However, the pearls were not the only jewels to attract the public. Also on display was the great yellow Red Cross diamond. This stunning jewel, weighing 205 carats, was found at the De Beers Mines in South Africa in 1901.14 It was presented to the Red Cross by the Diamond Syndicate and it had raised £10,000 at a Christie’s auction in April.
Queen Mary spent a long time examining all the jewels and ‘expressed again and again her delight at the generosity of the ladies who had given their flawless, perfect gems to this great cause’. At the end of their visit, each of the queens said to Sir Robert Hudson, ‘You owe this to Lady Northcliffe.’ He replied, ‘Yes Ma’am we of the Red Cross are well aware of that!’15
Almost every visitor to the Grafton Galleries that day had experienced the loss of a loved one and it was an occasion when mothers and daughters supported each other. The Duchess of Rutland was there with her widowed daughter, Letty. Lady Sarah Wilson, whose husband had died at the start of the war, and Lady Lansdowne, mother-in-law of Violet Astor, also mingled in the crowd. It was an emotive occasion, and as they looked at the pearls no one could forget that each jewel represented at least one life changed forever by the war.
The horror of battle was reinforced by the large photographs in the gallery that loomed over the cases of pearls. Since May, the Grafton Galleries had been displaying the Australian War Pictures. During the war, several propaganda exhibitions of war photographs had been held in London. Two by the Canadians in December 1916 and July 1917, and two of ‘British’ photographs and war relics, which included Canadians and Australians, had already appeared at the Grafton Galleries and the Royal Academy.16 The core of each exhibition was huge mural-sized panels which were up to 6m by 3m in size and artificially coloured. By displaying the war photographs at such distinguished galleries, it sent a signal that they were to be taken seriously, not just as a documentary record or propaganda but as art photography.17
The driving force behind these exhibitions was the Canadian newspaper owner Lord Beaverbrook, who worked closely with Lord Northcliffe at shaping public opinion. As head of the Canadian War Record Office and chair of the new Cinematographic Committee, Beaverbrook was well aware of the propaganda value of the photographs. He knew that to win the war it was vital that civilians were willing to endure to the end, but to inspire their steadfast support they needed to realise fully the conditions at the Front. He believed that the best way to bring the reality home to them was through photographs. Written descriptions of battles were harder for the mind to take in than the immediate visual impact of photographs. The war images had a realism that made them stick in the imagination. The idea was to make spectators at home feel as if they were on the battlefield itself.18
A gulf divided the experience of the soldiers from their loved ones. Often men tried to protect their families from knowing the full horror of the battlefield. Their letters were often couched in positive terms to reassure their readers. However, the risk of sparing their wives and mothers was that it put an unbridgeable emotional distance between them. To understand and come to terms with what was happening, the women at home needed to face the reality, because only then could they find their own ways of dealing with it.
In 1916, Lloyd George’s mistress, Frances Stevenson, wrote in her diary about the effect of seeing the The Battle of the Somme film, a documentary filmed during the battle. It was a gruelling experience – 13 per cent of the seventy-seven-minute film was made up of shots of the dead and wounded.19 There were pictures of the battlefield after the fighting and one particularly memorable shot showed a mortally wounded man being carried out of the communication trenches with a look of agony on his face. The caption read, ‘British Tommies rescuing a comrade under shell fire. (This man died 20 minutes after reaching a trench.)’ The film attracted large audiences and by October 1916 it had been booked by over 2,000 cinemas across the country, and it is estimated that 20 million people saw the documentary within a few weeks of its release.20 It inspired mixed reactions. The Times and The Guardian received letters complaining about its explicitness while the dean of Durham described it as an entertainment which violated the sanctity of bereavement.21 However, for many of the bereaved, including Frances Stevenson, it was cathartic. Frances’ brother Paul had been killed earlier in the war and until she saw the film she had found it hard to imagine what his experience had actually been like, but having seen it she wrote that now she knew and would never forget. She compared it to the experience of ancient Greeks going to a tragedy – her mind had been purged through pity and terror.22
The photographs in the May 1918 exhibition at the Grafton Galleries were by Frank Hurley, who was already famous as an adventurer-photographer and cinematographer as the camera artist on the Australasian Antarctic Expedition and Ernest Shackleton’s Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Hurley had been appointed official photographer with the Australian War Records Section in summer 1917. He was determined that his show should be even better than the Canadian exhibitions that had already been staged in London. His work provided an insight into the horrendous conditions men had to endure in modern warfare, while also recognising the vital role played by Australians in the war.
