The Germans are still attacking. They break through in the sector held by the British division that includes the looters, but it’s a different story in the area occupied by Pompey’s men. The German attackers there, according to Pompey, conclude they have “urgent business elsewhere”.
The bombed town of Corbie in France’s Somme Valley, 1918-19.
Meanwhile, Pompey is astonished by the Corbie residence he has been allocated for his headquarters. It’s “a most glorious house”, the finest he’s ever been in, with exquisite furniture, carpets that would “make your mouth water”, and collections of photographs, weapons, birds, flora and fauna.
He raves about these treasures in page after page of description. The dining room is extraordinary, the drawing room is stunning, and the billiard room is phenomenal: “Ranged round the walls from floor to ceiling in cabinets of beautifully polished walnut [is] the most wonderful collection of gorgeous butterflies I have ever seen.”
The owner of this residence has had to vacate it in the emergency, and in April 1918, it looks decidedly vulnerable as German shells crash down in the vicinity. Pompey is busy with onerous responsibilities in Britain’s gravest crisis of the war, but he nevertheless decides he has to do something to protect the magnificent collections he has discovered.
So he tells the interpreter at his headquarters to write to the French government recommending that the precious art and furniture should be removed for its protection. He receives a grateful reply from the authorities. Shortly afterwards, lorries arrive to take these treasures away to safety.
Pompey inquires about the butterflies that have so entranced him, and finds they are even more special than he’d realised.
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This is the second-most complete collection of butterflies in the world, with unique specimens that are irreplaceable. They belong to the Museum of Paris, which had lent them to the owner of the Corbie residence because he was classifying them for a learned publication.
A museum official writes to Pompey about this exceptional collection, urging him to “get it away safely as it is absolutely priceless, and asking us to please be careful as the insects are extremely fragile”.
While Pompey and his men are making their vital contribution to the war effort – strengthening the defences, securing the Somme bridges and counterattacking successfully – they also manage to package up the collection of butterflies and transport it well away from the danger zone.
Harold “Pompey” Elliott.Credit: Australian War Memorial
As Pompey reports: “So careful were the men with the fragile specimen cases that the whole immense collection was loaded, conveyed along rough roads some 40 miles or so to Flixecourt, and unloaded there almost absolutely intact.”
The museum officials are ecstatic. A professor writes to Pompey proposing an expression of gratitude. He “talked about rewarding me in some way, I suppose making me a director or honorary governor of the museum or something, but I wrote and told him that I had no need to be rewarded for what anyone should do in the interests of science”.
The owner of the Corbie residence is also extremely grateful.
Pompey assures him that, “I’m very happy to have had the opportunity in this way to render service to a Frenchman and to science.”
Later that month no one is more influential than Pompey in the stunning and decisive counterattack at Villers-Bretonneux.
Welcome Back to the Somme (1918) by Australian war artist Will Dyson. Credit: Australian War Memorial
What happened at Corbie and nearby in April 1918 confirmed that Pompey Elliott was not only a brilliant, forceful and successful military commander; he was also culturally enlightened with an artistic sensibility and an acute sense of beauty.
Pompey Elliott survived the war, returned home and topped the Victorian Senate poll in 1919. Living in Camberwell during the 1920s, he became a household name – prominent in parliament, the law and the history of the war. He was Australia’s most popular unveiler of war memorials, and any Victorian schoolboy with the surname Elliott was liable to be nicknamed Pompey. On March 23,1931, aged 52, he died by suicide.
Ross McMullin’s biography Pompey Elliott won multiple awards. His most recent book, Life So Full of Promise, won the 2024 Age Book of the Year Award.
Read the full article here
