What have I done for you,England, my England?What is there I would not do,England, my own?
What have I done for you,England, my England?What is there I would not do,England, my own?
What have I done for you,England, my England?What is there I would not do,England, my own?
What have I done for you,
England, my England?
What is there I would not do,
England, my own?
W. E. Henley’s“For England’s Sake.”
Soldier, soldier, if by shot and shellThey wound him, my dear lad, my sweetheart O,He’ll lie bleeding in the rainAnd call me, all in vain,Crying for the fingers of his sweetheart O.
Soldier, soldier, if by shot and shellThey wound him, my dear lad, my sweetheart O,He’ll lie bleeding in the rainAnd call me, all in vain,Crying for the fingers of his sweetheart O.
Soldier, soldier, if by shot and shellThey wound him, my dear lad, my sweetheart O,He’ll lie bleeding in the rainAnd call me, all in vain,Crying for the fingers of his sweetheart O.
Soldier, soldier, if by shot and shell
They wound him, my dear lad, my sweetheart O,
He’ll lie bleeding in the rain
And call me, all in vain,
Crying for the fingers of his sweetheart O.
Maurice Hewlett’s“Soldier, Soldier.”
Give them a cigarette and let them grip the operating-table, and they will stick anything until they practically collapse:Corpl. H. Stewart, Royal Army Medical Corps.
They have shot my greatest friend from under me—my horse Minnie, the most faithful animal in the world. God forgive them for that; I never will:Pte. Knowles, 6th Dragoons.
I came across a young chap sitting with his back against a tree—dead, and around him, in a circle, he placed all his letters and photographs, as much as to say: “Please post these to the people concerned, as I am dying”:A Private of the Northumberland Fusiliers.
One of our men holding his water-bottle to a wounded German was shot dead close to Mons on Sunday. Another stopped under fire to light a cigarette, when a bullet struck him on the fingers, and one hand will have to come off:Private S. Burns.
In the middle of the battle a driver got wounded and asked to seethe colours before he died, and he was told by an officer that the guns were his colours. He replied, “Tell the drivers to keep their eyes on their guns, because if we lose our guns we lose our colours”:Driver W. Moore, Royal Field Artillery.
The grandest thing to buck a man up is the way our men take their wounds. You do not hear them yelling when they are hit. You hear the words, “I’ve got it, boys. Hard luck!” It is grand to see the way they take it, a smile on their face, and not a murmur as they are carried down on the stretchers:Pte. A. Robson, 7th Batt. Royal Fusiliers.
I was fetching our bottles of water. I crept to one house. The woman tried to tell me something in French. I could not understand, so she pulled me in the next room. There was a woman just confined. She was on the point of madness. I could not do anything, so I told my officer. He sent me for the parson, and got some of us together, and we carried her, bed and all, to a safe place:Pte. E. Smith, 2nd Worcestershire Regiment.
It was wonderful how cheerful the wounded were. One poor fellow who had been shot in the head, and hit by a shrapnel bullet in the mouth—he was apparently dying—pointed out to me another man, badly wounded, remarking, “That poor bloke is going home; he will be gone before me”:Pte. W. Webb, Royal Army Medical Corps.
I was in a cottage in France, in the country, Tuesday night, to cook a bit of grub—we had had none all day—and while I was doing it the woman cried bitterly, as her husband was at the front, but I tried to cheer her up as best I could; she had a boy like Jackie, so I told her I was married and had a wife and child, and she cried worse still then:Private Davies, of Ipswich.
“Is there anything I can do for you, old chap?” I asked a wounded man of the Hampshires, one day. “Yes,” he answered, “you might light my fag for me. You will find matches and all in my inside pocket.” I did as he asked, and the last glimpse I caught of him he was lying out there with German shells and bullets flying all around, calmly smoking a “Gold Flake.” That spirit is characteristic of our lads:A Private of the Grenadier Guards.
