The Postcard
A Dudley Tennant Series postcard that was published by the Regent Publishing Co. Ltd. of London NW. The artwork was by Dudley Tennant.
The card was posted in Woodford using a ½d. stamp on Saturday the 26th. July 1913. It was sent to:
Miss Edith Ling,
8, Fort Road,
Margate.
The pencilled message on the divided back of the card was as follows:
"Woodford,
26/7/13.
Dear Edith,
Many thanks for the
lovely card.
Hope you are having
a good time (Eh, What?)
and not falling in love
with every one you
meet.
Thank May for the card.
Am looking forward to
seeing you.
Glad you fixed up the
'digs'.
Robert x
Having to kill time at
Woodford."
Shootings in Dublin
So what else happened on the day that Robert posted the card to Edith?
Well, on the 26th. July 1913, British soldiers, who had been sent to monitor the Ulster Volunteers, fired into a crowd of Irish protesters in Dublin, killing three and wounding 38.
The Dublin Lock-out
The 26th. August 1913 was also the first day of the Dublin lock-out. This was a major industrial dispute between approximately 20,000 workers and 300 employers that took place in Dublin.
The dispute, which lasted until the 18th. January 1914, was the most severe and significant industrial dispute in Irish history.
Central to the dispute was the workers' right to unionise.
Employers in Dublin locked out their workers and employed blackleg labour from Britain and elsewhere in Ireland.
On the 31st. August 1913, the Dublin Metropolitan Police attacked a meeting on Sackville Street (now known as O'Connell Street) that had been publicly banned. It caused the deaths of two workers: James Nolan and John Byrne. Over 300 more were injured.
-- W. B. Yeats' "September 1913"
'September 1913', one of the most famous of W. B. Yeats' poems, was published in The Irish Times during the lock-out.
Although the occasion of the poem was the decision of Dublin Corporation not to build a gallery to house the Hugh Lane collection of paintings, it has been viewed by scholars as a commentary on the lock-out.
In the poem, Yeats wrote mockingly of commerciants who "fumble in a greasy till, and add the halfpence to the pence."
He asked:
'Was it for this the wild geese spread
The grey wing upon every tide;
For this that all that blood was shed,
For this Edward Fitzgerald died,
And Robert Emmet and Wolfe Tone,
All that delirium of the brave?
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.'
Ringer Edwards' Crucifixion
The day also marked the birth in Freemantle, WA of Ringer Edwards.
Herbert James "Ringer" Edwards was an Australian soldier during World War II. As a prisoner of war (POW), he survived being crucified for 63 hours by Japanese soldiers on the Burma Railway.
Edwards was the basis for the character Joe Harman in Nevil Shute's novel A Town Like Alice (1950).
-- Ringer Edwards - The Early Years
Edwards spent much of his adult life working on stations (ranches) in outback Australia.
The nickname "Ringer" means a stockman who works on cattle stations, alluding to the stockmen's practice of ringing cattle at night, keeping them in a tight mob, which can be easily controlled.
In the morning, as the cattle are moved off, a ring of manure remains. The term 'Ringer' is shortened from "Shit Ringer". A gun shearer (i.e. the shearer who shears the most during an annual shearing) is also called a ringer; however, there is no evidence to suggest Edwards was ever a shearer.
-- Ringer Edwards and WWII
Edwards enlisted at Cairns, Queensland, on the 21st. January 1941, and was posted to the 2/26th. Battalion whch became part of the 8th. Division. As the possibility of war with Japan increased, the main body of the division was sent later in 1941 to garrison the British colony of Singapore.
The 2/26th fought the Japanese in the Malayan campaign and the Battle of Singapore. Edwards, along with the rest of the 8th. Division, became a POW when the Allied forces at Singapore surrendered on the 15th. February 1942.
-- Ringer Edwards' Experiences as a POW
Along with many other Allied prisoners, Edwards was sent to work as forced labour on the railway being built by the Japanese army from Thailand to Burma.
In 1943, he and two other prisoners killed cattle to provide food for themselves and comrades. They were caught by the Japanese and sentenced to death.
Crucifixion was a form of punishment, torture and/or execution that the Japanese military sometimes used against prisoners during the war.
Edwards and the others were initially bound at the wrists with fencing wire, suspended from a tree and beaten with a baseball bat.
When Edwards managed to free his right hand, the wire was driven through the palms of his hands. His comrades managed to smuggle food to him and he survived his ordeal. The other two men crucified at the same time did not survive.
-- Ringer Edwards' Post-War Experiences
After the Surrender of Japan, Edwards was released and was discharged from the army on the 4th. December 1945.
British novelist Nevil Shute met Edwards in 1948 at a station in Queensland. Some of Edwards' experiences, including the crucifixion, became the basis for the character Joe Harman in A Town Like Alice. Unlike Edwards' experiences, the entire story takes place in Malaya.
The other main character, Jean Paget, was based on the separate experiences of a Dutchwoman whom Edwards never met. The novel was the basis for subsequent adaptations, including a 1956 film and a 1981 television miniseries.
In the former, the Harman character was played by Peter Finch, and in the latter by Bryan Brown.
Edwards later returned to Western Australia and settled at Gingin, where he died in 2000 at the age of 86.
A Football Match Resulting in a Tribunal
Also on the 26th. July 1913, an Australian football match took place that became contentious.
Bill A. Walker. who was born in Essendon, Victoria on the 29th. August 1886, was central to the controversy. He was an Australian rules footballer who played for Essendon in the VFL.
-- The VFL Tribunal (30th. July 1913)
During a match on the 26th. July 1913 against Fitzroy, Walker, who played in a long-sleeved guernsey, was reported by both Dan Feehan, the match steward, and Jack Elder, the central umpire, for striking Fitzroy's Jim Martin with his elbow.
A guernsey is a sweather, originally made of oiled dark blue wool that was first knitted by fishermen's wives in Guernsey.
The evidence given to the tribunal established that Martin had indeed been elbowed by somebody; and that the perpetrator had been wearing a short-sleeve guernsey.
Martin stated that it was not Walker who had struck him, but rather it was Jack Woolley. Jack Woolley also appeared before the tribunal, stating that he had worn a short-sleeved guernsey, and that it was he, rather than Walker, who had had struck Martin with his elbow. The charge against Walker was dismissed.
Bill died in Fitzroy, Victoria at the age of 48 on the 8th. November 1934.
