IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 40

In 2002 the B.B.C. held a poll among viewers to find the One Hundred Greatest Britons. While polls give different results every time they are taken, it is interesting to note how the 2002 poll compared with the great Britons who featured on the back page of EAGLE in the 1950s. Top of the poll was Winston Churchill, who appeared on the back page in The Happy Warrior in 1957 - 58. Also in the top ten was Horatio Nelson at number nine, whose story was told in The Great Sailor in 1956 - 57. At number thirteen was Baden Powell, the founder of the Scouting Movement, who appeared on the back page in 1954 and at number fourteen was King Alfred the Great, featured in 1953 - 54. We then have to wait until number eighty eight and Bernard Law Montgomery, the Second World War General whose story was actually featured on EAGLE's centre pages in 1962 and was the last of EAGLE's serialised biographies. At number ninety three was the Elizabethan hero Walter Raleigh, featured in The Golden Man on the back page in 1961 and finally at number ninety eight was David Livingstone, the Victorian missionary and explorer, who featured on EAGLE's back page in 1957. Many of the back page heroes weren't British, so obviously didn't qualify for the poll, but there were two back page Britons who didn't make the hundred. These were St. Patrick, featured in EAGLE in 1951, who some people don't realise was British and Wilfred Grenfell, the Labrador doctor and missionary, featured in 1952 - 53, who is less well remembered in Britain today than he was in the 1950s. 

The B.B.C. top ten also included Isambard Kingdom Brunel (2), Diana, Princess of Wales (3), Charles Darwin (4), William Shakespeare (5), Isaac Newton (6), Queen Elizabeth I (7), John Lennon (8) and Oliver Cromwell (10). Princess Diana wasn't born when most of the back pagers appeared in EAGLE and John Lennon was not quite ten years old when EAGLE was launched. 

IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 7

WITH JIM DUCKETT

You don’t tend to bump into people called Horatio every day, but no less than three Horatios featured in their own strips in Eagle. First was John Ryan’s Captain Horatio Pugwash, who appeared from the first issue until the nineteenth in 1950. The next was the real life Horatio Nelson, who was featured in the back page serial The Great Sailor in 1956-57 and finally there was C.S. Forester’s fictional naval hero, Horatio Hornblower, whose adventures were adapted for Eagle in 1962-63. Of course all these Horatios are linked by the sea and all captained ships at some time in their lives. Nelson was one of Britain’s greatest heroes of the Napoleonic wars and Eagle included no less than three fictional strips set during this period. Only the wild west and contemporary times were featured more. First was Jack O’Lantern, about a young boy in the later years of the conflict, which ran in Eagle from 1955-60. Then came the already mentioned Hornblower stories and finally in 1964, Johnny Frog, about another young boy, this time set around the time of the Battle of Trafalgar. Both Jack O’Lantern and Johnny Frog were written by George Beardmore. 

Pugwash, created by John Ryan appeared in semi-animated cartoons made by Ryan himself for the BBC and became a television and literary success. He is soon to appear in a live action feature film starring Nick Frost as the popular pirate.  

Staying with the sea, Eagle forged strong links with the aircraft carrier H.M.S. Eagle, including featuring her as a cutaway drawing. H.M.S. Eagle was launched in 1946 and was the fifteenth Royal Navy ship to bear the name. Commissioned in 1951 she saw war service during the Suez Crisis of 1956. After service all over the world, she had an extensive refit in 1959 and another in 1966, finally being withdrawn from service in 1972. She was subsequently moored in the River Tamar, where she was held in reserve until 1976, although she was stripped for essential parts needed by H.M.S. Ark Royal. She was finally scrapped in 1978. I was lucky enough to see the ship’s brass name plate on a visit to the Royal Naval Dockyard Museum at Devonport a few years ago and one of her anchors can be seen at the entrance to the Fleet Air Arm Museum at Yeovilton.