun.
Felix checked the map again and raised a finger, pointing up the hill.
“About 200 metres up this hill. As near as dammit. That’s where he was hit. That’s where X marks the spot.”
We stood silent for what seemed like an age but was probably just a few seconds. Just looking at the rows of turnips and trying to imagine the noise and chaos of October 7, 1916. Neither of us wanted to upset the quiet, nor the farmer.
I retrieved a couple of plastic cups from my coat pocket and passed them to Felix. I unscrewed the cap of the Bushmills and poured two solid slugs. I replaced the cap and took one of the cups.
Sports writing – and rugby in particular – has been guilty over the years of overborrowing phrases or cliches from the world of war. How many times have you read of a player “going over the top” or “launching an aerial bombardment” on the opposing full-back? Even the great Bill McLaren went there in his commentary when he described the Scotland full-back Gavin Hastings as having a “boot like a howitzer”.
Once upon a time, though, this kind of language was used to describe the actions of rugby players in the actual field of battle, a place where the red card meant an unmarked grave and no chance to fraternise in the bar with the beefy prop from the other team who escaped the ref’s attention when he surreptitiously caught you a punch early in the second half.
And what Cooper does so cleverly through his choice of players is to tiptoe through the maze of the war as it unfolded from 1914 to 1918, from the Western Front, Gallipoli and Mesopotamia to the opening salvos of the Easter Rising in Dublin. These men find their wars at sea, in the air and, needless to say, in the thick, cold, cloying mud of the trenches.
Rosslyn Park began life in 1879 and quickly became a backbone for the game in the London area, developing lasting rivalries with Richmond and Blackheath. When war was declared, it was comfortably based in Old Deer Park in Richmond. The club moved to Roehampton in 1956 which is where some of its great names were nurtured: Andy Ripley, Paul Ackford, Alex King and Danny Cipriani all went on to play for England.
In 1914, it could also lay claim to a number of internationals
Alec Todd cut a dash through South African society during the 1896 British Isles tour
Alec Todd was a backrow forward who had toured South Africa with the British Isles team of 1896 – they weren’t to become the Lions until 1930 – scoring his only international try in the second Test win in Johannesburg. In 1899, he played for London County Cricket Club under the captaincy and management of a certain Dr WG Grace.
He was shot by a sniper on Hill 60 and died four days later on April 21, 1915 at Number 3 Casualty Clearing Station, Poperinghe.
Arthur Leyland Harrison put the Royal Navy above all else, entering Britannia Royal Naval College in 1901 at the age of 15. He played rugby for Rosslyn Park and even went on tour with them to Germany in June 1913 where “the team had a great time owing to the hospitality of the Germans”.
The robust lock, with a jaw that puts even the mighty Lawrence Dallaglio’s to shame, caught the eye of the selectors and won his first England cap against Ireland at Twickenham on Valentine’s Day 1914, his performance earning him rave reviews. He missed the Scotland match because of Navy duties but then returned and contributed to England’s win over France April 1914.
Arthur Leyland Harrison, capped twice by England, a VC at Zeebrugge
He would surely have played a lot more for England had it not been for an assassin’s bullet in Sarajevo, three months later.
Lieutenant-Commander Harrison volunteered for a new force – a forerunner of the Special Boat Service – which launched a daring and almost suicidal mission on the night of April 22, 1917 to neutralise the German guns at Zeebrugge while the navy blockaded the port.
That impressive jaw was ripped apart by a shell and he was taken for dead. In fact, he had been knocked out and when he roused himself he immediately rejoined the fray. The end came soon enough, though, as he led his men back into the fray. Harrison was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.
In among the XV is Eric Fairbairn; an Olympic silver medallist in rowing (coxless pairs) in the London Games of 1908, The Australian survived just one week in the trenches in Belgium before being “dangerously wounded” by a rifle grenade, dying on June 20 1915.
Then there is the Hampshire cricketer Wilfred Jesson, the playwright Guy du Maurier, who played for the club as early as 1881 when he was just 16, and the would-be poet Nowell Oxland.
Six members of the Rosslyn Park team of 1909-10 never came back from the war including Charles Bayly (front left) who died three weeks after war began and his half-back partner Wilfred Jesson (front, second from right)
Through Jack Bodenham, Cooper tells the story of the first day or the Battle of the Somme, the perfumer one of those that “simply disappeared”, while the tale of Guy Pinfield illustrates the sideshow of the Easter Rising in Dublin, the young Rosslyn Park wing the first British officer to die that day in Dublin Castle.
