John Hollands spent years investigating the life of poet and First World War hero Siegfried Sassoon

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Bestselling author John Hollands tells JON COATES how meeting a mute veteran led him to unravel a First World War mystery. When the war hero-turned-pacifist was shot in the head by a soldier in his company while serving on the front in France, it was thought to have been an unfortunate accident. Official records show the decorated war poet was injured near the end of the war in a “friendly-fire” incident but as we approach the centenary of the shooting, which took place near Arras on July 13, 1918, John Hollands – Britain’s most decorated national serviceman – is publishing research that reveals Sassoon was actually wounded in an act of attempted murder. Hollands, who was awarded the Military Cross for his bravery during the Korean War, has a book out on Wednesday – The Man Who Shot Siegfried Sassoon – and says visiting the family of his then-fiancée Eileen Davies in the Rhondda Valley in 1960 led to the encounter that sparked a 30-year investigation.

“They had a Christmas do in the local club and every year they used to entertain war veterans,” says Hollands, 85, whose first book, The Dead, The Dying And The Damned, an account of the savagery of the Korean War, was published in 1956 and sold more than three million copies. “At the buffet I met a fellow named Morgan*. “He introduced me to some veterans who, it turned out, had served with Sassoon. There was a man who was mute. “I asked about him and was told, ‘he was the bloke who shot Sassoon.He did not kill him but he shot him’, before we moved on.” At that time Hollands was preoccupied, busy trying to forge a career as a journalist and working for a local paper in Woking, Surrey.

Siegfried Sassoon wearing his uniform in camp

But the conversation stayed with him, playing at the back of his mind. It would be three decades later, in the mid-1980s, that he would finally find time to delve deeper. Divorced and spending winters in Tenerife, Hollands began by reading any books he could find about Sassoon. “It struck me that there were gaps in his story,” he recalls. “Even the two major biographies about him skated over the inconsistencies.

“With the information I had gleaned from meeting these veterans and my friendship with Morgan – who turned out to be the ex-Company Sergeant Major for Sassoon’s platoon – I investigated the story more seriously over a number of years while I was working on other books. “I wanted to fill in the gaps but the more I learned, the more intrigued I became about Sassoon’s protest. [Known as his Soldier’s Declaration, Sassoon had declared himself a pacifist and refused to return to the front line to fight after an earlier injury.] “He was a complete contradiction. He was very brave but was not averse to skiving off, he was very ill-disciplined and accused of anarchy by his company commander.

He was impetuous and in the midst of it all he was churning out wonderful poetry. “It always seemed strange that a man so brave should be so foolhardy, that someone awarded an MC – and whose friend and fellow soldier poet Robert Graves said should be awarded a VC – should become a pacifist. “In truth, he had been influenced by pacifists such as Lady Ottoline Morrell and Bertrand Russell. “ While recuperating from another wound at their home, Garsington Manor, in 1917 he attended a dinner party with another budding writer, Lytton Strachey.

“They hated each other straight away. Sassoon’s impetuosity came through as Strachey said, ‘What are you going to do now you’ve recovered from your wound. Are you going back to France to win the war for us, perhaps you’ll get the VC this time, not just the MC?’ “This infuriated Sassoon so much that he made up a protest on the spot, saying ‘I am not going to go back and will get the Government to rethink this madness’.” Even though he was only a second lieutenant then, says Holland, his breeding and poetry made him think he was more important than he was. “Before he knew it, all these people round the table who were all pacifists came rushing round to congratulate him, forcing him into a position where he would have to keep his promise. Being Sassoon, he did.”

First World War in colour Tue, July 29, 2014 The devastating events of the First World War were captured in myriad photographs on all sides of the front. Since then, thousands of books of black-and-white photographs of the war have been published as all nations endeavour to comprehend the scale and the carnage of the “greatest catastrophe of the 20th century”. Far less familiar are the rare colour images of the First World War, taken at the time by a small group of photographers pioneering recently developed autochrome technology. To mark the centenary of the outbreak of war, TASCHEN has produced this groundbreaking volume bringing together all of these remarkable, fully hued pictures of the „war to end war“. Assembled from archives in Europe, the United States and Australia. Play slideshow Jules Gervais-Courtellemont / TASCHEN 1 of 11 French warplane, Caudron G3, 1914. The First World War was the first time air warfare played a role in combat. Together the British and the French had at their disposal about the same number of airplanes as the Germans. Aerial reconnaissance by the Royal Flying Corps contributed considerably to the stopping of the German advance on the Marne

Sassoon sent his Soldier’s Declaration, saying he was finished with the war, to all his friends, including his batman (or personal servant) Davey Jones, who was still in France with the Royal Welch Fusiliers. Davey, an autistic savant who was gifted in remembering rhyming words, had bonded with Sassoon. His protective twin brother, Rhys Jones, was Sassoon’s runner on the front. Sassoon thought it would be a good idea for Davey to pin his declaration on a noticeboard in the company barracks, which he did.

It was considered an act of mutiny by Army chiefs. Sassoon was sent to Craig-lockhart War Hospital near Edinburgh to be treated for “shell shock” until he rescinded his protest. Here he met and inspired Wilfred Owen, who became the most famous of the War Poets. But while Sassoon was playing golf and discussing literature, Davey was at the front, copying anti-war poems Sassoon had discarded around his bunker into an exercise book.

Mr Sassoon in 1916

Hollands says: “When the authorities found these poems written in Davey’s handwriting, they thought he had written them, so he was court-martialled and executed. “Morgan’s wife told me that when Davey Jones was shot it was not done right and it did not kill him, so Morgan, the CSM, ended up having to finish him off. “The reaction of Rhys, his twin, was to swear revenge on Sassoon,” says Hollands. His opportunity came after Sassoon was finally forced to return to the front line.

Sassoon would go out on patrol in the darkness, against his Italian commander’s orders, and on the last night before they were due to go on leave Rhys Jones took a shot at him John Hollands

“The pair ended up in the same battalion – although not in the same company – in France in 1918 and Rhys took his opportunity to seek Sassoon out in the middle of the night. “Sassoon would go out on patrol in the darkness, against his Italian commander’s orders, and on the last night before they were due to go on leave Rhys Jones took a shot at him, knowing full well who he was.” The only reason he did not kill him was that Morgan spotted what he was doing and threw a grenade at him, albeit with the pin in, to put him off. Sassoon cracked up after this and returned to England on the verge of insanity.