The arrival of the Martians …
126 years ago, humanity faced the greatest threat to its existence with the Martian invasion.
Recreated through the diaries and newspapers of the time, and with the assistance of H.G. Well’s seminal work (‘The War of the Worlds’), ‘The War of the Worlds – In Real Time’ (@1897WotW) will tell the story of what really happened during that crucial month when the Earth stood on the precipice, and civilization teetered on the edge of extinction.
Welcome to HG Wells’ The War of the Worlds in Real Time. A fictionalised docudrama by: Michael Cnudde, Andrew J. Harvey, Leonie Rogers, Ken Vickery, and H.G. Wells – based on the documents, diaries, and recordings of those involved in the Martian War.
WARNING:
This docudrama is a work of fiction. While ‘real-world’ characters may appear, the nature of the divergent story means any depictions herein are fictionalised and in no way an indication of real events. Above all, characterisations have been developed with the primary aim of telling a compelling story.
Herbert George Wells
HG Wells was the author of the seminal work The War of the Worlds in which he documents his experiences during the Martian invasion. Born in Kent, on 21 September 1866, Wells died on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home overlooking Regent’s Park, London.
A prolific author he wrote more than 50 novels and dozens of short stories. His non-fiction output included works of social commentary, politics, history, popular science, satire, biography and autobiography.
In addition to his fame as a writer, he was prominent in his lifetime as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works.
Wells rendered his fiction convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed Wells’s Law – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 with “O Realist of the Fantastic!”. His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), and The Invisible Man (1897), before the Martian invasion turned him to chronicling the ‘War’.
Wells’s earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always) sympathising with pacifist views.
Antoinette Louise Clark
The Martian Landing of 1897, or as we now know it, the War of the Worlds, involved many people, including Antionette Louise Clark, whose contemporary was the brother of the renowned HG Wells himself. #WOTW #Martians
Antoinette (Toni to her friends) was a young medical student – one of the first of her era – heavily influenced by Grace Harwood Stewart, one of the first female doctors, and Millicent Fawcett, a noted suffragist #wedemandthevote
She was challenged by Wells’ brother, to keep a diary entirely in telegram style for a month. Despite the challenges, she kept the style throughout the Martian invasion. #memories
Her diary entries have been translated to current ‘text/tweet’ speak, for which telegram style was a forerunner, for ease of reading for the modern reader, since words such as Naloopen, or Empanel, are not in current usage. #technologyforthewin
Unsurprisingly, her twitter handle turns out to be @ToniWantsToVote, and her diary is a treasure trove of insight into the post invasion changes to society. She also sent some of her telegrams – we shall leave you to decide which ones #wedemandthevote #ihavepocketsinmytrousers
Harry Harbord Morant
While researching the life of Marie Curie for this project, with the assistance of the Curie Museum in Paris, I found in her personal papers the diary of a fortune fighter called Breaker Morant. Marie Curie had written inside the front cover:
“This rapscallion saved my life during the Martian invasion.”
There were also letters to Morant stored in the diary from the editor of the Australian newspaper The Bulletin. It appears from the letters that these diary notes were being kept for poems and stories to be written for the paper (Morant having received commissions for other work). No evidence exists of publications from these notes, however, Morant’s diary required little editing other than the removal of some the language he has used which reflects the unconscious racism of his time, the replacement of initials with a name when he refers to an individual, and the addition of an occasional footnote to clarify the events he is describing.
Morant emigrated to Australia from England in 1883. A year after his arrival, Morant settled in outback Queensland where he adopted the name, Harry Harbord Morant, claiming to be a member of the British nobility and the estranged son of Admiral Morant. He drifted around Queensland, South Australia, and New South Wales for 15 years, earning a reputation as a boozer, womaniser, bush poet, and expert horseman.
Morant worked various occupations, reportedly trading horses in Charters Towers, and in 1884 working for a newspaper at Hughenden, before finding work as a bookkeeper and storeman at the Esmeralda cattle station. It was here he met Arthur James Vogan, who was researching a book and helped him prepare his “Slave Map of Modern Australia”, which showed the locations of slavery and massacres of the first nation people.
Morant then worked for several years as an itinerant drover and horse-breaker. He also wrote popular bush ballads and became friendly with famed Australian bush poets Henry Lawson, Banjo Paterson, and Will H. Ogilvie.