On 21 August 1917 Captain Hurley crossed the Channel to begin work in France and Belgium. Almost at once he was photographing the Third Battle of Ypres. Coming across ground covered with bits of guns, shells, bayonets and men, he described the scene as like hell. The most awful sight was of three decomposing corpses of German gunners in a mine crater. Recognising their humanity irrespective of their nationality, he thought it was a hideous end for men who had once been husbands, sweethearts or sons.23 Visiting the ruins of the town of Ypres, he was moved by the shreds of clothing and fragments of toys which added pathos to the scene, reminding the onlooker that each item represented a tale of suffering and families destroyed.
War photography was dangerous work and Hurley soon won the respect of the Australian soldiers. In spite of heavy shelling by the Germans, he tried to take a number of shell-burst pictures. Many of the shells exploded only a few dozen paces away from him so he had to throw himself into shell holes to avoid splinters. Despite his dedication, Hurley soon clashed with the head of the Australian War Records Section, Charles Bean, because rather than recording events exactly as they happened he wanted to re-enact some scenes and use new photographic techniques. Hurley believed that composite printing, using two or more negatives to print a single photograph, was needed to capture the scale of the conflict. Bean disapproved and claimed that such methods would produce fakes or staged photographs. Hurley threatened to resign if he could not use composites, so eventually he was granted permission to make six combination prints for the Grafton Galleries exhibition.24
Due to this difference of opinion, in November 1917 Hurley was reassigned to Palestine and the Middle East to photograph the Australian Light Horse. As many of the key battles, such as the Charge of the Light Horse at Beersheba, had already taken place, Hurley persuaded the officers to re-enact the events. The brigades were very keen to have their photos taken and generals came from all over the country to take part. Hurley wrote that, compared to the hell of France, Palestine was like a holiday.25 The experience was more like life back at home in Australia, the troops lived in the open air and there was less rigid discipline than in France.
In May, Hurley returned to London in time to curate the exhibition at the Grafton Galleries. It was a mad rush to get the pictures enlarged and displayed properly and he was worried that they would not be ready for the opening. With only two days to go there was still not a single picture hung, so Hurley and his team worked until 1 a.m. at the gallery to put up as many pictures as possible. However, some of the most important photographs were still not ready to be displayed and Hurley complained that the exhibition looked extemporised and unfinished. To register his disgust, he did not attend the official opening on 24 May.26
Once the problems behind the scenes had been sorted out and the final picture
s were all in place, Hurley became more positive. He was pleased with the favourable criticism he received and felt that seeing his work admired by the masses was some recompense for the risks he had taken. One of Hurley’s most famous images was captioned ‘Death’s Highway’. In it a soldier is surrounded by German artillery and shell bursts. Another picture, billed as the largest photograph in the world, was called ‘A Raid’. Aiming to be cinematic, it shows two waves of men going over the top. ‘Death the Reaper’ suggested a spiritual dimension beyond the devastation by combining the image of the mud-splashed corpse of a German soldier with a shell burst.