I was through all the fighting, commencing with the battle ofMons, until the 9th of last month, when I got wounded. This little verse will explain a lot:
I was wounded on the 9th,Near the River Marne.They got me in hospital on the 13th,On the 18th they took off my arm:
I was wounded on the 9th,Near the River Marne.They got me in hospital on the 13th,On the 18th they took off my arm:
I was wounded on the 9th,Near the River Marne.They got me in hospital on the 13th,On the 18th they took off my arm:
I was wounded on the 9th,
Near the River Marne.
They got me in hospital on the 13th,
On the 18th they took off my arm:
A Corporal of the Durham Light Infantry.
A lot of German wounded were moved into a wood for protection and shelter against the rain. Their own artillery opened fire, and soon all the trees were ablaze. The cries of the wounded were agonizing. A party of our men asked permission from their officers to go and carry the Germans out. They did it under heavy fire all the time. The wounded men were very grateful, and said that had it not been for our lads they would have been burned alive:A Private of the Highland Light Infantry.
Near Cambrai one dark night the British took the offensive against the Germans, who were holding a bridge spanning the canal. When our men reached an embankment running sharply down to the river several failed to secure a foothold and fell into the water. Four of the men, who were unable to swim, were in imminent danger of drowning, when Corporal Brindall, an excellent swimmer, plunged into the river and rescued all four in turn. He was clambering up the embankment himself, when a German shell exploded near him, killing him instantly:Drummer H. Savage, 1st Batt. Royal Berks.
One night in the trenches a man of the West Yorkshire Regiment took off his coat and wrapped it around a wounded chum who had to lie there until the ambulance took him away. All that night the game “tyke” stood in the trenches in his shirt-sleeves, with water up to his waist, and the temperature near to freezing-point, quietly returning the German fire. In the morning he would only own to “a bit of a chill that a cup of tea and a smoke would soon put right,” but I wasn’t surprised to learn that he had to be sent down to the base with pneumonia that afternoon. I hope he will pull through:A Sergeant of the Liverpool Regiment.
After one of our hard fights in the Aisne, there was occasion to let the wounded lie out in the rain all night. I came on one man of the Royal Irish Fusiliers who was donefor. He had a waterproof cloak over him, but near by was a man of the artillery without any covering at all. I asked the Irishman if I could do anything for him. “Nothing,” he said; “but if you would take this cloak and throw it over that poor chap there I would be so grateful. I will never pull through, but he may if he is attended to at once. Good-bye. See that the vultures don’t get me when I’m gone, will you?”:A Private from the Aisne.
There was a “boy” of the Connaught Rangers who made a rush out of the trenches under heavy fire to an orchard near by to get an apple for a wounded comrade who was suffering from thirst and hunger. He got the apple all right, but he got a German bullet or two in him as well on the way back, and dropped dead within fifty feet of the goal. The wounded chap had his apple brought in, after an artilleryman had been wounded in getting at it, and I hope he valued it, for it was the costliest apple I ever heard tell of bar one, and that was a long time ago:A Private of the Highland Light Infantry.
Two of our R.A.M.C. men were bringing in a badly wounded trooper on a stretcher, when a fiendish fire was opened on them by a party of Germans posted on a hill about a mile off. Both of the bearers were hit, and though they strove manfully to keep up they collapsed from loss of blood, and the wounded man toppled over with them. A score of our men rushed out to their assistance, but some of them were shot down before they reached the stretcher. Four reached the stretcher and brought it in safely under a hellish fire. All the rest of the wounded were got in safely:Private H. Sykes.
One fellow had been shot in the forehead: he had been in the trenches, full of water, for six days and seven nights, and yet he said to me, “I don’t care what becomes of me. I have the satisfaction of knowing that I popped four of the Germans off before I got hit.” I made a few of them some cigarettes, and gave them water to drink, and did my best to make them comfortable. You would be surprised at the gratitude which they expressed to me. These men are glorious examples of self-sacrifice. There is no distinction of persons with the wounded out here:Motor-driver T. Robinson, of Brighton.
