Question ; Which character in the Biggles series is tall and slim, wears a monocle, has a combat wound that makes him limp and comes from an aristocratic family ?
Answer : The obvious answer to this question is not just von Stalhein, as one might expect, but Bertie.
The team is Biggles, Algy, Ginger and Bertie. However, Bertie only enters the stories in Spitfire Parade which is set at the beginning of the Second World War. From that point onwards he is an ever-present, sharing the fortunes, the adventures and, indeed, the home flat of the three intrepid airmen who have already been together for many books. He starts as a raving eccentric but evolves with total credibility into being a sensible and well-balanced member of the British police force.
It was easy to see what W.E.Johns was up to. For the duration of the war Biggles was to be given his own squadron to lead against the Nazis. Already he recognised that in total war every fighting man, no matter what his background, had to be committed to building a team that would unify their efforts and take them to success. Thus Biggles was given his special squadron of the misfits and rejects from other establishments. The force that was to bind them together was the power of Biggles’ personality. Already he had his inner team of Algy and Ginger. We should remember that Algy himself in the First World War stories appeared to obey no normal rules of combat but flew with individual brilliance and recklessness until he was moulded into a first class-member of Biggles’ flight. The same could be said of Ginger who was living like a wild boy in the woods before Biggles took him under his wing and turned him into a first-class mechanic and pilot. Algy is the Honourable Algernon Montgomery Lacey and Biggles’ cousin. Ginger is Hebblethwaite (or Habblethwaite in the first story) from a mining village in Yorkshire. At first sight the recipe of forming a team from strong characters who come from widely differing backgrounds is already well-established before the eccentric Bertie Lissie enters the picture.
It is Raymond who briefs Biggles in a letter about his new squadron. The first name that leaps to his mind is Lord Bertie Lissie followed closely by that of Tug Carrington who comes from the rough east end of London. The toff and the tough, who have little in common, who do not understand or appreciate each others background but who eventually earn mutual respect, are ,without doubt, an important theme in W.E.Johns’ writing. The backbone of the Gimlet series is the contrast between Copper, the ex-London policeman who is bent on revenge for the bombs dropped on London, and Gimlet himself, Captain Lorrington King, the essence of a minor aristocrat. Copper and Gimlet are both in the Commandos and, mainly through the eyes of Nigel “Cub” Peters, a public-school boy himself, we are encouraged to see the way that England is uniting to fight back. (The inclusion of the French Canadian Trapper pushes the idea that the British Empire will also help to defeat the Nazis and the Japanese).
“he’s a devil with a Spitfire and a wizard with a gun, but I’m afraid he’s as mad as a hatter”.
These are Raymond’s first words about Bertie and they seem to be immediately confirmed. Within seconds of Biggles reading the letter Bertie surges into his office in pursuit of his dog, Towser, whilst blowing a small hunting horn. The comment “That fellow’s off his rocker” does not seem inappropriate. However, unlike Algy and Ginger who received their first taste of aerial conflict under the watchful eyes of Biggles, Bertie is already a Flight Commander and a man with a record. Indeed Tex O’Hara (belligerent American) and Ferocity Ferris (Liverpool slums) are astonished to discover that Bertie already holds the DFC and the AFC.
It is hardly surprising that the very first story in which he appears tell us more about Bertie’s appearance than all the other stories put together. The same could be said of the descriptions we are given of Biggles himself. On the other hand some of these early details in Spitfire Parade are never repeated and it takes a reading of all the other books to fill in the details of his background and situation. The monocle is Bertie’s trademark but other, more uncomplimentary details, are never repeated.
“Nobody, not even his best friend, would have called Lieutenant Lord Bertie Lissie handsome, or his face a strong face. On the contrary, his small aristocratic features, had, at Cranwell, once inspired an adaptation of his name to “Cissy”.”
The “hay-coloured moustache” which is mentioned next is also never referred to again. The fact that his clothes were in disarray, as though he were careless of his appearance, may be put down to his frantic pursuit of Towser, rather than a long-standing slovenliness in dress. Strangely enough, even his eyes,
“extraordinarily blue and curiously bright”
his one positively described attribute are never mentioned again, though the looks in them, suggesting greater shrewdness than betrayed by the rest of his face, do occasionally figure at moments of crisis.
The eyes and the monocle do cause a problem. Rather like von Stalhein’s limp, we never do find the truth of the matter. Does Bertie have a defect in his sight or is the monocle an affectation ? The evidence that is of practical use to him in seeing things finally comes in Biggles and the Plane that Disappeared. When asked whether he has to wear it his reply is
“Not really, but it saves me looking for a pair of spectacles, or having to grope in my pocket for ages, when I want to look at something very small.”
He mentions the tying of flies for fishing as being one occasion when he would find it useful. However, up to this point in the series of adventures the monocle has been a symbol of Bertie’s personality and an indicator of his upper-class status. More importantly it is used to signify his feelings at particular points in quite a few episodes. Thus we have:
“Casually polishing his eyeglass” Biggles in the Gobi
“polishing his eyeglass thoughtfully” Biggles breaks the silence.
“Bertie polished his eyeglass reflectively” Biggles hunts big game.
“polishing his eyeglass vigorously” Biggles in the Orient.
“Monocle in eye, looking slightly bored” Comrades in Arms
and many, many more.
