Private Peaceful

by

Michael Morpurgo

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Private Peaceful makes teaching easy.

Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful Character Analysis

Tommo Peaceful is the narrator and protagonist of the novel. Tommo is a kind boy who is fiercely loyal to his brothers Charlie and Big Joe, as well as his mother, Mrs. Peaceful. Throughout the novel, he struggles with feelings of inadequacy and guilt, especially surrounding his father’s tragic death. Tommo’s father was crushed by a tree as he was rescuing young Tommo from the same fate. In an unfortunate coincidence, the way that his father’s body was positioned when he died meant that his finger was pointing right at Tommo, which Tommo interpreted as a sign that he was to blame for his father’s death. By the end of the novel, Charlie assures Tommo that the death was not his fault, and Tommo finally comes to terms with the loss of his father. Tommo also initially considers himself to be something of a coward after an old woman accuses him of being a “chicken” for hesitating to enlist in the First World War. In an effort to prove his own bravery, he enlists to fight alongside his brother Charlie, even though he is technically too young to fight at just fifteen years old. The youngest in the family, he also feels left out of Charlie and Molly’s relationship as they begin to fall in love and grow up faster than Tommo. Tommo loves Molly, so he is jealous of Charlie in particular. Tommo later also falls in love with a girl called Anna in France, although she is killed not long after they meet. Tommo also loves his family, and their letters buoy him throughout the war. Charlie is a great inspiration to Tommo throughout the novel, often inspiring Tommo to be brave by example of his own courage. Charlie is in fact executed because he refuses to leave Tommo on the battlefield when Tommo is too injured to walk, demonstrating great courage and brotherly loyalty. This in turn inspires Tommo to try and survive the war, so that he can repay Charlie for his sacrifice by caring for his family, including his and Molly’s infant son, Little Tommo.

Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful Quotes in Private Peaceful

The Private Peaceful quotes below are all either spoken by Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful or refer to Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
The Injustice of War Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1 Quotes

He is on his back, his face turned away from me as if he doesn’t want me to see. One arm is outstretched towards me, his glove fallen off, his finger pointing at me.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Tommo’s Father / Mr. Peaceful
Page Number: 9-10
Explanation and Analysis:

A swallow swoops over our heads all through the prayers, all through the hymns, flitting from window to window, from the belfry to the altar, looking for some way out. And I know for certain it is Father trying to escape. I know it because he told us more than once that in his next life he’d like to be a bird, so he could fly free wherever he wanted.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful , Tommo’s Mother / Mrs. Peaceful, Big Joe Peaceful , Tommo’s Father / Mr. Peaceful
Related Symbols: Birds
Page Number: 10
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2 Quotes

Big Jimmy gets it first, and he keeps crying out: “Ow, sir! Ow, sir! Ow, sir!” But when it’s Charlie’s turn, all we hear are the whacks, and then the silences in between. I am so proud of him for that. I have the bravest brother in the world.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Jimmy Parsons (speaker), Charlie Peaceful , Mr. Munnings
Page Number: 20
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

I was once told in Sunday school that a church tower reaches up skywards because it is a promise of Heaven. Church towers are different in France. It was the first thing I noticed when I came here, when I changed my world of home for my world of war. […] There are not many steeples left now. I have seen the one in Albert, hanging down like a broken promise.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker)
Related Symbols: Church Towers
Page Number: 87-88
Explanation and Analysis:

Suddenly someone prodded me hard in the small of my back. It was a toothless old lady pointing at me with her crooked finger. “Go on, son,” she croaked. “You go and fight. It’s every man’s duty to fight when his country calls, that’s what I say. Go on. Y’aint a coward, are you?”

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker)
Page Number: 97
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 9 Quotes

We had a brew up with our prisoner in the dugout before they came for him. He smoked a cigarette Pete had given him. He’d stopped shaking now, but his eyes still held their fear. We had nothing to say to one another until the moment he got up to leave. “Danke,” he said. “Danke sehr.”

“Funny that,” Nipper said when he’d gone. “Seeing him standing there with not a stitch on. Take off our uniforms and you can hardly tell the difference, can you? Not a bad bloke, for a Fritz that is.”

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Nipper Martin , Pete Bovey
Page Number: 137-138
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10 Quotes

I feel a surge of triumph welling inside me, not because we have won, but because I have stood with the others. I have not run.

Y’aint a coward, are you?”

No, old woman, I am not. I am not.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful
Page Number: 146
Explanation and Analysis:

From then on, every waking hour of every day, Hanley was at us. […] By the time we went back up into the line, Hanley snapping at our heels, his voice had become a vicious bark inside each of our heads. Every one of us hated him like poison, a great deal more than we had ever hated Fritz.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Sergeant “Horrible” Hanley
Page Number: 156
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 11 Quotes

I looked up at the church steeple, a dark arrow pointing at the moon and beyond, and tried with all my heart and mind to believe she was up there somewhere in that vast expanse of infinity, up there in Sunday-school Heaven, in Big Joe’s happy Heaven. I couldn’t bring myself to think it. I knew she was lying in the cold earth at my feet. I knelt down and kissed the earth, then left her there.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Big Joe Peaceful , Anna
Related Symbols: Church Towers
Page Number: 171-172
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12 Quotes

“The whole court martial took less than an hour, Tommo. That’s all they gave me. An hour for a man’s life. Not a lot, is it? And do you know what the brigadier said, Tommo? He said I was a worthless man. Worthless. I’ve been called a lot of things in my life, Tommo, but none of them ever upset me, except that one. I didn’t show it, mind. I wouldn’t have given them the satisfaction.”

