THE BATTLING BOATMAN

摘要

I was a friend of David's for many years, and besides our great interest in the inland waterways, we also shared a passion for World War One, writes Tim Coghlan.In 2014 I co-wrote with Jennifer Coy a booklet on the 31 World War One dead of the canal village of Braunston, which included six known boatmen. I shared my researches with David, who sent me a copy of his earlier account of an Oxford Canal boatman Jack James in World War One. It recorded how closely that man came to shooting Adolf Hitler in late 1914.That account was part of David's life of Jack James, who later went on to work as a lock-keeper at Stoke Bruerne, and whose collection of canal artifacts became the foundation of what is today the Canal Museum at Stoke Bruerne. David's account of Jack's life appears never to have been published. I have produced this shortened account of that amazing story, and Harry's remaining wartime involvement.