The Lamp of Toc H.

Radio Record, Volume II, Issue 40, 19 April 1929, Page 5

The Lamp of Toc H.

3YA to Broadcast Service QNCE upon a time there was a war. At least, memories are becoming so hazy, it almost seems like that. And maybe, when one considers the horrors, the fearfulness and the tragedy of those four years, it is as well that memories should grow dim. Toe H had its origin in the great war. It was one of the bright spots and is one of the bright memories. It is also still a growing, virile, living force throughout the British Empire. "Toe H" got its name from "Talbot House" in Poperinghe. "Talbot House" was a haven. Thréugh the dreadful war it stood like a lighthouse for lightheartedness and deep-mindedness-the true combination for men. The more it was chipped and perforated, the more good leaked ‘out of it; and the source of this good was first the Christian God, and next the family life that grew up inside it among the thousands of British soldiers who fought in the Ypres Salient. "There was," said Punch, "a Talbot House in Poperinghe from 1915 to 1918, and it had an annexe in Little Talbot House in Ypres from the November of 1917 to the dark days before the final counter-stroke in 1918. Both were in the danger zone; both brought a corner of heaven into the hell of men’s and officers’ lives." "But is it really?" one writer has said, "Has anyone 4 right to suffer from sleeping sickness when the war is i.entioned, while there are still so many homes in which it has left empty chairs, and still more men with empty sleeves and trouser-legs?" Here is the tragedy of war,. but the inspiration of peace, not to avenge their loss, but to replace it. To find in the sacrifice of those men, inspiration to accept with a fuller sense of duty, the obligations their loss imposes on wus. Remembrance carries with it a great responsibility. "To you, from failing hands, we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high." It is a Toc H service that 3YA will proadeast from St. John’s Anglican Church on the morning of Anzac Day.