Books read during 2011

There are few upsides to commuting by train, but one of them is that, after many years driving around the UK, I am now able to read and travel at the same time.

As a consequence, I have read more books this year than I have for many years. This is what I’ve been reading in 2011.

Empires of the Sea: The Siege of Malta, the Battle of Lepanto, and the Contest for the Centre of the World by Roger Crowley

Comment: This account of the battles between rival Christian and Islamic empires is littered with atrocities, enslavement and cruelty. Barbarossa makes Osama Bin Laden look like a pussycat! Tom lent me this book. It’s compelling stuff and gives a real insight into an aspect of history that isn’t taught in the UK curriculum. The whole of the Mediterranean was very nearly Islamic and the impact that would have had on history is massive. The book covers the siege of Rhodes, the expulsion of the Knights of St John to Malta, the conquest of Cyprus by the Turks, the siege of Malta and finally the defeat of the Turks at Lepanto by Spanish, Italian and Venetian ships.

Rifles by Mark Urban

Comment: Some interesting new perspectives on the rifle brigade and how they helped alter the tactics of warfare. Quite a gritty account of the Peninsula War with lots of personal accounts from those taking part. Max bought me this book for Christmas. I thought I’d read all I wanted to on Wellington and the Peninsula War, but this brought new insights and told it from a different perspective. As a result, I bought quite a few more books, all personal accounts by soldiers (although I haven’t got around to reading them until just recently).

The Autobiography Of Lieutenant-General Sir Harry Smith, Baronet Of Aliwal On The Sutlej by Harry Smith, George C. M. Smith

Comment: One for serious Harry Smith fans! His first hand account (although written many years later) of the Peninsula War, Battle of New Orleans and the end of Napolean makes fascinating reading. He had one hell of a life. Sadly the book doesn't cover his actions in South Africa or India. It was interesting to read Smith’s perspective on the campaign. He’s engaged in historic epic battles (including Waterloo), but most of the time, he’s more concerned about accommodation, food and hunting.

Nelson's Trafalgar: The Battle That Changed the World by Roy Adkins

Comment: Roy Adkins is a terrific narrative historian with his text coloured by contemporary accounts from sailors and officers. Trafalgar was a great victory, but to win it took training, individual initiative, radical tactics and immense bravery. To break the French and Spanish lines, the smaller British force exposed themselves to gunfire for many hours as they closed slowly on the line and there was devastating close quarter fighting and point-blank broadsides. Nelson was unlucky that the Victory broke the line and engaged a French ship where the crew had been drilled in sniping onto the open deck of the British ships with the express intention of killing the officers who could not show cowardice by seeking cover.

Unjustifiable Risk? The Story of British Climbing by Simon Thompson

Comment: Fascinating history of climbing even if (like me) you have no head for heights. Much of it is social history as climbing has moved from a pursuit of aristocrats, through the middle classes to the working class. I bought this book for Max and then decided to read it after talking about it with him. You don’t have to be a climber to find it interesting.

Genghis Khan: Life, Death, and Resurrection by John Man

Comment: Contains an interesting recipe for braised marmot - a favourite for Sunday lunch among the Mongol hordes! I read John Man’s book on Attila the Hun last year and bought this book on Genghis Khan on the back of that. I like the fact that he makes a point of visiting the places where battles were fought, where these people lived and that often gives a really different slant and, sometimes, a better insight and understanding. Genghis Khan was an amazing figure; his empire dwarfed that of the Romans and Alexander and his descendants were still ruling part of it until the Russian revolution. Why isn’t he on the history curriculum?

Kublai Khan by John Man

Comment: Fascinating account of the mediaeval leader, grandson of Genghis Khan, whose actions have had (and are still having) such a profound effect on today's world. For example, China's claim to Tibet is based largely on the fact that Kublai conquered Tibet and then China, incorporating them into a single empire. He was an amazing conqueror, but we only know of him (in truth) because of an opium fuelled poem (now recognised as one of the greatest works in English romantic poetry) by Coleridge, who had presumably read about Kublai Khan and his summer palace Xanadu from the work of Marco Polo.