In 1896, Morant and his droving partner George Brown enlisted with the Second Contingent of the South Australian Mounted Rifles in Adelaide. Brown was Aboriginal-Scot, and avoided the ban on Aboriginals by claiming he was Italian to explain away the colour of his skin.
Morant was invited to visit the summer residence of South Australia’s governor, Lord Tennyson. This meeting must have gone well because he was appointed lance corporal at the end of his training.
At this time, Vogal published his novel ‘Black Police’, which documented the callous slaughter of indigenous Australians by the Queensland Native Police. Pilloried for releasing this book Vogal lost his job writing for a newspaper. Morant convinced his friend to join his brick of four soldiers in Adelaide.
Military records show that both Brown and Vogan were in Morant’s brick when their regiment was selected to participate as part of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations. The regiment embarked for London on 26 January 1897 and arrived in time to experience the Martian invasion.
Vogan, Brown, and I joined the literary group at White’s Gentleman’s Club.
Mother was pleased to receive Vogan and I to her ‘school’ today.
Asked @hgwellsbro to go out for drinks. @graceharwoodstewart is in town and he said he’d like to meet her.
Also, bought myself some new #dividedskirts from @rationaldresssociety and can’t recommend them enough. #socomfy #ihavepockets
The police receive a number of reports of an especially bright falling-star, which was seen early in the morning rushing over Winchester eastward, a line of flame, high in the atmosphere. Observers described it as leaving a greenish streak behind it that glowed for some seconds.
HMS Thunder Child
HMS Thunder Child was a Majestic class battleship launched February 30, 1894, and commanded by Captain Allenby.
Although Wells described Thunder Child as a ‘ram’, the sole sole torpedo ram to see service with the Royal Navy from 1881 to 1903 was HMS Polyphemus, and it is possible that Wells’ use of the term ‘torpedo ram’ was merely referring to the ram bows common in Victorian warships of the time.
The Majestic class of 9 pre-dreadnought battleships were built for the Royal Navy in the mid-1890s under the Spencer Programme, named after the First Lord of the Admiralty, John Poyntz Spencer. 9 units were commissioned, including: HMS Majestic, Caesar, Hannibal, Illustrious, Jupiter, Magnificent, Thunder Child, Prince George, and Victorious between 1894 and 1897.
The Majestics introduced a number of significant improvements to British battleship design, including armoured gun shields for the barbette-mounted main battery guns. The ships were armed with a main battery of four BL 12-inch Mark VIII guns, the first large-calibre weapon in the Royal Navy to use smokeless propellant. They were also the first British ships to incorporate Harvey armour.
Attended rehearsals for the QV’s Diamond Jubilee.
The Diamond Jubilee organisers appreciated our devotion to the Queen. It was hard not to smirk.
Lieutenant Roger Carver
Lt. Roger Carver commanded HMS Thunder Child’s Royal Marine (Light Infantry) detachment during those crucial days in June 1897.
While no individual photograph of Lt. Carver exists, we were able to locate a photograph in “Black and White, November 13th, 1896,” titled the “Portsmouth Division Royal Marine Light Infantry – Winners of the Cup”, with both Lt Carver, and then Colour Sgt Howard in the front row. Lt Carver is on the left, Colour Sgt. Howard on the right. Lt Carver transfered to HMS #ThunderChild 2 months later, where he was joined by Sergeant Howard in March 1897, following the Colour Sergeant’s demotion.
20 minutes later some people in the crowd gathered around the pit, which includes Wells, report seeing something alive within the pit’s shadows. #Martians
Wells later reports seeing greyish billowy movements in the pit, and then two luminous disks—like eyes emerge. Then something resembling a little grey snake, about the thickness of a walking-stick, coils up out of the writhing middle, and wriggles in the air towards the crowd.
And now a big greyish, rounded bulk, the size, perhaps, of a bear, rises slowly and painfully out of the cylinder. As it catches the light Wells describes its skin glistening like wet leather.
Two large dark-coloured eyes regard the crowd. There is a mouth under the eyes, the lipless brim of which quivers and pants, and drops saliva. The body heaves and pulsates convulsively. A lank tentacular appendage grips the edge of the cylinder, another sways in the air.
Wells later writes of a strange horror in their appearance. The peculiar V-shaped mouth with its pointed upper lip, the absence of brow ridges or any chin, the incessant quivering of its mouth, the Gorgon groups of tentacles, the tumultuous breathing of its lungs.
Ogilvy and Stent are chosen to lead the deputation. As they approach the pit there is a flash of light, and a quantity of luminous greenish smoke comes out of the pit in three distinct puffs. Slowly a humped shape rises out of the pit, and the ghost of a beam of light flickers out from it.