After Soissons, I was lying on the field badly wounded. Near bywas a young fellow of the Northamptonshire Regiment. Standing over him was a German infantryman holding a water-bottle to his lips and trying to soothe him. The wounded man was delirious, and kept calling, “Mother are you there?” all the time. The German seemed to understand, for he passed his hand gently over the feverish brow and caressed the poor lad as tenderly as any woman might have done. Death came at last, and as the soul of the wounded man passed to its last account I saw the German trying to hide his tears:Corpl. Houston, Seaforth Highlanders.
The burning of the poor villagers’ houses was bad enough to see, but the sight of the poor women and children fleeing before the Germans would break a man’s heart. The poor people did not know what to do or where to go. Some of them came to us asking questions, but we, of course, could do nothing, for we did not understand their language and did not know what they were saying. They were in a bad way, and the sight of some of them and their misery brought the tears to the eyes of many of the men of my regiment:Pte. Rossiter, Royal Irish Rifles.
The other day I stopped to assist a young lad of the West Kents who had been badly hit by a piece of shell. He hadn’t long to live, and he knew it, too. I asked him if there was any message I could take to someone at home. The poor lad’s eyes filled with tears as he answered, “I ran away from home and ’listed a year ago. Mother and dad don’t know I’m here, but you tell them from me I’m not sorry I did it.” When I told our boys afterwards about that they cried like babies, but, mind you, that is the spirit that is going to pull England through this war, and there isn’t a man of us that doesn’t think of that poor boy and his example every time we go into a fight:Corporal Sam Haslett.
The worst part, to my mind, was to see the plight of the poor women and children. English people at home cannot realize what these poor creatures suffered. We used to meet them on the road utterly worn out with walking and carrying their babies and the few small things that they had. They wept with joy on seeing us. It seemed grand to be a soldier. No matter how tired we were, it was almost a free fight as to who carried the “kiddy” and the bundle, and there was always atin or two of our “bully” to spare. We made them spare it if there wasn’t:A Private of the Lancashire Regiment.
When we were waiting for the order to go in I saw a cavalry sergeant who had been badly wounded three times and was still pegging away at it. As he was fighting I saw him go to a badly wounded corporal who was shouting to be taken out of the way of the line. The wounded sergeant bound up the other man’s wound, and then sat him on his own horse and sent him back out of the way. Then I saw the sergeant limp along on foot as best he could after his regiment to fight again. I don’t know what became of him, but I know I shall never see a finer thing as long as I live:A Wounded Hussar.
McCabe helped me to dress my knee wound under a hail of shells and bullets. I had been lying there for half an hour when Mac came along. “Hullo,” he said, “what’s up?” “Rip up my trousers,” I cried, “and help me to bind my knee.” While we were getting on with the job the shells started to pepper about. I said, “Clear out, Mac, you’ll get hit.” He said, “After I’ve finished with you.” He then went after the ambulance men, but it was like looking for a bushel of gold. He did not return. I then made up my mind to crawl to safety, so I discarded my rifle and equipment, and with another fellow crawled about 600 yards back through a swede field:Corporal Erler.
A troop train with a thousand Belgian soldiers came in. They looked terribly dirty, but awfully earnest. They seemed delighted to meet an Englishman, and always wanted to shake hands. I reckon I shook hands with a couple of hundred of them. When they saw an English officer they jumped to the salute. As they passed a major of one of the Scottish regiments who was lying on a stretcher, having been shot in the chest twice, and also other parts, they saluted him, too. The major, although he was very weak, cried to his orderly, “Hold me up. I can’t take a salute lying down.” His orderly told him he was too ill to move, but he persisted, and he was propped up, and acknowledged the salutes, with hardly sufficient strength to hold his hand to his forehead. It was a pathetic sight:Anonymous.
We were in a very hot attack in defending a bridge. The Germanspoured a very destructive fire into us; we were forced to give way, and had to retire across the bridge. There was practically no shelter, and during our retirement one of our officers was severely wounded. He would undoubtedly have fallen into the hands of the enemy but for the extreme bravery of Sergeant Cropp, who, perceiving the situation, gallantly ventured on to the bridge and, seizing the wounded lieutenant, placed him on his back. Instead of risking a journey across the shot-swept bridge, he decided, encumbered as he was, to swim the canal, which he did, and swam with the wounded officer out of the line of fire and into a place of safety:A Scots Fusilier.
