The Extinguished Flame: Olympians Killed in The Great War

by Nigel McCrery

In August 2016 the world will be spellbound by the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro as 10,500 athletes from 206 countries compete in 306 events. Tracing their origins back to the Greeks in 776 BC, the history of the Olympics is a glorious one but it has had its darker moments.

During the First World War no fewer than 135 Olympians perished. Many had won Gold, Silver and Bronze medals. They came not just from the UK, Germany, France, USA but from all over the globe.

Wyndham Halswelle, killed in action on 31 March 1915, won a Gold, Silver and Bronze medals in both field and track events. The Frenchman Leon Flameng, the fastest cyclist ever, died on 2 January 1917, having won Gold, Silver and Bronze medals in the 1896 Olympics. The German Fritz Bartholomae, killed in action 12 September 1915, won a Bronze in the rowing eights during the 1912 Olympics. The list of these heroes goes on and on.

Each Olympian, who made the supreme sacrifice, is honored in this magnificent book by a summary of their life, sporting achievement and manner of their death.

296 pages, Hardcover

First published September 28, 2016

About the author

Nigel Colin McCrery was an English screenwriter, producer and writer. He was the creator of the long-running crime dramas Silent Witness (1996–present) and New Tricks (2003–2015).

Reviews

[JD · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another good book by Nigel McCrery about sportsmen making the ultimate sacrifice during wartime. I have read his two books about cricketers and rugby players killed during the Second World War and think this book about the Olympians is a much more inclusive book than those, as more nations that participated in the Olympics also went to war than in rugby or cricket.

Amongst those killed were some of the best sportsmen of their times and some excelled far beyond just their Olympic achievements, on and off the sports fields, and their stories are very colorful. A 135 athletes lost their lives, mostly in action on the Western Front. The British lost by far the most (50) and surprisingly even though they entered the war late, the Americans only lost 2. The author gives (mostly) a brief, but detailed description of the athletes athletics career and achievements, his personal life and service and death during the war.

The author has done a tremendous job with his research and brings home the personal side of the war where the numbers of dead gets names and faces. Yet the only negative for me, and this is beyond the reach of great research, is that some athletes could not be given the coverage they deserved as there are no more records available for them, these are mostly from the Central Powers and eastern European nations involved in the war.

The Olympics covered are 1896 Athens, 1900 Paris, 1904 St. Louis, 1908 London and 1912 Stockholm, and as an added bonus the 1906 Intercalated Games in Athens which was recognized as an Olympic Games, but not anymore by the International Olympic Committee. The histories about all these Olympics are very interesting as there are descriptions of the many events involved in those games that you would not even know about today. Highly recommended to all fans of the Olympics and sports.

[Erin (Historical Fiction Reader) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Find this and other reviews at: http://flashlightcommentary.blogspot....

I jumped when I stumbled over Nigel McCrery’s The Extinguished Flame: Olympians Killed in the Great War. It sounds disrespectful considering the subject matter, but I enjoy stories of those who served on the front lines and I especially like those volumes that treat them as individuals rather than military units.

McCrery uncovered a lot of forgotten stories in this volume. I can’t imagine the level of research that went into it, but I think the author’s dedication quite obvious. The book is section by year – 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, and 1918 – with each Olympian chronicled in order by their date of death. The bios include general details about each athlete with specific information about their service and the Games and events in which they competed. Where possible the author also included photos of each Olympian.

Personally, I quite liked the volume and think it offers an interesting snapshot of lives cut short by the Great War. That said, I found the presentation a little dry and unbalanced. Some of the bios are a few pages long while others are only a few paragraphs. One can’t blame the author for this, there simply a lot of information out there on some of these individuals, but as a reader I was frustrated that some stories are very well-documented while other lives boiled down to only a few lines.

I found the writing itself a little bland and didn’t appreciate how the flow felt punctuated as if the author were hitting bullet points with each statement, but I think the book rather insightful just the same and I would definitely recommend it as resource to anyone interested in the men who gave their lives to the Great War.

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

thanks to netgalley and publishers for a free copy in exchange for an open and honest review.
detailed book in the first world war sports series showing sportsman who were killed during the great war and getting details on their bio and what events and which games they entered

[Terri Wangard · Rating 4 out of 5]

So many of the athletes at the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm, Sweden, served in World War One, and died. So many from earlier Olympics as well. These athletes would have known one another from these and other competitions. Then they were expected to kill each other.

The Extinguished Flame lists all the athletes and as much as is known about them. The biggest losers: fifty British men, twenty-nine French, twenty-two German. Only two Americans.

Not all of them died violently. American tennis player Arthur Yancy Wear was ill with ulcers and should not have been at the front. He insisted, collapsed, and died.

Prince Karl was the first athlete from the royal house of Hohenzollern to take part in the Olympics. He won an equestrian team bronze medal. A pilot, he crash landed his plane in no man’s land, tried to run for his line, and was shot.

An especially good luck, bad luck story concerned French runner Jean Bouin. He was encouraged by his stepfather, with whom he didn’t get along, to run in an Italian race. Jean won by a good margin, only to discover his stepfather claimed the prize purse and spent it. The French team came in third at the 1908 Olympics, and Jean set a French record, but the French federation refused to recognize the award of the bronze medal or Jean’s record as punishment for an unauthorized night out. In the war, he could have remained in a training capacity, but he refused, insisting on going to the front with his regiment. He was killed by shrapnel during the last days of the first battle of the Marne. In his will, Jean left everything to his wife, Rose. However, his stepfather challenged the will, demanding that all Jean’s property be handed over to him. After a lengthy legal process, Rose was finally awarded Jean’s effects.

Oswald Carver’s widow remarried a decade after his death, to future Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery.

Some athletes competed in events no longer part of the Olympics, such as the tug-of-war. Underwater swimming took place only in the 1900 games.

For some, especially the Russians, little is known. The Extinguished Flame offers an interesting look at one part of the lost generation.

[Katherine Wacker · Rating 2 out of 5]

In The Extinguished Flame: Olympians Killed in The Great War, Nigel McCrery chronicles the lives of the 135 athletes who perished in World War I. The volume is composed like an encyclopedia, and each entry has a short biographical sketch, the Olympic event, and a photo, if available. The athletes are separated by the year in which they died on the battlefield.

The Extinguished Flame is a fitting tribute to those who competed for their country and defended it as well. It is clear that the book is well-researched, a worthy effort to honor those who fought bravely on the frontlines.

However, there are frustrating aspects to the book. The author should not be faulted for the lack of information available for a specific individual, but some entries are so brief that one profile tends to meld into another in the reader’s mind. The writing style of McCrery is also somewhat dry and formulaic. As a result, the interest in The Extinguished Flame may be limited to those who study World War I.


I was given a free copy from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

[Kristyna Mackinnon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rio was the home of the summer Olympics this year. The thirty-first Olympics games to be exact and just like the others in previous years will go down in the history books. But The Extinguished Flame by Nigel McCrey novel was not about this year’s Olympics but the one that occurred in 1912 in Stockholm and the last Olympics to have occurred before World War I. A fair amount of the Olympians went on to defend their country during the Great War. Mr. McCrey novel recounts their stories of both the Olympics and the War. He does so in a way that would be able to hold onto most readers even the ones who find sport writings to be boring.

[A.L. Butcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not nearly as interesting as it first seemed. A bit more about each person would have helped

[Debbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not entirely what I had expected. I think I would have wished for a bit more "fleshing out" of the Olympians.