WHEN OUR LADS COME MARCHING HOME
Cheltenham Looker-On, Saturday 09 March 1918
THE THEATRE AND OPERA HOUSE.
“WHEN OUR LADS COME MARCHING HOME.”
The popular taste is hit by Sheila Walsh in the play now running at the Theatre and Opera House, and as it is presented by Mr. Harry Foxwell’s capable Company, success was assured from the first night. When our Lads Come Marching Home not only the joy bells but the marriage bells will be set ringing if the author’s insight is correct, for in the play four couples are quick in finding their way to church after the return of Sergeant Jack Maxwell, Private Robert Saunders, Private Wm. Snooker, and Lieutenant Arthur Railton. The chief interest in the story affects the relationship between Sergeant Maxwell and Peggy Leslie, who, when Maxwell’s regiment is ordered to the front, part under a particularly black cloud, for an insinuation has been made against Peggy which the latter is unable to repel without betraying her sister’s trust. The scene moves to the trenches, where, or rather in no man’s land. Maxwell rescues a wounded officer from certain death by risking his own life, only to find that he has saved the man whom he imagines to be the cause of his separation from Peggy. In the face of death, however. Railton reveals Peggy’s secret, to which he too had been made a party by the latter’s sister, for whom he retains an ardent affection in spite of her faux pas. The end of the war—i.e., the stage war—sees the lads hurrying back home, and Maxwell among them to ask Peggy’s forgiveness for his mistrust. Another love story, not without its rough passages, runs alongside the main one, and in this Private Saunders and Dolly Dawson are the hero and heroine, while Private Snooker has some unenviable experiences in the same line. The scallywag in the piece is a certain Conscientious Objector, Silas Wigglesworth by name, who does not object to profiteering even in munitions, and whose aim in parting Maxwell from Peggy was to secure her for himself—a purpose in which he was of course foiled. The part of the much-tried Sergeant is well taken by Mr. Roy Selfridge, and Miss Lilian Maitland very successfully doubles the parts of the two sisters Peggy and Elsie Leslie. Mr. Ernest Lester is Private Saunders, and Mr. Courtney Robinson personates Private Snooker. Mr. Edgar C. Milton is effective as Silas Wigglesworth, and Mr. Arthur Edwards plays John Maxwell, the Sergeant’s father. Mr. Frank Irish is Lieutenant Railton, and Miss Florrie Hall is a smart Dolly Dawson.