The chapter on John Harmon preludes his end in a flying accident by laying out the background of Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin while the development of the tank is portrayed in the stories of Denis Monaghan, a good enough three-quarter player to represent the Barbarians, and JJ Conilh de Beyssac, another international who played the first of his five Tests for France against Ireland on New Year’s Day 1912 and the last against England in April 1914 – when Arthur Harrison was lined up opposite him.
Rosslyn Park provided over 350 young men to the services; Cooper’s research suggests 72 of those never came back. He has settled on 15 riveting stories, building vivid pictures of the men, their backgrounds in family, business and rugby and the battles they fought.
The Final Whistle is a lasting tribute to each and every one of them;
Neil Young and Crazy Horse in full gallop at the Roman Arena in Nimes (Photo; Barney Spender 2013)
Let’s just get it out there at the start: Neil Young is a pain in the arse. I mean that in the nicest possible way but there is no escaping the fact that he can drive you up the wall.
He has certainly been sending me around the bend for the last five years – ever since Mrs S flew off to Copenhagen for a Leonard Cohen concert and returned as a convert to the way of the Horse.
Prior to that trip, the music in the house had varied, old friends such as Cohen, Morrissey and Strummer rubbing shoulders with some of the new kids on the block, bands like The View, The Fratellis, Fleet Foxes. We even threw on some of our Greek friends like Mickey Pantelous and the Chessmates, Old House Playground and the Dead City Jetz.
But once she came back, these guys were consigned to history. It was wall to wall Neil Young, his whiny voice creeping through the timbers and insinuating itself into every nook and cranny of Iliados 48. I missed our old friends,
I missed the variety. I grew to scowl at the very mention of Neil sodding Young. In that mood, I didn’t listen; I closed my ears to him and his flipping horse.
As with any addiction things got worse as Mrs S found friends among other Neil Young fans. She even became a Rustie, a member of the unofficial fan club that meets up prior and post gig, that holds festivals in various parts of the world to celebrate His Youngness’ genius and listens religiously to old gigs played out on Rust Radio.
And then she began to box clever, turning my new-found loathing inside out.
The first strategy came in the summer of 2012 when she announced that we were going to go camping in Spain. She had found a nice campsite in Torredembarra, about 90 kilometres south of Barcelona.
“There’s a little bit of something for everyone,” she announced. “It is right by the sea so the kids can go swimming every day, there are plenty of Roman ruins around so you should fit right in.”
The faithful gather at Torredembarra for the 3rd Spanish RustFest in 2012
“But what about you?” I asked. “You aren’t too keen on the sun and the heat. What is there for you?”
“Oh don’t worry about me, I will be going to the Spanish Rustfest. You can come too if you like.”
Dead sneaky. But brilliant. Presented with the fait accompli and with so many other temptations, who wouldn’t want to go to Catalonia for a week? Besides, I have always been a sucker for live music and she promised me plenty of cold beer so it was a no-brainer.
And we had a ball. A great three days of music, bands and beer. Sure Neil Young was the common factor but they weren’t nuts or celebrity chasers. They just loved his music and loved to play it themselves. I surprised myself by making some new friends while we were there.
And then came this year, the announcement that Neil Young was touring with Crazy Horse was met with semi-hysteria by the Rusties. The last time that happened was back in 2003 with the Greendale tour. Maybe this would be the last tour for them. Mrs S booked tickets for a couple of concerts and then asked me if I had ever been to Nimes.
“It sounds a lovely old town, it even has a Roman arena,” she said.
“Sounds good,” I replied.
“In fact, Neil is playing there…I thought we could all go, you, me, the kids. I would love them to experience Neil and Crazy Horse.”
There was a pause as I digested the wonderful sleight of hand – I was just too darn dim to spot it. She sensed the hesitation and let it ride for a few moments before delivering the punchline.
The first four in line outside the arena in Nimes; Uwe has the white hair (Photo: Barney Spender 2013)
And so it came to pass that on July 17, 2013, la famille Spender found themselves in Nimes.
When we arrived at the Roman arena shortly after 1pm, there was just one other person there, waiting for the gates to open in five hours time.
“I am always number one,” announced Uwe proudly.
Ah Uwe. Where to begin? The kids and I had met him for the first time a couple of nights previously when he and Mrs S went to see NY in Vienne in another Roman theatre.
