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‘Thou Hast Given Us Home and Freedom, Mother England’: Anglo-Jewish Gratitude, Patriotism, and Service During and After the First World War

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The Jewish Experience of the First World War

Abstract

This chapter seeks to add to the layered but elliptical historiography on Anglo-Jewry and the First World War by exploring the distinctive and revealing ways in which Jewish commentators in England responded to the war in 1914, and, in particular on the framing of Jewish military service as the repayment of a perceived debt of gratitude to Britain. Madigan also traces the degree to which Anglo-Jewish patriotism and Englishness were subsequently denigrated before considering one of the key ways in which the Anglo-Jewish community attempted to counter these attacks.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For an early account of the emergence of ideological antisemitism in Western Europe in the last decades of the nineteenth century, see Lucien Wolf (1934), Essays in Jewish History (London, The Jewish Historical Society of England), 413–460.

  2. 2.

    Jewish Chronicle, 3 September 1897, 7.

  3. 3.

    Jewish Chronicle, 16 January 1920, 23.

  4. 4.

    The Allied states would formally recognise Britain as the mandatory power in Palestine at the San Remo Conference in April 1920, less than four months after Nordau’s speech. Stuart A. Cohen (1982, 2014) English Zionists and British Jews: The Communal Politics of Anglo-Jewry, 1895–1920 (Princeton, Princeton University Press), 20–21.

  5. 5.

    David Cesarani (1991), ‘An Embattled Minority: The Jews in Britain During the First World War’, Immigrants and Minorities 8:1–2, 60–81.

  6. 6.

    Todd M. Endelman (2002), The Jews of Britain, 1656–2006.

  7. 7.

    Martin Watts (2004), The Jewish Legion During the First World War (Basingstoke, Palgrave); For a transnational overview of Jewish engagement with military service during the war, see Derek J. Penslar (2013), Jews and the Military (Princeton, Princeton University Press), 152–165.

  8. 8.

    Tony Kushner (2009), Anglo-Jewry Since 1066.

  9. 9.

    Arago Easton (1900), Tommy Atkins, You’re a Dandy (London, Nolan & Easton); Blanche Eryl (1900), A Medal or a Bullet (London, Novello & Company); and James Fax (1900), He Isn’t Sleeping Now (Toronto, Anglo-Canadian Music Publishers Association).

  10. 10.

    Mrs. Henry Lucas and Arthur M. Friedländer (1900), The Jewish Soldier (London, Edwin Ashdown), 2–6.

  11. 11.

    Colin Holmes (1979, 2016), Anti-semitism in British Society, 1876–1939 (London, Routledge), 108–109.

  12. 12.

    Todd M. Endelman (2002), The Jews of Britain, 1656–2000 (London, University of California Press), 155; Colin Holmes (1979, 2016), Anti-semitism in British Society, 1876–1939, 109.

  13. 13.

    Colin Holmes (1979, 2016), Anti-semitism in British Society, 1876–1939, 110.

  14. 14.

    Ibid., 162.

  15. 15.

    William D. Rubinstein (1972), ‘Jews Among Top British Wealth Holders, 1857–1969: Decline of the Golden Age’, Jewish Social Studies 34:1, 76–77.

  16. 16.

    On the gratitude engendered among English Jews by their sense of enjoying privileges that other communities in the diaspora did not, see especially William D. Rubinstein (2002), ‘The Decline and Fall of Anglo-Jewry?’, Jewish Historical Studies 38, 16.

  17. 17.

    Todd M. Endelman (2002), The Jews in Britain, 1656–2000 (London, University of California Press), 189.

  18. 18.

    William D. Rubinstein (2002), The Decline and Fall of Anglo-Jewry?, 18; Jonathan Schneer (2010), The Balfour Declaration: The Origins of the Arab-Israeli Conflict (London, Bloomsbury), 110–112.

  19. 19.

    Jewish Chronicle, 1 March 1907, 17.

  20. 20.

    H. A. L. Fisher in Lucy Cohen (1940), Some Recollections of Claude Goldsmid Montefiore (London, Faber & Faber), 14.

  21. 21.

    Ibid., 89.

  22. 22.

    Basil Henriques (1937), The Indiscretions of a Warden (London, Methuen), 12.

  23. 23.

    Ibid., 93.

  24. 24.

    Gisela Lebzelter (1978), Political Anti-semitism in England, 1918–1939 (Basingstoke, Macmillan), 136. A much greater number of Jewish immigrants—perhaps as many as one million—spent some amount of time in Britain or Ireland before moving on to the United States, see Tony Kushner (2009), Anglo-Jewry Since 1066, 184.

  25. 25.