Tamerlane: Sword of Islam, Conqueror of the World by Justin Marozzi

Comment: I’m getting through my central Asian mediaeval history! Temur the Lame made Genghis Khan look a bit Lib-Dem. Countries and regions he ravished, including chunks of Afghanistan still haven't recovered to this day. His tactics in Afghanistan were very effective, although they did involve building towers of skulls, so are unlikely to be adopted by NATO. In many ways, Tamerlane was a better general than Genghis Khan, but like him (and Alexander) the lack of a successor who had the ability to step into his shoes, meant the empire was relatively short-lived.

The White Spider by Heinrich Harrer

Comment: Harrer is an amazing guy and this is an amazing climb. I've seen the north face and it's unbelievable to me that anyone could climb it. Indeed, for a long time, that was the considered view. Heinrich Harrer was one of the four-man team who climbed it for the first time in 1938 and it wasn't until 1947 that it was climbed again. Chris Bonington and Ian Clough were the first Brits to make the climb (the 31st ascent) in 1962. Bonington had to abandon his attempt the previous year to help rescue another climber. The account of Harrer's ascent is gripping, as are many of the early climbs (successful and unsuccessful), but the book does tail off into something of a log book of Eiger activity. It also stops in 1964 and therefore misses some of the new direct routes.

K2: Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain by Ed Viesturs and David Roberts

Comment: Unbelievable bravery, endurance, pain and sorrow. Climbing 8000-metre peaks is clearly no picnic but this book gives you an insight into just how difficult it is. You need massive fitness, endurance, skill, judgment, bravery and luck. Having been gasping around this winter at 9000ft carrying ski boots and skis, I've tremendous respect for high-altitude climbers. The author has climbed all 14 of the 8000-metre peaks and he's a good writer as well as an accomplished mountaineer. American spelling and phrases grate for a while, but the subject matter is so compelling, you soon forget that.

The Beckoning Silence by Joe Simpson

Comment: Joe Simpson is a really good writer. His account of the challenge of climbing the north face of the Eiger (one last mountaineering challenge for him) is gripping. The book is also an examination of what drives climbers and why Joe has lost his drive to carry on climbing. I guess I should have read Touching the Void before I read this – ho-hum.

No Shortcuts to the Top: Climbing the World's 14 Highest Peaks by Ed Viesturs and David Roberts

Comment: To climb the world's 14 peaks over 8000 metres is an amazing feat of endurance, but also massively dangerous. Ed Viesturs did all 14 peaks without oxygen, which is incredible. The book tells you how he did it, which is a remarkable story of commitment. It contains some scary descriptions of what happens to the human body above 25,000 ft and how mountaineers take a dump with all that kit on; essential to know as getting the runs is a consequence of high altitude living for many climbers. I bought this after reading his book on K2.

K2: Triumph and Tragedy by Jim Curran

Comment: I am getting into my mountain disaster books – and there are a lot of them about. For every major mountain disaster, there’s a foot or so of bookshelf devoted to it. Jim Curran’s account of the 1986 season on K2 when 13 climbers died is both a success and also fails by the fact that he was not a climber accomplished enough to undertake a summit challenge, he was a photographer and film cameraman who became base camp manager and a helpless witness to the tragic events thousands of feet above. That perspective both gives it a different slant, but also misses something as a result. Really good book.

Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer

Comment: I said I was getting into my mountain disaster books! This account is of the 1996 disaster when a dozen people were killed attempting Everest, including the New Zealand guide John Hall and the American guide Scott Fischer. Hall’s death was particularly poignant because he was able to talk to his heavily pregnant wife by satellite phone as he froze to death high on the south ridge. The author, Jon Krakauer, is a journalist writing for mountaineering journals in the US and he writes with a journalistic style and skill; although he made some serious factual errors in the first edition of his book concerning who had died and where. It pretty obvious now that the account has flaws, but it’s still an amazing account by a man who was there and was almost a victim himself.