His concern for his monocle in times of crisis provides a comic counterpoint to the tension displayed by other characters. Thus in Spitfire Parade the last adventure concludes with Bertie who has just returned from a dangerous mission to blow up the lock of a vital canal in occupied France his only problem was not the cowardly French agent who lost his nerve but the fact that in the explosion he lost his eyeglass. When Biggles and the rest of his officers are under attack by dive-bombers in the Sahara (Biggles sweeps the desert) Bertie is so confused by what happens that he starts to grope around and ask the others about his precious monocle. This provokes Biggles to say,
“Don’t be a fool ……It’s in your eye.”
His monocle causes both consternation and curiosity amongst the native inhabitants of the various different countries that his career as a detective takes him too. Thus one of the Taureg Arabs in Sergeant Bigglesworth C.I.D. asks:
“Who is this man who wears a window in his face ?”
In Biggles Goes Home Bertie helps to finish off a man-eating tiger that has been terrifying a small village of the Gond tribe. As a result of becoming a local hero all the small children in the village start putting small stones into their eye-sockets to imitate the great white hunter. When all four comrades have to dress as Orochon traders in Biggles Gets His Men not only do they have to have their skin dyed yellow Bertie also needs a reminder from his leader.
“you’d better take that window out of your face”.
“But I shall be lost absolutely lost without it.”
Without doubt the monocle often appears to give more trouble than it is worth.
“The trouble with these tropical climes is my eyeglass keeps getting steamed up…..” he complains in Biggles Makes Ends Meet. Strangely enough the description of Bertie’s monocle gradually recedes into the background with one of the last mentions being in Biggles’ Special Case where W.E.Johns finds another use for the continuing motif of the eyeglass by Bertie swearing;
“If I haven’t seen him before I’ll swallow my eyeglass.”
From Biggles and the Plane that Disappeared onwards a reader of the last 18 Biggles stories would scarcely know that Bertie wore a monocle apart from a few illustrations and some rare book covers. Is this partly a sign that the repetition has worn the device out or is it, as I will try to demonstrate, that Bertie, like Erich von Stalhein, has begun to evolve into a different sort of character ?
There is no doubt that the way in which Bertie talks is the key to his personality and to his appeal. In Spitfire Parade it mentions “a slight lisp” and because this speech defect is never mentioned again we get the impression that Lord Bertie was meant to be a temporary denizen of Biggles’ world whose role was to be the deliberate contrast to Tug and Ferocity and Tex and the rest. W.E. Johns was not alone in this approach of mixing the classes in war-time as even a cursory viewing of any British propaganda film from 1939-1945 will reveal. However, if the lisp was discarded all the other tricks and mannerisms of speech were established, adopted for the duration and then expanded in all the post-war detective adventures. Bertie was so different to the others that his mere presence could lighten the tone, especially of the rather serious discussions that Biggles embarked on at Air Police Headquarters.
If we start with the adverbs of manner used to describe his utterances without doubt a close scrutiny reveals that “cheerfully” is used again and again by W.E.Johns. Sometimes it also allied to “enthusiastically” and both words are particularly evident towards the beginning of each adventure when things are starting to happen. In contrast to this is the used of words “in a bored tone” and its equivalents crop up when a period of waiting sets in. Bertie, particularly in the early stories is a man of action who loathes waiting for things. Patience, at this stage in his career, is not his strongest asset. As you would expect from a member of the upper class there is the occasional clipping of the endings of words faithfully represented by W.E.Johns with such examples as “Good Lor’” and “huntin’” and “waitin’”. These verbal tics are surprisingly rare compared with other features of his language. Nevertheless it his vocabulary that causes the greatest amusement and it sometimes creates the impression that somehow or other Bertie Wooster has escaped from PG.Wodehouse and Jeeves and joined the R.A.F. under the name Bertie Lissie.
His favourite adjectives are “bally” and “beastly”. They appear to be applied injudiciously in any sort of circumstances from the deeply serious to the totally mundane. Here are just a few of his “beastly” nouns:- beastly calculations, eyeglass (inevitably), too beastly hot, beastly destroyers, beastly bombers, beastly things mines, beastly place, beastly islands, beastly iceberg - and so into their hundreds. There is the occasional “frightful” and “frightfully” thrown in for good measure. Should I list all the expressions where "bally” appears it would mount up to a similar number but, as Bertie says in Biggles’ Second Case,
“no bally fear”.
Of course a measure of approval can be seen with the use of “jolly” and “jolly old”.
“I’ve just been posted to this jolly old squadron” he tells Biggles when they first meet in Spitfire Parade.
If he enjoys a situation he says “What fun !” or “Not half !” Things to be approved of are “top hole” and he confirms his approval or agreement by coming out with “Absolutely”.
Other people, usually the villains or the enemy, are “blighters”. However, “blighters” can be a mild form of criticism of his own comrades, especially when they are poking fun at him. In true public-school style he is able to exclaim in Biggles ‘Fails to Return’ :
“What a bounder the blighter must be…..” in a voice which W.E.Johns suggests is “well-dressed”. On a mounting scale some of the villains they meet are “pirates” or “rats” or even “scallywags” but worst of all they are “stinkers” or “absolute stinkers”. Words which suggest that he hasn’t yet made up his mind but he fears the worst include calling potential villains “johnnies” or “stiffs”.
