MALAGO SOCIETY PUBLICATIONS

NOT ALL CAME BACK: A Somerset farmer's son at Gallipoli

by well-known local historian ANTON BANTOCK

This is the story of two worlds which collided in 1915.

In the village of Bishopsworth, not far from Bristol in rural north Somerset, the traditional farming families followed the seasonal round. It was still the age in which farmers were lesser gentry. They were generally well educated. They sat on the parish council, were overseers of the poor, members of the local school board, read the lessons in church and dispensed charity. In the evenings they congregated in each other’s homes and, while their elders held whist drives, the younger members organised tennis tournaments, for no self-respecting farm was without its well-tended lawn.

Meanwhile, the carnage of the First World War trenches was, in all senses, stuck in the mud. In a bold attempt to open a second front, Winston Churchill planned an invasion of Turkey via the Gallipoli peninsula. It was a disaster, and hundreds of thousands died and were wounded on both sides. One of the young men killed at Gallipoli was Sgt-Mjr Sydney Hall, of Fillwood Farm, Bishopsworth. He had a promising engineering career in front of him, and, as for so many others, his future was wiped away and a family was left to grieve.

Unlike nearly all the others, though, we can know him and his two worlds personally. Amazingly, the letters between him and his family and friends have survived, as have photographs of the family, the farm, and life in Bishopsworth in 1915. His diary and his military pocket-book have come down to us.

Here is unfamiliar social history, and a unique insight into military history, told in contemporary photographs and the words of people whom we can identify with from nearly a century away ...

For more information e-mail info@malago.org.uk.

Not All Came Back is now available for postal delivery. We are offering it at the cover price of £9.99, with FREE postage & packing within the U.K. To order, send a cheque for £9.99 (£19.98 for two books etc.), along with the name and address for delivery, to:

Please make cheques payable to 'The Malago Society'. For any queries, please e-mail info@malago.org.uk.

The Malago Society has also published the following books. If you are interested in buying any of them, please contact info@malago.org.uk.

A4 size booklet by ANTON BANTOCK relating a short history of the Gibbs family from the 18th to the 21st century.

A4 size booklet by ANTON BANTOCK relating a short history of the Smyth family from the 16th to the 20th century.

* The Earlier Smyths of Ashton Court, from their letters, 1545-1741 [out of print: second-hand copies sometimes available]

* The Later Smyths of Ashton Court, from their letters, 1741-1802 [out of print: second-hand copies sometimes available]

* The Last Smyths of Ashton Court (Part I), from their papers, 1802-1880 [out of print: second-hand copies sometimes available]

* The Last Smyths of Ashton Court (Part II), from their papers, 1880-1900 (272 pages)

* The Last Smyths of Ashton Court (Part III), from their papers, 1900-1946 (240 pages)

Also compiled by Anton Bantock and members of The Malago Society in the Archive Photograph Series published by the Chalford Publishing Company (now Tempus Publishing):