Annapurna: The First Conquest of an 8,000-Meter Peak by Maurice Herzog

Comment: This is the book that inspired the young Joe Simpson to take up mountaineering. It is Herzog’s story of how they climbed Annapurna – one of the smaller 8000m peaks, but also one of the most difficult (and dangerous) – a year before Everest was climbed. It made them heroes in France, it proved that man could climb that high and live, but the team suffered dreadful consequences. They were caught in a storm on the way down and were severely frostbitten. They then suffered a truly awful return journey in great pain, running low on supplies and having fingers and toes amputated without anaesthetic as they went. It’s incredible that only 60 years ago, a large part of this region was pretty well unmapped. The expedition found valleys that were not marked and ridges where they expected valleys. Just getting to Annapurna, let alone climbing it, was a real adventure.

A Day to Die for: The Untold True Story Behind Everest's Worst Disaster - Anno Domini, 1996 by Graham Ratcliffe

Comment: After reading Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air, I thought that I had read everything there was to know about the 1996 disaster, but I was wrong. There must be a dozen books on the events of that year, but Ratcliffe finds a new angle. The book is sometimes ponderous, but in the end triumphs. Ratcliffe was the first British climber to summit Everest from the north and south sides. He’s an amateur climber, financing his expeditions largely from his own pocket with bits of sponsorship here and there. His team was camped on the South Col when the storm struck and the book seeks to analyse why Hall and Fischer attempted the summit when the weather was clearly deteriorating and whether they had been given accurate weather forecasts. The prevailing view of 1996 is that Hall and Fischer were unlucky to have been hit by a massive and unexpected storm while they were high on the mountain. Ratcliffe, with typical northern tenacity and bluntness, manages to prove that they not only knew that the storm was coming, but they also manoeuvred to get themselves a day when they thought they would have a narrow time window to get down before the storm struck. Ratcliffe’s conclusion is that it was a reckless gamble, taken due to commercial pressures on their business of guiding skilled, but amateur climbers up Everest. Both teams had journalists among their clients and the team that had the reports of getting the most people to the top successfully was likely to get to most business next year. There was even more pressure on Hall as a New Zealander because the American Fischer had a “home advantage” when it came to attracting clients who were, in the main, rich Americans. Read Jon Krakauer first and then Graham Ratcliffe – a fascinating contrast and one that Krakauer (as a journalist) must be smarting about because it shows him up to be a very poor journalist indeed.

Touching the Void: The True Story of One Man's Miraculous Survival by Joe Simpson

Comment: This is an incredible story and one that’s very different from most of the mountaineering horror stories that I have been reading in that it is told mainly in the first person, with contemporaneous accounts from the perspective of Simpson’s climbing partner, Simon Yates. The two men set off to climb Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985 – a really difficult climb. They made it to the top but were hit by bad weather on the way down and Simpson broke a leg in a fall. Instead of leaving him to die, Yates, helped him down from the ridge, a feat they undertook by lowering Simpson down the steep ice slope on a narrow rope. They had almost reached the glacier when, in the darkness and a blizzard, Simpson was lowered over a cliff and left dangling helplessly. Yates didn’t know what happened and was being pulled off the mountain by Simpson’s weight. He had no other choice than to cut the rope. Yates thought Simpson was dead and managed to get back to his base camp in a pretty bad way himself. Simpson had fallen into a crevasse in the glacier, but managed to get himself out and crawl back to base camp. It is an amazing story and Simpson is such a good writer that the book is a real stand-out piece of work.

Seven Years in Tibet by Heinrich Harrer

Comment: This is considered one of the great travel books of all time and it is an incredible story. Harrer, one of the team of mountaineers who climbed the Eigerwand for the first time, was part of a German expedition to Nanga Parbat in 1939. When the Second World War broke out, he was interned in India as a German citizen. He escaped and fled into Tibet, where he evaded capture and managed to reach the capital Lhasa. Here, he lived for some three or four years until the Chinese invaded, seized the country and expelled the Dali Llama. His account of the country in the 1940s and life in free Tibet before the Chinese arrived is incredible.

