Iron in the Fire
Sydney, Angus & Robertson Limited, 1934 [first edition].
Octavo, x, 270 pages.
Cream cloth (lettered in green) lightly bumped at the ends of the spine; edges and endpapers a little foxed, with scattered light foxing elsewhere; an excellent copy with the lightly used colour-pictorial dustwrapper.
The personal account of a Western Australian soldier serving with the 28th Battalion on the Western Front. 1556 Corporal Edgar Morrow enlisted with the 28th Battalion in May 1915 and saw action at Gallipoli, but his time there is dismissed in under two pages: 'Memories of my three months on the Peninsula are strangely blurred, faint and broken ...' One significant omission here is the death of his younger brother Albert, killed in action by a high explosive shell at Russell's Top on 16 December 1915. The two brothers enlisted together (Albert's service number was 1557), and family sensibilities are likely the true reason for his reticence with respect to the Dardanelles campaign. He is much more expansive and engaging in recounting his time on the Western Front, where he was wounded twice. The book is scarce, and the dustwrapper must be considered rare. This copy has the ownership signature 'A. McLennan' on the front flyleaf. We have traced two WA servicemen with that name: 2740a Private Alexander McLennan (who enlisted with the 28th Battalion reinforcements on 12 August 1915 at the age of 42, and was soon transferred to the 4th Pioneers Battalion); and 3434 Sapper Angus Douglas McLennan (6th and 13th Field Company Engineers). Dornbusch 332.
Item #130720
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