He never uses bad language but he has a limited repertoire of words to show mild surprise or indignation. Thus he can declare “By Jove” or “By Gad” or “By Jingo” or even “Dash it all !” Most amusing of all are the expressions he uses when he is totally flabbergasted. Thus in Biggles on Mystery Island he declares
“Chase me round the gasworks !”
whereas earlier in Biggles in Australia it was “Chase Aunt Lizzie round the haystacks !” On two subsequent occasions he decides it should be Aunt Annie who is chased round the gasworks. When faced with a problem or a reversal of fortune that has him or the team temporarily stymied he suggests that the situation is “a bit of a corker !” If he thinks that he has been treated unreasonably he is inclined to say that things are “a bit steep”. When he is treated very unreasonably he declares that it is not just a bit steep but that it is “practically vertical”.
Bertie doesn’t ever suggest he should “move” or “go” from one point to another. Walking or running are never simply described as just that. Slow movement is suggested by “toddle”
“Toddle along and let off your fireworks..” Spitfire Parade.
Flying endlessly across the Indian Ocean carrying loads of rubber in slow-moving Liberators brings forth the comment that he dislikes
“tootling across that beastly ocean.”
It is difficult to discover whether the term “waffle” as used by both Bertie and Biggles is meant to describe faster locomotion than “trot”. Without doubt, however,
“skid long home” Biggles in the Blue
is the fastest of all.
Quite often his turn of speech is self-deprecating and betrays a feeling of inadequacy or perhaps an ability to express himself clearly. Thus he relies upon a series of stock tag-questions, the most frequent of which is - “if you know what I mean” or “if you see what I mean”. Constantly his utterances run out with the rather indefinite “and all that” or “and all that sort of rot”. His seeking of agreement or fellow feeling is often suggested by the addition of the word “what” on the end of his last phrase
it of a bore what ?” Biggles in Borneo
He describes himself quite often as a “bally idiot” or a “silly ass” who often asks the “silly ass “ sort of question and at times it seems that W.E.Johns has come up with an exaggerated creation who talks in a mixture of public school juvenile language and R.A.F. jargon. And yet it is this stark contrast between Bertie’s manner of speech and those of his companions that makes the dialogue come to life. When this is coupled with the contrast between Bertie’s asinine language and his splendid career as a man of action the very contradiction that arises becomes the essence of his contribution to the Biggles saga. His role is to be underestimated. The juvenile reader who has come to know him from the wartime books onward knows that there is more to Bertie than meets the eye. On countless occasions he is underestimated or dismissed by an enemy who is not as shrewd as the reader. It is, of course, von Stalhein who sums it up in Biggles Works it Out
“He looks and sounds a complete ass but he isn’t.” In fact he also gives him the following accolade:
“One of Bigglesworth’s best men.”
It is time to examine what Bertie actually does to merit this flattering (but surprisingly accurate) description.
So what do we really know about the life and background of Lord Bertie Lissie ? The evidence is there in the books as far apart as Spitfire Parade when he first appears to Biggles Scores a Bull which is one of the last dozen books to be written. It can be detected in stories as diverse as Biggles and the Lost Sovereigns and Gimlet, King of the Commandos.
After the war Bertie shares the Mount Street flat with Biggles, Algy and Ginger. In Biggles Hunts Big Game we learn that he has to collect rifles and other equipment so that he and Ginger can assume their undercover roles.
“With them they had the usual equipment of the amateur big game hunter…..All these things had been picked up at Bertie’s home.”
Thus we know that as well as his pied a terre in London to be handy for Air Police headquarters he also has another, presumably larger residence possibly somewhere close to the capital. In Biggles Looks Back Bertie for the first time tells us where it is. He announces himself and his credentials, as though under inspection by the authorities of Bohemia,
“The Lord Lissie. Chedcombe Manor. Occupation, gentleman and all that rot.”
In Biggles and the Dark Intruder Bertie shows good knowledge of the area around Bodmin Moor but that would appear to contradict an establishment closer to London.
We learn a little about Bertie’s childhood in Biggles Scores a Bull. According to Lord Dubray who had known Bertie’s father Bertie has been a
“sandy-haired freckle-faced kid..”
Lord Dubray goes on to express his regret over how Bertie’s father had been killed in the hunting field. Bertie also tells Biggles how his own family had fallen on hard times.
“Well, before taxation I mean these infernal death duties knocked us for six, my father and his father before him were well-known stock-breeders. Having plenty of land they did it as a sort of hobby, as does Lord Dubray.”
Without a doubt Bertie’s family has fallen on hard times and we get the impression that he now retains little more than the family home rather than any worthwhile estates. Quite clearly he has been brought up as a country gentleman. He even manages to make light of quite a traumatic incident from his youth. He tells Ginger in Biggles and the Lost Sovereigns that he once had the experience of being blasted with shot gun pellets.
“I can tell you, old boy, because I once had to go through the same ordeal after a silly ass, firing blind through a hedge at a rabbit, plastered me with a charge of number six shot. I was a kid at the time. Our game-keeper, scared of what my father would say, made me strip to the waist so that he could pick out the bullets with the point of his knife.”
Other incidents from before the Second World War are somewhat sketchy. In Biggles ‘Fails to Return’ he is shown to have an intimate knowledge of Monaco and its environs. He used to go there for the ‘season’ as a competitor in the Monte Carlo Rally.
“He had competed in the motor boat trials, had played tennis on the famous courts, and golf on the links at Mont Agel. He had stayed at most of the big hotels, and had been a guest at most of the villas owned by leading members of society.”