About three in the afternoon, just as our artillery had got up ready to cover us, the Germans found our range with artillery, and down came the “coal-boxes.” Near me was lying our brave captain mortally wounded, and as the shells burst he would occasionally open his eyes and call out—but ’twas very weak—“Stick it, Welsh, stick it.” Many of the wounded managed to crawl up and down the firing line “dishing out” ammunition we were unable to use, so our brave lads stuck at it until our artillery got into action and put “paid” to the enemy’s account. We had won! The “contemptible little army,” are we? We made them eat their words. Out in that field were strewn thousands of German dead and wounded. They even piled them up and made barricades of their dead. Toward dusk, though we were still exposed to terrible shell fire, several of our lads volunteered to collect the wounded. Many got hit in doing so. Captain Haggard died that evening, his last words being, “Stick it, Welsh!” He died as he had lived—an officer and a gentleman:Pte. C. Derry, Welsh Regiment.
There is absolutely no doubt that our men are still animated by the spirit of old. I came on a couple of men of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders who had been cut off at Mons. One was badly wounded, but his companion had stuck by him all the time in a country swarming with Germans, and though they had only a few biscuits between them they managed to pull through until we picked them up. I pressed the unwounded man to tell me how they managed to get through the four days on six biscuits, but he always got angry and told me to shut up. I fancy he went without anything, and gave the biscuits to the wounded man. They were offered shelter many times by the French peasants,but they were so afraid of bringing trouble on these kind folk that they would never accept shelter. One night they lay out in the open all through a heavy downpour, though there was a house at hand where they could have had shelter. Uhlans were on the prowl, and they would not think of compromising the French people, who would have been glad to help them:Lance-Corpl. Edmondson, Royal Irish Regiment.
We had been lying in the trenches firing for all we were worth. On my right, shoulder to shoulder, were two Salvationists. I remembered them as having held a meeting with some of us chaps about a week before. As we lay there with the bullets whistling round us these two were the coolest of the whole cool lot! After we had been fighting some time we had orders to fall back, and as we were getting away from the trenches one of the Salvationists was hit and fell. His chum didn’t miss him until we had gone several hundred yards, and then he says, “Where’s ----?” calling him by name. “I must go back and fetch him!” and off he hurried, braving the hail of shot and shell. I admired his bravery so much that I offered to go with him, but he said, “No, the Lord will protect me; I’ll manage it.” So I threw myself on the ground and waited. I saw him creep along for some yards, then run to cover; creep along, and take shelter again; and, finally, having found his chum, he picked him up and made a dash for safety! How the bullets fell around him! Into the shelter of some trees he went; out again, and in once more; and when he did get into the last piece of clearing I couldn’t wait any longer, so I rushed forward to help him. Then I got hit. What do you think the brave fellow did? He just put his other arm around me and carried us both off. Darkness was fast coming on, and presently he laid us both down and found the wounds, which he bandaged up with strips which he tore from his shirt. I shall never forget that terrible night:An Anonymous Private.
Near our trenches there were a lot of wounded, and their cries for water were pitiful. In the trenches was a quiet chap of the Engineers, who could stand it no longer. He collected all the water-bottles he could lay hold of, and said he was going out. The air was thick with shell and rifle fire, and to show yourself at all was to sign your death-warrant. That chap knew it as well as we did, but that was notgoing to stop him. He got to the first man all right, and gave him a swig from a bottle. No sooner did he show himself than the Germans opened fire. After attending to the first man he crawled along the ground to others until he was about a quarter of a mile away from us. Then he stood up and zigzagged towards another batch of wounded, but that was the end of him. The German fire got hotter and hotter. He was hit badly, and with just a slight upward fling of his arms he dropped to earth like the hero he was. Later he was picked up with the wounded, but he was as dead as they make them out there. The wounded men, for whose sake he had risked and lost his life, thought a lot of him, and were greatly cut up at his death. One of them, who was hit so hard that he would never see another Sunday, said to me as we passed the Engineer chap, who lay with a smile on his white face, and had more bullets in him than would set a battalion of sharpshooters up in business for themselves, “He was a rare good one, he was. It’s something worth living for to have seen a deed like that, and now that I have seen it I don’t care what becomes of me.” That’s what we all felt about it:A Corporal of the Bedfordshire Regiment.