    Todd M. Endelman (2002), The Jews of Britain, 1656–2006, 156–158; Mark Levene (1992), War, Jews, and the New Europe: The Diplomacy of Lucien Wolf, 1914–1919 (Oxford, Oxford University Press), 23. Levene points out that Lucien Wolf and certain other members of the Anglo-Jewish elite felt that Jewish immigration from Eastern Europe drew unwanted negative attention on the wider community and should be discouraged.

  26. 26.

    For an account of the raising of the five Jewish battalions of the Royal Fusiliers that became known as the Jewish Legion, see especially Martin Watts (2004), The Jewish Legion During the First World War (Basingstoke, Palgrave).

  27. 27.

    Edward Madigan (2011), Faith Under Fire: Anglican Army Chaplains and the Great War (Basingstoke, Palgrave), 41–42; Edward Madigan (2015), ‘‘Their Cross to Bear’: The Church of England and Military Service, 1914–1918’, Annali di Scienze Religiose 8, 168–172.

  28. 28.

    Michael Adler (1914), Anglo-Jewry and the Great War (London), 8.

  29. 29.

    Jewish World, 19 August 1914, 10.

  30. 30.

    Ibid., 10.

  31. 31.

    Jewish Chronicle, 18 September 1914, 26.

  32. 32.

    Oliver Rafferty (2011), ‘Catholic Chaplains to the British Forces in the First World War’, Religion State and Society, 39:1, 37–38. See, for example, Msgr. Bernard Ward (1915), Thoughts in War Time (London, Catholic Truth Society), 22–24. On Anti-Catholic mentalities in nineteenth century Britain, see Diana Peschier (2005), Nineteenth-Century Anti-Catholic Discourses: The Case of Charlotte Brontë (Basingstoke, Palgrave). On the degree to which English Catholics interpreted the war, at least partly, as an opportunity to assert their patriotism, see Keith Robbins (2008), England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales: The Christian Church, 1900–2000 (Oxford, Oxford University Press), 112–115.

  33. 33.

    For a detailed portrait of Greenberg during his tenure as editor of the Jewish World and the Jewish Chronicle, see David Cesarani, The Jewish Chronicle and Anglo-Jewry, 103–114.

  34. 34.

    Jewish World, 5 August 1914, 5.

  35. 35.

    Jewish World, 12 August 1914, 3.

  36. 36.

    Jewish Chronicle, 7 August 1915, 5.

  37. 37.

    David Cesarani (2005), The Jewish Chronicle and Anglo-Jewry, 1841–1990 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press), 115; Jewish World, 19 August 1914, 7.

  38. 38.

    Jewish Chronicle, 14 August 1914, 10.

  39. 39.

    Jewish World, 19 August 1914, 3.

  40. 40.

    Jewish World, 7 October 1914, 7.

  41. 41.

    Jewish World, 28 October 1914, 12–13.

  42. 42.

    On the extent and nature of atrocities committed by the German armed forces in the opening phase of the war on the Western Front, see John Horne and Alan Kramer (2001), German Atrocities: A History of Denial (London, Yale University Press). On the impact of reports of atrocities on the British home front see Adrian Gregory (2008), The Last Great War: British Society and the First World War (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press), 40–69; Catriona Pennell (2012), A Kingdom United: Popular Responses to the Outbreak of the First World War in Britain and Ireland (Oxford, Oxford University Press), 92–116.

  43. 43.

    In the Jewish Chronicle see, for example, ‘German Atrocities Against the Jews at Kalish’, 28 August 1914, 11; ‘The German Atrocities Against the Jews’, 4 September 1914, 13. In the Jewish World, see ‘The Unatoneable Sin’, 2 September 1914.

  44. 44.

    For a pioneering account of British intellectual responses to the war, see Stuart Wallace (1988), War and the Image of Germany: British Academics, 1914–1918 (Edinburgh, John Donald). For contemporary criticism of the influence of German philosophy on German militarism see, for example, Joseph McCabe (1914), Treitschke and the Great War (London, T. Fisher Unwin); William Archer (1915), Fighting a Philosophy: A Study of Nietzsche on Germany Policy (Oxford, Oxford University Press).

  45. 45.

    Lucien Wolf (1914), Jewish Ideals and the War (London, Buck & Wootton), 6.

  46. 46.

    Mark Levene (1992), War, Jews and the New Europe, 32–36; David Cesarani (1994, 2005), The Jewish Chronicle and Anglo-Jewry, 115. For a detailed exploration of the content and impact of Darkest Russia, see Sam Johnson (2006), ‘Darkest Russia, British Opinion and Tsarism’s “Jewish Question”, 1890–1914’, East European Jewish Affairs 36:2, 199–211.

  47. 47.

    Jewish Chronicle, 14 August 1914, 10. Adler kept a diary throughout his years at the front and although the entries lack detail they nonetheless reflect the varied and demanding nature of his chaplaincy. See Papers of Revd. Michael Adler, University of Southampton Special Collections, AS/16.

  48. 48.

