Arthur Douglas Crease Letters, Diaries and Scrapbooks
Letters from Arthur Douglas Crease of Victoria to his brother Lindley Crease and his mother Sarah Crease; instructions for the offensive of July 26, 1917; a regimental notebook, diaries and scrapbook. Learn more.
*All transcriptions are provided by volunteers, and the accuracy of the transcriptions is not guaranteed. Please be sure to verify the information by viewing the image record, or visiting the BC Archives in person.
BC Archives MS-0055; BC Archives MS-2879
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62
July 5, 1918
THE CRISIS: APRIL 12, 1918
THE TRIBUTE OF AN AMERICAN TO THE BRITISH ARMY.
"Now with our backs turned to the wall, we stand," Said Haig; and all the world wheeled at his cry, Straining to watch. Whatever else was planned, Whatever else was thought of - born of gleams of happier dawns or hope-inspired dreams - Was rooted up, and down the shell-scarred sky Blown like the canvas of a storm-wrecked ship, Blown like the lava from the crater's lip, Blown like dead leaves upon an Autumn gale.
They will not fail! They are of that indomitable breed That oft hath saved the world at need And loosed the tyrant's yoke. Against their sires broke The steel of Philip, and their sea-dogs strewed The green depths of the wind-trashed seas With ships that flew his flag: They turned at bay to Waterloo and thrust Beneath torn Flanders' weeping sky The pard-like Man of Destiny Into the Dust. Again, to-day, In this world-feud, High-hearted like their sires, and mighty-thewed, They turn at bay, Themselves the last thin walls That block the blood-stained Teuton's way To Liberty's stripped halls.
They will not fail! Within their hands keen swords, untarnished kept, Within their hearts the courage of their race, That sleeps not, nor hath slept. Men worthy of their place! Men of the breed that Shakespeare sand, Who under Nelson fought and bled, Whose blades at Balaklava rang, The island breed, inured to strife, Proved in the searching flames of wars, That holds its honour more than life, As much the sun outshines the stars, The breed that for its word hath won The tribute of the world's belief, Whose record, blazoned in the sun, Holdeth a thousand years in fief - They will not fail!
O.R. Howard Thomson.
BC Archives, MS-0055 Box 15 File 4 / CREASE FAMILY Letters from Arthur Douglas Crease to his brother, Lindley Crease, 1918.