Pushing 50 with a shock of spikey white hair, the charmingly crazy German was criss-crossing Europe in the path of the Horse. He drove with terrifying speed through roundabouts, apparently not at ease with the notion of going “around” them and expanded the kids’ vocabulary tenfold as he cussed his way through the English-German Lexicon of Cusswords.
On our first meeting, as we sat outside our tents sucking on a cold beer, he booked a place in family folklore.
“Do you fancy some nibbles?” I asked.
He looked puzzled, shocked even, quite lost for words. I reached into a large shopping bag and produced a packet of crinkle-cut crisps. He blinked and did a double-take.
“Nipples? You call these nipples?”
And nipples they remained.
Rusties get their name from the album Rust Never Sleeps so it is no surprise to find they are a dedicated bunch. Uwe was the first but the line quickly began to lengthen, Rusties from around the world greeting each other as old friends or meeting each other for the first time after years of verbal exchanges on the Rustie website.
They get there early to get into pole position for the run to the rail. These are the fans who cannot be doing with the comfort of a numbered seat up in the Gods; these are the groundlings who want to gather in the pit, to count the droplets of sweat rolling down Poncho’s neck or make genuine eye contact with the great man. They want the best view in the house.
The arena in Nimes (Sydney Spender 2013)
Waiting five hours is not much fun for the kids especially when they are meant to be on holiday but they settled into it. Syd, who is 11, took her sketch block to draw the arena while ten-year-old Nat attempted to use a box of pretzels to recreate Salvador Dali’s moustache under his nose.
Finally it was time to run. The kids were like Usain Bolt out of the blocks; I was more in the John Candy bracket. Even so, we were up on the rail next to Uwe, ready for the action.
Of course, this was still only 6pm so after five hours in line outside we now had another two hours to wait inside. But at least we were in.
Looking behind us, the arena was a peculiar sight. Evening sunshine had cut through the flurry of rain we had had outside, the pit was filling fast but there was no one in the seats above us.
In fact, the arena possessed little charm – all advertising hoardings and a lattice of bucket seats and metal railings an ugly smear across the antiquity of the original. A distant cry from what you find at the Herod Atticus or the Kalimarmaro in Athens where today’s audiences park their backsides on the same marble as their predecessors, the wise remembering to bring their own cushions.
But the atmosphere still crept through to all of us, the kids indulging in a grand debate about the nature of ancient history.
“It’s pretty cool to think that where we are standing was where the gladiators used to fight each other. Do you think anyone died right here?” asked Syd.
“Duh, I think they changed the floor since then,” replied Nat.
BECAUSE THE NIGHT
Patti Smith lighting up the evening in Nimes (Photo: Barney Spender 2013)
First on was Patti Smith who stopped after the first song to send some ear defenders down to Syd and Nat on the rail. As it was they already had some but it was a great way of engaging them in the concert. She later sent down a bottle of water for them.
She and the band were in outstanding form, the crowd of Neil lovers warming to her to the point that the roof – had there been one – would have come off during People have the Power and Gloria. She served up several songs from her new album Banga, the title-track of which also proved an instant hit with the crowd, and she produced a short acoustic song in support of Edward Snowden, the CIA whistle-blower who is still on the run.
It was outstanding. From my point of view, I had had my money’s worth but there was something else on the menu.
“Neil Young. And Crazy Horse. My favourite band in the world….apart from my own of course,” said Patti Smith in slightly awed tones towards the end of her set. She was later spotted dancing in the wings as the Horse began to gallop.
I don’t want to gush as it just doesn’t seem right. But it quickly became apparent that I had been wrong about Neil Young. He wasn’t a whiny pain in the arse. He was a legend. And Crazy Horse too. The chemistry between the four of them – Neil, Billy, Poncho and Ralph – something very special, not surprising perhaps given that they have been together, off and on, since the 1970s.
Neil, Billy and Poncho jamming like teenagers (Photo: Barney Spender 2013)
At various points, Neil, Billy and Poncho would stand in a circle, challenging each other with their guitars; all of them in the sixties, they were like a bunch of naughty schoolboys jamming in their parents’ garage and loving every minute of it – Ralph, the drummer with the pirate flag, lending his voice to the harmonies.
The low point was the acoustic rendition of Heart of Gold – and the Bob Dylan classic Blowin’ in the Wind. Not that this was Neil’s fault. He did them as they were meant to be done. Or at least I think he did; it was difficult to hear anything as 16,000 people launched into community karaoke, drowning out the one song that many of them had probably paid their entrance money to hear.
