Maurice Baring’s Flight of Fancy: Botanical Entries in a Pilot’s Diary

On April 25, 1917, Maurice Baring wrote about flying over the Fourth Army among some nature entries in his WWI diary.

Ah, dear garden friend, marvel with me on the curious ways in which life intertwines, even amidst the most tumultuous of times.

Consider, for instance, the unlikely pairing of a soldier soaring through the skies of World War I and the quiet contemplation of a garden in bloom.

Such is the delightful juxtaposition presented in Maurice Baring's wartime diary, a treasure trove of observations that transcend the battlefield and transport us to a realm of natural beauty.

As a fellow lover of the verdant and the vibrant, I am particularly drawn to Maurice's descriptions of the flora that graced his surroundings, even in the midst of such terrible chaos.

His words paint vivid pictures of oxlips and cowslips adorning the landscape, of trees bursting with sap, and of hedges awakening from their winter slumber. It is as though the natural world served as a steadfast anchor, a reminder of life's enduring rhythms amidst the turmoil of war.

Maurice was a soldier with the Royal Flying Corps, and I think Maurice would be surprised and delighted to know that his diary is part of a gardening podcast here in 2023.

Maurice's account of his flight over the Fourth Army, a moment of both terror and wonder, is a poignant example of how even in the most perilous circumstances, the beauty of nature can assert itself. The sight of a kite balloon drifting down into the river, the swoop of a scout plane, and the stark contrast of the shelled ground all serve to highlight the fragility of human existence and the resilience of the natural world.

I found an adorable little review of his diary, which became a book called A War Diary by Maurice Baring.

The reviewer wrote:

The remarkable thing about his book is that although it has an objective quality, it is also extraordinarily personal.

It is far from being a history of the work of the R.F.C. during the war. It attempts nothing of the kind.

It is rather an account of the author during the war, and by noting down whatever interested him at the moment, whether it was the book he happened to be reading or a talk he had had, he conveys to us what the war was in reality to him.

His irrelevancies are relevant to that. An enormous number of these entries might have been made in his diary if there had been no war going on. Yet their inclusion is precisely what conveys to us the sense of actuality.

He has endless details to attend to, news and odd rumours pour in from all sides, men are fighting and being killed (often he stops to record the death of a friend), yet his other interests persist.

He is not always thinking about the war he copies out passages from the books he reads, quotes the poets, translates Horace; speculates about this and that, trusting that if he puts down all these things without emphasis, picture of what the war was actually like IS an experience to live through at H.Q. will be left in the reader's mind.

Entries follow each other pell-mell.

These are typical pages. Dip in anywhere and you will find the same drift of unconnected observations and unaccentuated records, noted down simply and quickly, by a man sensitive to many sides of life.

Read the whole book and a curious ineffaceable impression remains of a confused process of human activity and emotion rushing on, on, on, in a definite direction, like a train which carries its passengers, now looking out of the windows, now talking together, now occupied with their own memories, on to a terminus.

Such is Mr. Baring's record of the war.

Yet, it is not only the grand spectacle of nature that captivates Maurice. He also finds solace in the simple pleasures of gardening, sharing tales of potato-planting and cotton-reel-carrying pilots who hoped to charm their German captors with such practical gifts. These small moments of human connection and ingenuity offer a welcome respite from the horrors of war.

As a gardener, I am delighted by the number of times Maurice mentions some plant or something that's happening in nature. The natural world was an anchor for him amid wartime chaos and heartbreak.

As I delve into Maurice's diary, I am struck by the timeless quality of his observations. His words resonate with a profound understanding of the human condition, a recognition of the interconnectedness of all things, and a deep appreciation for the beauty and fragility of life.

In a world often consumed by conflict and strife, Maurice's botanical musings serve as a gentle reminder of the enduring power of nature and the enduring spirit of the human heart.

Here's some of Maurice's entries for spring:

On April 25th, 1917: We heard two shots in the air on the way there on the way back, just as we were this side of the Somme, a kite balloon was shot down and floated down into the river.

We were looking at this; at that moment a scout appeared in the sky, and came swooping towards us.

I thought it was a German, and that we were going to land looking down at the shelled condition of the ground.

I was terrified.

It turned out to be an S.E.

It was bitterly cold: the earth looked like was a photograph: a war photograph.

April 26th. I cannot read any more, not another line of the Golden Bowl by Henry James.

April 28th. The garden full of oxlips and cowslips. The trees are red with sap. The hedges are budding.

April 20th. We went to Vert Galant to see Harvey Kelly, who commands No. 19 Squadron...

He always took a potato and a reel of cotton with him when he went over the lines.

The Germans, he said, would be sure to treat him well if he had to land on the other side, and they found him provided with such useful and scarce commodities.

He was the first pilot to land in France.

A little look back at WWI through the eyes of a nature lover, a gardener, and a pilot.