Two Autograph Letters signed to his mother, written on Active Service in Egypt. [With:] A 'Field Service Post Card', completed and signed by Reynolds[And:] Numerous 'On Active Service' envelopes signed by him (but empty)[And:] 5 original photographs of Alexandrian life, 3 captioned to the verso in pencil ('Native Women'; 'Fishing'; 'Wedding Procession')[And:] A wartime Player's cigarette card, illustrated with a cartoon ('The Occupation of Egypt') by Lance Thackeray, captioned by Reynolds in manuscript at foot of image.

Bookseller Notes

Wilfred Owen Reynolds was the proprietor of The Peacock Press in Plymstock, Plymouth after the War - an amateur printer, whose output seems to have amounted to not more than a modest book a decade. The artistic sensibility displayed in his few books, illustrated by him, is also evident in these wartime letters.The letters were both written during his service in Egypt, though the content of the 4pp. letter, dated February 24th 1916, shows him at leisure in Luxor - staying at the Winter Palace (so headed): he begins in reference to his impending return to fighting in Alexandria, and relates a report that 'they are not having a particularly pleasant time at the Camp on the Desert', but then proceeds to a lengthy, and wonderfully vivid, account of the ruins of Karnak ('I don't think I have ever seen anything so fine before'), describing in detail the landmarks there and the theology behind them. Their relation to the present conflict, the sort of analogy subsequently drawn by H.D. in her 'Trilogy' of the Second World War', is suggested when he mentions the 'Many scenes of warfare [...] displayed on the walls', looking as though they had been 'cut quite recently instead of thousands of years ago'. He closes by complaining of the limited knowledge of 'the guide or dragoman that took us around', but that compensated for by the resource of 'a native here who is very well educated', and promising to offer further account, based on 'notes on the buildings in my sketch book', 'when I come home' - signing off with 'heaps of love to yourself & Dad'. The following letter, on 'Winter Palace' stationery, finds Reynolds 'leaving Luxor for Alexandria - this evening [...] going back to work', reflecting that 'all good things come to an end don't they?'. He mentions a final visit to the Tombs of Kings at Thebes and promises to 'write when I arrive at Camp'.Whilst omitting any but passing reference to fighting - i.e., the 'work' that has taken him there - these letters offer a rich document of an alternative aspect of the soldier's experience, the War providing access to remote destinations that could be enjoyed during leisure periods, a temporary state that offered rare opportunity to a cultured sensibility such as Reynolds'. We might assume that the tantalising stash of empty 'On Active Service' envelopes might have addressed the other side of things, though - as the printed text on each asserts - the contents of those was highly regulated, a quality evinced by the 'Field Service Post Card', a printed form that is signed and dated by Reynolds, with his crossings-through offering reassurance to the recipient that he is neither sick nor wounded and had received the letter sent to him.The photographs, not professional, are perhaps Reynolds' own - watercolours by him, of life in Alexandria, are also known.