Martin Shelley

Martin Shelley was a VMCE Blackburne and OCE Marque specialist. He was an amateur historian of the early motor industry. He and his brother Nick discovered the Burney Brothers' photograph albums and medals in an auction. They quickly realised they featured in the classic "Adventures of a Despatch Rider" by W.H.L. Watson. Critically, the captions and names, written on the backs of some pictures in the album, helped them to identify the 12 despatch riders, whose exploits Watson had written about. The Shelley brothers used these striking pictures to illustrate the book, which also sought to place Watson's thoughtful memoirs into a wider context through detailed research. Over the course of 6 years, they traced the despatch riders' families, unearthed unpublished material written by other members of the unit, and read the war diaries and Watson's correspondence with his publishers. They also visited the Western Front, where they followed the tracks of the despatch riders, from Mons to the Aisne and back to Flanders.

RCC7767 Two Wheels to War. A Tale of Twelve Bright Young Men Who Volunteered Their Own Motorcycles for the British Expeditionary Force 1914. Incorporating the Full Text of "Adventures of a Despatch Rider" (Shelley, Shelley)