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Elizabeth Speakman O'Neill


Robert Dunlop

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Apologies but I don't know what happened to the original post. Elizabeth Speakman O'Neill was an author who wrote several books. I happened across one of them recently - 'The War 1914: A history and an explanation for boys and girls', which formed the first of an ongoing series. The book was published shortly after the Battle of the Aisne. It contains some interesting insights, not least into two of the most important factors that marked the Great War out as different from previous wars: the huge size of the armies involved and the use of heavy artillery. Does anyone know anything more about Elizabeth O'Neill? The only other biographical detail that I have found is her year of birth, which is given as 1877. The book mentions the Boy Scouts movement, which suggests there may have been a link to Baden-Powell. The military insights suggest links to one or more senior military figures, though perhaps the information could have been gleaned from newspaper reports at the time.

Robert

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Robert

She was the wife of Herbert Charles O'Neill (1879 -1953). They were married in December 1906. Her husband was a journalist, working variously on the editorial staff of the The Daily Mail, as a columnist on The Spectator and Assistant Editor of the Observer. He was also an author, specialising in writing military books such as The Royal Fusilers in the Great War (1922), and some ten books about WW2 under the pseudonym "Strategicus", a name which he used whilst with The Spectator.

Not much about Elizabeth I'm afraid, but it does show they were a literary couple and may explain her WW1 interest.

TR

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TR, thank you very much for the information. The connection to The Daily Mail, coupled with her husband's joint interest in things military, helps explain how Elizabeth could have developed the themes in her book. Much appreciated.

Robert

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  • 2 years later...

Robert

She was the wife of Herbert Charles O'Neill (1879 -1953). They were married in December 1906. Her husband was a journalist, working variously on the editorial staff of the The Daily Mail, as a columnist on The Spectator and Assistant Editor of the Observer. He was also an author, specialising in writing military books such as The Royal Fusilers in the Great War (1922), and some ten books about WW2 under the pseudonym "Strategicus", a name which he used whilst with The Spectator.

Not much about Elizabeth I'm afraid, but it does show they were a literary couple and may explain her WW1 interest.

TR

I am grateful for this information, as Elizabeth Speakman O'Neill was my cousin, and I have been trying to find out more about her.

Many thanks

Paul Allerton

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