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Invasion Literature
Battle of Dorking
REMINISCENCES OF A VOLUNTEER
by
George Chesney
Chesney’s "Battle of Dorking" - appeared in
the Blackwood’s Magazine for May 1871. It touched off a chain reaction of
alarm and indignation in the United Kingdom so much so that the prime
minister, William Gladstone, felt he had to speak out against the "alarmism"
of "a famous article called The Battle of Dorking."
In The Battle of Dorking the narrator is a Volunteer, a half- trained
soldier in the military who relates the story long after the German
conquest. The narrator is an old man who begins:
"You ask me to tell you, my grandchildren, something about my own share in
the great events that happened fifty years ago. ‘Tis sad work turning back
to that bitter page in our history, but you may perhaps take profit in your
new homes from the lesson it teaches."
From that ominous start he goes on to lament the past glories, wealth and
power of a defeated nation. As the young Volunteer, he is able to recount
the sad history of the national disaster in a series of brilliantly observed
episodes; and, when he moves into the reflective mode of the grandfather, he
comments on the failures and defeats with all the benefit of hindsight.
The narrator is forever looking over his shoulder at the advancing enemy, as
the Volunteer and his comrades march and countermarch, badly equipped, half-
trained, and uncertain of their role. For most of the action the enemy are
off-stage—always victorious, an irresistible force which approaches nearer
and near—as the defense forces are for ever retreating. These are the
moments when Chesney begins to move towards his conclusion; and in the
final, eloquent paragraphs the grandfather piles on the agony of
recollecting happier days in a miserable old age: "the bitterest part of our
reflection is that all this misery and decay might have been so easily
prevented and that we brought it about ourselves by our own shortsighted
recklessness." The rich were idle and luxurious, Chesney wrote in his last
paragraph; and the poor begrudged the cost of defense:
During the first week of May 1871 there was an immediate and absolute
division of opinion. For many the final disaster came as a punishment for a
soft and complacent nation; but for even more it was an outrageous,
unmerited judgment and a betrayal of their country. Suddenly, for the first
time in fiction, a short story became a matter of intense debate for a
nation. The issue was conscription. If the British could have created a vast
army on the European scale, they would be more than ready for any invading
force.
The Battle of Dorking set a precedent for
Invasion Literature of the period and the eventual development of science
fiction such a War of the Worlds.
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