Dear Brian,
I come late to your request for information about "My Boy Jack", and I
am sure that you now have the details you needed. However, I did
notice your telling slip in the title of your email (My Son Jack), and
would be reassured to know that you are including a note in your
material to mention the original "Boy Jack", about whom the piece was
composed. This was not, I am sure, John Kipling.
Of course, Kipling had his own son in mind, but successive
commentators have clouded and over-simplified the issue. As far as we
can now ascertain, John was never called "Jack" in the family (though
Rider Haggard did call him "Jacko" once, I think). Instead, the Jack
in question was Jack Cornwell V.C., Ship's Boy of H.M.S. Chester,
mortally wounded at Jutland.
All of a piece with the misunderstanding of Kipling's motives in
pulling strings to gain John his Commission, we now have the picture
of a grieving father unable to resist naming his son in verse in a
national newspaper (and even quoting the piece to his good friend, the
King!).
Instead, if you have looked at the contemporary press campaign, in
support of for honours for Ship's Boy Jack Cornwell, just before the
publication of the verse, you may be tempted - like me - to read the
title with a long emphasis on the word "My". This was a cry on behalf
of all those parents who had lost sons at sea (and, of course, on
land). The theme is similar to the reactions we heard when the lost
child, Madeleine McCann, filled front pages for day after day. "What
about all the other lost children?"
Kipling did write of his personal loss, most movingly (in my view) in
"A Recantation", but this is carefully coded, and fits acceptably with
the admonition to "never breathe a word about your loss".
This is a bee in my bonnet, I will admit, but a worthwhile one, in
honouring the indidvidual sacrifice of two young men, and in
recognising an Edwardian father's restraint in grief.
If there are other questions to resolve, please don't hesitate to contact me.
Best regards,
John
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