Testament of Youth

Roland goes to the front on March 31, 1915, nearly a year after he and Brittain first met at her home in Buxton. In the months before he leaves for France, he and Brittain exchange a multitude of letters encouraging hope and bravery in each other; just before he leaves, Roland sends her an amethyst brooch. At this point in the war, Brittain explains that the news is scant and the understanding of the unfolding tragedy in Europe is very gradual. Brittain is preoccupied with thoughts of Roland, and she forces herself to study and to be hopeful about his return. During her vacation away from her studies, just before the summer term, she rides her bicycle and thinks intensely about “analogies and distinctions between life and death, soul and intellect, spirit and immortality” (117). Brittain writes to Roland about her musings, confessing to him that she no longer expects to enjoy peace of mind ever again, in any capacity. As Brittain explores philosophical concepts, the women of Buxton organize a volunteer corps of women; though Brittain avoids their activities, she does decide to become a nurse while also studying at Oxford. This decision enables her to feel “at least one step nearer to Roland and the War” (119).

Air-raids in April 1915 and news of gas attacks at the Second Battle of Ypres rattle Brittain’s faith in God. Letters from Roland take longer to reach Brittain, and they contain reports of his own growing anxiety. Brittain’s angst also intensifies, and she begins to worry that even if he is to survive the front, he will return home completely altered by the atrocities he has witnessed. One letter from Roland contains four violets he picked from his dugout, and the tone of the letters from this particular wooded area in France called Ploegsteert Wood are more cheerful. Brittain’s nursing training in Buxton continues, during which she notices a deep and penetrating sadness in the wounded soldiers she meets. 

Brittain returns to Oxford for summer term just as news of Rupert Brooke’s death is announced at the end of April 1915. Somerville College has been converted into a war hospital, so the remaining students transfer to Oriel College, as most of the young men of that college have left for the war. During this term at Oxford, Brittain receives more loving letters from Roland, who is still in Ploegsteert Wood, and she resolves to take part “in the glorious Allied fight against militarism” (125). The term passes without incident, and Brittain is grateful for her tutor’s sympathetic nature. The tutor appears to know that Brittain is vulnerable for being in love, and after the sinking of the Lusitania, the tutor even participates in the preparation of food for the invalids housed in Somerville. Tennis and the study of Wordsworth dominate Brittain’s attentions throughout the summer term, but the chapel services “provided better consolation than tennis-matches” (131). This term at Oxford is Brittain’s last as she decides to pursue nursing full-time. 

After Brittain’s English tutor reads out loud from the first edition of Rupert Brooke’s collection of sonnets titled 1914, Brittain finds she reads Roland’s letters differently and that the letters become more realistic to her. The weighty matters of life and death contrast with the small issues of college rules and expectations, and Brittain cannot focus on both. Towards the end of the term, Brittain spends time with Edward, who has been in the south of England all summer. They talk of the possibility that Edward will have to go to the Dardanelles, where many young men from Buxton have already died; though these deaths of local friends and acquaintances do not bode well for Edward, who describes himself as “a lover of peace” (136), he feels optimistic about Roland’s survival. 

Though she enjoys her Oxford life of the mind immensely, Brittain decides to give up her academic ambitions and commit herself to voluntary nursing after she passes her last round of exams. Roland’s mother writes to Brittain to express her approval of this decision while Brittain hopes that she will eventually be able to work in France, closer to Roland. In June 1915, Brittain, having returned to Buxton, begins work at the Devonshire Hospital. Here, Brittain gains a different kind of education as she tends to wounded men and partakes in activities that are brand new to her; though her cooking skills are lacking and her experience with male nakedness nonexistent, Brittain adapts so well and works so tirelessly, she gains “approval from most of the nurses” (144). One night, Brittain dreams of Roland, and in her dream, she receives news of a man’s death; she feels sure the news concerns Roland, but the piece of paper proving the truth has another man’s name on it. Brittain wakes up “in a kind of ecstasy” (146).

