Letter from Peter Barton to Kenneth Duesbery re the John Duesbery archive

• November 1, 2018 10:01:12 Zafiro Marti

  Mr K Duesbury

  Townend Cottage

  2 Cockshott Lane

  Idle

  Bradford

  BD10 8UE

  
  8 December 2005
  
  

       I believe Eddie Edwards of the WFR Archives may have been in touch to say I

  would be contacting. My name is Peter Barton, and I am an author and filmmaker specialising in the First World War.

        My son Tom is presently researching for me in archives in the Midlands area for

  a book on the Battle of the Somme which I am preparing. My publishers are Constable and Robinson, who very recently published my rather hefty volume

  The Battlefields of the First World War, which you should find in bookshops everywhere should you wish to examine content, style, quality etc. My books and films are always based upon the most important historical source: a wide range

  of personal testimony, either recorded on film/audio, or from diaries, memoirs

  etc., i.e. the words of those who took part. I always try my best to find previously unpublished material with which to illustrate my narratives.

  
  

        Tom recently came across the archive of your relative Corporal J Duesbury of

  2nd Battalion Sherwood Foresters (my apologies, I am unaware of exactly how

  you are related), and I found it both intensely moving and unusual, especially the letter written from the shellhole in front of the Quadrilateral at Ginchy - a spot I

  know very well. It is quite extraordinary.

  You will be pleased to know that the archivist at Chetwynd Barracks in Chilwell,

  was supremely dutiful, would not allow copies to be made, and rightly insisted

  that permissions for reproduction of any part of the archive must be obtained

  from the family. So I am writing to you today to ask whether you would object to

  my using portions of the archive for my Somme volume. I do not yet know the full extent of the material as Tom was rather limited for time o the day in question; he will be returning, however. I am very happy to pay the standard reproduction rate,

  should you so wish.

        If you are happy for me to use sections of the archive, I wondered whether

  you might also have photographs of the various family members involved - these

  
  

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