Research Catalog

Title

Great-Uncle Harry : a tale of war and empire / Michael Palin.

Author

Palin, Michael

Publication

• London, England : Hutchinson Heinemann, 2023.
• ©2023

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xiii, 322 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some colour), maps, portraits (some colour); 24 cm.

Summary

Some years ago a stash of family records was handed down to Michael Palin, among which was a photograph of an enigmatic young man in army uniform. This, he learnt, was his Great-Uncle Harry, who perished at the Battle of the Somme in 1916 aged just thirty-two. The discovery both shocked him and made him want to know more. The quest that followed involved hundreds of hours of painstaking detective work, as Michael set out to trace his great-uncle's journey from the comfort of a middle-class Victorian childhood, via spells working on railways and tea plantations in India and on a farm in New Zealand, to the slaughtering grounds of Gallipoli and Flanders. He pored over surviving fragments of family correspondence and tantalisingly brief mentions in official documents. He scrutinised Harry's often frustratingly terse war diaries. He sifted through battlefield photographs to see whether his great-uncle appeared in any of them. He walked the route Harry took on that fatal, final day of his life amid the mud of northern France. As he did so, he gained a personal insight into what it was like to be a child of the British Empire and to fight for king and country in one of history's most devastating conflicts. And a figure that had previously existed in the shadows was gradually revealed to him. Great-Uncle Harry is an utterly compelling account of an ordinary man who led an extraordinary life. A blend of biography, history, travelogue and personal memoir, this is Michael Palin at his very finest.

Subject

• Palin, Harry, 1884-1916
• Palin, Michael > Family
• Palin, Michael
• 1914-1918
• World War, 1914-1918 > New Zealand
• Soldiers > New Zealand > Biography
• Soldiers > Great Britain > Biography
• Families
• Great Britain

Genre/Form

Biographies.

Note

• Harry Palin worked in New Zealand between 1912 and 1914, before enlisting in the 12th New Zealand Regiment of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force to serve overseas in the Great War.
• Published in Canada by Random House Canada, 2023.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

Preface: the short life of my great-uncle -- Prelude -- Part 1. Linton -- 1. Star pupil -- 2. American friends -- 3. The lastborn -- 4. Schooldays -- 5. Travelling to work -- Part 2. India and New Zealand -- 6. Indian sunset -- 7. The call of the wild -- Part 3. Gallipoli -- 8. Off to war -- 9. The calm before the storm -- 10. The storm -- 11. A tin of meat -- Part 4. France -- 12. To the Western Front -- 13. Waiting -- 14. The road to the Somme -- 15. The last man -- Afterword: the hunt for Harry.

Call Number

JFE 23-3522

ISBN

• 9781529152623
• 1529152623
• 9781529152616
• 1529152615

OCLC

1381435944

Author

Palin, Michael, author.

Title

Great-Uncle Harry : a tale of war and empire / Michael Palin.

Publisher

London, England : Hutchinson Heinemann, 2023.

Copyright Date

©2023

Type of Content

text

still image

cartographic image

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Chronological Term

1914-1918

Other Form:

ebook version : 9781529152630

Research Call Number

JFE 23-3522