Guy , Ethelbert (E)

ETHELBERT GUY: Uncle Bertie had looks and personality on his side, but his life was interrupted by the first World War, and ended by a really minor struggle for dominance in South Africa in 1922 when he was still comparatively young. I have very little remembrance of him personally and most of what follows is based on hearsay. I do know that he was my mother’s favourite in the Guy relations, and he was certainly popular with women. Tall, good looking and with a sparkling personality, he always wore a monocle and I remember on one occasion being taken by Uncle Bertie to lunch at the Carlton Hotel, then as now one of the best hotels in South Africa. I do not remember if I were alone, but I do remember that his monocle fell into the soup, and he had to fish it out. I remember too his buying my mother a piece of purple and silver brocade, at what still seems to have been an exorbitant price for a half yard of material namely 30 shillings: remember that 10 years later one could still get a 3 course meal for 1/6. With several million other young men Bertie volunteered for the army in 1914 and joined the Umvoti Mounted Rifles . What happened between then, and when he reappeared in the Royal Field Artillery in France, I don’t know, but he must have made an impression on at least one young female, because there is still a poem to him, entitled I think, “To a very gallant gentleman”. He left his mark in the artillery, inventing an improved gunsight which was used for years and a shell designed to burst on impact and spread burning petrol around; a forerunner of napalm. It was, however, turned down by the War Office as being “too barbarous”. It would have been employed against an enemy who had already used poison gas and flame throwers which shows how out of touch with actuality were the generals of WWI. After the war, Bertie got a job as a sampler on one of the mines, and joined the Transvaal Scottish , for company and for the social life it afforded. I remember that years later, when I was on my way to Edinburgh University I met two women on the Union Castle liner and on being asked if I were related to Bertie Guy, was promptly asked to lunch with them on Madeira when I replied that I was. I have a vague recollection that he became engaged a few short days before he was killed, but I do not remember