Siegfried Sassoon. © The Executors of GT Sassoon (deceased)
The National Heritage Memorial Fund has announced a £550,000 award to the University of Cambridge to secure the personal archive of First World War poet, author and soldier Siegfried Sassoon.
Sassoon's former university will use the grant to help secure private diaries and pocket notebooks compiled while he was serving on the Western Front. The collection also includes an autographed manuscript of the seminal A Soldier's Declaration – the statement he wrote detailing his refusal to return to war after being wounded.
"The war Siegfried Sassoon lived through, fought in, and wrote about was supposed to be the war to end all wars," reflected award-winning author Michael Morpurgo.
"It wasn't. The reason his words echo down through the decades so powerfully is that they are as sadly relevant to today's wars, and so to us, as they ever were to his."
Morpurgo said it was "right and proper" that the University should acquire the papers.
"Every generation, all of us, should read, mark, and never forget how it really is for young men when older men send them off to war," he added. "We may then learn."
An autographed manuscript of the seminal 1917 A Soldier's Declaration. © The Executors of GT Sassoon (deceased)
If a £1.25 million campaign to secure Sassoon's archive at Sotheby's in June is successful, the archive will be held at Cambridge University Library, where significant sets of Sassoon's letters and manuscripts will be made available to the public.
"The passing of the UK's last surviving First World War veteran earlier this year has brought into sharp focus the sacrifice made by so many in service to the nation," said Dame Jenny Abramsky, Chair of the NHMF.
"The NHMF was founded to help safeguard our heritage as a lasting memorial to those men and women. Sassoon's archive – full of fascinating personal accounts of his own experiences at war – provides the perfect tribute."
For more information visit the Cambridge Library website or The National Heritage Memorial Fund online.
