William George Shiell (1890-1974)

Shiell was born in Dundee on 29 August 1890 as the second son of John Shiell, solicitor (1844–1920), and Katherine G. Guthrie (1850–1922). His paternal grandmother was German: Alexandrina Ursula Wilhelmina Korn (1822–69, born in Hanover). He was educated at Rugby School and was a Commoner at Magdalen from 1909 to 1912, graduating with a 4^th class degree in Law in 1912.

William George Shiell
(From the Magdalen group photo of 1912)

At the outbreak of war Shiell was travelling with Mark Kearley, and they were interned together in Ruhleben. They may have been touring the Bavarian Alps, as after the war Shiell published a booklet entitled A Tour in the Bavarian Alps 1914–1916.[1] In May 1915 in the Rugby School magazine,[2] the headmaster reported having received a letter of greetings to himself and the school from six old boys, including Shiell, who were interned at Ruhleben.

Early in 1916 Shiell fell ill, as he describes in a letter to President Warren dated 17 September 1916: “I was ill in January last, while in the Camp Sanatorium, the Doctors there described it as a chill but when I got to London and saw a Doctor, he told me that I almost certainly had scarlet fever and in consequence my heart has dilated and is in bad condition.”[3] This treatment, or rather lack of it, for some months at Ruhleben was described by Cohen thus: “there was only one doctor for the 4500 prisoners: he was in attendance in his room for two hours, at utmost, in the morning, after which he left the Camp for the rest of the day”.[4] Things did improve and were much better when Shiell was taken ill, due to representations by the American ambassador. However, in the new sanatorium prisoners had to pay eight or twelve marks a day, and those who could not afford it were paid for by British government funds administered by the American embassy, but they were expected to repay the loan in due course. Shiell obviously did not improve in the camp and so he was transferred for medical treatment to the spa of Bad Nauheim.

He was released in July 1916, possibly in exchange for S.J. Bieber, who was interned in the civilian internment camp at Lofthouse Park near Wakefield.[5] He arrived in Gravesend on 7 July. The Times[6] reported his arrival, which came at a time when there was much criticism in England of the way the internees were treated, especially with respect to food. The returning internees had agreed to say nothing as they feared “that anything published might cause harm to the men left behind”. Nevertheless, one “declared very emphatically that it was quite impossible to live on the food now supplied to the men”, and moreover, the supplement that could be bought in the canteens “is now very scanty indeed, much of it consisting of a very inferior kind of jam”.[7]

Shiell recovered, and initially worked in the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence, but on 1 January 1918 he landed in France and on 29 January he was gazetted 2nd Lieutenant on the General List serving as a censor in Calais. He was awarded the Victory and British Medals. After the war he was attached to the legation in Vienna and then the embassy in Berlin before going to work with the Anglo-International Bank. But at the beginning of World War Two he returned to the Foreign Office, where he worked until he retired.

In 1922 he married the Hon. Violet Kitson (1900–73), the daughter of Albert Ernest Kitson, 2^nd Baron Airedale (1863–1944), and Florence von Schunck (1868–1942). They had one son and three daughters. His best man was the Hon. Mark Kearley, the Magdalen man with whom he had been travelling when they were interned in Ruhleben.

Shiell died in 1974 leaving £115,000

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[1] William Georg Shiell, A Tour in the Bavarian Alps 1914–1916 (Woodchester: Arthurs Press Limited, 1925).

[2] The Meteor, no. 585 (28 May 1915), p. 4.

[3] Magdalen College Archives: PR32/C/3/106i.

[4] Israel Cohen, The Ruhleben Prison Camp: A Record of Nineteen Months’ Internment (London: Methuen & Co. Ltd, 1917), p. 84 et seq.

[5] National Archives FO 383/169.

[6] The Times, no. 41,214 (8 July 1916), p. 7.

[7] This lack of provision of food by the German government was a recurring theme in The Times throughout the war. The German response was that it was the British blockade that caused the food shortage in Ruhleben. See for example The Times of Saturday 8 July 1916, p. 7 (no. 41,214).