Author(s): Michael Palin

Military History | Biography & Memoir

Michael Palin recreates the extraordinary life and tragic death of a First World War soldier - his great-uncle Harry.

From the time, many years ago, when Michael Palin first heard that his grandfather had a brother, Harry, who died in tragic circumstances, he was determined to find out more about him.

The quest that followed involved hundreds of hours of painstaking detective work. Michael dug out every bit of family gossip and correspondence he could. He studied every relevant official document. He tracked down what remained of his great-uncle Harry's diaries and letters, and pored over photographs of First World War battle scenes to see whether Harry appeared in any of them. He walked the route Harry took on that fatal, final day of his life amid the mud of northern France.

And as he did so, a life that had previously existed in the shadows was revealed to him. Great-Uncle Harry is an utterly compelling account of an ordinary man who led an extraordinary life. A blend of biography, history, travelogue and personal memoir this is Michael Palin at his very finest.

Schrödinger's Books' Review:

Harry Palin was a nondescript sort of chap, one might even call him feckless. Despite his privileged upbringing he didn’t distinguish himself at school or working as a clerk in India, first for the railways and then on a tea plantation. In 1912 he emigrated to New Zealand and ended up working as a farmhand in Canvastown, Marlborough.

When war broke out he enlisted and began a diary, two or three banal lines per day, as he served in Egypt, Gallipoli and Flanders before being killed in the Battle of the Somme in 1916.

The author’s style is informal and very readable – there is quite a bit of speculation and supposition (backed by research) to draw out this man of few words, but it succeeds in putting you in the shoes of an ordinary soldier. It becomes a remarkable insight into someone who served good-naturedly alongside his mates as they were all wounded or killed – and I think there is something heroic in that.

- Catherine Clarke