Related Characters: Charlie Peaceful (speaker), Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful, Sergeant “Horrible” Hanley
Page Number: 188
Explanation and Analysis:

It is the moment. I have to do it now. It is my last chance. I tell him about how Father had died, about how it had happened, what I had done, how I should have told him years ago, but had never dared to. He smiles. “I always knew that, Tommo. So did Mother. You’d talk in your sleep. Always having nightmares, always keeping me awake about it, you were. All nonsense. Not your fault. It was the tree that killed Father, Tommo, not you.”

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful (speaker), Tommo’s Mother / Mrs. Peaceful, Tommo’s Father / Mr. Peaceful
Page Number: 189
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13 Quotes

They tell me he walked out with a smile on his face as if he were going for an early-morning stroll. They tell me that he refused the hood, and that they thought he was singing when he died.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful
Related Symbols: “Oranges and Lemons”
Page Number: 194-195
Explanation and Analysis:
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Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful Quotes in Private Peaceful

The Private Peaceful quotes below are all either spoken by Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful or refer to Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
The Injustice of War Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1 Quotes

He is on his back, his face turned away from me as if he doesn’t want me to see. One arm is outstretched towards me, his glove fallen off, his finger pointing at me.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Tommo’s Father / Mr. Peaceful
Page Number: 9-10
Explanation and Analysis:

A swallow swoops over our heads all through the prayers, all through the hymns, flitting from window to window, from the belfry to the altar, looking for some way out. And I know for certain it is Father trying to escape. I know it because he told us more than once that in his next life he’d like to be a bird, so he could fly free wherever he wanted.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful , Tommo’s Mother / Mrs. Peaceful, Big Joe Peaceful , Tommo’s Father / Mr. Peaceful
Related Symbols: Birds
Page Number: 10
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2 Quotes

Big Jimmy gets it first, and he keeps crying out: “Ow, sir! Ow, sir! Ow, sir!” But when it’s Charlie’s turn, all we hear are the whacks, and then the silences in between. I am so proud of him for that. I have the bravest brother in the world.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Jimmy Parsons (speaker), Charlie Peaceful , Mr. Munnings
Page Number: 20
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

I was once told in Sunday school that a church tower reaches up skywards because it is a promise of Heaven. Church towers are different in France. It was the first thing I noticed when I came here, when I changed my world of home for my world of war. […] There are not many steeples left now. I have seen the one in Albert, hanging down like a broken promise.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker)
Related Symbols: Church Towers
Page Number: 87-88
Explanation and Analysis:

Suddenly someone prodded me hard in the small of my back. It was a toothless old lady pointing at me with her crooked finger. “Go on, son,” she croaked. “You go and fight. It’s every man’s duty to fight when his country calls, that’s what I say. Go on. Y’aint a coward, are you?”

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker)
Page Number: 97
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 9 Quotes

We had a brew up with our prisoner in the dugout before they came for him. He smoked a cigarette Pete had given him. He’d stopped shaking now, but his eyes still held their fear. We had nothing to say to one another until the moment he got up to leave. “Danke,” he said. “Danke sehr.”

“Funny that,” Nipper said when he’d gone. “Seeing him standing there with not a stitch on. Take off our uniforms and you can hardly tell the difference, can you? Not a bad bloke, for a Fritz that is.”

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Nipper Martin , Pete Bovey
Page Number: 137-138
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 10 Quotes

I feel a surge of triumph welling inside me, not because we have won, but because I have stood with the others. I have not run.

Y’aint a coward, are you?”

No, old woman, I am not. I am not.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful
Page Number: 146
Explanation and Analysis:

From then on, every waking hour of every day, Hanley was at us. […] By the time we went back up into the line, Hanley snapping at our heels, his voice had become a vicious bark inside each of our heads. Every one of us hated him like poison, a great deal more than we had ever hated Fritz.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Sergeant “Horrible” Hanley
Page Number: 156
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 11 Quotes

I looked up at the church steeple, a dark arrow pointing at the moon and beyond, and tried with all my heart and mind to believe she was up there somewhere in that vast expanse of infinity, up there in Sunday-school Heaven, in Big Joe’s happy Heaven. I couldn’t bring myself to think it. I knew she was lying in the cold earth at my feet. I knelt down and kissed the earth, then left her there.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Big Joe Peaceful , Anna
Related Symbols: Church Towers
Page Number: 171-172
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12 Quotes

“The whole court martial took less than an hour, Tommo. That’s all they gave me. An hour for a man’s life. Not a lot, is it? And do you know what the brigadier said, Tommo? He said I was a worthless man. Worthless. I’ve been called a lot of things in my life, Tommo, but none of them ever upset me, except that one. I didn’t show it, mind. I wouldn’t have given them the satisfaction.”

Related Characters: Charlie Peaceful (speaker), Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful, Sergeant “Horrible” Hanley
Page Number: 188
Explanation and Analysis:

It is the moment. I have to do it now. It is my last chance. I tell him about how Father had died, about how it had happened, what I had done, how I should have told him years ago, but had never dared to. He smiles. “I always knew that, Tommo. So did Mother. You’d talk in your sleep. Always having nightmares, always keeping me awake about it, you were. All nonsense. Not your fault. It was the tree that killed Father, Tommo, not you.”

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful (speaker), Tommo’s Mother / Mrs. Peaceful, Tommo’s Father / Mr. Peaceful
Page Number: 189
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 13 Quotes

They tell me he walked out with a smile on his face as if he were going for an early-morning stroll. They tell me that he refused the hood, and that they thought he was singing when he died.

Related Characters: Thomas “Tommo” Peaceful (speaker), Charlie Peaceful
Related Symbols: “Oranges and Lemons”
Page Number: 194-195
Explanation and Analysis: