Brian Horrocks (A Full Life), Leonard Vining (Held By The Bolsheviks) and Francis McCullough (A Prisoner of the Reds) all published memoirs of their time as prisoners-of war in Russia. Although their recollections provided vital material for my book, they were not as important as the telegrams and diplomatic despatches from the British Consuls and army headquarters that I found in various archives. The one in the photograph below, signed by Charles Wickham (who was in the same house at Harrow as Winston Churchill) provided me with a comprehensive list of the “missing” soldiers in January 1920.
This nominal roll offers three crucial bits of information that led to more discoveries: the soldiers’ ranks, regiments and initials. It also gave me an important policy perspective by differentiating between the “Military Mission” and the “Railway Mission” (there were also medical, logistics and intelligence missions, but these had closed by 1920). As with many military documents, there are mistakes, so the information has to be cross-checked (for example, Horrocks’ initials are BG not RG, Johnston is spelled with an “e” and the list does not include Sapper Smith).
Four soldiers are included who did not share prison time with Horrocks and managed to leave Russia in April: Lieutenant Colonel EA Johnston; Major RE Mills; Captain HCG (or HGO) Smith; and CSM G Campbell. In the Siberian Honours, Eric Archibald Johnston was awarded a CBE and Edgar Ronald Mills earned one of the very few Military Crosses (he was later appointed an OBE for his work in World War II). We know that Johnston worked in Argentina on the Cordoba Central Railway and was also awarded the Japanese Order of the Rising Sun 4th Class, but sadly, I haven’t been able to trace the later lives of Smith and Campbell.
After the Café Royal dinner, the intrepid prisoners scattered around the globe. My next post will focus on the Canadian contingent, including the indominable “Uncle Charlie”, who emigrated from Birmingham with his wife, Emily, to Moosejaw in Saskatchewan.
Rupert Wieloch 