Word: sassoon
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Sherston (Sassoon) served as a 2nd Lieutenant in the Flintshires (Royal Welch Fusiliers), came through the Somme unhurt and with a Military Cross to his credit. He was shot through the chest by a sniper at the Battle of Arras. He won the M. C. by losing his temper. When a man alongside of him was shot, Sassoon charged the German trench singlehanded, bombing as he went. The Germans thought it was an attack, fled, and Sassoon occupied the abandoned trench. After a while, not knowing what else to do, he came back, found his commanding officer furious. A scheduled...
...Sassoon apparently never lost his nerve, but never felt himself a very competent officer. "My main fear was that I should make a fool of myself. The idea of making a fool of oneself in that murderous mix-up now appears to me rather a ludicrous one; for I see myself merely as a blundering, flustered little beetle; and if someone happens to put his foot on a beetle, it is unjust to accuse the unlucky insect of having made a fool of itself...
...time of the Battles of Messines (1917) Sassoon was in England recuperating from his wound. He had begun to be fed up with the War, finally decided he ought to do something about it. He wrote a formal statement of his refusal to return to the front (although he was not going to be sent back), "as an act of wilful defiance ot military authority, because I believe that the War is being deliberately prolonged by those who have the power to end it." He sent this statement to his colonel, was immediately ordered to report. To the colonel...
...Sassoon writes quietly, with an effect of naivete that often cloaks irony. The naivete is superficial, the irony fundamental. When he was brought back to London after being wounded, his stretcher was taken off the train at Charing Cross Station, where "a woman handed me a bunch of flowers and a leaflet by the Bishop of London who earnestly advised me to lead a clean life and attend Holy Communion...
...Author. The Sassoons, rich, prominent Anglo-Jewish family (they are supposed to have originated in Bagdad) are said to resemble early Assyrian wall sculptures. Siegfried, 44, is son of Sir Edward Sassoon, Anglo-Indian merchant whose father-in-law was Baron Gustave de Rothschild. Siegfried's cousin Philip was Under-Secretary for Air. Tall, bony, loosely built, he has a big jaw, nose, ears, hands; speaks usually in a slow, troubled voice. After his country gentleman's education at Marlborough and The House (Christ Church, Oxford), he spent his time mostly hunting, playing cricket, tennis, music, printed a few poems...