Lawrence of Arabia, Brough Superior, 1926

[Beerman]

I know this is not 'Guzzi related' but...some other interesting motorbike stuff isn't either, and this has 'Guzzi Spirit'..

Further to some text on my 'Riding in Snow' post, I copy below the beginning of a thread which first appeared fairly recently on Modern Vespa. I claim no originality.  Bearing in mind the era (1920's),  the individual (probably post-traumatic stressed and damaed war hero),  the bike, the protective equipment (or lack of) and the roads, I find this gripping stuff - though others will disagree; it is florid prose.

Many of you will be aware that Lawrence was a war hero and motorcyclist and owned a series of Brough Superiors: considered by most to be the ‘Rolls Royce’ of the motorcycle world of the early 20th century.

Lawrence actually met his untimely death while riding the Brough Superior a 1932 1000cc 58100 (GW 2275) he named George VII.

 From September 1922, Lawrence owned eight Brough motorcycles; he had names for each of them:
 1922 -'Boa', short for Boanerges 'Sons of Thunder', the title Jesus gave to disciples James and John.
 1923 - George I that cost £150, more than the price of a house at the time._
 1924 - George II.
 1925 - George III.
 1926 - George IV.
 1927 - George V (RK 4907).
 1929 - George VI (UL 656).
 1932 - George VII (GW 2275). This machine has been in the sole possession of Mr John Weebly of Ringwood for the past 23 years.

 George VIII was being built when to Lawrence died and it was never delivered.

these passages include his Correspondence with Bernard and Charlotte Shaw 1922-1926 (Woodgreen Common, Castle Hill Press) where he describes his bikes and riding them in letters to Charlotte.

Lawrence was in Edinburgh in August 1926 visiting Bartholemew, map-makers who were producing a map for the Seven Pillars of Wisdom.

 (Boanerges - Son of Thunder - was another name he gave to his bikes)

'Tomorrow morning I will see them and tomorrow afternoon I will be in Cranwell. It takes 7 1/2 hours, on Boanerges, going respectably. The respectability is mine. Boanerges would go madly, if I would. Alas, surely I grow old. Again and again, this morning, when we came to a piece of road which invited ninety, I patted his tank and murmured ‘Seventy only, old thing’, and kept to it. The excuse I gave myself was that Edinburgh was a long way and that there must be no open throttle on a long journey. Indeed that was once my maxim: but today I kept the maxim without being vexed thereby: and that is significant. Or is it only that I have ridden too many hundreds of miles this last week?

 I…then put Boanerges upon the London road. … Whether it was the ham and eggs, or Durham, or the morning, or the hope of London and the music tonight I don’t know: but after a mile or two I said to B ‘We are going to hurry’… and thereupon laid back my ears like a rabbit, and galloped down the road. Galloped to some purpose too: Cranwell (160 miles) in 2hrs 58 mins. It seemed to me that 65 miles an hour was a fitting pace. So we kept down to that where the road was not fit for more: but often we were 90 for two or three miles in end, with old B trumpeting ha ha like a war-horse.'

And later, from The Mint:

'I let in the clutch again, and eased Boanerges down the hill along the tram-lines through the dirty streets and up-hill to the aloof cathedral, where it stood in frigid perfection above the cowering close. No message of mercy in Lincoln. Our God is a jealous God: and man's very best offering will fall disdainfully short of worthiness, in the sight of Saint Hugh and his angels.

 Remigius, earthy old Remigius, looks with more charity on and Boanerges. I stabled the steel magnificence of strength and speed at his west door and went in: to find the organist practising something slow and rhythmical, like a multiplication table in notes on the organ. The fretted, unsatisfying and unsatisfied lace-work of choir screen and spandrels drank in the main sound. Its surplus spilled thoughtfully into my ears.

 By then my belly had forgotten its lunch, my eyes smarted and streamed. Out again, to sluice my head under the White Hart's yard-pump. A cup of real chocolate and a muffin at the teashop: and Boa and I took the Newark road for the last hour of daylight. He ambles at forty-five and when roaring his utmost, surpasses the hundred. A skittish motor-bike with a touch of blood in it is better than all the riding animals on earth, because of its logical extension of our faculties, and the hint, the provocation, to excess conferred by its honeyed untiring smoothness. Because Boa loves me, he gives me five more miles of speed than a stranger would get from him.

