It is just two weeks before the Spring Equinox. Today it’s raining and blowing a gale. I wonder how best to “celebrate” this blog’s 1400th story.
Putting on a warm pullover and raincoat I went up the little hill at the back of my house where there are the ruins of a home. The derelict house was built in the late 1800s. Growing in the field around the house are clumps of now wild daffodils and snowdrops, all in full flower. The field was once a garden. There is a grove of camellia trees in bloom, red and white. The abandoned kitchen cupboard hides a few old preserving jars and a starling’s nest.
The farming Hamblyn family used to live there. It was there that Charles and Mary Hamblyn began their married life in 1887. The excitement of breaking in new land! From wild forest to farm! From flooding quagmire to dairy cows! It was there they had their thirteen children. Two children died in infancy, but by 1905 there were eight healthy sons and three healthy daughters! Here’s a little information on some of them…
William Charles Hamblyn: the oldest son, a cheese-maker at the factory down the road, left for France on the 9th December 1916. Killed in France on the 9th of June 1917.
James Edward Hamblyn: the second son, a farm hand, left for France on the 13th April 1916. Missing, later declared killed in France, on the 9th September 1917.Henry John Hamblyn: the third son, a farm hand, left for France on the 5th of March 1916. Missing, later declared killed in France, on the 3rd of October 1916.
Thomas Day Hamblyn: the fourth son, a farm hand, left for France on the 9th December 1916. Killed in France on the 9th of June 1917, the same day as his oldest brother.
Richard Ernest Hamblyn: the fifth son, a farm hand, left for France on the 18th September 1916. On the 28 November 1917, declared “No longer physically fit for war service on account of illness contracted on active service”.
Frederick Leonard Hamblyn: the sixth son, a farm hand, left for France on the 28th September 1917. On the 4th of October 1917, classified as injured with an “indeterminate disability”. The authorities believed that four brothers killed and another ill was enough.
Before the two surviving veteran sons could return home, father Charles and youngest brother Osborne died back home in the 1918 flu epidemic.
I wonder who planted all those daffodils and snowdrops? Who established the grove of red and white of camellias? Was it Mary the mother, or the sisters Winifred, Bessie and Letitia? Perhaps it was their brother, Harold, who never went to war, or Richard and Frederick who came back. Perhaps it was the children themselves in an earlier time. Perhaps it was their father. Maybe even grandchildren.
Few remember the family of course. But there’s a remnant of memory in those flowers each year at the end of winter. In the field next to the old house a cow has had a calf. It’s a girl! It is two weeks before the Spring Equinox. It’s not a platitude to say new life begins to spin out of control.
What a wonderful place to have at the back of your house Bruce – full of stories and memories. They certainly had their share of tragedies and I found the stories of the brothers and your thoughts about who planted the flowers very moving.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Andrea. I was partly inspired by a blogger I know whose lyrical musings are always profound!!!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh Bruce, what a moving post this is. How do parents survive those enormous losses? And, war never dies, it always survives.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Yvonne. Yes, you wonder what keeps some people going.
LikeLike
What a story. The bloody 20th Century. There’s a song–I think it’s by an Australian–the first time it was fathers / and the last time it was sons/ and in between your husbands /marched away with drums and guns. Probably the story of many centuries. My grandfather had to sign a release for my father to go in the navy in WWII–combination of three brothers already overseas and him being the last son left to help on the farm. It’s breathtaking, people’s hardships, and how most straighten up from the painful crouch and keep moving. I love the flowers, though, and imagine people took pleasure in them, as you do now.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Gosh – your father and his three brothers overseas brings it all home. Thanks for the youtube link – I shall download it in the night as I can’t do videos during the day with limited downloadage!
LikeLiked by 1 person
found the link. Judy Small. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CZ-UpLCG78
LikeLike
A terrific link and song thanks. I came across an old newspaper obituary of a woman in New Zealand. She had 19 grandsons overseas in WW1. I guess she was grateful that in those days they didn’t send all her granddaughters as well!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh, God. I just think of Gallipoli. And the Brits were so awful about the regiments. But then again, Eisenhower wanted green recruits for D-Day because the experienced soldiers would know enough to be scared.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Very sad story, Bruce, but the flowers are lovely. Glad that something lovely came from all that heartbreak.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks! I don’t know how people cope in times like that. The house ruins could do with some of your wild cucumber to dolly it up!
LikeLike
I am always happy to come upon slightly larger installments from your scheming quill. This piece has the potential of casting a shadow on the entire opus of Thomas Hardy . Are you going to expand the blurb?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks. I would only “expand the blurb” if the names were changed and it turned into fiction. Now you’ve given me an idea…
LikeLike
So much heartbreak. This is a lovely piece.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks, Sarah. That’s praise indeed!!
LikeLike
The family deserves national recognition for its sacrifices in the name of God and country.
LikeLiked by 1 person
There would be too many! My little town sent over 200 young men to WW1. 1 in 4 never came back. The town has a big commemoration of them all on ANZAC Day (April 25).
LikeLiked by 1 person
That is certainly fair enough!
LikeLiked by 1 person
A sad, sad story – but life clearly goes on.
LikeLiked by 1 person
In the main Nature seems to adapt and trundle on no matter what happens!
LikeLike