Hugh Gaitskell and Ann Fleming

Philip M. Williams, the author of Hugh Gaitskell (1979) does not appear to have known about Hugh Gaitskell's affair with Ann Fleming. He argued: "At home at Frognal Gardens his guests were mostly progressive and few were actively Tory. But he kept up a few personal friendships across the political divide, largely through Anne Fleming and her circle. Crosland chided him about it; but, with his Wykehamist sense of rectitude and distaste for the idle rich, Gaitskell was not in the least worried that he might yield to the embrace of the social Establishment, or might be sourly suspected of doing so. He appreciated its comforts, and its intellectual stimulus still more." Williams goes on to argue that this was the view of senior members of the Labour Party.
However, Andrew Lycett, the author of Ian Fleming (1997) sees the relationship very differently: ""Ann (Fleming) used to joke that when she went to bed with Gaitskell, she liked to imagine she was with the more debonair Crosland. Much as she enjoyed her unexpected romance, she could only cope with it by being slightly disparaging." Fleming told Lord Beaverbrook: "I suppose I shall have to go dancing next Friday with Hugh Gaitskell to explode his pathetic belief in equality, but it will be a great sacrifice to my country... He (Hugh Gaitskell) saw her (Ann Fleming) as a spirited and amusing antidote to his dour professional life; she liked his brains and political clout, and considered it a challenge to wean him from his puritanical socialist principles to an enjoyment of the more overt pleasures in life. On one level, she promoted Gaitskell with Beaverbrook and ensured that his policies received favourable Express group newspaper coverage in any internal Labour Party dispute with his left wing. On another, she subverted the Labour leader's pretensions to seriousness. Ann Fleming, the political hostess who split the Labour Party and kept the Labour right wing in business: it is an interesting and not implausible thesis."
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/TUgaitskell.htm
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/WNfleming.htm

The 13th (Service) Battalion (West Ham Battalion)

Lord Kitchener was appointed Secretary for War in August 1914. His main task was to persuade men to join the British Army. At a meeting on the 19th August it was suggested by Sir Henry Rawlinson that men would be more willing to enlist if they knew they would serve with people they knew. Rawlinson asked his friend, Robert White, to raise a battalion composed of men who worked in the City. White opened a recruiting office in Throgmorton Street and in the first two hours, 210 City workers joined the army. Six days later, the Stockbrokers' Battalion, as it became known, had 1,600 men.



When Lord Edward Derby heard about Robert White's success he decided to form a battalion in Liverpool. Derby opened the recruitment office on 28th August 1914 and by the end of the day had signed up 1,500 men. It was Derby who first used the term a "battalion of pals" to describe men who had been recruited locally.


When Lord Kitchener heard about Derby's success in Liverpool he decided to encourage towns and villages all over Britain to organise recruitment campaigns based on the promise that the men could serve with friends, neighbours and workmates. These units were raised by local authorities, industrialists or committees of private citizens. By the end of September over fifty towns in Britain had formed pals battalions. The larger towns and cities were able to form more than one battalion. Manchester and Hull had four, Liverpool, Birmingham and Glasgow had three and many more were able to raise at least two battalions. In Gasgow one battalion was drawn from the drivers, conductors, mechanics and labourers of the city's Tramways Department.


West Ham United supporters also formed their own Pals Battalion. The 13th (Service) Battalion (West Ham Battalion) were part of the Essex Regiment. In his book War Hammers: The Story of West Ham United During the First World War (2006), Brian Belton argues that the battle cry of the West Ham Pals was "Up the Hammers" and "Up the Irons." They saw action at the Somme, Vimy Ridge and Cambrai. The war took a terrible toll on these men. Elliott Taylor, the author of Up The Hammers!: the West Ham Battalion in the Great War, has argued "Roughly one quarter of the original battalion volunteers were killed and nearly half were returned to UK with severe injuries."




http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWpals.htm

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Up-The-Hammers-ebook/dp/B007XWQG92/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1337581821&sr=1-2-fkmr0" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;