World+War+I+and+last+years

=World War I and last years=

Jerome had always taken to using humour as panacea though privately he was often melancholy. His play The Passing of the Third Floor Back, (1908) with an uncharacteristic moral tone was only a success after people got used to his new style of delivery. The English army wouldn't accept his service but in 1916 Jerome was an ambulance driver for the French army. He would return to England after the war and like many it had taken away a large part of his spirit of good humour. Jerome's autobiography My Life and Times was published in 1926. On 17 February 1927 Jerome went back to Belsize house where a tablet graces his birth home and he was given the honour of Freeman of the Borough of Walsall in the Town Hall, followed by a dinner. On the occasion Jerome said "This Freedom of the Borough, it is the people's knighthood. I take it you have conferred upon me the Knighthood of Walsall, and I shall always be proud of my spurs." He wrote to the Mayor about just how touched his was by the entire ceremony. On 14 June 1927 Jerome died in Northampton General Hospital after suffering a series of strokes. He was cremated at Golders Green, Middlesex on 17 June and buried at St Mary's Church, Ewelme, Oxfordshire. On 29 October 1938 Georgina Elizabeth Henrietta Stanley Marris died. She, along with Ettie, Elsie and his sister Blandina now lie buried beside Jerome. The Jerome K. Jerome Society was formed in 1984 and consists of members from all over the globe. Belsize house holds the Jerome K. Jerome museum and houses a fair amount of photographs, books and personal items of Jerome's. "Let your boat of life be light, packed with only what you need - a homely home and simple pleasures, one or two friends, worth the name, someone to love and someone to love you, a cat, a dog, and a pipe or two, enough to eat and enough to wear, and a little more than enough to drink; for thirst is a dangerous thing." from Three Men in a Boat (to Say nothing of the Dog) "It is in our faults and failings, not in our virtues, that we touch one another and find sympathy." from Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow.