[lit-ideas] Re: Born a Plunkett or a Kyoungjong
- From: John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: Lit-Ideas <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 11:02:32 +0900
Died in 1942, surrendered in 1944? Nice trick that.
John
On Thu, Oct 17, 2013 at 9:52 AM, David Ritchie <profdritchie@xxxxxxxxx>wrote:
> I found in our local library a new book about World War Two and thought,
> as you might, "Really? Another? Is that what the world needs?" Anthony
> Beevor wrote it. I opened at page sixteen. "Stalin suspected, with a good
> deal of justification, that the British government was playing for time.
> He was even less impressed by the Franco-British military delegation which
> departed on 5 August aboard a slow steamer to Leningrad. General Aimé
> Doumenc and Admiral Sir Reginald Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax lacked any power
> of decision. They could only report back to Paris and London..."
>
> "Goodness," I thought, "Why not call him simply Admiral Drax?"
>
> Wikipedia says that the British man's full name was
> *Admiral<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiral_(Royal_Navy)> the
> Hon. Sir Reginald Aylmer Ranfurly Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax*,
> KCB<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knight_Commander_of_the_Order_of_the_Bath>
> , DSO <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distinguished_Service_Order>,
> JP<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_of_the_Peace>
> , DL <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deputy_Lieutenant>, and continues:
>
> Sir Reginald, born a Plunkett, was christened Reginald Aylmer Ranfurly
> (Plunkett) on 9 September 1880 at Holy Trinity Church,
> Marylebone<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marylebone>,
> Westminster,[3] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reginald_Drax#cite_note-3> and
> assumed the Ernle-Erle-Drax on 4 October
> 1916.[4]<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reginald_Drax#cite_note-4> His
> long series of titles, Christian names, surnames and postnominals has made
> him famous beyond his career as an Admiral in the Royal
> Navy<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Navy>
> .[5] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reginald_Drax#cite_note-5> Elsewhere,
> the name has been cited[*by
> whom?<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Words_to_watch#Unsupported_attributions>
> *] as having inspired some of the more fanciful appellations employed by
> writers about the British aristocracy such as P. G.
> Wodehouse<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._G._Wodehouse>
> and Evelyn Waugh <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evelyn_Waugh>; and in the
> penultimate
> episode of Series
> 2<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Upstairs_Downstairs_(2010_TV_series)_episodes#Series_2_.282012.29>
> of
> the BBC1 costume drama*Upstairs
> Downstairs<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upstairs_Downstairs_(2010_TV_series)>
> *, the storyline adopts the conceit that Admiral Drax was known amongst
> his civil servants as "Admiral Acronym". *Upstairs Downstairs*features a
> leading character, Sir Hallam Holland, who is a member of the British
> Government's Foreign Office. The leaking of this nickname by Sir Hallam's
> lover to the German authorities forms part of the storyline of the final
> episode.
>
>
> I checked Beevor's history out and spent some of today reading it. The
> opening lines are memorable, "In June 1944, a young soldier surrendered to
> American paratroopers in the Allied invasion of Normandy. At first his
> captors thought that he was Japanese, but he was in fact Korean. His name
> was Yang Kyoungjong. In 1938, at the age of eighteen, Yang had been
> forcibly conscripted by the Japanese into their Kwantung Army in Manchuria.
> A year later, he was captured by the Red Army after the Battle of Khalkhin
> Gol and sent to a labour camp. The Soviet military authorities, at a
> moment of crisis in 1942, drafted him along with thousands of other
> prisoners into their forces. Then, early in 1943 he was taken prisoner by
> the German army at the Battle of Kharkov in Ukraine. In 1944, now in
> German uniform, he was sent to France to serve with an Ostbataillon
> supposedly boosting the strength of the Atlantic Wall at the base of the
> Cotentin Peninsular inland from Utah Beach. After time in a prison camp in
> Britain, he went to the United States where he said nothing of his past.
> He settled there and finally died in Illinois in 1942."
>
> There's a photo of Yang surrendering in June of 1944.
>
> Like him, do carry on.
>
> David Ritchie,
> Portland, Oregon
>
--
John McCreery
The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
Tel. +81-45-314-9324
jlm@xxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.wordworks.jp/
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