Soldiers, Shakespeare & St. George: Exploring a connection with the Bard and the Battlefield with Commonwealth War Graves

Did you know there’s a connection between Commonwealth War Graves, William Shakespeare and St George's Day? CWG PEC Sarah Nathaniel reveals all.

Shakespeare, War Graves, and St. George’s Day

Connecting the dots

April 23rd: a key date in English history. St George’s Day and the birthday of William Shakespeare, but what’s the connection between St George, the Royal Shakespeare Theatre and the First World War?

This was not a question, I was expecting to have to answer on a sunny spring day, exploring the theatre in Stratford-Upon-Avon ahead of a performance of Hamlet that evening. But, as anyone with an interest in our work commemorating the dead of both wars knows, you can’t go far around our country without stumbling across a connection to those who lost their lives.

In this case, it was a beautiful stained-glass window in the Swan Theatre, commemorating those members of the Benson Company who had died in the First World War.

Image:  The magnificent stained glass window at the Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon

It’s not often I get to combine my great interests and the chance to explore the connection between Shakespeare and the First World War piqued my interest.

Sir Frank Benson & the Bard

Sir Frank Benson is a well-known name in the theatrical world of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. He founded his own company in 1883 and, over his career, produced all but two of Shakespeare’s plays.

He is best known for his thirty-year association with the annual Shakespeare Festival in Stratford-Upon-Avon, which put on a giddying number of plays each season, typically six or seven different plays in one week!

The popularity of the Festival and Benson’s work led to the foundation of the now world-famous Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford and the National Theatre in London. Indeed, Benson’s Company was known as the ‘nursery of modern Shakespearean acting’.

As with all aspects of life, the Company was affected directly by the start of the First World War in 1914. In an attempt to boost morale, Benson staged patriotic performances of Henry V during the early years of the war but wanted to be more directly involved in the war effort. 

Rejected for active service due to his age, he drove an ambulance in France and was awarded the Croix de Guerre for his bravery in this endeavour. He also worked as an orderly at the canteen his wife set up for soldiers in France.

It is Benson’s son and the other Old Bensonians on the memorial who are of real interest, however, from a Commission point of view. 

Remembering the Old Bensonians

The stained-glass window commemorates ten men with associations to the Benson Company, mostly as actors. The window shows an image of St George slaying the dragon and the really interesting detail is that the face of St George is a portrait of Bensons’ son, Eric.

Lieutenant Colonel Eric William Benson MC

Image: Lieutenant Colonel Eric Benson

Eric William Benson was born in 1887 and was Frank Benson’s only son. After leaving Winchester College, Eric joined the Jersey Militia, from which he was transferred into the Cheshire Regiment. 

A talented hockey player, Eric spent four years with the regiment in India, before retiring from the army just before the war broke out.

In August 1914, Eric was granted a commission in the Rifle Brigade, transferring to the 9th Battalion King’s Royal Rifle Corps which he served with until his death.

Eric Benson was awarded the Military Cross for his actions at Hooge on 30th July, 1915. He recovered from injuries gained in this attack to rise to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was killed leading his men into battle at Delville Wood on the Somme, during the attack of the 5th September, 1916.

Benson had been married for just three months when he died. He has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial.

But the interesting stories didn’t stop there. As I researched some of the other names, I came across more fascinating connections.

Private Charles Leslie Bibby

Image: Charles Bibby, immortalised in stained glass as Feste from Shakespeare's Twelfth Night"

Private Charles Leslie Bibby’s story is told in an article from the Birkenhead News of the 19th August 1916: 

"Mr. and Mrs. J. Bibby Bereaved. Son Dies of Wounds.

"Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Bibby, The Priory, Bidston, have received the regrettable news that their son, C. Leslie Bibby, a private in the “Pals,” has died of wounds at Abbeville, France. He had been previously wounded and had rejoined his regiment before the recent push – in which he was wounded – commenced.

"He and his younger brother, now lying wounded at Southmead, Bristol, were among the first to join the “Pals,” and along with an older brother, Mr. J. Morton Bibby, a director of J. Bibby and Sons Ltd., also wounded – they all went out to France together as machine gunners in November last year.

"A search of the RSC archives shows that Charles Bibby was a regular performer in the Benson Company with parts listed in Romeo & Juliet and Macbeth as early as 1900. 