It becomes clear that Bertie had built up a good relationship with some of the ordinary people of Monaco for Francois Budette is delighted to see him again and invites home into the bosom of his family in spite of the danger that this will cause with occupying Fascists. Naturally his pre-war knowledge proves invaluable to Algy and Ginger as they set out to rescue Biggles. W.E.Johns provides a few more hints about Bertie’s background for during the Gimlet adventures we learn of the old boy network that links people like Bertie and Gimlet and the nonchalant agent Freddie. Instead of the war they talk about their horses and their dogs and the possibility of fox hunting. In one adventure Bertie is portrayed as being more worried about one of his bitches in whelp than the dangers of flight over and landing in occupied France.
His career before joining Biggles squadron must have begun at Cranwell where the look in his eye soon convinced his fellow officers that the nickname ‘Cissy’, although it rhymed with Lissie, was not appropriate. The first flight he makes with Tex O’Hara and Ferocity Ferris is enough to convince them and the reader that Bertie is a force to be reckoned with. Biggles never has cause to regret that Raymond sent him to him as a Flight Commander. That he belonged to one of the squadrons that had fought on French soil before the disaster at Dunkirk emerges when he takes Biggles’ place in flying over the agent to blow up the canal lock.
“Why, dash it all. I did three months on the aerodrome at Abbeville before the Frenchies went wallop.”
He has also had experience of the type of eccentric that Biggles likes to deal with for he gives a clear but vivid picture of Taffy Hughes, the wrecker, before that man arrives at 666 squadron in a runaway tank. Poor old Bertie loses the ancient Morris car he drives in the resulting debacle.
Surprisingly Bertie is the only one of the four comrades whose tally of enemy planes shot down we are actually told by W.E.Johns. It is Ginger in Biggles Takes Charge who tries to explain the apparent strangeness and contradictions in Bertie’s personality.
“That rot he sometimes talks comes from an inborn horror of being taken for a line-shooter, as we call a braggart. When you meet that sort of Britisher, be careful. They’re dangerous. They may talk in circles but they act straight, ride straight and shoot straight. It may surprise you to know that during the war Bertie managed to knock down thirty-two enemy aircraft. He didn’t keep count, but I did.”
So Bertie enters the stories in Spitfire Parade and soon becomes almost indispensable to the tight-knit team of three that had existed before the war. That W.E.Johns knew his importance as a character is demonstrated in Biggles ‘Fails to Return’ where Biggles is absent from the narrative until near the very end and Algy, Ginger and Bertie all have separate adventures. As we have already mentioned Bertie’s knowledge of Monaco proves invaluable. This and the fact that he is a Flight Commander are enough to guarantee that he will take part in the rescue. One of W.E.Johns’ few errors or rather contradictions in later books indicates the leverage that he applied to get Bertie centre-stage in the story. The contradiction concerns Algy. In Biggles ‘Fails to Return’ it clearly states :
“Neither Algy nor Ginger had ever been to Monaco…”
yet much later in Biggles Takes Charge Algy describes in some detail his time in Monte Carlo including playing tennis matches, golf and swimming. Now this is perfectly acceptable behaviour for both Bertie and Algy because before the war they both moved in the kind of society where life on the Cote d’Azur would be normal. However, to get Bertie a vital role in rescuing Biggles W.E.Johns gives him specialist knowledge of the area which the others do not possess. By the end of the book Bertie seems very much a member of the team and not just one of the squadron. However, the transition to a special place in the readers’ minds was not yet complete. The other wartime adventures include Bertie and his vocal peculiarities are given a small amount of play in various minor episodes. Thus, for example, in Biggles Sweeps the Desert whilst flying a decoy Whitley he complains that Biggles has “snaffled” his hun.
In Biggles Delivers the Goods Biggles has to face the loss of Algy to the Japanese.The following thoughts run through his mind:
“The thought of Algy a prisoner in enemy hands affected him more than he was prepared to reveal to the others. Probably they felt the same. While he did not allow himself to dwell upon the possibility of Algy or Ginger becoming a casualty there was always a fear of it lurking in the background of his mind. If one of them went it would make a difference.”
You will notice that there is no mention of Bertie as occupying the same depth of feeling in Biggles’ heart. It seems as though the vital role he played in Monaco has now receded into the background. Yet, though he would make the most unlikely policeman, there never seems any doubt that he will be one of the chosen to join Sergeant Bigglesworth C.I.D. in his new venture. At this stage Air Commodore Raymond confirms the attachment that Algy and Ginger have to Biggles when he makes his decision.
“I don’t think you need to consult Algy and Ginger.”
He does, however, have to ask Bertie separately.
Just like the others Bertie has run out of things to do now that the war is over. He cannot resume his activities as a country gentleman;
“They’ve shot all the bally foxes, so there won’t be any huntin’ for a bit.”
He treats the whole idea as a bit of joke. Yet it must be round about this time that taxation begins to bite into the Lissie family fortunes. Bertie very soon may have to find some form of remunerative employment. It comes very near the end of the series but in Biggles and the Noble Lord W.E.Johns manages to point out that not everybody shows such constructive adaptability and resourcefulness. Lord Malboise and his brother have turned to crime in order to keep up the family estates. Clarence tries to defend his action by a strongly-felt argument.