 At Nottingham I added sausages from my wholesaler to the bacon which I'd bought at Lincoln: bacon so nicely sliced that each rasher meant a penny. The solid pannier-bags behind the saddle took all this and at my next stop a (farm) took also a felt-hammocked box of fifteen eggs. Home by Sleaford, our squalid, purse-proud, local village. Its butcher had six penn'orth of dripping ready for me. For months have I been making my evening round a marketing, twice a week, riding a hundred miles for the joy of it and picking up the best food cheapest, over half the country side.'


The prose can be challenging, but the sensation I am left with is the visceral, dangerous 'thrill' or madness of riding a motorcycle at speed in the 1920's (100mph on that bike must have felt like being battered, and some). And I loved it.

If you enjoyed this, thanks to the OP on the MV site, If not, blame me!

Beerman

[Testarossa]

This is the English professor in me speaking, not the journalist. Lawrence's prose is overblown by our standards but poetic and typical of the era. This is just before Hemingway and Scott Fitzgerald sensationally streamlined literary English. The Victorian-Edwardian style was so common and influential that 20th-century humorists like PG Wodehouse, SJ Perelman and Henry Manney made entire careers by lampooning it. Manney, of course, was an automotive journalist who reported especially on the European racing scene, and did so as if writing for the London Times of 1899. SJ Perelman wrote hilarious short novels but especially screenplays for the Marx Brothers.

[oldbike54]

 An interesting read , and while most of us probably already know the T.E. Lawrence Brough Superior story , it is good to see it being retold so future generations might know the story . Yes , Lawrence was a victim of PTSD , and none too happy with his own Govt over what happened after WW1 . He spent his remaining years living in a very small cottage in a remote area , riding George VII, and writing his memoirs .

 Dusty

[twowings]

For a very good perspective on why we ended up with the Middle East we have today, read "Lawrence In Arabia" by Scott Anderson...maybe the high mucky-mucks in the British, French, and American governments should have listened to Colonel Lawrence a little more closely...

[Beerman]

An interesting read , and while most of us probably already know the T.E. Lawrence Brough Superior story , it is good to see it being retold so future generations might know the story . Yes , Lawrence was a victim of PTSD , and none too happy with his own Govt over what happened after WW1 . He spent his remaining years living in a very small cottage in a remote area , riding George VII, and writing his memoirs .

 Dusty

I agree oldbike54; I did think as I posted that many on this site - given the knowledgeable membership - would be very familiar with the story, but I had not been, and for those interested I think it is a fascinating piece of motorcycling history.

beerman

[Testarossa]

For a very good perspective on why we ended up with the Middle East we have today, read "Lawrence In Arabia" by Scott Anderson...maybe the high mucky-mucks in the British, French, and American governments should have listened to Colonel Lawrence a little more closely...

:1:

Winston Churchill, who bears as much responsibility as anyone for arbitrarily dividing up the Middle East not according to ethnic boundaries but for purposes of oil exploitation, did have a pretty sober assessment of Western attitudes toward waging war in the area:

..there are many people in England, and perhaps elsewhere, who seem to be unable to contemplate military operations for clear political objects, unless they can cajole themselves into the belief that their enemy are utterly and hopelessly vile. To this end the Dervishes, from the Mahdi and the Khalifa downwards, have been loaded with every variety of abuse and charged with all conceivable crimes. This may be very comforting to philanthropic persons at home; but when an army in the field becomes imbued with the idea that the enemy are vermin who cumber the earth, instances of barbarity may easily be the outcome. This unmeasured condemnation is moreover as unjust as it is dangerous and unnecessary... We are told that the British and Egyptian armies entered Omdurman to free the people from the Khalifa's yoke. Never were rescuers more unwelcome.

[RANDM]

Always thought Lawrence stuck out like a sore thumb because
he was that rare good man set against a backdrop of
uncaring greed and avarice.