No chance of drowning him out on most of the others, especially once he strapped on Old Black – Walk like a Giant breaking into Hole in the Sky and a rousing rendition of Rockin’ in the Free World some of the highlights.
Like Patti Smith he also engaged with the kids, winking at Syd during Cinnamon Girl and getting into a finger-jabbing fight with Nat on Roll Another Number.
Neil Young in Nimes (Photo: Barney Spender 2013)
The end came in a breathless rush of drums, guitars, feedback and orchestrated mayhem. And I recognized that I had undergone a kind of epiphany, not quite walked the road to Damascus but maybe the path to Ontario. I had realised I was too young to rust on my musical laurels. Neil Horse and Crazy Young were all they were cracked up to be. Truly outstanding.
“I need a beer, “ I heard myself say.
“Yah,” said an emotionally drained Uwe. “And some nipples.”
Van Gogh’s last self-portrait, sent to his mother as a gift
It’s a strange day when you head off for a quiet walk in the country to track the footsteps of Vincent van Gogh and come within a whisker of being frog-marched off to a holding cell behind barbed wire, not to mention a good beating.
It all happened last Sunday. A family walk with friends up the river at Auvers-sur-Oise, a few miles to the north of Paris.
A hint of rain, a sliver of sun, a picnic in the backpack, a stately line of cypress trees, the dogs and kids running ahead to check out the swans and the ducks, the paunchy journalist bringing up the rear. A merry band indeed.
The purpose: to find out more about the town and area where Vincent van Gogh spent the last three months of his life. It was in Auvers on July 27, 1890 that he put a revolver to his chest and fired the fatal bullet.
He was a better painter than marksman to be sure. No swift suicide (if it was indeed suicide for in 2011 came a suggestion that Vincent had not in fact shot himself, but that two boys with a misfiring gun had pulled the trigger); instead the bullet ricocheted off a rib and lodged in his spine. It took two days for him to shuffle off his mortal coil.
Vincent and Theo lie side by side in the cemetry in Auvers (Photo: B Spender)
His brother Theo died of illnesses caused by syphilis six months later and is buried alongside Vincent in Auvers.
The cemetery was just one of our stops. Another was the house where Vincent expired and the church that he immortalised in paint. The town of Auvers has traded well on a painter who spent just three months there – a museum of absinthe has also claimed its place among the drifting lanes.
The day, though, belonged to another less than merry band of spycatchers who appeared from nowhere to pounce on me along the riverbank.
One of our fellow walkers, who lives in Auvers, had explained that along our path was the house where the last Shah of Iran lived in exile after his fall from power in 1979. I was under the impression he had spent his time buzzing around the USA getting treatment for his cancer, Morocco, Mexico and Egypt where he is buried.
Be that as it may, I am a sucker for what you might call “living” history. Iran remains very much in the forefront of the world’s news and so I was able to use the Shah as a pretext to explain to the kids what had happened there in the 1970s. And what is happening now. They laugh at the thought of a president called Ahmadinnerjacket but rush back to join the dogs and the ducks.
The church at Auvers with van Gogh’s version alongside (Photo: B Spender)
Until we reach the residence with its long, high walls topped with barbed wire, lights and, unseen by me at the time, security cameras. Just over the wall, we could pick out the sloping roof and top floor of a grand residence.
“It’s like a prison,” they said.
“Well, I suppose it was,” I replied. “A man in exile, fearful for his life, barricades himself into his palace. In spite of all his money, he doesn’t have any freedom. He can’t just walk along the riverbank like us.”
The kids nod, a moment in thought. And then screech and chase each other with the sticks they have picked up along the way. The dogs start barking and games of Tag and Fetch begin simultaneously up ahead.
A house that is interesting for its history, I thought. Maybe I can put in a line about it if/when I blog about this lovely day out following van Gogh (or Gog, as the French prefer to say). And so, as my colleagues walked ahead, I fetched out the camera and lined up a shot of wall, wire and rooftop. Just one. Nothing special. Then returned the camera to its case.
Before I had stepped three paces, a sidedoor had opened and a man slithered out, walkie-talkie in hand and approached me.
“Bonjour,” he greeted me.
“Bonjour.”
“You just took a photograph.”
The Shah and Empress Farah shortly before leaving Iran in 1979 during the height of the Iranian revolution.
“Yes, fascinating place. I understand the Shah lived here.”