Flashes of flame follow the light and a bright glare leaps to figure to figure. It is as if some invisible jet impinges upon them and flashes into white flame. And then each man is suddenly turned to fire. And then the beam is turned on the crowd.
#Martian-Heat-Ray
@lizcadbury gave me chocs! #buycadburychocolate
Due to the absence of active combat, Friday the 4th has been described by the historian Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart (better known as Captain B H Liddell Hart – see picture) as the #False War.
Great lecture on #germtheory today. @listersantiseptics was there in person! The great man himself spoke on #antisepsis. Can’t believe #London was so #hostile to him initially. #antisepsissaveslives
A police liason with the recently arrived military forces recalled turning back the Woking Fire Brigade’s new 3 horse tender, which had responded to requests from the owners of the Byfleet Golf Links who were concerned at the possibility of fire threating their facilities.
The Constable’s actions in turning the five men back undoubtedly saved their lives, and the future of the Woking FC, with whom all 5 men played. The club had only been formed in 1887, and had joined the West Surrey League in 1895–96, winning the title by one point.
Leave for Oxford by stagecoach to hear the Curie’s talk. Trip took almost 8 hours. The news about the Martians is getting worse.
Wells observes the tops of the trees about the Oriental College bursting into flames, and the tower of the little church beside it collapsing. The pinnacle of the mosque had vanished, and the roof-line of the college itself looks as if a 100-ton gun had been at work upon it.
The illustration shows the design of the original mosque, intended to have been completed in 1899.
Lieutenant James Robert Dullanty (1870 – 1897)
The youngest son of Sir John Dullanty, whose estate at Rotch Wood abutted the Queen’s estate at Balmoral, James enlisted at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst following three years at Oxford University studying history.
Lieutenant Dullanty received the Sword of Honour on his graduation in 1892 from Sandhurst. The Sword being awarded to the most outstanding graduate of each intake.
With his father’s support he joined the Coldstream Guards, formed in 1650 it was the oldest continuously serving regiment of the British Army. As well as guarding the monarch and undertaking ceremonial duties, its soldiers served as infantry in almost every major campaign fought by the Army.
Lt. Dullanty’s talent as a mimic and musician earned him an immediate commission in the Guards’ 4th Coy, which trained in special operations as well as providing the Regiment’s band.
The only picture known to exist of Lt J R Dullanty: taken by Christina Broom (1863–1939), who after the war made an extensive chronicle of the leaders of the Suffragette movement between 1900 and 1906. For the leaders of the campaign for the enfranchisement of women, photographs that would distance them from the popular press imagery of militancy and disorder proved vital tools.
(originally modelled by Captain-Heneage: Roger-Fenton-Crimean-War-photograph-collection)
At the start of the 18th century, Tilbury Fort was one of the most powerful forts in Britain. However, by 1889, Tilbury Fort’s bastion design had become out-dated. The government considered the defences further down the Thames to be sufficient and Tilbury was therefore not improved. By 1889 Tilbury was largely redundant as a defensive fortification, although it was still in use as a strategic depot.
Tilbury Fort served as a mobilisation centre to support a mobile strike force in the event of an invasion, part of the wider London Defence Scheme, and large storage buildings were accordingly added to the site to store materiel.
Am feeling #fearful, but also #determined. Meeting @lizcadbury and @graceharwoodstewart at Liz’s flat in #QueenAnnesMansions. Good high point for easy viewing, but large building so hopefully #wewillbesafe and #roomforrefugees
Refugees have begun to appear in London.
Both the The Birmingham Illustrated News (BIN), and its older, sister publication The Illustrated London News (ILN), both normally weeklies, brought out a special edition. Founded by Herbert Ingram, the ILN had first appeared in 1842. the BIN several decades later.
The BIN leads with: “At 7pm last night the Martians came out of their cylinder, and under the armor of metallic shields, completely wrecked Woking station, the adjacent houses, and massacred an entire battalion of the Cardigan Regiment…
“Maxims have been absolutely useless against their armor; the field-guns have been disabled by them. Flying hussars have been galloping into Chertsey. The Martians appear to be moving slowly towards Chertsey or Windsor…
“Great anxiety prevails in West Surrey, and earthworks are being thrown up to check the advance Londonwards.”