Rifleman Costello: The adventures of a soldier of the 95th (rifles) in the Peninsular & Waterloo Campaigns of the Napoleonic Wars by E Costello

Comment:  After the victory over Napoleon, the Peninsula War and Waterloo, there was a real thirst among the public for accounts of battles and general derring do. Edward Costello fought with the rifle brigade right through the Peninsula and at Waterloo. The book was his pension. It’s a narrative account, uncontroversial (it makes no criticism of the army or commanders) but it is fascinating to get into the mind of an ordinary soldier of this period. Like Harry Smith, he’s more concerned about food and shelter than he is about the bigger picture. He makes light of the hardships, but he does say that many men were so miserable and tired of life that they welcomed death in battle as something of a relief.


Also see the Post: Books Read in 2012

Pelsall colliery follow-up

Family history research can get compulsive and it has been really nice how people have been keen and willing to share information (myself included). Susan Wilkes, a second cousin of Margaret’s, who we discovered through us both researching family through Ancestry.co.uk, sent me some information on some relatives killed in a colliery accident in Pelsall, Staffordshire in 1872.

Her research has saved me lots of time in identifying relatives on Margaret’s grandmother Robinson’s line. In summary, they were agricultural labourers (like most of the people in the country in the 18^th century) who had moved into Staffordshire in the 19^th century to work in the expanding coalmines and other industry.

This was the Black Country, heart of the industrial revolution and home to hundreds of mines, furnaces and engineering. They clearly thought this would be a better life (and perhaps it was), but it can’t have been a great place to live and work.

Pelsall, where they moved to was a small mining village, but unlike some mining communities, it had a history going way back before mining. I was prompted to find out a little more about the place and the local history society has a very good website: http://www.pelsall-history.co.uk, which includes an account of the colliery disaster.

There was an error on the site concerning the age of Frank Dilks, our family member who died, so I e-mailed the contact to say how good the site was, but also to make them aware of the error.

Andrew Weller mailed back to thank me, but also included some photographs and other information from the Pelsall History Centre.

Every year, on the anniversary of the disaster, they lay a wreath at the miners’ memorial in the village and here’s a picture of that ceremony. It’s incredible that the event is still commemorated all these years later. It would be good to go to Pelsall one day and have a look round the place.

Andrew also sent me pictures of George Cassell’s memorial and of bibles given to the widows of those who died. George was 28 when he was killed in the disaster and he was the husband of Harriett Dilks, Frank’s elder sister and a great, great aunt of Margaret.

Susan Wilkes (sorry about all the Dilks and Wilkes) had discovered that Harriett and George had two sons – George and Frank (who was born after his father was killed). No doubt Harriett called him Frank after her younger brother who died alongside her husband in the mine. I can imagine the anguish of a young woman, pregnant with her second child, losing her husband and breadwinner in such a way. She would have received a pretty meagre pension and she would also have been given one of the bibles (pictured). I wonder what happened to that? It would be interesting to see it.

George’s memorial is interesting as it includes a long poetical inscription:

In affectionate remembrance of George Cassell, the beloved husband of Harriett Cassell of Pelsall, who lost his life by the terrible accident at Pelsall Hall Colliery, November 14^th 1872; aged 28 years.

All under the coal I lost my life,

No time to get away;

There I did die, and here I must lie,

Until the judgment day.

All you that do my grave pass by

As you are now, so once was I;

As I am now, so you must be,

Therefore prepare to follow me.

I miss thee when the morning dawns,

I miss thee when the night returns,

I miss thee here, I miss thee there,

My husband I miss thee everywhere.

Farewell my wife and children, and friends so dear,

Weep not for me though I lie here,

It’s hard to part with those we love,

But sweet to meet with Christ above.

I thought that was so charming and also poignant. The first four lines are simple and describe in stark terms what happened in the accident. They’re also an acceptance, in words put into George’s mouth, of his fate.

The next four lines: As you are now, so once was I is reminiscent of the epitaph on the tomb of Edward the Black Prince (1330-1376) in Canterbury. It was originally written in Norman French but was, at some point, translated into English and became popular in the mid 19^th Century

Whoso thou be that passeth by;
Where these corps entombed lie:
Understand what I shall say,
As at this time speak I may.
Such as thou art, sometime was I,
Such as I am, such shalt thou be.

