Cardiff remembered: Not everyone on the frontline was a fan of Ivor Novello’s famous songs

Keep the Home Fires Burning By Phil Carradice

Written by Brian Lee

PENARTH’S Phil Carradice, who is the author of more than 60 books, is a man of many parts.

He’s a poet, story teller, historian and a broadcaster on BBC Radio and TV and is widely regarded as one of the finest creative writing tutors in Wales.

His latest book, Keeping the Home Fires Burning, tells the story of how the troops and the general public were kept happy and content during the First World War.

To quote from the blurb of the book: “Between 1914 and 1918 there was entertainment of the masses for the sole purpose of promotion of the war effort.

“It was the first time that a concerted effort to raise and sustain morale was ever made by any British government and was a combination of government sponsored ideas and lucky happenstance.”

A chapter is devoted to Cardiff’s own Ivor Novello, and rightly so. He will always be associated with those songs of his We’ll Keep the home Fires Burning and Gathering Lilacs.

We learn that the poet soldier Siegfried Sassoon was so sickened by the soldiers’ constant whistling of the latter tune that he threatened when the war was over he would find Novello and shoot him!

And we are told that: “Despite his acclamation as a Welsh entertainer, an acclamation that resulted in a rather fey-looking statue in Cardiff Bay and a blue plaque on his first home in Cathedral Road, he had more or less severed his connections to Wales by the end of the First World War.

“London was more important to him.”

Another First World War character we learn about is Woodbine Willie, who was the Reverend Geoffrey Studdert Kennedy.

He was, we are informed, “revered not only by the troops in the front lines but also by their families back home.”

I was surprised to learn that during the war he had sparred with Cardiff’s own Peerless Jim Driscoll not once but upon on several occasions.

The theme of this cracking book is backed up by 40 illustrations from the time, including participants, posters, battlefield views and so forth.

Keeping The Home Fires Burning by Phil Carradice is published by Pen and Sword at £20.

• Please send your pictures and stories to Brian Lee, Cardiff Remember, South Wales Echo, Six Park Street, Cardiff, CF10 1XR
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