“No, not the Shah. But you are not permitted to take pictures.”
Generally, I am quite amenable to people’s requests but I took umbrage at the man’s aggressive tone.
“Who says?” I asked.
“We don’t allow it.”
“Who is we? Are you with the gendarmes?”
“No, I am not police but you are not allowed to take photos.”
“But who says? Do you have some kind of ID? Are you with French state security? Who are you?”
I thought it best during this exchange and throughout all that followed not to mention that I was a journalist.
He didn’t answer me, just began talking into his walkie-talkie. Not in French but, I guessed, in Persian. Within moments another three men appeared from the magic door and the four of them formed a circle around me.
A different one spoke, slightly younger than the others, a scar just under his left ear.
“Where are you from?” he asked.
“Where are you from?” I returned.
“Why are you taking photos here?”
“Why don’t you want me to take photos here?”
A pause before the scar tried again.
“You are English aren’t you?” he asked in English, adopting a softer tone.
“As it is yes, I am. And you are Iranian, are you?”
“I know England very well. I was a student in Newcastle. I lived in Bristol and Manchester. I know it very well.”
“Good stuff. Wish I could say the same about Iran but I haven’t ever been. ”
“Please, we don’t like people taking pictures. For security reasons.”
“So who lives here then? The son of the Shah?”
The cypress trees of Auvers along the banks of the Oise, as real for van Gogh as for the Iranian opposition (Photo: B Spender)
“No, not the Shah. No. We are the official opposition, the NCRI (National Council of Resistance of Iran). We are fighting against the government of Iran. They have people who are trying to do us damage and we have to be careful about our security. That is why we cannot allow you to take pictures.”
There are moments when the fight is worth fighting and there are moments when it really doesn’t seem terribly important. I suspect the Iranian secret service know perfectly well where the opposition is so I didn’t believe the security aspect of their argument but even so this one just didn’t seem important. It was a pretty lousy picture anyway. Besides I was reading John Le Carré at the time and had visions of my ending up gagged and blindfolded in a cardboard box while my co-walkers continued along the riverbank blissfully unaware of the drama unfolding behind them.
“I see. Well, I certainly don’t want to put anyone in jeopardy (not least my family, I thought). So I will gladly delete it. The only problem is that this is a new camera and I don’t actually know how it works. I will have to get my daughter to do it.”
Feeble as it sounds, this was absolutely true. As a technophobe, I need a good couple of hours with the instruction manual before I can do anything. My children need five minutes and no manual.
“No, I am sorry. We cannot allow that. We have to delete it now.”
“Well, as I said, I don’t know how to. It is a new camera and I am not going to let you take it away. I give you my word that it will be deleted and that it will not be shared anywhere.”
“No. We have a man who understands these things.”
More talking on the walkie-talkies and a fifth man appears through the magic door, this one twice the size of the others put together. Immense but smiling which is always a touch sinister. I definitely wasn’t going to argue although I did warn him that he had better be careful.
“There are a lot of family pictures on there and some films. You delete those and you will have to answer to my wife. She’s Welsh and a lot scarier and tougher than me.”
The giant didn’t look unduly concerned about the prospect of a Gallic onslaught as he delicately worked the buttons on the camera which was like a toy in his bucket hands.
Not quite van Gogh but roughly what this is how the forbidden photo looked (Image: B Spender)
“This one,” he said.
“That is it. Like I said, just the one picture.”
The giant pressed the Erase button and then Confirmed.
Smiles all around; suddenly their anxiety was lifted and we were all chums, apparently united in the war against the regime in Iran. I kept my mouth shut.
“So,” said the scar as I made to move off. “This is our embassy. You can come in if you like. Would you like a coffee? Good Iranian coffee.”
I will admit to feeling confused by this swift transition from public enemy number one, the master spy angling to bring down the opposition in exile, to brother in arms. Had I been a spy, I imagine I would have seen a lot more from inside the compound. But maybe they still suspected me and were trying to lure me into that cardboard box which could then be dumped from 30,000 feet over the Persian Gulf.
I declined politely, explaining that while an Iranian coffee would be absolutely perfect, I had to catch up with my family and my friends. I wished them good luck in their political endeavours and marched off along the riverbank.
Fabien Pelous’ eyes sparkle as he “gets to take the girl home” after the 2002 Six Nations
It’s probably stereotyping but the French can’t keep sex out of anything. Just can’t. Check the ads for cars, baby wipes, stairlifts for the elderly; they are all loaded with a whiff of je ne sais quoi, that feeling that anything is possible and nothink ees eemposeeble.