“It’s the government you work for who are the crooks. During the war I risked my life a hundred times. What did I get for it ? My brother and I were taxed until we hadn’t a penny to put our property in order. Look at the state this place is in. Now you know why. Well, we’ve thought of a way to get over that difficulty, and you’re not going to stop us. Don’t you call me a crook.
‘Have you ever thought of working for a living ?’ snapped back Ginger.”
Clarence and his brother had not. Lord Bertie Lissie did. He became a policeman.
But what qualities did Bertie have that would suggest that he would be successful in his new job ? To be honest he hardly looks promising detective material. In fact at times he hardly even looks like a plausible Flight Commander. In Biggles Sweeps the Desert he is left in temporary command of the detachment stranded in the Sahara. He outranks Ginger but is immediately prepared to concede the leadership and the plan of campaign to him. Admittedly he manages to carry out the plan of ambushing the armoured car with little difficulty but, when it comes to thinking things out he appears to be on the back row for ideas. To a certain extent this is contradicted by his tactics with Air Commodore Raymond in Biggles Fails to Return where he does not admit he knows Monaco and its surroundings until he and his comrades have a plausible plan of campaign ready.
“Never play your trump cards too soon no, by Jove.”
Although he often shows courage and determination and strong principles
“It is rash to make promises but we do not desert our friends….”,
it is fair to say that Bertie is more often acknowledging his own weakness in the brain department.
“Good thing you are here to do the thinking,” is what he says to Biggles as the Germans prepare to attack the oasis at the climax of Biggles Sweeps the Desert.
His behaviour on his first detective case identifies him as the rather foolish Watson to Biggles’ Sherlock Holmes. Bertie asks how he and Algy are meant to measure the breadth of the undercarriage span from the tyre marks in the desert sand if the pilot, after landing, had taken the trouble to wipe them out. Biggles of course points out that it would be a very clever pilot who could erase his track marks after the plane has taken off again. Not for the last time Bertie suggests that he is a silly ass. Still caught up in the destruction of wartime most of Bertie’s solutions to problems tend to be the violent ones:
“How about shooting the beastly place up…” he says in Sergeant Bigglesworth C.I.D., forgetting in his foolish enthusiasm that Biggles himself would be a likely victim of such an attack. Later in the same story he ventures on
“How about dropping a bomb or two on them to stir them up if you see what I mean.”
This second time he has forgotten that this will result in the destruction of the gold that they have been sent to recover.
Bertie’s strengths and weaknesses are clearly brought out at the end of the book where his flying skill makes him successful in a duel in the air over Sudan with the German ace Von Zoyton. Unfortunately he is wounded in the shooting match and the doctors have to operate on his leg so that it ends up shorter than the other. His courage and never say die spirit come through with his declaration about the surgeon.
“I asked him to cut a piece off the other, to get ‘em the same length again.”
For a long time Bertie is required to play the foil to Biggles and the others. His leaps to a solution are nearly always criticised by Biggles and sometimes Algy and Ginger. In Biggles’ Second Case he talks of sinking the German submarine, forgetting once again that the gold that they seek to recover will be sent to the bottom of the ocean. He displays his impatient nature when he wants to set off on a search the moment that the aeroplane belonging to Biggles and Ginger is a few minutes overdue. Algy has to remind him of what Biggles would want them to do. When later the remains of the missing aircraft are found on an iceberg the two of them do not know what to make of the crash. In fact Bertie declares:
“I’m no bally detective.”
In fact that is just what he is supposed to be. However, even as he makes this admission he provides it untrue by his close observation of the longerons of the wrecked aircraft and his sensible deduction about what could have happened. His place in the pecking order of the four comrades is still clearly at the bottom. In Biggles Takes a Holiday another crisis arises in which Algy, Ginger and Bertie have to decide what to do in the absence of Biggles. Bertie declares:
“Never was any use at organizing. You tell me what to do.”
Ginger does so. Bertie, never short of boldness, immediately recovers our respect by the way in which he plunges into the tropical river in order to lighten the grounded machine. Biggles must have moments when he doubts the contributions that Bertie can make to the detective side of the enterprises that they get involved in the Air Police. In fact, in the frozen wastes of Antarctica, after another of Bertie’s madcap suggestions he remarks,
“There are times, Bertie, when I think that you must be sheer bone from one ear to the other.”
In these early days Bertie is still learning and earns his place in the team by sheer grit and determination and reckless courage. Like Algy and Ginger he has acquired the one track mind needed to see a job through no matter what the consequences and what his private fears about Biggles and the others may be. Thus in Another Job for Biggles he is left alone with Zahar, the Arab who has joined their party, and with the instructions that he must destroy the dam at the oasis of El Moab. However, inclined he may feel to go searching for the missing Ginger and Biggles, he fixes himself upon the task that he has been set. He completes the job with verve and splendid spirit and in the nick of time. His reputation stands high with Algy as well as Biggles for in Biggles Works it Out their newly acquired comrade, Marcel Brissac of the French Air Police, tells Biggles that he has just been attacked by Bertie in a Hurricane and that this so-called policeman had tried to shoot him down. Algy is quick to comment:
“If Bertie was flying that Hurricane, and wanted to shoot you down, you wouldn’t be here now. What he shoots at, he hits.”
