Hopeless!

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 892, 8 February 1930, Page 18

Hopeless!

Kitchener i Refused to J Consider “ Tin Helmets ” For Soldiers. fl “ You are Talking " Nonsense.”

B' 'W. -■ OW Lord Kitchener Is mWM said to have rejected the idea of steel helmets for y|j[] British soldiers during jpßpi the war is told by Colonel Beckles Willson in “From Quebec to Piccadilly,” published by Jonathan Cape. Colonel Willson, who served with the Canadian Expeditionary Force, writes: In my diary I note that upon one occasion (October 26, 1917) I lunched with !sir Arthur Sloggett, director of Medical Services. He showed me the very first British helmet, which he himself had been the means of introducing. Said that at the outset he went to Kitchener and earnestly advocated its adoption. He talked for nearly 40 minutes as eloquently and earnestly as he ever did in his life. At the end of his harangue Kitchener, who had never moved, took out his watch and said, slowly:— “Sloggett, do you know you have been talking nonsense for 40 minutes.” Sloggett told me that he packed up his helmet and went away without a word. “I saw it was hopeless,” he said. Steel helmets were subsequently worn as a protection by men of all ranks in the British Army when serving in the line. Many interesting personalities of the war, both military and civilian, figure in the book and from his personal knowledge of most of them the author is able to throw illuminating sidelights on their characters.