The presence of beauty in Hurley’s photographs was one of their most controversial aspects. Amidst the horror, Hurley had a sense of the sublime and he described the ruined town of Ypres as ‘somehow wildly beautiful’.27 His work helped to create the Anzac legend of the dashing Australian soldier who always achieved his objectives. Adding to this mythology, there was a romanticised quality in his photographs of the Middle East which drew on Biblical and medieval associations. Australian airmen were shown standing in landscapes of the Holy Land, suggesting that this was a modern Crusade in which they reclaimed the Middle East from the Turks and succeeded where Richard the Lionheart had failed in the twelfth century.28
A showman as well as a photographer, at the exhibition Hurley tried to create what would now be described as a multimedia experience. To add to the emotive atmosphere, a military band played throughout the day and a display of coloured lantern slides was put on depicting scenes of the Western Front, Flanders and Palestine. The audience were so moved that they applauded after every showing. There were also paintings by Australian official war artists, G.W. Lambert and H.S. Power, and Australia House contributed war relics, including an Albatross DVA biplane, guns and uniformed mannequins.29
Officially the show closed on 22 June, but the 137 photographs were left in place during the Pearl Exhibition. Entering the Long Gallery must have been an almost overwhelming experience for many of the visitors. Wives, mothers and sisters had come to see the pearls, but were confronted with graphic images of exactly what their men at the Front faced. The photographs were on such an epic scale that they dwarfed the spectators. Enlargements meant that every gory detail was exposed, bringing to life elements of suffering that had previously been beyond the darkest imagining of civilians.
Although the experience was heart-breaking, most visitors spent a long time looking at the photographs. It was a haunting sight, but one they needed to see to remain close to their men. The photographs were a fitting backdrop for the pearls as they silently signified the need for such generous gifts.
The purpose of the exhibition was not only to display the pearls but also to fundraise; visitors were charged 2s 6d for admission on the first Saturday and then 1s 3d for the rest of the week. The interest in the exhibition was far greater than the organisers had imagined. While the royal private viewing was taking place, a large crowd gathered outside, keen to see the pearls for themselves. By the end of the first day more than 1,500 people filled the gallery, and over the following days more than 2,000 people a day attended, until by the end of the week 16,000 had visited the exhibition.30
Many women came with the intention to give pearls in person to the appeal. Some donors who had already given were so moved by the exhibition that they gave again. Typical of her family’s unstinting sacrifice, on 28 June Lilian Kekewich, who had lost three of her sons, made her second donation of two pearls. By the end of the week nearly 300 additional jewels had been donated and the case that had been left empty to be filled with pearls was indeed almost full.31
Ten
THE PEARL POEMS
The culmination of the Pearl Exhibition was an afternoon concert held at the Grafton Galleries on Sunday, 30 June 1918. Showing the support of the musical and theatrical world for the Red Cross appeal, in the Long Gallery actors and musicians mingled with aristocrats and artists. The fundraising performance was opened by the tall, redheaded Australian violinist, Daisy Kennedy, playing Bach’s ‘Prelude in E Major’.
Equally adept as a recital artist and a concerto soloist, she performed regularly with leading orchestras under the conductors Sir Henry Wood and Sir Landon Ronald. Possessing a striking presence, all eyes in the audience were on Daisy as she was joined on stage by her husband, the Russian/Ukrainian pianist, Benno Moiseiwitsch. They then played together Franck’s violin sonata. The romance of the Pearl Appeal was echoed in the choice of music, as the famous pianist then played three pieces by Chopin. Romantic music was Moiseiwitsch’s forte, he was particularly identified with the works of Chopin, Schumann and his close friend, Rachmaninov.
Reflecting the international theme of the afternoon, the programme continued with the Scottish contralto, Carmen Hill, performing Hahn’s ‘D’une Prison’. A regular performer at the Promenade Concerts, she had recently sung the part of the angel in Sir Edward Elgar’s ‘The Dream of Gerontius’ in cities throughout Britain.
A late addition to the programme was Henry Ainley reciting or, as he preferred to call it, ‘telling’, two patriotic poems: ‘A Chant of love for England’ by Helen Gray Cone and ‘The Irish Guards’ by Rudyard Kipling. The distinguished Shakespearean actor had been appearing in silent movies since 1911, including A Bachelor’s Love Story and The Prisoner of Zenda, but the stage was always his real home.