In fact Bertie’s foolish behaviour, his silly ass voice and his lack of resemblance to anything like a real policeman start to prove to be a real asset when he goes undercover to try to crack the air pirates. When in Biggles Works it Out he manages to convince Canson that he is a British R.A.F. officer down on his luck he acts with speed and decision. He manages to get rid of all the possessions and papers that will reveal his true identity before entering the bandits’ stronghold. He recognises the psychological power tricks that the Count (the leader of the international criminals) is trying to play on him by making him sit whilst he continued to stand. Only the fact that von Stalhein is joining the crooks’ organisation blows his cover. Bertie makes no mistakes and acts with his usual courage as the story builds to its climax in the Ahagger Desert. Over twenty stories later it is clear that Biggles has learned to take advantage of Bertie’s “front” of foolishness. In Orchids for Biggles he comments to the Air Commodore:
“I think Lissie would be the best man for the job, which seems one in which he could play the dumb Englishman to advantage.”
This is not the last time that this happens for example the image of Bertie as a young man with money to spare again proves useful when the team investigate the case of the missing aeroplane in Biggles and the Plane that Disappeared.
However, Bertie is also shown to be gradually improving in the perception of the suggestions that he makes. When he and Biggles are forced down by a collision with a bird in Biggles in the Gobi it is Bertie’s idea that they may as well stay on their emergency landing ground for a flight to Dacca and back is unnecessary. The suggestion is adopted with great success. When they are stranded on the small island in the South Atlantic in Biggles Cuts it Fine it is Bertie who reads the state of the weather and the sea conditions, revealing another aspect of his privileged background.
“I’ve done a fair bit of yachting and I know a rip tide when I see one.”
When Marcel Brissac is missing in Indo China Bertie sums up the feelings of all four members of the team when he says:
“Never mind the arithmetic, argued Bertie. The basic idea of Interpol was that one member country should help another. If they’re not going to do that then the whole bally thing falls down. If Marcel is in a jam then it’s up to us to get him out.”
The extent of Biggles’ growing affection is shown in No Rest for Biggles where Bertie is captured and stabbed by native spears. Though feeling very ill, Bertie apologises and comments that:
“I wouldn’t guarantee to beat Bannister over a mile.”
Biggles responds;
“You couldn’t be a nuisance if you tried, you big stiff.”
Bertie’s desire to get one of his schemes adapted by Biggles becomes one of the running themes of the books and this all comes to a head in Biggles’ Combined Operation. Working in cooperation with an American colleague Biggles and Co. are shadowing the contact man for a drug running operation that operates via a ship that calls in southern France. This involves following a ship as it makes its way eastward through the Mediterranean. Bertie thinks that it would be a good idea to get someone on the inside of the organisation by getting on board the ship which is clearly used for smuggling. His proposal is that he should be dropped in the sea in advance of the track that the ship is taking. Even though his plan is later modified into being placed into a small rubber dinghy, Biggles knows that what is being attempted is extremely hazardous. Eddie, the American, is frankly appalled at the risk that is being taken. Biggles declares:
“I’m allowing him to do this against my better judgement. In fact, I only agreed to this crazy plan because I could see if I turned it down he’d have been hurt, saying I always knocked his ideas on the head.”
Inevitably Bertie gets into trouble for his identity as a detective is soon exposed. Thinking resourcefully, he succeeds in sowing dissension in the enemy organisation by revealing that one its agents has been responsible for an unauthorised killing.
Incidentally, though Bertie many times seems to be little more than the silly ass he claims to be, there are constant reminders of his classical education. Thus, when in the Greek islands on the adventure mentioned above, he is able to talk with authority about Daedalus and Icarus. He is also able to quote the story of Hero and Leander. When Marcel opens fire on the Russian submarine with the machine gun that the Russians themselves had secretly installed in Biggles Cuts it Fine Bertie is ready with his singularly appropriate comment.
“Hoist the blighters with their own beastly petard, as old Willie Shakespeare used to say.”
By the time we reach Biggles Goes Home Bertie is back in his self-critical mode. He complains to Biggles:
“Funny how none of my schemes seem to click.”
However, very soon afterwards he wins Biggles’ approval for the inventive way he has used Ginger’s parachute to devise a workable stretcher that will make movement easier for the injured member of their party. He grows further in stature in Biggles and the Leopards of Zinn when he succeeds in standing off two armed men and various savage natives who wish to take an old helpless member of the Zinn tribe back into captivity. Everyone can approve of the principles that he declares and that he is prepared to fight for.
“It’s a thundering shame people can’t be left alone to live as they like and do what they like. From what we have been told these Zinns have always been a decent enough folk.”
He puts himself in the position of maximum danger and refuses to give ground. Later in the same story he volunteers to help Charlie, the native member of the King’s African Rifles, to stand guard in deserted Zinn village when attacks by the vicious leopard people could still take place. At the end he thoroughly approves of Biggles’ decision not to let the world know that the Zinn territory in rich in aluminium ore.
All the usual traits in his character are confirmed again in Biggles Takes it Rough. Left on guard by the others Bertie spends his time in both maintaining his vigilance and fishing for a lobster. When confronted by the enemy party in force Bertie is both forceful and funny. They demand information from him. Bertie replies:
“My name is no concern of yours, you impudent fellow.”
As he speaks he is nipped by the lobster he has just caught and instinctively throws it away. One of the men threatening him is taken by surprise and falls into a rock pool. After further threats Bertie manages to send them away worried by talking about how the Royal Navy are soon going to turn up. Alas his scheme for cooking and eating lobster comes to nothing. Later on when he and the others are burnt out of the deserted cottage where they are staying by a deliberately set fire his suggestion of using the same tactics on the enemy in their castle is also dismissed.