Quite like the prose too - it paints a much more detailed
picture than say - " It was rad. - I mean it was like WOW!!

Maurie.

[jacksonracingcomau]

I was bought up only mins from Pole Hill, due North of Geenwich where Lawrence had a shack and intended to build his mansion, is a small plaque there. But took me 50 + years to read 7 Pillars of Wisdom, yes the complete shambles of the Middle East is explained therein.
The O'Toole film doesn't come close, read the book.
Even here in Australia he gets decried on our national remembrance day, they say the Australian troops beat him to Damascus, he clearly wrote at the time, synchronising the different troops arrival was part of the plan, not a race !!!!  Nearly blew the whole op but wouldn't be pc to tell world.
Then " giving " Syria to the French (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sykes–Picot_Agreement) after all his work was the icing on the cake

Riding the Broughs was where he was happy, no general or politician to slow him down, above quote lovely, thanks,
 RIP T.E.L.

[leafman60]

T.E. Lawrence was a complicated and enigmatic man.  Lots of questions and speculation about him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._E._Lawrence

.

[nobleswood]

I grew up in the part of England that Lawrence quotes; between Lincoln & Newark, working in Nottingham as a young man. While the road from Lincoln through Newark and most of the way to Nottingham was & is an old Roman road and hence very straight, it's a two lane road with many side roads from villages & farms. To read again the distances he travels on his roundabout shopping trip and to cover them in the time he does. He was flying ! Then consider whilst there weren't the number of vehicles in the 1920's that we experience, the roads would have not been maintained for travelling at the speeds he describes.
Lawrence was out to prove himself, trying to outrun his personal Demons.

[Sasquatch Jim]

  In the end his demons caught up with him, but it took him 5 days to die of his injuries.
 Has anything ever been written about what he might have said during those 5 days?

[oldbike54]

  In the end his demons caught up with him, but it took him 5 days to die of his injuries.
 Has anything ever been written about what he might have said during those 5 days?

 I believe he was in a coma , so probably not much .

 The doctor who treated him is generally credited for spurring the development and implementation
of helmets . So Lawrence , in his death , certainly left us a legacy of safety .

 Dusty

[Sasquatch Jim]

 I once read a short story by Lawrence about  riding his motorcycle when he noticed one of his friends flying an aircraft low alongside.  A race ensued in which he pulled ahead of the aircraft.  Pretty impressive for a twenties era bike on Brit roads of the day,  but then Broughs were the best bike The Brits made at that time.

[oldbike54]

I once read a short story by Lawrence about  riding his motorcycle when he noticed one of his friends flying an aircraft low alongside.  A race ensued in which he pulled ahead of the aircraft.  Pretty impressive for a twenties era bike on Brit roads of the day,  but then Broughs were the best bike The Brits made at that time.

 Always thought that might have been a bit of exageration . The plane was a Bristol fighter capable of 120+ MPH , Brough 100 SS models were fast in their day , but not that fast .

 Dusty

[Beerman]

Sasquatch Jim, oldbike54, this is his account of the race with the Bristol aircraft:

'Once we so fled across the evening light, with the yellow sun on my left, when a huge shadow roared just overhead. A Bristol Fighter, from Whitewash Villas, our neighbour aerodrome, was banking sharply round. I checked speed an instant to wave: and the slip-stream of my impetus snapped my arm and elbow astern, like a raised flail. The pilot pointed down the road towards Lincoln. I sat hard in the saddle, folded back my ears and went away after him, like a dog after a hare. Quickly we drew abreast, as the impulse of his dive to my level exhausted itself.

 The next mile of road was rough. I braced my feet into the rests, thrust with my arms, and clenched my knees on the tank till its rubber grips goggled under my thighs. Over the first pot-hole Boanerges screamed in surprise, its mud-guard bottoming with a yawp upon the tyre. Through the plunges of the next ten seconds I clung on, wedging my gloved hand in the throttle lever so that no bump should close it and spoil our speed. Then the bicycle wrenched sideways into three long ruts: it swayed dizzily, wagging its tail for thirty awful yards. Out came the clutch, the engine raced freely: Boa checked and straightened his head with a shake, as a Brough should.

