Ernie Pyle In England
“Ernie Pyle In England”
by
Ernie Pyle
Ernie Pyle in England
written by Ernie Pyle
Originally Published in 1941
Ernie Pyle in England is a straight-forward and moving account of English life during the Battle of Britain in WWII. It’s a phenomenal piece of history told as it should be told: fascinatingly. And by someone who walked the cobblestones under the bombing, drank tea in blacked out hotels, and cracked jokes with the common man.
It’s a tale of courage. A masterpiece painting of a people. Of everyday unassuming faithfulness, fortitude, and guts. Of the workaday life in an ugly war– met by a level gaze of hope. He tells the sort of things I’ve always wanted to know about a war. The things you usually wouldn’t know unless you were standing there yourself breathing in the dust as a bomb settles.
One particularly interesting part in the book is where he tells about Britain’s Home Guard. It’s essentially a deep-line-defence made up of civilians, who, with astonishing efficiency, had everything in running order to defend every home, city, town, village, road, and field of grass in the nation. Entirely manned and maintained by armed citizens– all night, every night. Of course, I’d heard of the Home Guard. But I never appreciated it on the high level it deserved before reading this. The strategy and the people merit some attention and study.
Reading history, and learning of the struggles and daily life of other folks such as this, helps to give perspective to our lives and our times. To quote a great line in the book:
I have friends here [in Scotland] who travel to London weekly and who know what has happened down there. These friends get disgusted with their home folks when they return. “Up here we are all complaining about our stomach aches and rheumatism,” they say. “It sounds mighty trivial when you have just come from London, where they really have got something to complain about–and don’t. I think a little blitzing would do us good.”
The point is NOT that stomach aches and rheumatism aren’t worthy struggles. Nor that what is a big hardship to one, is a trivial matter to another, and so should be dismissed. But rather, that the folks living with maiming and EVERYTHING a second from being stripped raw and blown to shreds could maintain an uncomplaining and cheerful attitude. “…they really have got something to complain about–and don’t.”
The point, you see, is the attitude–not the size of your dragon. And its a point well woven into what you could almost call a theme of the book.
On a personal note, I’m thankful for history like this because it increases my mental toughness. Books of this sort give me courage. They make me stronger and more cheerful. And give me a greater sensitivity and appreciation of beauty. These folks don’t pity themselves. They eschew the victim mentality.
Yes, it’s really just a tiny sliver of English history, but is has the tonic-like affect of a brisk fall wind on a muggy August afternoon. It’s bracing, and makes me ready to tackle life with my chin up. That’s the power of history books like this. They change your mindset. Your attitude toward life. It’s far better than the best routines and strengthening exercises I could try to inculcate as habits. Those are things imposed from the outside. But once your very mindset has been altered, all else external follows. Because we really do “live like we live, because we think like we think.”¹
One of Ernie Pyle’s strongest points is in his quick eye and hundreds of descriptive accounts of the normal little people who make up the population. The average Joe and his breakfast. Or Johnny making ice-cream during a night flying bombing mission. It’s a theme throughout all his books I’ve read, and one of the elements that gives them such charm.
Here’s a couple quotes before I wrap this review up:
“There are thousands of “Davises” serving these harassed people of London.
I have a friend who works as an accountant all day then serves most of the night as a shelter marshal, without pay. I’ve seen girls who clerk all day in a ten-cent store and then go to an East End shelter to serve thousands of people over the canteen counter till ten o’clock at night. And they are up at five in the morning to serve early tea and coffee. They do that every night, and they get no pay for it. In the West End I saw women of comfortable means who go every night to sit on stools and make sandwiches by the thousands to be sold to the shelterers at cost.
Britians’s civil army has it’s big blitz heroes who are the greatest this war has produced. But it also has it’s little heroes by the tens of thousands. I think it’s lots harder to be a little hero, because you have to keep so everlastingly at it.” ~p.123
“I sat until 3 A.M. in front of a glowing fireplace with David McQueen, a Presbyterian minister here in Paisley. The Church of Scotland, you know, is Presbyterian; and it used to be a part of the State. Presbyterian ministers here are highly educated in classics. When you sit with Mr. McQueen you are sitting with a man of intellect.
Mr. McQueen is in the war. He has raised thousands of pounds for soldier’s entertainment. His church runs a canteen for the troops stationed here. Wounded R.A.F. fliers come to live with him in his manse, to recuperate. And Mr. McQueen is a private in the Home Guard.
They wanted to make him a padre for the Guard but he wouldn’t do it. He said that if they did that they they should make the pipe organist a bandsman, and no band is needed. So on every duty night David McQueen, Presbyterian minister, is out in the dark fields in uniform, patrolling up and down, looking for Germans.
When his turn falls on Saturday night, he has to go right to church Sunday morning without a wink of sleep, and preach two sermons. He says he has to keep the church cold in order not to fall asleep while he’s talking.
That’s the Home Guard for you.”
Ernie Plye has quite a sense of dry humor. As I’ve said before on this blog, his writing is superb, and he is the most engaging newspaperman I’ve read in my life. His lean sentences, eye for beauty, and “sun-tanned” conversational tone are a delight. As do his other works, this book on the ‘Battle of Britain’ stands out as stellar among it’s peers.
I’ve never been the same since “meeting” Ernie Pyle. And I’m much indebted to the fellow who read his books aloud to me for a couple of years until I realized what treasures they are, and started reading them myself.
If I haven’t convinced you to read this book yet, take a hop over to Goodreads and read a review or two. That should do the trick.
It’s a short 228 pages of fine history by a master writer. If all history were told like this I would be beside myself with joy. But I’m grateful that at least there is this book. Be sure you don’t miss it.
¹ Joe Morecraft
