Old Thunder

Photograph from the Hilary A. Belloc Collection, MS1998-004 Box 2,Folder 21, John J. Burns Library, Boston College.

Defender of the Faith: Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953)

Hilaire Belloc’s nickname that stuck with him for life was ‘Old Thunder’, so named for his fierceness in argument and strong views. Yet he was also a kind and sympathetic man with a mischievous sense of humour. He was a prolific writer of fiction, poetry, essays, history, biography and a huge number of letters.

Belloc was born in July 1870 in a village just outside Paris on the eve of the Franco-Prussian war to a French father, Louis, a lawyer, and an English mother, Elizabeth, who converted from the Unitarian church to Catholicism. A great lover of Catholic culture, apologetics, the outdoors, sailing, Belloc’s life was nevertheless beset by tragedy. Following the death of his father (after five years of marriage) in 1872, when Belloc was only two, the family returned to Birmingham and Belloc was then educated at Cardinal Newman’s Oratory School. On leaving school, Belloc chose to serve a term of military service with the French army. Back in England, he went to Balliol College, Oxford University where he became President of the Oxford Union, the University’s debating society, and began to establish his reputation as a brilliant but intemperate speaker. He became good friends with G. K. Chesterton and George Bernard Shaw, who along with H.G.Wells became known as the ‘Big Four of Edwardian Letters’. Graduating with First Class honours, Belloc was aggrieved not to be offered a Fellowship, a failure he put down to his Catholicism. Following a long involvement in politics after he’d become a British subject, he turned all his energy to journalism and writing.

Belloc’s robust Faith was the guiding force of his life, and he believed it to be central to the survival of Western civilisation, famously declaring “the Faith is Europe and Europe is the Faith”. He feared no foe, challenging in debate and condemning all the heresies of his day, and those in history, sometimes using very strong language which made him plenty of enemies! Many of Belloc’s strongest views were aimed against Islam which he prophesied would be a returning menace and threat one day. At the time of his writing, the Islamic world was still largely under the rule of the European colonial powers and the threat to Britain was from Fascism and Nazism. Belloc, however, considered that Islam was permanently intent on destroying the Church, as well as the West, which Christendom had built.

He had a great love for the Blessed Virgin and prayed the rosary daily.

In an excerpt from his ‘Ballade to Our Lady of Czestochwa’ we read:

“You shall receive me when the clouds are high

With evening and the sheep attain the fold.

This is the faith that I have held and hold,

And this is that in which I mean to die.”

Elodie Agnes Hogan was born in 1868, the daughter of Irish immigrant parents.

Belloc was happily married to Elodie, an American from California, and they had five children. A great sportsman, Belloc practically crossed the U.S.A. on foot in seach of his beloved. He had met and fallen in love with her on a trip she and her family had made to Europe. Elodie’s untimely death on the feast of the Purification 2^nd February 1914 at 45 years of age left a deep wound in Belloc’s heart that lasted till he drew his last breath. Tragedy struck again in 1918, when his eldest son Louis was killed in action during the First World War. Post-war a torrent of articles and books continued to pour from his pen, many critical of the modern world. In 1942 he suffered a stroke, not long after the death of another son, Peter, in the fighting of the Second World War, which effectively brought his literary career to an end.

He lived on till his shortly before his death in 1953 (at nearly 83 years) at his home in the beautiful dales of West Sussex, England, to which he’d often expressed a deep fondness.

For further reading:

http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0035.html

And to hear a recording of Hilaire Belloc’s voice singing four of his poems:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmCTfnNvafo

A new book has just been published by St. Benedict Press  on Hilaire Belloc’s writings, titled “The Essential Belloc: a Prophet for Our Times”. It is co-edited by Scott J. Bloch, who gave an interesting interview on EWTN’s ‘Bookmark’ about this fascinating, larger-than-life character.

Reprints

Ignatius Press of California and IHS Press of Virginia have been reissuing Belloc. TAN Books of Charlotte, NC publishes a number of Belloc’s works, particularly his historical writings.

(Original pictures from here)