Fleur de Lys flashback
Why did we create the Fleur de Lys magazine in the first place?

To celebrate the 150^th anniversary of Trinity College, we're diving into the time machine to share stories and deliberations of our past students, as recorded in our annual student publication, the Fleur de Lys.

In our final Fleur de Lys flashback for the year, we rewind all the way back to the beginning – 1907, volume I – when the magazine first came into being. Editors Franc Carse and Warden Alexander Leeper share their hopes for the magazine – to be a record of events, to celebrate history, and to report on and debate matters beyond the college bounds; a vision that has been upheld through various magazines of Trinity College since.

It was also penned at a time when military training was at the forefront of public debate. Our first Warden had some strong views on the matter, and used his inaugural magazine introduction to share these:

It has long been an aspiration of the College to possess a permanent magazine. Spasmodic attempts there have been, but with all their various merits they can hardly be said to have realised the ideal of a College paper.

We hope that the Fleur de Lys will realise that ideal and supply a want which has become more widely felt with each successive year. So we hardly need an introduction to our readers, and if any justification be demanded for our attempt, a short glance at the aim and object of a College magazine will provide it.

In the first place, we require some record of College affairs in every phase, including not only a chronicle of our achievements in work and sport, but a reflection of the inner life of the College.

These aims are obvious.

But we hope to supply a broader, deeper need. We would deal not only with matters of exclusive College interest, but would, as far as in us lies, present the College point of view on matters further afield.

And not forgetting the claims of an older generation we hope to find room for the doings of those who went before us, thus emphasising the continuity of College life.

If we can succeed in this, our effort will not have been wholly vain.

The general improvement all round the University in finance, numbers, work and sport is in no small measure due to the generous help we have received from the nation. For this we owe a debt which we cannot better repay than by leading the way in the solution of one of the most pressing problems of the day – our national defence.

We strongly advocate the scheme of compulsory military training, and desire to see it introduced at any rate in the University. Opponents of the scheme lay great stress on the fact that is would be impolitic to take any side on a controversial matter.

The nation has not yet made up its mind they say; the University must not venture to throw its weight into the scale. But we have a higher ideal of the functions of a University than seems to obtain among the majority of the professional board.

We wish to see it lead public opinion, not timorously follow it. The University should be the intellectual centre of the nation: not a mere “shop” for the purchase of technical knowledge. It should endeavour to produce citizens of the broadest, completest and most useful type possible – and for this we venture to say military training is essential – not mere automata saturated with technical knowledge and technical knowledge only, in the acquiring of which they cannot spare time to fulfil the duties of citizenship.

Other objections there are – and always will be to every bold proposal – but all objections lose their force in the face of our country’s need and our alma mater’s obvious duty.