RF Delderfield's school novel

To Serve them all my Days is one of Delderfields more modern novels and it has more independent women in it than many of his older works. It is set in the 20 years or so between the end of World War One and the first part of World War Two, and is about a small public school in Devon. The hero is a young Welsh man called David Powlett Jones, who comes from a mining family. He was a clever boy and though his father ad brothers were miners who died in a pit disaster, he got scholarships and was planning to go to college. At the age of 18, the War broke out and David decided to join up. He rose from the ranks and became a captain, but after 3 years he was seriously injured and suffered shell shock. He was invalided out and spent a lot of time in hospital, where a doctor suggested that he should try and get a job in the country, in a small community. David is shy and apart from the war has had a very quiet life. However, he agrees to try and find such a job and is offered an interview in the small country School, Bamfylde, which has trouble getting staff because it is so isolated. He tells the headmaster Algy Herries that he has no experience of teaching and no degree.... Mr Herries tells him that he would be a godsend, if he can teach at all, as most of thier masters are elderly or sick men who could not fight, and that he could study for his degree during holidays.