RUDYARD KIPLING...A TRAGIC STORY

I was in the process of adding to my catalogue www.dougfindsbooks.com a book by Rudyard Kipling that I had not come across before.It was described as "his forgotten masterpiece" Well aware of his stories such as 'Kim', 'Puck of Pooks Hill' and his'Just So' series and that he had served as a correspondent in both India and South Africa,I was a little surprised to see the title as The Irish Guards in the Great War...The Second Battalion.
However behind this book was a very tragic story.His only son John Kipling, who was born in 1897,was not only deeply loved by his famous father but who was featured as Dem in Puck of Pooks Hill. When World War broke out in 1914, John, who was only 17 and below the minimum age to volunteer of 18,begged his father to allow him to join by using his influence.Reluctantly Rudyard contacted his old friend from their Boer War days, the eminent Lord Roberts(who had lost his own son,who was awarded a posthumous V.C attempting to save the guns in Natal during the Boer War).Lord Roberts succeeded in getting John Roberts a commission as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 2nd Battalion,The Irish Guards before his 18th birthday.His father accepted all this with great foreboding and a very heavy heart but accepted his son's wishes.
It was leading his platoon  at the battle of Loos in 1915 he was seen to have been wounded and was never seen again alive and was posted as 'missing' and later as killed in action.He was later buried with a tombstone as an' Irish officer' and it was only many later that a formal identification was made.Kipling died in 1936 never knowing where he fell and where he was buried. A sad story but it lead to him writing this very accomplished history of his son's regiment in World War 1.A very good read !