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Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Bob Maslen-Jones. Outrageous Fortune. Whittles Publishing, 2006.
Major-General (ret'd) Clive Addy, Colonel of The Regiment of The Royal Canadian
Abstract
A wonderful read! The story of this well-traveled regimental leader in operations over a mere 14 years of his life is the stuff of military legend. It is also the tale of the end of an era in the service of "Queen and Country" and the sunset of the British Empire. Robert Maslen-Jones, who died last July,1 tells the story of a passionately active and obviously much loved military part of his life. He begins his account with recollections of himself as a young medical student reflecting upon the sadness of Chamberlain's failure, witnessing the arrival home of the defeated British Expeditionary Force, cheering on the brave and wonderful British pilots during the Battle of Britain dog fights, and expressing what certainly was a sincere wish to do his duty. The reader gets a very strong sense of what it was like to be a young British man at the crossroads of choosing a future in May 1940. From the rationing of petrol coupons to his description of his classmate Ian Beddows' father as a "retired Royal Artillery colonel who sported a monocle and was kind" and finally to his "less than impressed" description of his "moral tutor" at New College, Oxford, one senses easily that his destiny in these troubled times is very much elsewhere. He seeks counsel and obtains support for his enrolment in the Brigade of Guards with the Welsh Guards from his father, a well-to-do gynecologist and former medical officer in the Great War. Whilst in training and having been advised to apply to the Indian Army for a commission by his Uncle Eric, a senior officer with the Indian Police in Delhi, he, like many in his "social class," does so and is commissioned into Queen Victoria's Own Corps of Guides. Soon after Sandhurst he began his professional military career with a most challenging sea voyage from Scotland, north towards Iceland, then southwest to Sierra Leone, Cape Town, and finally northeast to Bombay aboard the SS Mulbera. The cruise lasted over two months, avoiding German U-boats, stopping for the inevitable repairs and provisioning and finally arriving in India in April 1941.