"The fact he was a key member of the group is also suggested by Charles having his own stained-glass window at the theatre alongside other esteemed members of the company. He can be seen here in role of Feste, the fool in the comedy Twelfth Night."

Captain Guy Rathbone

Image: Captain Guy Rathbone as Amiens from Shakespeare's As You Like It

Another key member of the company and a famous actor of the time in his own right was Captain Guy Rathbone of the 7th Battalion, Gloucestershire Regiment, who died on 21st April 1916 during the attempts to relieve Kut in modern-day Iraq.  

He was killed during an attempt to take a Turkish trench under heavy machine gun fire. He is remembered on the Basra Memorial. His death was reported in his old school magazine, the Malvernian, and goes some way to bringing Guy to life:

"After a short time spent as a schoolmaster, he joined the Benson Company, and, making rapid progress as an actor, had played important parts on the London stage with marked success. 

"In February 1915 he was given a commission in the 11th Battalion of the Gloucestershire Regiment, becoming Lieutenant in August and Captain in November. He was reported as having been killed on April 21st. 

"The curtain has fallen on an artist who gave promise of reaching a foremost place in his profession, but we think rather of the man who never lost his boyish charm of manner and character, and of the home which is bereft of a strong and lovable personality."

Rathbone was honoured with his own stained-glass panel in the Benson window depicting him as Amiens from the play As You Like It. The RSC archives reveal he had also performed in Hamlet, Julius Caesar and Shakespeare’s great patriotic play, Henry V.

Lance Corporal Harold Chapin

The final story related to the Benson Company relates to Harold Chapin. Chapin was encouraged to act by his mother and was performing a part with his mother in Coriolanus at the age of seven.

Chapin continued to act as he grew up and eventually also began to write his own plays. These often explored concerns about social inequality and reform and this is perhaps reflected in his choice to join the Royal Army Medical Corps in 1914. He seems from his letters to his wife to be reluctant to engage in the killing and was pleased when he was given a job in a cook house:

"This is good because it is as useful a job as is going and one that demands conscientious hard work still it does not involve going into the actual firing line - a thing I have no ambition to do. Stray shell fire and epidemics are all I want to face thank you, let those who like the firing line have all the bullets they want."

By January 1915, Chapin had become a stretcher bearer and reached the Western Front in May 1915 and was soon writing to his wife about the devastation he was seeing around him:

"Mayhew - who knew the two dead very intimately - is fearfully down: seems to think he should have been with them. Curious how people feel, isn't it? I feel most for their mothers. Chick - the younger of the two - was only nineteen and such a child; though very tall. They were all smashed by a shell."

Harold Chapin was killed on Sunday, 26th September, at the battle of Loos. A fellow soldier, Richard Capell, wrote to his wife about what happened: 

“Our line that afternoon wavered for a moment, before the counter-attack. There was a short period of confusion, and some of our men were caught in the open by German rifle and machine-gun fire. You may possibly one day get an exact account from an actual eye-witness, but from what I can piece together, your husband went over the parapet to fetch in some wounded man. He was certainly shot in the foot. It appears that he persisted and was then killed outright by a shot through the head.”

Lance Corporal Harold Chapin has no known grave and is commemorated on the Loos memorial in France. The additional information provided by his family to the IWGC lists him as a ‘dramatist and actor’.

We will remember them

It is hard to imagine a scene further removed from the stage of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre than the battlefields of the First World War, and yet this is where these men met their end.

The memorial window, featuring Eric Benson as St George, and the additional stained-glass windows, including Bibby and Rathbone in character, were dedicated in 1925. The war memorial was unveiled by Dame Ellen Terry, one of the greatest actors of the age. The inscription on the nearby wall read:

"This stained glass window is a memorial to the members of the Benson theatre company who lost their lives in the First World War. Led by actor-manager Frank Benson, the Bensonians were the first permanent theatre company in Stratford-Upon-Avon who were dedicated to the performance of Shakespeare. In 1925 the actor Ellen Terry dedicated the window to: 

Benson, Eric
Bibby, Charles
Chapin, Harold
Conrick, Rupert
Curtis, Arthur
Haines, W Ribton
Harris, William
Mathews, Frank
Rathbone, Guy
Stanners, James"

On April 23rd, perhaps spare a moment to think about these young men who had dedicated themselves to keeping the art of Shakespeare alive and who sadly had their lives and careers cut short by war.

All photos supplied by Sarah Nathaniel.

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