Naturally, this extends to the Six Nations as well. A decade and some ago, the then French captain Fabien Pelous (right) almost went down on one knee and proposed to it.
“For me the beginning of the Six Nations is like the start of a grand party where your eyes meet those of the most beautiful woman there on the far side of the room,” he told me.
“Your eyes lock and you know in that instant that this evening will hold a mystery. Maybe the beautiful women will be cruel and turn her back on you or maybe you drink champagne and make love. This woman is the Six Nations.”
I kid you not. After our phone call, I chuckled heartily as I told my girlfriend. Her reaction was not to laugh but to wipe away a tear from the corner of her eye and scold me for never saying things like that about her; why couldn’t I be a bit more like Fabien? She did go on to marry me but I suspect deep down she still pines for him.
This week, Thierry Dusautoir was less expansive but if you can read anything in people’s eyes, he was thinking the same as that romantic old devil Fabien.
“It is still exciting even for me, after all these years. We may be professionals but this is not just a case of going to the office. It is a beautiful competition, sometimes it doesn’t turn out so well but sometimes…” (and this is where the slightly rheumy eyes give him away) “….there is a magic about it all. It is very (Pinteresque pause laced with mystery and just a hint of menace) stimulating.”
Dusautoir, of course, has had his many grand romances on the rugby field, notably leading the French to the 2011 World Cup final, but these days he is no longer the captain, permanently demoted by coach Philippe Saint-André after Pascal Papé did such an excellent filling-in job during last summer’s tout to Argentina and the autumn tests.
Thierry Dusautoir on the charge
Such is the competition these days for places in the back row, Dusautoir was not even sure until Wednesday when he was given the nod ahead of Toulouse teammate Yannick Nyanga, who has been in outstanding form, that he would be travelling to Rome for France’s opening match against Italy.
Remember Imanol Harinordiquy? Albeit he was injured earlier in the season but at the moment it would be a surprise if the Biarritz number eight, such a totem in seasons past, were to feature for France in the Six Nations or any other time. Injuries, of course, can change things quickly so don’t go ducking down to the bookie on that one on my account.
“I hope to profit from this change of role,” said Dusautoir, 31, who had been the undisputed captain since taking on the role in 2008. “I am a soldier now, not the captain so I have to prepare differently. I have the luxury of focusing only on myself. I am not certain to start and I have to share a room again so it is all a bit different. Whatever happens, I won’t regret a thing.”
The point is, Saint-André is not prepared to mark time. He inherited Marc Lièvremont’s team last year and it came up a bit breathless in the Six Nations, especially against a young England side that turned them over in spectacular style at the Stade de France.
George Barbier’s view of the Belle Epoque vision of rugby where the rugby players, themselves a touch effete, make the ladies go weak at the knees
That was the cue to look forward, to create a new Belle Epoque for French rugby. Perhaps not in the George Barbier style – these guys don’t look ready to kick over a sandcastle so not sure how they deal with the hairy, muscelbound thugs that prowl the fringes of every modern ruck.
Effectively the team has a new spine. At hooker, Dimitri Szarzewski has finally stepped into the boots of the almost (but not quite) irreplaceable William Servat while Louis Picamoles nailed down the number eight shirt with some compelling performances in the autumn, notably in the shredding of Australia – when Nyanga was also outstanding.
The half-backs changed as well with Maxime Marchenaud and Morgan Parra sharing duties at 9 with the rejuvenated Frédéric Michalak looking twice the player he was ten years ago at 10.
At full-back Brice Dulin announced himself against the Wallabies but he is injured. Saint-Andre’, though, hasn’t gone the obvious route of calling up the mercurial Clément Poitrenaud; instead he summons Poitrenaud’s Toulouse colleague Yoann Huget, who is five years younger, to fill the breach with 23-year-old Benjamin Fall coming in for Vincent Clerc on the wing.
There are changes elsewhere of course. Romain Taufifenua is a lock to watch and you may well see Matthieu Basteraud, a squat, powerful battering ram of a centre relishing his second chance at this level.
“The past is the past,” he said referring to an unsavoury incident on tour to New Zealand in 2009 involving too much alcohol and a bust up with a couple of teammates in which Bastareaud emerged with severe bruising on his face.
He claimed he had been mugged in the street, sparking national soul-searching in New Zealand, not to mention a massive police investigation which upon inspection of the CCTV footage at the hotel suggested that the young centre had made it all up.
