Siegfried Sassoon

Siegfried Loraine Sassoon, CBE, MC (1886 – 1967)
Biography

Sassoon was born in Matfield, Kent to a Jewish father and Protestant mother. He dropped out of University after a couple of years studying law and history, and spent his time, hunting, playing cricket and privately publishing some of his own poetry.

When he joined the military in 1914 (with the Sussex Yeomanry), he managed to break his arm whilst riding and had to remain in England. Whilst healing, his younger brother was killed at Gallipoli which hit Siegfried very hard. Later, in November 1915, Siegfried was sent to First Battalion in France becoming close friends with Robert Graves.

During his course of duty he single handedly captured a German trench in the Hindenburg Line, and often went out on night-raids and bombing patrols, which earned him the nickname ‘Mad Jack’, although his perceived bravery was driven by a manic courage and suicidal exploits. At the end of his convalescent leave, he threw his Military Cross into the river Mersey, and declined to return to duty. Encouraged by such friends as Bertrand Russell, he sent a letter to his commanding officer entitled, ‘A Soldier’s Declaration’.

Sassoon was fortunately not court-martialed over his declination to return to duty, instead the authorities declared he was unfit for service and sent him to a hospital in Edinburgh where he was treated for shell shock. It was here he met Wilfred Owen. A manuscript of Owen’s ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ contains Sassoon’s handwritten amendments.

Siegfried Sassoon's Poems
Absolution		Poems by Sigfried Sassoon
A Child’s Prayer
A Letter Home
Alone
A Mystic as Soldier
Ancestors
An Old French Poet
A Poplar and the Moon
Arcady Unheeding
Arms and the Man		Morning Express
A Subaltern		Morning-Glory
At Daybreak		Morning-Land
At Carnoy		Night-Piece
A Wanderer		Nimrod in September
A Whispered Tale		Noah
A Working Party		October
Before Day		Old Huntsman, The
Before the Battle		One-Legged Man, The
Blighters		Redeemer, The
Blind		Road, The
Choral Union, The		Secret Music
Companions		South Wind
Conscripts		Stand-to: Good Friday Morning
David Cleek		Storm and Sunlight
Daybreak in a Garden		Stretcher Case
Death-Bed, The		They
Dragon and the Undying, The		To-day
Dream-Forest		To His Dead Body
Dryads		Tombstone-Maker, The
Enemies		To My Brother
France		To Victory
Goblin Revel		Tree and Sky
Golgotha		Two Hundred Years After
Haunted		Villon
Heritage, The		When I’m among a Blaze of Lights
Hero, The		Wind in the Beechwood
In the Pink		Wisdom
Kiss, The		Wonderment
Last Meeting, The

UK Buyers Purchase the Book Siegfried Sassoon by Max Egremont (Author) SIEGFRIED SASSOON DENIED that he was 'a typical Jew' and disliked to be thought rich, but at the end of the nineteenth century, when he was born, the name of Sassoon meant great riches: a 'gilded' Jewish family linked to the raffish Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) and to an exotic, slightly mysterious past... US Buyers

Other War Poets

John Mcrae		Wilfred Owen		Edward Thomas		Herbert Read		Isaac Rosenberg
William Hodgson		Siegfried Sassoon		Rupert Brooke		Alan Seeger		Charles Sorley