 The bad ground was passed and on the new road our flight became birdlike. My head was blown out with air so that my ears had failed and we seemed to whirl soundlessly between the sun-gilt stubble fields. I dared, on a rise, to slow imperceptibly and glance sideways into the sky. There the Bristol was, two hundred yards and more back. Play with the fellow? Why not? I slowed to ninety: signalled with my hand for him to overtake. Slowed ten more: sat up. Over he rattled. His passenger, a helmeted and goggled grin, hung out of the cock-pit to pass me the 'Up yer' RAF randy greeting.

 They were hoping I was a flash in the pan, giving them best. Open went my throttle again. Boa crept level, fifty feet below: held them: sailed ahead into the clean and lonely country. An approaching car pulled nearly into its ditch at the sight of our race. The Bristol was zooming among the trees and telegraph poles, with my scurrying spot only eighty yards ahead. I gained though, gained steadily: was perhaps five miles an hour the faster. Down went my left hand to give the engine two extra dollops of oil, for fear that something was running hot: but an overhead JAP twin, super-tuned like this one, would carry on to the moon and back, unfaltering.

 We drew near the settlement. A long mile before the first houses I closed down and coasted to the cross-roads by the hospital. Bif caught up, banked, climbed and turned for home, waving to me as long as he was in sight. Fourteen miles from camp, we are, here: and fifteen minutes since I left Tug and Dusty at the hut door. '

Beerman

[Sasquatch Jim]

 Yeah, that's the story.  I don't know how you found it but thanks for posting.
 Lawrence was a rider with guts and élan.

[RANDM]

Dusty should know - he was there!

[oldbike54]

Dusty should know - he was there!

 I was , but it was a loooonnnngggg time ago . What were we talking about ????

 Dusty

[Beerman]

In a way, nobleswood was there...Lincoln Cathedral (incredible, incredible, building - it was the tallest building in the world for 238 years (1311–1549)) and is, unsurprisingly, still there, and it remains at the top of a steep hill (the imaginatively named 'Steep Hill'). The road from Newark is of course smooth, but still dead straight - it is, after all, a Roman road.

I don't think you can sluice your head outside the cathedral these days, but you can get a decent pint of beer at the aptly named Magna Carta.

Beerman

[Sasquatch Jim]

 T.E Lawrence acquired many political and personal enemies in his too short life time.  For the most part he bore them with aplomb, and most of them saved their most vitriolic attacks until after he was dead.  It is the way of cowards.

[fotoguzzi]

not a single pic yet?

[Beerman]

Top man, fotoguzzi,

Beerman

[RANDM]

I was , but it was a loooonnnngggg time ago . What were we talking about ????

 Dusty

Ahhhhh ................... .......... the Dust has settled then?

I was bought up only mins from Pole Hill, due North of Geenwich where Lawrence had a shack and intended to build his mansion, is a small plaque there. But took me 50 + years to read 7 Pillars of Wisdom, yes the complete shambles of the Middle East is explained therein.
The O'Toole film doesn't come close, read the book.
RIP T.E.L.

Bugger Martin ................... .. you've got me into it now!

Maurie.

[oldbike54]

Ahhhhh ................... .......... the Dust has settled then?



 Once again , what were we talking about ? Decks , bugs, and rotten rolls 

 Dusty

















Maurie.

[LowRyter]

Always thought that might have been a bit of exageration . The plane was a Bristol fighter capable of 120+ MPH , Brough 100 SS models were fast in their day , but not that fast .

 Dusty

After the pilot landed the plane and hitchhiked to the pub, Lawrence had already won........ 

And was two sheets passed.

[oldbike54]

After the pilot landed the plane and hitchhiked to the pub, Lawrence had already won........ 

And was two sheets passed.

 That actually sounds more plausible  Someone mentioned earlier that the movie didn't do justice , doubt if any movie could really tell the true story of Lawrence .

 Dusty

[SED]

Great passages Beerman - I need to read a biography.  A 1000cc OHV motorcycle when most cars were 750cc flat heads and most deliveries made by horse drawn wagons and a JN4 would top out at 75mph.  WOW!

Thanks for the pics FotoGuzzi.