With her two friends from St. Monica’s, Mina and Betty, Brittain plans to work at an Army hospital in Camberwell in London. Mina eventually changes her mind, but Brittain presses on with her efforts to transfer to London, eager to leave the company of an unpleasant new addition to the Devonshire Hospital staff. A new Sister-in-Charge grates on Brittain, and her behavior offers Brittain insight into the importance of good leadership when it comes to the feminist movement. As usual, Brittain finds solace in writing to Roland, whose poems and reflections on his wartime experience reassure Brittain that some measure of his true self is surviving. 

In August 1915, Roland unexpectedly obtains leave, and he comes home to England. Brittain plans to meet him in London, and thanks to the omnipresence of unsupervised “girl war-workers” (154), Brittain is able to travel alone to spend an entire day with Roland. Their meeting at St. Pancras train station is awkward and deeply emotional; they decide Roland will return to Buxton with Brittain that evening, and then the following morning, they will travel together to Lowestoft to spend the weekend with Roland’s family. While on the train to Buxton, Roland suggests they become engaged, which leads the young couple to argue. Neither Roland nor Brittain enjoy the prospect of diminishing their love into a mere “category […] labelled with a description regarded as ‘correct’” (157), but eventually they agree to be engaged after much intellectual discussion of the meaning of love. In Buxton, they do not tell Brittain’s parents, but at a lunch with Edward and Victor back in London on their way to Lowestoft, they announce their news. Their time together in Lowestoft brings more emotional turmoil, but Roland and Brittain do enjoy their time together before they return to London to go their separate ways. As Brittain prepares to board her train home, she remains stoic, but Roland is in tears.

Upon her arrival home, Brittain learns that Edward has just that day been sent to the front. She goes to work at the hospital the next day overwhelmed by grief and anxiety for the two men she loves most. After work, Brittain learns from her parents that though Edward’s regiment is on their way to France, Edward has been left behind by his colonel, a humiliation that no one can explain. 

Brittain spends the rest of the month of August and all of September working and writing to Roland, reading poetry and the newspapers. Finally, in October, several months after Brittain decides to work in London, she receives news of her appointment at the 1st London General Hospital in Camberwell.  

Brittain’s new accommodations at the hostel in Camberwell are inadequate, and she finds them a shock after the comforts of her home in Buxton. Minimal hot water and a lengthy commute on foot combined with long hours at the hospital mean she, like the other nurses who live at the hostel, are unable to bathe regularly; significant discomfort and illness prove to be inevitable. Brittain reflects that this “cheerless reception” (185) is regrettable, but the attention a warmer reception requires seems to have been invested in the running of the hospital itself. Brittain dreams of encountering Roland at the hospital and treating him herself, but such fantasies soon give way to the horrifying realities of tending to gangrenous wounds and mutilating amputations. Just as at Devonshire Hospital, Brittain’s only relief from her work are her letters to Roland and his letters to her. 

After a month of working in Camberwell, Brittain and Roland exchange letters in a series she describes as “an epistolary quarrel” (189), the only one they ever have in their entire relationship. Roland first writes of how his growing preoccupation with life at the front explains his recent infrequency and brevity of letters; at first, Brittain is gentle when reminding him that the war will eventually end. When, however, she receives letters from Roland that show they are growing apart due to his preoccupations, she grows angry and tells him so. Roland continues to write to Brittain but he does not apologize for several weeks, during which Brittain visits his family at Lowestoft while recuperating from a brief illness; when he does respond to her words and acknowledges her frustration, equilibrium is restored.

In November, after Brittain’s first five weeks at the hospital in Camberwell, she is offered a six-month contract, which brings Brittain pride in her work. On her time off, she enjoys London, and she finds that the city makes her think of Roland in many ways. Roland writes of his intention to take leave at the end of December, and he is due home on Christmas Day. Brittain is able to coordinate her time off so that they can both be home at the same time. As Brittain anticipates this time with Roland, they exchange tender and deeply hopeful letters, writing of beauty and the future with optimism and joy. Brittain goes shopping for new clothes in London and makes efforts to ensure that “the stage seemed perfectly set for his leave” (206). As Christmas Day approaches, she receives no word from Roland. On the 26th, Roland’s sister Clare calls her at her home in Buxton with the news that Roland has died of wounds to the stomach two days before Christmas.