Edward's epitaph, though it contains some of the sentiments found in the popularised 19^th Century version, does not exhort the visitor to, "prepare for death and follow me."  I guess that was added by the Victorians – never slow to miss a mournful moment.

George Cassell, who died in the Pelsall Colliery
disaster, aged 28,

George Cassell’s epigraph then runs into doggerel which would almost be comic if it wasn’t so poignant and written as the words of his widow. Perhaps Harriett wrote them? I don’t know. The final four lines are words again put into George’s mouth and clearly aimed to give some comfort to his loved ones.

I often wonder what life would be like for my ancestors. I once rode a vintage Triumph motorcycle made just before the First World War. It was driven by a leather belt made up of separate links and started by pedals. When I was 17 and had a motorcycle, my grandfather took an interest in it and told me about his belt-drive Triumph and how he’d ridden it to Birkenhead in the rain with the belt slipping so much it was hard to get up the hills. I couldn’t see how you could have a leather belt, except to hold up your trousers and I thought he was going a bit soft. Well 40 years later I was able to ride one at a Vintage Motorcycle Club event. It struck me at the time, how rare it is to have the chance to experience what our grandfathers experienced; to stand in their shoes. The bike must have been just like the one he had as a young man.

That was quite a pleasure, but much of what our ancestors had to cope with, we’re well to manage without – there are mine accidents today, but the conditions in Pelsall (from cutting the coal with pick and shovel to riding up and down the mine on an open basket) don’t bear thinking about. I wouldn't want to have stood in Frank Dilks' or George Cassell's shoes. They were a lot tougher than us.

Holly’s first anniversary

It was a year ago (at the beginning of December 2010) that we got Holly, our second springer spaniel, so she’s been with us now for just over a year.

We adopted her through a dog rescue charity called CAESSR, which stands for Cocker and English Springer Spaniel Rescue - http://www.caessr.org.uk. Margaret had been musing about having a second dog for some time. Gravel is so good that we thought another would be hardly any work – hmm!

I came across CAESSR and, after a home visit, we were passed fit to have a dog. They were in touch pretty quickly and suggested Holly, a three-year-old bitch who was being fostered by a family in Moulton Chapel near Spalding after being brought into care. She’d started out in Ireland and had been given some gundog training. I guess she failed, which is why she came across to England (rescue No 1) and then lived in Portsmouth for a while. The story was that the other dog didn’t get on with her.

So we were to be home No 3 in three years. The house where she was being cared for was a big place, one of those you see a lot in the Fens, where the extension is as big as the original house, and they’d also bought some land at the back where they had a massive fenced paddock. It would be perfect for Gravel as we could let him off the lead and not worry about him running off.

Holly was a nervous little thing. Very small and slight compared to Gravel, but she was friendly. Max had come with us and he was hitting tennis balls with a racquet for the dogs (Gravel, Holly and Debbie – the fosterer/carer’s – two springers). Holly was brilliant at bringing back the ball, unlike Gravel who thinks it’s great to catch it and run off.

It was a bitter day, hard frost and a light dusting of snow – the start of one of the worst winters for many years – so we went inside the house to have a chat. Holly had a bladder weakness caused by a botched spaying and was on a drug called Incurin to keep her bladder tight and, in spite of a few misgivings, we decided to take her.

She came back in the car as good as gold and settled in the house quite well. She likes to be fussed and Max is always happy to oblige. It all seemed to be going very well and, in fairness, it has gone OK. You never know, when you rescue a dog, what it has suffered or experienced. It was hard to say Holly has been mistreated, but she is a very nervous dog. She cowers, she is frightened of new people and of other dogs. When we got her, she was pretty bony and her fur was quite dull and thin.

She certainly has an appetite, she eats her food even more quickly than Gravel (which I would have said was impossible) and she’s very quick across the ground.

