Happy New Year! A year of World War One Centenary Celebrations

As I stood with my cigar in one hand and a glass of port in the other mulling over a new year, my dull intoxication did not, perhaps appreciate the significance of the year 2014 as Jools Holland went nuts on a Steinbeck. I had often thought about the upcoming year and already some of the official plans had brought criticism and to a much lesser extent, admiration. Eric Pickles' idea to have poppy seeds spread across every grass verge, Tesco car park and abandoned warehouse smacked of an April Fools joke, but the idea of paving slabs to celebrate each of the 627 different recipients of the Victoria Cross in towns and villages across the country seems like a sound plan. The Empire's ultimate award for bravery was awarded irrespective of race, creed, colour or background and singled out acts of heroism in the crucible of the war. Walking over one of these slabs will hopefully make people take a moment to think and even go home and research somebody who may have followed their daily commute over a century before.

Inevitably, commemorations have been attacked, with many calling the plans a 'celebration of war', which I feel rather misses the point. The First World War was so abhorrent, ghastly and deadly that it should never be forgotten. It is true that many wanted to fight for their country; an idea ridiculed today. Many more simply wanted adventure and an escape from the 'dark satanic mills' which spread across the country or the backbreaking work in the fields. Whatever people's motivation, we must never forget that nearly 1 million British and Commonwealth soldiers died in the conflict. 250,000 a year. 20,833 a month. 672 a day. 28 an hour. One every two minutes. Not to mention the millions injured, mentally and physically. Why would anybody celebrate the war? Despite such losses, British forces never mutinied and we must pay tribute to the systems which ensured they remained an effective fighting unit: their regiments and the cameraderie within.

It is, therefore, rather disheartening to see that 5 days into the New Year, we already have a quarrel between the Education Secretary, Michael Gove, and the actor (and Labour grandee) Tony Robinson. Whilst I can never agree with Gove's style of teaching history, Robinson's take on the First World War appeared to be edging towards Bolshevism on Sky News this morning. He consistently blamed the 'officer class' for leading thousands to their death. It is unclear whether Robinson has read any decent history books or simply watched re-runs of 'Oh What a Lovely War' and waxed lyrical about Baldrick in 'Blackadder Goes Forth', but this is a myth. The young officers, or Captain Blackadder and Lieutenant George, for Robinson's sake, had a life expectancy of just six weeks in the trenches. It is true that in peacetime, some of these regular army officers had a charmed life, but after 12 months of war, the junior officers of the British Expeditionary Force had been all but wiped out. Whilst the public schools are now easy whipping boys (excuse the pun) for churning out career politicians, it is worth remembering that 1,157 old Etonians died in the First World War and 13 won the Victoria Cross. Junior officers advancing across no man's land were often singled out by German snipers and machine gunners, easily identified by their jodhpurs, pistols or pace sticks.

Whilst many senior officers were kept far from the lines, planning offensives, the idea that they stayed away from the lines totally is also false, with 78 British officers of Brigadier or higher, killed during the war. The Royal Mint released plans of its new currency to commemorate the conflict, with the £2 coin featuring the famous image of Lord Kitchener summoning Britons to join the army. Kitchener has been given the reputation by some as a warmongering Imperial overlord who led thousands of men to their deaths. One must appreciate that in 1914, Britain's standing army numbered just shy of 400,000, whilst the German conscript army was close to 2 million. Thanks to Kitchener, within 2 years, 2.5 million men had volunteered to join hiss new armies, ready to help France take on the might of the German army. It is perhaps also worth considering that Kitchener was killed by a German mine before his battalions saw the light of the day in the Battle of the Somme. Horatio Herbert Kitchener had commanded the British Army in its triumph at the Battle of Omdurman in the Sudan in 1898 and his realisation that a quick campaign of conscription would save the day in the First World War are achievements that must never be forgotten.

This year will see much debate about how commemoration should take place. Baldrick has already managed to turn it into an argument about political ideologies. The commemoration should focus on the lives of the men lost. The Old Contemptibles who had spent the latter part of the 19th Century fighting throughout Africa, who would die in the fields of Northern France during the first, mobile months of war. The young men who joined up in their droves with their friends and who would be slaughtered, shoulder to shoulder, in the first moments of the Battle of the Somme. Men like Noel Chavasse, the Medical Officer who would receive two Victoria Crosses for immense bravery, the second awarded posthumously. Tubby Clayton, the army padre who established Toc H house, an oasis of peace and calm within the slaughter and horror of the Ypres salient.

The First World War saw an uneasy clash between generals who were used to fighting vastly inferior forces in the reaches of Empire suddenly against a well-trained and well-equipped German army of vastly superior numbers. It saw warfare become truly mechanised, where innovation was used to develop the best way of delivering toxic chlorine and mustard gas and the heaviest artillery possible. This created a stalemate across the Western Front which resulted in an horrific crucible within which men were poured. We must never forget their sacrifice. At the time they fought for their friends, their families and, as it may seem unpalatable for some in our modern age, they fought for their country.

Their Name Liveth For Evermore