The Sunday telegram. [volume] (Clarksburg, W. Va.) 1914-1927, 1914-12-27
L|.0|R|DBlIGHENER
OF 'Q|||[|QS0EF0Ik
lEgl|N||A ] ! STOCK
And Not Irish, as Many Think,
though He Was Bornirl
& That Country.

tC6rresp0ndence OF Associated Press).
t1AkttCNf1EATH. Dec. GA Visit
to Lakenheath, the ancestral home o,
Lord Kitchener, impresses one with
the facts that Lord KitchS ner IL NO,
an Irishman but a Suffolk man, anc
thai war and rnmors Of war have very
little significance of Importance b
the free, hard air Of the English
countryside. 81, I
One reaches Lakenhearth from Lon
don in q couple of hours. The VII
lage IS a sleepy old Suffolk town. In
the midst OF the fens--a city on one
street. one church, one inn. one grave
yard, but with profusion Of farm
land and farm animals, and an al
most Dutch abundance OF whirrinE
wind mills. u. !,
This Is Kitchener's country. For
Kitchener, like the Duke Of WeIling-
ton. is called an 1rishman merely BY
the accident OF birth. He was born
In ireland because his father happen
ed to be stationed there t the time.
He is really Of old Suffolk yoeman
stock, as may be easily proved by
pointing to the eleven Kitchener
gravestones In the Lakenheath grave
yard. Y,
Lakenheath is hardly what one
wonid call an up-to-the-minute town.
II Is frankly, proudly ''slo-y.'.s It talks
the Suffolk dialect It shares with
Thousands Of exactly similar agricul-
tural villages in Britain leisureiy
contempt for what goes on in the
outside world. IS ls
In the inn, they discuss the war as
they discuss all subjects, but In a
far-of detached way. There Is no
doubling their patriotism, firm and
solid, unquestioning patriotism; ana
tn etown has furnished its share Of
recruits as 1t has for every war since
the beginning Of things.
The old Kitchener house Is half
mile or so up the moor road from the
Half Moon inn. It is small, decrepit,
old farmhouse, : now Labelled the
sRookery." 1t Is of brick and cobbie,
with the regulation four white WIN
dows in front, and a smaller false
window frowning down from over
the door. Behind is the farmyard,
crowded with geese and chickens and
q COW and dog. For over two hun
dreds years, that house and farm-
stead was the home Of Lord Kitchen
er's forebears. On his mothers side
he is a Chevalier. a family of long
standing In Suffolk, despite the
French name
In the church yard, which has re-
Gently been repaired and restored at
nrd ifnl, az, re v,S.,,se. III, : xrtt-t
ener graves occupy a prominent place.
There are no elaborate monuments
they have plain NOISY markers at
head and foot, the same as the other
village dead.
The first Kitchener's Inscription is
as follows: Here lyeth the; body Of
Kitchener, who came from
Binsted In Hampshire in the year
1888, an agent to ye Honble Sir Mich
oias Stuart, Bart, and departed this
life April ye 5th. 1881, aged SIS years. y
He was Lord Kitchener's thrice great
grandfather
By his side lies John Kitchener. his
son, who is honored with poetic epi-.
taph:a Fl 81
stay mortal, and depart not from my
stone,
But. stand and ponder well where i
am gone;
Death quickly took my sense and
strength away
And laid me down in this dark bed Of
clay,
Consider Of it and take home this
line
The grave that is made next may
chance be thine &