Legal niceties, sadly, keep us from telling the whole tale but it is, trust me, very unsavoury.
Philippe Saint-André is writing a new chapter for French rugby which could well end with a World Cup win in 2015
Diplomatic relations between New Zealand and France dipped to their worst since the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior in 1985 before Bastareaud ‘fessed up and was effectively sent to international coventry.
He has been playing well for Toulon of late, though, and Saint-André sees him as a useful weapon to have in his armoury. Hence the rehabilitation.
“I am 23 now, I have changed clubs (from Stade Français to Toulon), I have learnt much from being with players like Jonny Wilkinson and Matt Giteau. On and off the field.” We hope so.
And with the likes of Maxime Mermoz and Wesley Fofana in the backs, this French side promises to deliver everything we love about their game. Bullish scrummaging, some dark arts around the fringes – Dusautoir remains one of the world masters when it comes to turnovers – and some blissful running. Now who’s getting rheumy-eyed?
I am told there are people who travel to Six Nations games for the rugby. I cannot be sure of this and I have no first-hand evidence but apparently they travel to the game on the morning of the match, have lunch and – if they are feeling reckless – a glass of beer, watch the game, head back to the station, airport or worst of all the car park, and travel home again. All in one day. Extraordinary behaviour, of course, and I only report this as hearsay.
Or should that be heresy? These people if they exist – and I really do have my doubts that any self-respecting rugby fraternity would allow such heretics to fester in their ranks for long – should be publicly outed.
They should be named and shamed and never permitted to go to a Six Nations game again until they have spent every Saturday for two seasons at the local Old Foreskinians learning all the songs and the art of public drinking. Then, and only then, should they be entrusted with another ticket.
I know, you are shocked. As was I when I hear about these lily-livered charlatans. But hold fire. Best not to be too harsh on them. Yes, the waste is a disgrace but the chances are they do not actually realise the wider concept of the finest tournament on earth. They do not realise the notion of the Lost Weekend.
For most rugby fans, the Six Nations is a chance to sack Constantinople all over again, if you get my drift
Fortunately, the vast majority of rugby followers worked out a long time ago that the Six Nations was the best excuse given to Man – and latterly Woman – to disappear for a weekend in a haze of revelry and bonhomie. Yes, there may be a bit of sight-seeing going on – without wishing to sound sexist it is usually when the ladies accompany their philistine men – but the weekend, fuelled by some well-appointed ales, is about having a good time and making new friends.
I first came across the concept when I was a student in Dublin in the early 1980s. At the time, Ireland had rather a good team – think Slattery, Duggan, Keane, Fitzgerald, Orr, Campbell, Finn, MacNeill to name just a few – which gave an added edge to games in Dublin which was, and still is, the number one destination for any Six Nations weekend.
The opening game of the 1983 championship saw the French coming to town and it was with a mix of excitement and admiration that I noticed the first berets and stripy shirts – this was before the age of replica shirt – sauntering up Grafton Street. It was the Wednesday before the game. Sod the Lost Weekend, this was A la Récherche de la Semaine Perdue.
And I swear that one group had a live cockerel with them. If there were European regulations about the import of livestock, someone had turned a very blind eye.
A JOYCEAN EPIPHANY
The scales slid from my own eyes. James Joyce, a Dubliner whose eagerness for a pint would have commanded an approving eye from the most experienced Lost Weekender, would have called it my epiphany. From that day forward, the Six Nations – or Five as it then was – was about the craic.
The great day in 1985 when Michael Kiernan taught England the value of a late drop goal as he clinched the Triple Crown for Ireland
This hit a new level two years later when Ireland won the Triple Crown. Jonny may have brought the drop goal to the attention of the previously slack-jawed English but in Ireland, St Michael Kiernan was the man, his late drop at Lansdowne sinking the English in 1985. It was a mighty strike and the crowd rose as one to acknowledge it.
The party was even mightier, especially at the official reception at the Shelbourne Hotel. My flatmate and I, carried away by the emotion of the day and a fair few pints in O’Neill’s of Suffolk Street, repaired to our rooms at Trinity College, threw on dinner jackets and walked through the crowds and the security without so much as a second glance.
“Bad luck lads,” said the doormen, assuming us to be the vanquished English.
With free booze and nibbles, it was a fantastic evening. The only tight moment came when a member of the Irish Referees Association pulled his programme from his pocket and asked me to sign for him.
