Table talk
Sir: Sir Denis Brogan is collecting a danger- ous reputation for inaccuracy.- His allegation that F.E. remained at home during the first world war indicates some lack of research. It is common and easily obtained know- ledge that having spent the period August- September 1914 organising the Press Bureau, he departed for the front attached to the Indian Corps and remained there until the spring of 1915. The whole background of the incident—which was last raised in an anony-
mous letter in the Morning Post at that time to 'smear' F.E.—can be found in a letter from Arthur Dugdale, co, Queen's Own Oxfordshire Hussars, to F.E. at the time of the earliest smear.
Later in his article Sir Denis remarks that the prosecution of Casement by the success- ful rebel F.E. turned the stomachs of a great many people. This remark indicates a par- tiality no doubt related to Sir Denis's Irish origin.
It is to say the least normal that the Attorney-General, as F.E. then was, should prosecute in a serious charge of treason, and to place F.E.'s alleged rebellion on the same plane as Casement's treason reinforces the impression of a lack of impartiality by Sir Denis which is unworthy of a serious his- torian, especially a Glasgow graduate.
David C. H. Ross Baldernock Road, Milngavie, Glasgow
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