Inscribed by author: "Isabel S.R. Kinnear from Lady Jenkins, Jan. 1918."
Inserted: letter: "Sussex House, New [illegible], 11.III.20, My dear Mrs. Poole, Thank you so much for your very kind letter. We have laid her beside him, but I cannot bear it. Life is too hard to be borne I think. With my love, Yours affectionately, J.M. Jenkins. A few days before Elinor was ill she wrote this poem to Arthur Clowes in my little book- + I put it on a laurel wreath on his grave the day she was buried." On the back of the letter: "Finis. Soldier and poet, we you loved bring laurel/ Bring burnished laurel + sharp scented bay/ Bays to the poet, laurels to the soldier/ The last vain gifts before we go our way// All your sweet songs dumb in the dust hi with you/ all your great deeds, ash on war's altars hi/ Now we that loved you crown you once + leave you/ Poet and Soldier. Greeting and Goodbye."
Note from Jacky Rodger" The poems are by Elinor May Jenkins 1893-1920. I am particularly touched by the letter from her mother, Lady Jenkins, following Elinor’s death on 28 Feb 1920. I believe some of the hard-to-read names in the letter may be as follows:
Sussex House, Kew Gardens
F.M. Jenkins [Lady Jenkins is Florence Maud]
Arthur Lewis [Elinor’s brother Arthur Lewis Jenkins]
Her brother, Arthur Lewis Jenkins, (also in collection) was killed in a flying corps accident in 1917. Brother and sister are buried in neighbouring graves in Richmond Cemetery, Richmond-upon-Thames, London, UK.
Correspondanec with Jacky Rodger
"You also have Arthur's book Forlorn Adventures in your collection. He died in a flying accident in the Royal Flying Corps in 1917, details here: http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casualty/401977/JENKINS,%20ARTHUR%20LEWIS
Brother and sister are buried in neighbouring graves in Richmond Cemetery, Richmond-upon-Thames, London, UK. The cemetery database is as below, and I attach printouts for convenience. Buried with Elinor, much later, are another three of her brothers and her sister-in-law. This is a family of merchants and civil servants of the British Empire in India, and most of the brothers were very high profile and googleable, if you’re interested.
http://www2.richmond.gov.uk/lbrburials/(S(rml3g0brk4iv5sih1mdeip45))/DeceasedDetails.aspx?t=dec&id=247443
http://www2.richmond.gov.uk/lbrburials/(S(dedcku5544q2sm5550aa4wef))/DeceasedDetails.aspx?t=dec&id=246374 ....
Thank you so much, that’s marvellous. And so sad.
Seeing the letter, I wonder if the correct transcriptions are actually:
• “she wrote this poem to Arthur down in my little book”
• "All your sweet songs dumb in the dust lie with you/ all your great deeds, ash on war's altars lie/"
I’ve found a lot more detail on Elinor since my email. She was born in Bombay on 2 or 3 Sep 1893, of a British Raj family, had come to the UK with her mother and siblings by 1901, and went to Southlands School, Exmouth, Devon. She died of influenza in the great epidemic.
I attach a newspaper obituary for brother Arthur from the Western Mail, Thursday 3 January 1918, p5 (transcription below in case it’s hard to read).
I see the letter addressed to "Mrs Poole" was tucked inside a book inscribed by Lady Jenkins to “Isabel S.R. Kinnear, Jan 1918”. Almost the only candidate for Isabel S.R. Kinnear in the censuses and Birth / Marriage / Death records is an Isabel Susan Rose Kinnear, who in Mar 1918 marries Frederick Robert Poole of the Coldstream Guards. What’s more, Isabel had a brother John Lawson Kinnear who was an aviator like Arthur, and who served in an RAF training squadron (killed April 1918).
I’ve also been passing my findings to Lucy London of http://www.femalewarpoets.blogspot.co.uk, who will be writing up a bio of Elinor. Would you mind if I shared the image of the letter with her?
All best wishes
Jacky
ROLL OF HONOUR.
SON OF THE LATE SIR J. L JENKINS.
PROMISING POET KILLED WHILST FLYING.
LONDON. Wednesday
On New Year's Day the news reached London that Arthur Lewis Jenkins, the eldest son of the late Sir John Lewis Jenkins, K.C.S.I., some time vice-president of the Indian Viceroy's Council, had been killed in an accident while flying at Ripon, in Yorkshire. So has ended a career full of the most, brilliant promise.
Sir John Lewis Jenkins was one of the strong men of the Indian Civil Service. A pure-bred Welshman, the son of the late County Councillor James Jenkins, of Llangadock, Carmarthenshire, he was marked out by birth and early training for dealing in a conciliatory and statesmanlike way with "native problems." It was he, more than any other one man, who was responsible for the transference of the capital from Calcutta to Delhi. He was cut down suddenly six years ago in the full vigour of his manhood. He was married to a daughter of Sir Arthur Trevor, K.C.S.I., by whom he had seven children, one whom, Elinor Jenkins, published a successful book of "poems" last year.
Arthur Jenkins won a scholarship at Marlborough College, of which in due course became head boy. Later on he took an open classical scholarship at Balliol College, Oxford, and it was his intention, but for the outbreak of war, to enter the Indian Civil Service. Obtaining a commission in September, 1911, was sent out with his regiment to India, and afterwards to Aden. While there he wrote a charming little poem “Arabia," which appeared in "Punch." He saw some little service, which he thus commemorated:–
Sharp rattling fights at peep of day.
Machine-guns searching scrub and plain.
Red lances questing for the prey,
And shrapnel puffs that melt again:
Swift shifting stroke and counter-stroke,
Advance unhurrying and sure,
Until the stubborn foemen broke—
These are the memories that endure.
From Aden he proceeded to Egypt, where he joined the Flying Corps. A few months ago he came back to this country, and he would have gone to the Western front shortly. Though only 25 years of age, he had already shown great promise of a distinguished career. Tall, handsome, of rigorous frame and remarkable appearance, he was a figure that attracted attention in any assembly. A few weeks ago appeared a song of youth and war from his pen in "Punch,” entitled. "The Inn of the Sword," which displayed great vivacity and energy of style. But, perhaps, in these sad days, the most comforting of his verses to recall are those that appeared last February in the "Westminster Gazette," under the title of "Happy Warriors”:–
Clear came the call; they leapt to arms and died
As in old days the heroes prayed to do;
Great though our sorrow, greater yet our pride,
O, gallant hearts in you.
Surely they sleep content, our valiant dead,
Fallen untimely in the savage strife;
They have but followed whither duty led,
To find a fuller life.
Who, then, are we to grudge the bitter price
Of this our land inviolate through the years,
Or mar the splendour of their sacrifice
That is too high for tears?
God grant we fail not at the test—that when
We take, mayhap, our places in the fray,
Come life, come death, to quit ourselves like men.
The peers of such as they.
To-day the young singer lies in Richmond churchyard, and he, too, like the other gallant hearts that have gone before him, has found "a fuller life.”"
