Tyneham '43 Copyright © Richard J Whiting 2011

Villagers in Tyneham, Dorset, received notice in November 1943 that their village was to be used to train soldiers in the use of new weaponry. They had to leave by December 19th. They were promised that when peace was won, that they would be allowed back to their village. The population of Tyneham (Census 2001) was given as zero.

All along Post Office Row
Fingers opened envelopes;
Mouths quit eating,
Tea grew cold,
Doors flung wide
And the waters
Of Worbarrow Bay
Sang a lament.

There came a message
From on high;
That a week before Christmas
The villagers should be gone.
Wise men appeared
From over the hill
Bearing gifts
Of bullet, bomb,
Shillings for their pockets.

Those that had lent their sons
To the First War,
And upon each other in their grief,
Were split apart
Like shrapnel carved
From the chalky hills;
Scattered, no return
Lest peace reign
And weapons whimper obsolete
Across their promised land.

One by one the stones fell
As one by one the villagers
Passed into sleep.
Phosphorescent flares
Fractured the night
Like the Star of David
Presaging death.

When only the School-House
And Church remained
It was clear that Guilt
Provided an air-pocket
For Humanity
Beneath the rubble.

Still Tyneham sleeps;
Its monstrous nightmares
Filled with explosion,
Lonely silences
And the barking of sheep.

She awaits her peace
Like a lover bids a corpse
To breathe.
But War, that old insomniac
Never sleeps.
He strides across the World
With the limbs of youth,

Never yawns;

Never grows tired
Of a fight.