Testa - interesting and applicable quote.  Thanks!

:1:

Winston Churchill, who bears as much responsibility as anyone for arbitrarily dividing up the Middle East not according to ethnic boundaries but for purposes of oil exploitation, did have a pretty sober assessment of Western attitudes toward waging war in the area:

..there are many people in England, and perhaps elsewhere, who seem to be unable to contemplate military operations for clear political objects, unless they can cajole themselves into the belief that their enemy are utterly and hopelessly vile. To this end the Dervishes, from the Mahdi and the Khalifa downwards, have been loaded with every variety of abuse and charged with all conceivable crimes. This may be very comforting to philanthropic persons at home; but when an army in the field becomes imbued with the idea that the enemy are vermin who cumber the earth, instances of barbarity may easily be the outcome. This unmeasured condemnation is moreover as unjust as it is dangerous and unnecessary... We are told that the British and Egyptian armies entered Omdurman to free the people from the Khalifa's yoke. Never were rescuers more unwelcome.

[Fireflyr]

That was fun.  I read the whole thing in my best Peter O'Toole accent. 

The last century did produce some great personalities.  Another character I'd love to learn more about is Jack Churchill, credited with having the last long bow kill in battle, in WWII.

[Sasquatch Jim]

  Okay, here he is.  A most admirable life record.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Churchill

Wicked Pedia comes through again.

[Kentktk]

Sasquatch Jim, oldbike54, this is his account of the race with the Bristol aircraft:

'Once we so fled across the evening light, with the yellow sun on my left, when a huge shadow roared just overhead. A Bristol Fighter, from Whitewash Villas, our neighbour aerodrome, was banking sharply round. I checked speed an instant to wave: and the slip-stream of my impetus snapped my arm and elbow astern, like a raised flail. The pilot pointed down the road towards Lincoln. I sat hard in the saddle, folded back my ears and went away after him, like a dog after a hare. Quickly we drew abreast, as the impulse of his dive to my level exhausted itself.

 The next mile of road was rough. I braced my feet into the rests, thrust with my arms, and clenched my knees on the tank till its rubber grips goggled under my thighs. Over the first pot-hole Boanerges screamed in surprise, its mud-guard bottoming with a yawp upon the tyre. Through the plunges of the next ten seconds I clung on, wedging my gloved hand in the throttle lever so that no bump should close it and spoil our speed. Then the bicycle wrenched sideways into three long ruts: it swayed dizzily, wagging its tail for thirty awful yards. Out came the clutch, the engine raced freely: Boa checked and straightened his head with a shake, as a Brough should.

 The bad ground was passed and on the new road our flight became birdlike. My head was blown out with air so that my ears had failed and we seemed to whirl soundlessly between the sun-gilt stubble fields. I dared, on a rise, to slow imperceptibly and glance sideways into the sky. There the Bristol was, two hundred yards and more back. Play with the fellow? Why not? I slowed to ninety: signalled with my hand for him to overtake. Slowed ten more: sat up. Over he rattled. His passenger, a helmeted and goggled grin, hung out of the cock-pit to pass me the 'Up yer' RAF randy greeting.

 They were hoping I was a flash in the pan, giving them best. Open went my throttle again. Boa crept level, fifty feet below: held them: sailed ahead into the clean and lonely country. An approaching car pulled nearly into its ditch at the sight of our race. The Bristol was zooming among the trees and telegraph poles, with my scurrying spot only eighty yards ahead. I gained though, gained steadily: was perhaps five miles an hour the faster. Down went my left hand to give the engine two extra dollops of oil, for fear that something was running hot: but an overhead JAP twin, super-tuned like this one, would carry on to the moon and back, unfaltering.

 We drew near the settlement. A long mile before the first houses I closed down and coasted to the cross-roads by the hospital. Bif caught up, banked, climbed and turned for home, waving to me as long as he was in sight. Fourteen miles from camp, we are, here: and fifteen minutes since I left Tug and Dusty at the hut door. '

Beerman

Anyone who can write like that has a very vivid imagination, which can easily skewer the truth or facts of any event. It sounds like the Bristol pilot was just playing with him.