“Bertie shook his head sadly.’It’s no use. My ideas never click.’”
Perhaps the adventure in which the depth of Bertie’s courage and resolution is displayed to its greatest extent is Biggles Forms a Syndicate. Trapped underground in the deserts of Yemen with an old R.A.F. pilot called Dizzie Digswell, Bertie faces the gradual suffocation as the air in the cave is used up by their efforts to escape. Painstakingly the two men work on the landslip from inside, removing rock after rock until there is a chance of escape. To their horror there is a further crashing fall from above and there is another mountain of debris for them to work through. At this point Dizzie wants to give up for the task in front of them seems hopeless. W.E.Johns’ records Bertie’s reaction.
“Bertie did not answer. He went on with what he was doing, picking up the rocks and putting them behind him.”
And, of course, Bertie and Dizzy survive their ordeal.
One of the most remarkable books that Bertie appears in is Biggles Sets a Trap. Here Biggles’ investigations are concerned with the family curse and threat that hangs over Sir Leofric Landeville. Bertie is the assistant selected by Biggles to accompany him to Ringlesby Hall and to watch whilst the case unfolds and finally resolves itself. In view of his own aristocratic background the reader might expect that the Lord Lissie side of Bertie’s personality might emerge. However, at no point during the story does Bertie show any acquaintance with the sort of traditions that surround Leofric, the interpretation of heraldry or even any understanding of what it must be like for an aristocrat to live in straightened circumstances. It is like the peculiar behaviour of the dog in the night so beloved of Sherlock Holmes devotees. In this case why W.E.Johns chose Bertie to be in the story and did not exploit his special background is highly peculiar. You could substitute Ginger for Bertie and, apart from one “old boy” and another “blow me down” of surprise the reader would not notice. In fact the story would have been stronger if it had been Ginger for then Biggles’ explanation of the ideas and history associated with nobility would not strike such a false note when addressed to one unacquainted with that sort of life.
This similar toned-down Bertie appears in several of the later novels including Biggles and the Black Mask. Here his stereotypical language is uncannily muted. Admittedly he does describe someone as a “stinker” but this expression is lost in a sea of sensible behaviour. Biggles and the Plot that Failed is also without much in the way of Bertie-speak. In fact he reveals himself as quite knowledgeable about all the people who have explored or got lost in the deserts of Africa. Moreover as Bertie enters into this final phase of his career in the Biggles books his contributions to the success of the team’s efforts grow larger and his wealth of specialist knowledge grows richer. We have already seen the depth of his knowledge about cattle rearing in Biggles Scores a Bull and in Biggles and the Dark Intruder Bertie is, as he would put it, positively bristling with ideas. He knows about the china clay workings (he calls them the Cornish Alps) that would be clearly visible from the air to a pilot of a low-flying aeroplane. He knows the distribution of old mine-shafts across the county would provide plenty of potential hiding places. Most specialised of all he knows about how gorse is burned off in order to control the food supply on grouse moors. This last point is of invaluable assistance to Biggles who is trying to calculate the likelihood of an unauthorised plane making landings on Bodmin Moor.
“Glad to of help sometimes, if you see what I mean.”
This comment to Biggles is certainly justified in the Dark Intruder story for he goes on to make further deductions about the sort of dog ostensibly being used to look after sheep and the probable whereabouts of a radio aerial. As Biggles comments,
“This seems to be one of your really bright days.”
The class loyalty which was totally lacking in Biggles Sets a Trap suddenly re-emerges in this tale for he refuses to believe that Sir Humphrey Trethallan is a criminal.
“Once a gent always a gent.”
This time he is proved wrong.
He also finds himself imprisoned in a dip in the ground near an old mine-working. As Algy appreciates, Bertie is a very dedicated police officer by this stage in their careers, and he declares to Biggles,
“Only trouble in a big way would have prevented him from keeping the appointment with you.”
Bertie solves the problem of drawing attention to himself by setting fire to the moor in the hope that Biggles or one of the others will come inevitably to the source of the blaze. This proves effective and Ginger manages to rescue him. Bertie, however, has been injured by the fall into the dip. This is one of the many injuries that he seems to pick up during the later books.
Examples of Bertie’s courage, astuteness and acumen multiply. He may still claim to be a silly ass but his behaviour and his perceptive comments constantly give the lie to it. Thus in Biggles and the Black Mask he is the first to notice that, though they know for certain that forged notes have been smuggled into the country for some time, none of them were actually being put into circulation. Instinctively he has gleaned the vital information which eventually reveals the motive of Dr. Fortescue, the man behind it all. More impressive than this is the way that he, and he alone, finds the vital clue that leads to the villains in Biggles and the Noble Lord. In the round table conference that is held at the beginning Bertie is the one that points out the masterminds behind the crimes must some form of collectors. He deduces this from a small item on the lists of the objects that had been stolen and places the correct interpretation on why it had been stolen. Ironically this leads to members of a noble family being implicated in the crimes. As Biggles says, the Air Commodore may have an unhealthy respect for people with titles, but they (and he must include Bertie) do not.
