War and the Arme Blanche.

£450 · Offered by Maggs Bros Ltd

This copy inscribed to Hugh Dawnay by Earl Roberts on the front free endpaper. Dawnay served with the 2nd Life Guards in the Sudan, 1898; South Africa 1899-1900, MiD twice, Queen’s Medal and clasp, DSO; and Somaliland, 1908-10. From 1901-1904 he was A-D-C to Lord Roberts. He died at Klein Zillbeke during First Ypres, “For a moment there was wild confusion – French, British and the oncoming Germans being mingled together in the village street. Major the Hon. Hugh Dawnay, who had come from the Headquarters Staff to command the 2nd Life Guards, led his men to the charge, and inflicted heavy losses upon the foe. Two hundred years before, the French Maison du Roi had charged desperately in Flemish fields… with their lace and steel, their plumed hats and mettled horses. Very different was the attack of the British Household Cavalry - mud-splashed men in drab charging on foot with the bayonet. In this section Hugh Dawnay fell, but not before his advance had saved the position. In him Britain lost one of the most brilliant of her younger soldiers, most masterful both in character and in brain, who, had he lived, would without doubt have risen to the highest place. He would wish no better epitaph than Napier’s words: “No man died that night with more glory – yet many died, and there was much glory.”” [John Buchan] A poignant association copy in view of the subject of the work and the fate of the recipient.

• Year: 1910

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