Fascinating website. I actually have an original copy of a book that Walter wrote back in the late 70's. It is called "Early Days in Lynn Valley". He mentions his WW1 service numerous times. I'm glad to see that he has been immortalized on the web. An amazing man that lived through some very interesting times. I wish I could have met him while I was living in Lynn Valley.

I was very interested to read your web site and previous messages posted on the forum. My sister, Irene, and I are great nieces of Walter who was the eldest brother of our Grandfather, Charles Clarence Draycott. My father was Sidney Charles Draycott (1922-1999). We live in Liverpool, UK, and I would be interested in finding any relatives in Canada. I know that Walter's sister, Martha also lived in Canada and I wonder if the relative, Muriel Draycott was a descendent of hers. We have a copy of the extensive Draycott family tree, compiled by Walter, and it would be nice to fill in the missing blanks.

This is an incredibly rich source of knowledge about the First World War, its various strands mediated through a single protagonist in a way I have never come across before. I was utterly fascinated and most reluctant to leave it (owing to a hungry family), and I look forward to many return visits. Thank you!
Marianne Thormählen
Professor of English Literature, Lund University, Sweden
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I appreciate your comments. The four media discussed in the website have special contributions to make to our understanding of World War One. The Draycott collection is unusually rich and gives us a rare opportunity to compare four different representations of the same event, representations produced by one man with a special interest in detail and accuracy and a life-long passion for history.

Jane

At a time when I believe there are only three living British veterans of WW1 this is a timely reminder of the activities and conditions of soldiers on the war front. As WW2 also becomes more remote, and out of personal memories of the majority of the population it becomes even more important that we do not forget the scarifices made.

This site is also a reminder that these wars did not just involve Europe, but had ramifications around the world, even though in this case Walter MacKay Draycott was of British origin.

The site is well set out and will pay dividends from repeated visits.

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Many thanks for your encouraging and insightful comments. As you point out, there are very few survivors of World War One left. Draycott was unusual because he realised as far back as 1937 that the story of the private soldier on the Western Front must not be forgotten.

It is fascinating that so many excellent new novels based on World War One have been written in Britain and Canada in the last few years. These novels, by Charlotte Bingham, Jane Urquhart and others recreate a world and experiences which deserve to be remembered because they show what mankind can achieve as well as endure in the face of extreme hardship and danger.

It is my belief that Walter MacKay Draycott's story has all the ingredients of an excellent novel. Rarely does a writer get the opportunity to access such rich material, textual as well as pictorial. This is a novel waiting to be written!

I think this is an amazing story about artistic convictions and survival against terrible odds.
It testifies to the possibility and power of writing as a way to express personal and political injustice, and to the creative possibilities of self- vindication.

It is crucial to get the actual account of someone who was there in the line of fire, first hand. This makes it a contemporary issue as well because it lets the voices of those who were actually there to come through, as opposed to the “official accounts,” the master narratives and discourses of military history, which are often permeated with patriotic or nationalistic ideology.
War is indeed inextricably tied to identity – national, ethnic, and personal, a fact which this story and website convey in a very insightful way.

I think part of why the first world war is so fascinating to us is because it was, arguably, the last great war that was fought in a “traditional” way with infantry soldiers in trenches yet with the aid of technological advancements such as chemical warfare and rapid fire machine guns. This combination was, as is known, devastating, and remains a historical abomination unprecedented ever since.
The war moreover engages us because it coincides temporally with the genre transition from realism to modernism, and consequently a new way of writing and reading (e.g. in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, or Hemingway’s short stories and novels).

But it is also worth noting that we constantly develop new ways to analyze auto/biographical narratives through different narratological techniques, as this website does (e.g. the differentiation between the narrating “I”s). The employment of literary criticism in this respect provides a more nuanced approach to Draycott’s various moods, inner conflicts and responses to the trauma of war in a very rewarding way. We can, in effect, consider him both as a somewhat literary character, yet still allow him the weight he deserves as a real-life soldier fighting in a war. This double play I find especially interesting.

The recent developments of literary theory (the bending lines between fiction/non-fiction, auto-biography or biography, as well as journals as a literary form) allow us to take multiple views when studying narratives, which proves yet more relevant where historical accounts are concerned, such as in Draycott’s case. It moreover encourages a human and humane perspective into what is usually presented historically as a simplified opposition between fighting sides of a war; e.g. Draycott’s sympathetic view of the German soldiers as “pawns of a game” reminds us that real people were involved.

A great website I will revisit many times in the future!

Very many thanks for your entry, Simon. I do hope that you make contact with your Draycott relatives. I should be delighted if my website enables you to reconnect with relatives. Good luck and very best wishes.
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I am related to Walter Draycott, Gent. through his family from Stanley Grange in Derbyshire. Walter was the armiger (Arms holder) for the Draycotts of Loscoe, and Lords Draycott of Paynsley Hall. Walter's relatives include, of all people the late Queen Mother, Dr. Anthony Draycott of Bloody Mary Fame (1560), and Sir John De Dracott who fought Brave Heart's Scottish Clansmen at the battle of Falkirk (1298)
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Agora/3542/draycott.html

If there are any other relatives of Walter still alive, please contact me.

Simon Hollingworth, Australia

"Interest in WWl". People throughout the world saw it as the war to end wars and while this ideal was extinquished the hope for world peace lives on.A companion to Draycott is de Bernieres,"Birds Without Wings". Thank you Dr Mattisson for a job well done.
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Many thanks, Bruce Berglund, for your comment and book suggestion. It was Draycott's wish that World War One would indeed be the last war. It is no coincidence that his memoir ends with a plea to end war.

Walter Draycott's grand-niece, Muriel Evelyn Draycott (1926-2006) was married to my grandmother's cousin Andrew Gustav Finlayson (1915-1970)
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Thank you for this contribution, Ian. I am glad that my website has come to the attention of Draycott's family.

Congratulations! You have presented Walter Draycott as a real live person, a warm human being with deep emotions who was thrust into a situtation that would haunt him for the rest of his life. Readers are able to relate to the war much better when seen through a spectator's eyes rather than reading about one impersonal battle after another. You are absolutely right, this is a novel waiting to be written.

What a wonderful analysis of a fascinating person - so good to read and keep alive the first hand experiences and cling to the hope of a world without conflict. Some of the entries and photos are so powerful, emotional and provocative. Will certainly recommend to students and teachers of the first world war.
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Thank you for your comments. I should be glad if you would recommend my site to your school pupils: while Draycott was exceptional as a recorder of events, his story is not untypical.

Hello!
Nice site ;)
Bye
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Many thanks! I do hope you will return to my site now and then.
Are you a student of World War One?

I found this web very interesting. I have read quite a lot of books about WWI
but I have never realized there might be a different transatlantic perspective.

As a secondary English teacher I will recommend this web to my students.
It may serve as an example how to present such a hero.
And his life may be the example itself.

Well done.
Pavla Rudzka
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Very many thanks.I am particularly interested in your comment about how to present the life of a hero. The Draycott collection in North Vancouver is unusually rich and comprehensive. What makes it so special is that it gives the scholar the opportunity to study four different media and how they tell the story of man whose contributions to the War effort were exceptional. It is my hope that the Internet will bring Draycott the recognition he so richly deserves.

I was at a course today at the N. Van Archives and saw the boxes and boxes of personal papers and diaries of Walter Draycott. I also saw some of the drawings that he did of the topography of WWI battlefields-truly amazing. I am enjoying this site very much-great job.
Thank you, Sue
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Thank you so much for your appreciative comments, Sue. I am so glad that the Draycott collection is attracting attention.