"Two Generals" Pencils Nearing Completion

The platoon loses its radio operator in this grisly scene from page 115 of Two Generals:
 

More Illustration from the Vaults

Kind of enjoyed this old piece I just came across, a full page for an Atlanta Magazine article about suburban living. The title of the article went in the middle of the page, hence the amount of negative space there.

RIP Colonel Doug Barrie

In just a couple of hours, I'll be attending the funeral for retired Colonel Doug Barrie.

As I wrote in this post from May 2008, Colonel Barrie had been a friend of my grandfather and Jack Chrysler when all three were young lieutenants, each leading a platoon of the Highland Light Infantry of Canada during WWII. He was the last remaining officer of the war-era regiment.

In one of the most serendipitous episodes of my life, I met the Colonel completely by chance on my first trip of many to the Cambridge Armoury in the very early days of researching Two Generals. He was there returning some books he'd borrowed from the regimental library. We were introduced, someone from the officers' mess brought a couple of beers around, and then we sat and talked for about three hours. Or, rather, the Colonel talked while I furiously scribbled notes, stopping only to ask the occasional question.

I had twenty or twenty-five pages of an early draft written at that point, but after that night I came home, threw it away, and started again. Not only did I have so much more information than before about what happened to the HLI of C in England and France from someone who was there, but I had a personal take on who my granfather and Jack were, from someone who knew them at that age. It was clear that the book could now be expanded, and greatly improved. It was truly a turning point for the project.

I had the honour of interviewing Colonel Barrie two or three more times in the next few months, and he was always helpful, enthusiastic, kind, and a joy to spend time with. On one occasion, there was a scotch tasting being held in the officers' mess. The fellow conducting the tasting felt sorry for us just sitting there, so he kept bringing glasses of Scotch around for us. The Colonel would protest - "well, I'm really not supposed to" - just enough to say he'd done it, before gladly accepting each glass. It was a fun night.

As a thank you to the Colonel, I wrote him into two scenes in the book. In a strange bit of synchronicity, I drew the first of those scenes last week, just before he died. And I drew the second last night, just before I'll attend his funeral. I just wish that he could have lived to see his comics debut in print. But I was honoured to get to know him while he still lived, and will always be thankful for the stories and encouragement he gave me, which have meant so much to me on both a personal and professional level.

I could never quite get him to appreciate the fact that Two Generals wasn't something I was self-publishing, or doing for a small local publisher, or as a hobby. That it's for one of Canada's most prominent literary publishers and will, if all goes according to plan, end up in every classroom in the country. I think it may have seemed too much for him to hope that the stories he'd been telling for so many decades with such loyalty to his fallen comrades might find that wide of an audience. But they will. I just hope that I've done them the justice they deserve. It's the least I can do for such men, of whom Colonel Barrie was among the last.