The most poignant moment of the afternoon came at the very end of the performance when Ainley read Maurice Baring’s poem to his fallen friend, Julian Grenfell. First published anonymously in The Times on 5 June 1915, Baring wrote:
Because of you we will be glad and gay,
Remembering you, we will be brave and strong;
And hail the advent of each dangerous day,
And meet the last adventure with a song
And, as you proudly gave your jewelled gift,
We’ll give our lesser offering with a smile,
Nor falter on that path where, all too swift,
You led the way and leapt the golden stile.1
Maurice had known Julian since he was a boy. Part of the Baring banking family, Maurice’s brother, John Baring, Lord Revelstoke, was one of Ettie Desborough’s long-term admirers. Inevitably, Maurice had also become ensnared in her web. They met in 1896 when Ettie was 29 and Maurice 22, and they were soon playing word games and sending flirtatious messages to each other. Maurice recreated Ettie and her world in his writing. Portraying her as a siren, his poem ‘Circe’ was published in a volume called The Black Prince, which was dedicated to her.2 In his novel called C, which was one of the code names Ettie and his brother John used in their letters to each other, Maurice wrote about a young man ‘C’, who fell in love with a bewitching married woman called Leila. Capricious Leila had many lovers, but made each one think that they were the only one. ‘C’ died of love for her after he found out that her true love was his brother.3
Maurice drew on Ettie’s character again in 1910 when he published his play, Ariadne in Naxos, in his Diminutive Dramas. Like Leila, Ariadne was an effusive femme fatale who played off Dionysius and Theseus against each other.4 After the publication of this play there was a brief breach in Ettie and Maurice’s friendship, but their estrangement was only temporary. During the war years they drew closer as they shared a strong Christian faith and a similar perspective on the conflict.
The poem to Julian was a fitting way to end the concert. Its evocative lines reflected the initial concept of the Pearl Appeal, as the metaphor of a ‘jewelled gift’ was used to describe his sacrifice. It also emphasised poetry’s importance in the First World War. Steeped in literature from childhood, many soldiers turned to verse to record their experiences. The Times estimated that it received about 100 poems each day in August 1914 and most of them were written in a patriotic or romantic tone.5 Julian’s own poem ‘Into Battle’, written four weeks before he died, marked the high-water mark of enthusiasm for the war. Unlike many later war poems, it showed no outrage against war; in
stead it portrayed conflict as the time when he felt most fully alive and at one with the natural world. It also showed an acceptance of death, if that was to be his fate. He wrote:
And when the burning moment breaks,
And all things else are out of mind,
And Joy of Battle only takes
Him by the throat, and makes him blind –
Through joy and blindness he shall know,
Not caring much to know, that still
Nor lead nor steel shall reach him so
That it be not the Destined Will.6
Julian copied out this poem, signed it and then sent it to his mother. Immediately after his death, Ettie had his poem published in The Times. This posthumous work made him famous and won the admiration of people who had never met him. The writer Henry James wrote to Ettie that, through these verses, he seemed almost to have known Julian. He added, ‘What great and terrible and unspeakable things! But out of which, round his sublime young image, a noble and exquisite legend will flower.’7
As the war progressed, exterminating more and more young men, this positive line became increasingly hard to sustain. The novelist D.H. Lawrence claimed that these young soldiers were ‘in love’ with death.8 There was actually an element of truth in his analysis, as before the war young men like Raymond Asquith and Julian Grenfell had been searching for a purpose in their life. Julian’s biographer, Nicholas Mosley, wrote that for the first time he had a proper function within society and he believed that it was doing what a conventional society should do by dissolving itself. He had no illusions about war and he was not surprised when it involved killing and getting killed.9 Cynthia Asquith, who knew many of these young men well, saw it differently. She wrote:
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