In an act of desperation, I scribbled something unintelligible under the thumbnail picture of Stuart Barnes who, I had heard on good authority, from Wade Dooley and John Orwin was already tucked up in his bunk with a hangover in the making.
Stuart Barnes has kindly forgiven me for assuming his persona in every club on Leeson Street
Thankfully, when Mr Barnes heard this story some years later he had the decency to laugh and take wine with the culprit – the makings of yet another lost weekend.
Players often talk about making new friends through rugby and it is the same with the supporters. A mate of mine, in Cardiff for an Ireland game, found himself kidnapped by some lads from Bridgend. At the start of the day he didn’t know any of them but after being dragged to the clubhouse for a few late pints and a few hours on the sofa, they are now old friends. Mind you , as he had only gone for the day, he had some explaining to do when he got back to London the next afternoon.
The great thing about the Six Nations is that you get to visit six superb cities, each unique in its own right. As I mentioned before, Dublin is probably the best place to visit because the whole city gets wrapped up by the game. The excitement builds with every passing hour and by the time the walk to Lansdowne Road gets underway – you have to walk to the ground and stop for a couple of pints en route to get the best atmosphere – it fairly crackles.
DRUNK IN DUBLIN
For some reason, Dublin also seems to produce the bulk of the drinking stories. One journalist tells the tale of a match he covered there in the 1990s.
He was in Dublin on the Saturday for the game and had to fly out early on Sunday morning to some one-flight a week backwater like Maribor to cover a golf or ping-pong tournament. It just so happened that his Saturday night ended with some late night whiskies with the night porter. At around five o’clock our man staggers up to bed.
“Don’t forget,” he says by way of goodnight. “I need the alarm call at eight and a taxi to the airport for 8.30.”
The next morning the night porter, looking a tad weary in his boots, knocks on his door with a silver tray of the finest breakfast known to humanity. Alongside it, a bottle of Jameson, seal still intact.
“That is fantastic,” said the journalist. “But why the Jameson’s?”
“That’ll be on account of it being half past ten, sir.”
Another scribbler of the Welsh variety – for argument’s sake, let’s call him Tim – suffered a similar problem with booze and wake-ups. This time, after a big night in Keogh’s, Tim was incredibly annoyed to get a telephone call in his room in the middle of the night. It was one of his colleagues who began to wind him up.
“Where are you, Tim? The game’s just about to kick off,” asks his colleague.
It is a well-known fact that only stone-cold sober Wales fans are allowed to attend matches with a painted plastic bucket on their head
Cue a tirade of expletives along the lines of “kindly depart you illegitimate male offspring of a lady dog.”
“Seriously, mate it’s just about to kick-off.”
“You’re talking rubbish,” insists our man. “I was at the game, Ireland won 27-9 and I have already filed all my copy. So just piss off and leave me alone.”
Pause at the other end of the phone. “Er, Tim, I think you might want to turn on the TV.”
He did and to his horror, there were the teams trotting on to the field. He had dreamt the whole thing.
Fortunately, being the consummate pro he immediately settled down in front of the screen and produced 1,500 words of purple prose.
Like Dublin, Cardiff and Edinburgh are small cities with the grounds walkable from the city centre. Actually, the Millennium Stadium is bang in the middle of Cardiff so anyone arriving at Cardiff Central walks smack into the middle of it.
CITY CHARMS
Twickenham has its own charm although if you are looking for pre-match build-up the night before skip the West End and head for a decent boozer like The Sun in Richmond where you are likely to bump into some like-minded folk.
Rome is building a reputation although it still has a way to go before reaching Parisian status.
Paris’s charm lies, I regret to say, more in the exotic and erotic than in the culture or the cuisine. No one comes back from Paris without at least one story of “a friend” who disgraced himself in a bar or “club” in some way.
Fortunately, the Lost Weekender’s golden rule of “What goes on on tour, stays on tour” means these can never be divulged – except, of course, on the next lost weekend.
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Plenty has been written and said over the last fortnight about the horrors and sacrifices that the men of Britain and her colonies made during the First World War. For Britain, of course, you can read France, Germany, Russia, the United States, Turkey and so on. Nationality no longer seems to be important when it comes to counting the cost of the dead.
Sports writing – and rugby in particular – has been guilty over the years of overborrowing phrases or cliches from the world of war. How many times have you read of a player “going over the top” or “launching an aerial bombardment” on the opposing full-back? Even the great 