Wells later reports sighting “6 twelve-pounders set up in a field outside Byfleet at this time, pointing towards Woking. The gunners stood motionless by the guns waiting, almost as though ready for inspection. The ammunition wagons at a business-like distance from the guns.”
The normal train schedule has now been abandoned to allow the army to run special trains leading to long queues at all stations.
Wells, with others, races for the safety of the water, ignored for the moment by the Martians, even as a tripod breaches the far bank, and is fired on by a hidden battery of 6 guns.
Wells, later records that: “the first shell bursts 6 yards above the hood. Simultaneously 2 shells burst in the air near the body as the hood twists round in time to receive, but not in time to dodge, the fourth shell…
“The fourth shell bursts clean in the face of the Thing. The hood bulges, flashes, and whirls off in a dozen tattered fragments of red flesh and glittering metal. A spontaneous cheer arises from those watching…
“A violent explosion shakes the air, and a spout of water, steam, mud, and shattered metal shoots far up into the sky. And now a huge wave, like a muddy tidal bore, but scaldingly hot, sweeps down the river…
“Thick clouds of steam pours off the wreckage, and the machine’s gigantic limbs churn the water and fling mud and froth into the air. The tentacles sway and strike like living arms. Enormous quantities of a ruddy-brown fluid are spurting up in noisy jets out of the machine…
“The air is full of sound, a deafening and confusing conflict of noises—the clangorous din of the Martians, the crash of falling houses, the thud of trees, fences, sheds, flashing into flame, and the crackling and roaring of fire…
“Dense black smoke leaps up to mingle with the steam from the river, even as the Martian’s Heat-Ray passes to and fro over Weybridge its impact marked by flashes of incandescent white, that change immediately to lurid flames…
Around Wells: “houses cave in as they dissolve at the heat ray’s touch, and darted out flames; the trees changed to fire with a roar. It flickers up and down the towing-path, licking off the people trying to run…
The edge of the Heat-Ray sweeps down to the water’s edge not 50 yards from where Wells stands, before arching across the river to Shepperton, and the water in its track rises in a boiling wheal crested with steam, scalding those still in the water. And then quiet.
In 1899, Well’s published the first edition of The War of the Worlds via a series of serials in the USA. The American publisher included Goble’s illustrations. In the second and subsequent editions (Book II, Chapter 2) in the middle of dealing with a planet blasted by alien war, Wells takes some time to give a bitchy critique of the war reporter’s illustrations:
I recall particularly the illustration of one of the first pamphlets to give a consecutive account of the war. The artist had evidently made a hasty study of one of the fighting-machines, and there his knowledge ended. He presented them as tilted, stiff tripods, without either flexibility or subtlety, and with an altogether misleading monotony of effect.
The pamphlet containing these renderings had a considerable vogue, and I mention them here simply to warn the reader against the impression they may have created. They were no more like the Martians I saw in action than a Dutch doll is like a human being. To my mind, the pamphlet would have been much better without them.
From the personal log of Lt. Roger Carver, #RoyalMarines HMS Thunder Child, 07 June 1897 14:04 GMT
I could hear the screams of the people crowded on the pier echo across the water as the black smoke fell on them. They cried in terror, trying to escape, some even jumped into the water. As the smoke covered them, their voices began to choke out.
My mouth hung open.
In Wells’ report of the war, he notes that: “Fugitives from West Surrey were appearing in London at this time. Their faces haggard, their appearance contrasting conspicuously with the Sabbath-best appearance of the people on the omnibuses.”
Finally a sound like the distant concussion of a gun. It ripples along the Martian line. There is no flash, no smoke, simply a loaded detonation – and a large projectile hurtles overhead towards Hounslow, and without smoke or fire a white mist spreads across the country.
But for those watching there is only concern when the artillery fails to responds. There is a distant tumult of shouting but then it ceases, even as the Martians begin to move – eastward, a swift, rolling motion.
Wells notes that: “Everything becomes very still. Far away to the southeast, marking the quiet, I can hear the Martians hooting to one another, and then the air quivers again with the distant thud of their guns. But our own artillery makes no reply.”
Dr. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson (9 June 1836 – 8 June 1897) was an English physician and suffragist. She was the first woman to qualify in Britain as a physician and surgeon. She was the co-founder of the first hospital staffed by women, the first dean of a British medical school, the first woman in Britain to be elected to a school board. If not for her death during the Martian War it is quite possible that she might have been elected mayor of Aldeburgh, her father had been mayor in 1889 and, as mayor of Aldeburgh she would have been the first female mayor in Britain.