The week after we got her Tom and Hannah came up for the weekend (I think he wanted to see her) and then it was Christmas so she had all the family dropping in at various times. She enjoyed the fuss, but was clearly, already far more work than Gravel, who is so laid back and chilled.

Holly having a cuddle with Sam - Christmas 2010

First problem was panic wees. She’s much better now, but meeting new people often saw her lose control of her bladder. Sometimes she’d go into a submissive position on her back and wee, sometimes she’d just wee. Then she was also soiling in the house. Every morning when I got up, she’d have done a poo in the kitchen. Fortunately, they were hard and easy to clean up, but it’s not what you want at 5am! Third problem was the manic barking – sometimes she just runs up and down the garden barking and doing little pirouettes at the end of each run as if she’s trying to catch her tail. In the early days there was also a few growly spats with Gravel as they sorted out who was top dog (it’s Holly by the way).

Margaret had some good advice on keeping her calm and dealing with the soiling from a specialist at CAESSR and having that support made a big difference.

You sort of underestimate dogs. They’re so stoic, but they are very intelligent animals. Just image a person who is not treated brilliantly, shipped to another country, kept in an unhappy home for 18 months, then driven 150 miles north, kept for two weeks, then taken away by complete strangers to another home. It’s no wonder she was stressed and her behaviour is sometimes a little off.

She is now clean in the house, although we still get the odd panic wee, so it’s important to keep her calm. She is top dog, but she depends a lot on Gravel and she’s learned a lot from him.

When we first had her, we gave them both a bone. Holly knew it was food, but she had no idea how to eat it. She couldn’t hold it, so pushed it against the side of her basket where it was held firm and tried to gnaw it with her front body at ground level and her bum sticking up in the air. She’s watched Gravel and now sits happily with a bone held upright between her front paws so she can chew it easily.

She’s also learned to chase birds and other game (so she could be a working springer) and in the summer she caught her first pigeon. It was so funny, she grabbed it and shook it (instinct), but then clearly didn’t like the taste of feathers in her mouth. I don’t think dogs can spit, but Holly came as close as any dog I’ve seen.

She could sit (just about, but was otherwise untrained. She’s still not as good as Gravel, but she can sit, stay, trust and (sometimes) lie down.

Holly clearly had not been played with. She’ll bring a ball back double quick and do it until she drops, but if you try to play with her, especially a chase or “try to grab-me” game, which Gravel loves, she just flips on her back into the submissive position.

On a walk, she now sniffs scents like a proper spaniel and, incredibly, when we got her, she couldn’t swim, or at least she didn’t swim. For a springer spaniel, that’s extraordinary. She’s learnt from Gravel and also had a sink-or-swim lesson last winter when the thaw started and she fell through ice along the avenue towards Toneham. You’ve never seen so much panic splashing. We would have pulled her out, but she quickly managed to get back onto solid ice.

Holly, ears flapping in true spaniel style, runs through the long grass
along Toneham. Pictured by Tom Rayner.

One area where Holly does excel is recall. Gravel is so bad – once he picks up a scent, his nose works overtime and his ears go on strike – but Holly is always looking to see where you are; she does go further away now, but will generally come back quickly, even if there’s a really interesting scent to follow.

She’s improving all the time and is now definitely one of the family, we wouldn’t be without her. Every dog is an individual and Holly has some characteristics which I’ve not seen in other dogs. One of the funniest is her vanity. Dogs are not supposed to be able to recognise themselves in a mirror, but Holly does. When we first got her and she saw her reflection, she thought it was another dog and started barking and running around. She’s now worked out that it’s her she can see and she definitely looks and admires herself. Sometimes when she trots past the patio doors, she has a good look at herself and literally puffs up – just like me admiring my reflection in shop windows. I’ve never seen another dog do that.

Rescue dogs are an unknown quantity and do require more work than a puppy, which comes with no baggage and can be trained to your specification. With an adult rescue dog, you have to work with the dog and also everything else it’s been taught (and experienced) along the way. It’s very satisfying when it comes right and sometimes it requires the patience of a saint.

One of the delights of the summer - ice creams!