Dear Friends of Carmel Mission,
Lt. Tom Kettle died in the mud trenches near the French town of Ginchy, on September 9th, 1916, the 71st day of the Battle of the Somme. Tom was a hero who believed that all people have a right to freedom.
On this Veterans Day weekend, we honor all those heroes who fought for freedom. Tom Kettle kept a diary with him and it was found not far from his dead body.
He left his wife, Mary, at home in Dublin, Ireland, and only subsequently learnt from her in a letter, that she was pregnant with their first child.
Tom Kettle was a cousin of my father, and a frequent visitor to Dad’s home. One of the last entries In Tom’s diary is the following:
To My Daughter Betty – the Gift of God.
In wiser days, my darling rosebud, blown
To beauty, proud as was your mother’s prime,
In that desired, delayed, incredible time,
You’ll ask why I abandoned you, my own,
And the dear heart that was your baby throne,
To dice with death. And oh! they’ll give you rhyme
And reason: some will call the thing sublime,
And some decry it in a knowing tone.
So here, while the mad guns curse overhead,
And tired men sigh with mud for couch and floor,
Know that we fools, now with the foolish dead,
Died not for flag, nor King, nor Emperor, –
But for a dream, born in a herdsman’s shed
And for the secret Scripture of the poor.
On this Veterans Day, may we remember especially all those who died in wars far from home, and whose bodies were never found. May they rest in peace.
Fr. Paul
Pastor at Carmel Mission