Like the others Bertie has to play many different roles as a member of the police force. The word “role” has been chosen advisedly for disguise would be an inappropriate term. Bertie, in spite of his eccentricities being toned down slightly in the later books, is always quintessentially Bertie. He is so obviously not a policeman that his silly ass persona (as von Stalhein correctly identified) can be of invaluable assistance when disarming suspicion. In an early air police story Biggles Makes Ends Meet he completely hoodwinks the rogue American pirate into underestimating him and escapes successfully from the secret island supply base with the vital information that Biggles has been searching for. A country walk in Biggles on the Home Front leaves the enemy considering him to be a fool who has wandered off the public roads on to a private estate. On at least two occasions he poses as a R.A.F officer down on his luck and in need of a flying job. By the time we get to Biggles and the Noble Lord he has become capable of playing the part of the chauffeur of rich princess (played incidentally by Ginger). The last story of all has Bertie accompanying Biggles as a seaside holidaymaker in Biggles Sees Too Much.
In spite of his increasing versatility, his developing intelligence and knack for police work, his undoubted bravery, his well-developed sense of comradeship, it is his language that holds the main appeal for the reader. He always ventures the colourful expression. From the banal understatement of it being “a rum do” when a perplexing mystery faces them to the wild enthusiasm of “a clinking idea” Bertie’s character shouts from the page. This leads W.E.Johns into giving Bertie a few virtuoso performances that, though unnecessary to the development of the plot, give vitality and a touch of the grotesque to what could have been mundane dialogue. Thus in Biggles Gets His Men Bertie is faced with the awkward task of escorting the half-drunk Petroffsky back to the safety of his home village. Bertie reels him along by using half-placatory and half insulting names without once repeating himself. Thus by turns Petroffsky starts off as the “old Muscovite warrior” becomes “old boozer”, regains some dignity as “old Cossack”, loses it again as “old warbler”, becomes more inebriated as “old vodka bottle” and “old soaker” and then re-establishes his credibility as a hunter as “my nimble Nimrod”, “my old sabre-rattler” and finally “my old sharpshooter”. Petroffsky isn’t really listening and Bertie is really just talking to keep his own spirits up (and the reader amused.)
The book that follows (Another Job for Biggles) finds him in similar vein, though this time the results are less happy and strike an discordant and unpleasant note to modern ears. For Zahar, the Arab who has helped Biggles and his comrades in the pursuit of the villains who are trading in gurra, is called a series of names that it would be easy to take exception to because they refer apparently to the colour of his skin “old coffee berry”, “old chocolate drop”, “old chestnut” and the even more offensive “Sambo”. However, inoffensive Bertie intends to be there is no doubt that this reference would have struck a jarring and upsetting note in its sloppy racist insensibility even in the 1950’s when it was first written. Johns, and therefore Bertie, are guilty of tactless short-sightedness that mars a story in which the admirable qualities of Zahar (his courage, his resolution, his fatalism) are constantly extolled. By now the reader knows that it is just Bertie dribbling off nonsense and that no racial slur was intended by the author. Indeed Bertie’s lack of racism is amply demonstrated on this and other occasions:
“To him a pilot was a pilot, whatever his colour or nationality.”
Exuberance with language is the keynote of his contribution to the Biggles saga. Witness these examples of how his contributions to the dialogue enliven many of the patches of books where the waiting game is required. Perched in a tree outside a country mansion in Biggles on the Home Front he suddenly declares:
“I’m no dicky bird.”
When things go well he comments that it is
“a delicious drop of gravy…”
When he discovers that they are going to have a cook on their expedition to the islands off the coast of Burma he sums up his feelings of relief very pithily:
“If there’s one thing that binds me rigid it’s kitchen sinkery.”
“Stew me in a hogwash !” he asserts when confronted by another surprising incident in Biggles Looks Back. The arrival of a Tibetan lama ringing his bell in Biggles in the Gobi is greeted by:
“Well, stuff me with suet pudding. If it isn’t the muffin man.”
He whistles, he sings, he takes violent and sometimes hilarious action, most memorably in Biggles Makes Ends Meet where he immobolizes one of the enemy by dropping a pot full of porridge on his head.
By the time Bertie appears in the last book Biggles Sees Too Much, he has become much more sensible and a sober and reliable member of the team. His wisdom in making the point about using Jersey’s airport as an advanced base shows how he has evolved as his career progressed. However, a side of his nature that still remains unexplored is the way in which he reacts to women. In Biggles Fails to Return his attitude towards Ginger who has an involvement with a pretty Monagasque girl is rather anti-romantic. A running theme through the second half of the book are his sad but realistic observations on Ginger’s behaviour.
“Is this a romance or a rescue ?” he asks. He also calls Ginger Sir Galahad.
When they find Biggles and Ginger once again mentions Jeanette he responds with,
“Oh, good lor ! Haven’t you forgotten her yet ?”
He even makes the observation:
“I don’t hold with all these women in the party.”
The next time that Bertie encounters a female in the series of stories comes much later in Orchids for Biggles. Here, operating undercover in a tatty South American jungle town bar, Bertie is sat on by the resident female singer during the course of her act. His instinctive reaction is to take offence. Biggles later explains this to the women involved with the following comment:
“He meant no offence. He is afraid of women.”
Tantalisingly this point is never explored any further. However, sooner or later we return to one of the core books in the series Biggles Looks Back where together with Erich von Stalhein, another limping man with a monocle, he plays a vital part and this time a woman is deeply involved and not just any woman. But that comes later.