    The Times, Michael Adler Obituary, 2 October 1944, 6.

  49. 49.

    Articles and pamphlets published by Adler during and in the aftermath of the war include: ‘The YMCA and Jewish Soldiers’, The Times, 9 February 1915, 9; ‘A Few Thoughts on Jews’, On Service, vol. 4, June 1916, 6; and Michael Adler (1920), A Jewish Chaplain on the Western Front (Lewes, Lewes Press).

  50. 50.

    Michael Adler, ‘Jews in the War: Their Roll of Honour’, T. P. O’Connor’s Great Deeds of the Great War, vol. 1, 2 January 1915, 313.

  51. 51.

    Michael Adler (1919), The Jews of the Empire and the Great War (Hodder and Stoughton, London), 1.

  52. 52.

    Ibid., 4.

  53. 53.

    Ibid., 5.

  54. 54.

    See The Times, ‘Jews in the Firing Line’, 4 December 1914, 5; ‘Jews in the Fight’, 13 March 1915, 11; The Daily Mail, ‘British Jews Loyalty’, 14 December 1914, 3; and ‘Our Fighting Jews’, 8 August 1917, 5.

  55. 55.

    David Cesarani (1994, 2005), The Jewish Chronicle and Anglo-Jewry, 1841–1991, 117.

  56. 56.

    See Gisela Lebzelter (1978), Political Anti-semitism in England 1918–1939; Colin Holmes (1979), Anti-semitism in British Society, 1876–1939; Elkan D. Levy (1970), ‘Anti-semitism in England at War, 1914–1916’, Patterns of Prejudice 4:5, 27–30; and especially, Colin Holmes (1979), Anti-semitism in British Society, 1876–1939, 121–140. For an account of post-war antisemitism that adds to, and, in some ways, challenges this work, see Tony Kushner (1990), ‘The Impact of British Anti-semitism, 1918–1945’, in David Cesarani ed. The Making of Modern Anglo-Jewry (Oxford, Basil Blackwell), 191–208.

  57. 57.

    David Cesarani, ‘An Embattled Minority’, 66–69.

  58. 58.

    Aaron Kent, Identity, Migration and Belonging: The Jewish Community of Leeds, 1890–1920, 246–250.

  59. 59.

    Todd. M. Endelman, The Jews of Britain, 1656–2006, 185–186.

  60. 60.

    Jewish Chronicle, 15 March 1918, 10.

  61. 61.

    Harry Percival Smith, a war veteran and future Archdeacon of Lynn, and David Davies, editor of the South Wales Daily Post, both accused Mond of wartime treason when he campaigned to retain his Swansea seat in the autumn of 1918. See The Times, 18 October 1918, 3 and 12 December 1918, 10.

  62. 62.

    For a detailed account of what was said at the trial, see The Times, 2 December 1919, 5.

  63. 63.

    The Britons (1952), [history of the society] (London, BPS Printing Co.).

  64. 64.

    The Britons (1920), [membership leaflet] (London, Judaic Publishing Co.), 4.

  65. 65.

    Jewry Über Alles 1:3, April 1920, 2.

  66. 66.

    Gisela Lebzelter (1978), Political Anti-semitism in England 1918–1939, 67.

  67. 67.

    Colin Holmes (1979), Anti-semitism in British Society, 1876–1939, 215–216; Thomas Linehan, British Fascism, 1918–1939: Parties, Ideologies and Culture (Manchester, Manchester University Press), 177. For Belloc’s most detailed antisemitic statement, see Hilaire Belloc (1922), The Jews (London, Constable & Co.). On G. K. Chesterton’s antisemitism, see Dean Rapp (1990), ‘The Jewish Response to G. K. Chesterton’s Antisemitism, 1911–1933’, Patterns of Prejudice 24, 75–86; Adam Gopnik (2008), The Troubling Genius of G. K. Chesterton, The New Yorker, July 2008.

  68. 68.

    See, for example, E. H. D. Sewell, The Rugby Football Internationals Roll of Honour, London; Linton House School. The Great War, 1914–1919 [A Roll of Honour], London, 1920; and The National Bank of Scotland Roll of Honour, Edinburgh, 1922.

  69. 69.

    Michael Adler, ed. (1922), British Jewry Book of Honour (London, Caxton Publishing Co.), ix.

  70. 70.

    Ibid., 1.

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  1. Department of History, Royal Holloway, University of London, London, UK

    Edward Madigan

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  1. Department of History, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, UK

    Edward Madigan

  2. Department of History, University of Sussex, Falmer, UK

    Gideon Reuveni

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Madigan, E. (2019). ‘Thou Hast Given Us Home and Freedom, Mother England’: Anglo-Jewish Gratitude, Patriotism, and Service During and After the First World War. In: Madigan, E., Reuveni, G. (eds) The Jewish Experience of the First World War. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-54896-2_14

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