Bill Stone, RIP

I was sorry to learn of the death of Bill Stone, one of only three remaining British veterans of the first world war, at the age of 108. In fact, Bill served in the Royal Navy in the second world war as well, being demobbed after 27 years' service. From what I have read and heard, he was a man I would have very much liked to meet.

When I visited the library last week, my eye was drawn to a book containing extracts from diaries kept by people during the second world war. This was all part of an exercise conducted by Mass Observation, a social research organisation founded in 1937. Coincidentally, the BBC has also had diaries on its mind and last week broadcast a television adaptation of Anne Franck's diary. As this was split into five parts and was aired at an inconvenient time, we recorded it and so far I have watched only the first episode. It is many years since I visited the house were the Francks family hid in Amsterdam, and even more since I read to book, but all seems reasonably true to the story as I remember it.

The BBC also broadcast a programme about a diary kept by a 14-year-old girl, a Jewess, in Poland during the German occupation. This had only come to light fairly recently but has now been published in book form and is used as a textbook in Polish schools. It was very moving to hear Polish schoolgirls of the same age reading aloud from the diary, even with subtitles. Unfortunately, the girl (I can't remember her name and couldn't spell it even if I could remember it) perished in Auschwitz.