War, that mad game the world so loves to play.
War, that mad game the world so loves to play.
War, that mad game the world so loves to play.
War, that mad game the world so loves to play.
Swift’s“Ode to Sir William Temple.”
The combat deepens. On, ye brave,Who rush to glory or the grave.
The combat deepens. On, ye brave,Who rush to glory or the grave.
The combat deepens. On, ye brave,Who rush to glory or the grave.
The combat deepens. On, ye brave,
Who rush to glory or the grave.
Campbell’s“Hohenlinden.”
But there is neither East nor West, border, nor breed nor birth,When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth!
But there is neither East nor West, border, nor breed nor birth,When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth!
But there is neither East nor West, border, nor breed nor birth,When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth!
But there is neither East nor West, border, nor breed nor birth,
When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth!
Kipling’s“Ballad of East and West.”
Everybody is brave out here, but we all pass the biscuit on to the flying-men. If ever men won a V.C. they have:An Infantry Private.
It’s all “Vive l’Anglais” where we go. The villagers look on us as their saviours. We all feel very cheerful and all have the one idea that we must win, so as long as we are not downhearted. “All’s well” will be the cry:An Unnamed Private.
You have a sort of want-to-go-home-to-your-mother feeling at the start, but that soon goes when you get into your stride. When your pal gets wiped out at your side you feel anxious to get your own back:Private W. A. Cast.
My hat has six holes punctured by shrapnel. One shot carried half of the badge away, another caught the wire rim and doubled it up like a hat-pin to five inches. I have had up to a sovereign offered for it, but I am sticking to it, you bet:Pte. Cawley, 3rd Coldstream Guards.
Now about this jam. If you get a big pot you’ll carry it along, and like as not get it smashed. Then your whole kit’s muckered up. Likewise if you get it in a tin you’ll open it and take what youwant, but you’ll have no lid to put on, so you’ll leave the rest behind:Pte. Moss, of the Hussars.
One daring thing I saw on the Aisne was done by a man of the Buffs. He was surprised by the Germans, and the only weapon he had to meet the attack of one who came at him with a rifle was a half-brick. He let fly with it, and caught the “sausage” on the head, bowling him clean over. Then he picked up his rifle and coolly took his position, calling out, “Next for shaving”:Pte. G. Barton, Royal Engineers.
A few years ago I was a delegate for the I.L.P. at the International Socialist Congress at Stuttgart, and stayed at the house of a German, Hans Woesschhoeft by name. After the battle of the Marne I was with a force pursuing the Germans, and one day engaged in bayonet fighting a German cavalryman. Looking at him closer, I recognized my host of happier days. He recognized me, and we had not the heart to fight further. He saved the situation by surrendering:Corpl. Hayhurst, Shropshire Light Infantry.
We are still getting on in the pink of health, and have all we want. My chum, ——, wishes to be remembered to you; he says he doesn’t want to come back again to England. We are amongst some of the finest people I have ever met, and they will give us anything we want. We can get plenty of tobacco here, so will you please send me a pipe? I shall get it some time. Well, dear, I can’t say more now, so will wish you good-bye for the present. Tell the missis I wish to be remembered to her. I will close with heaps of love:A Sergeant of the 3rd Hussars.
The army is full of dare-devils who are never happy unless they are risking their lives in some extravagant way. Two men of the Leinster Regiment had an argument about each other’s running powers. To settle the dispute they had a hundred yards sprint outside the trenches under German fire all the time. Both had some narrow escapes, but got through without a scratch. They wanted to do it over again, but an officer stopped them:Pte. R. Collier, Sherwood Foresters.
You can see that the German hates you by the evil look in his eye. It isn’t safe to go near him unless you have a bayonet in yourhand. I was trying to do something for one wounded German, and the next thing I saw was his mate from behind him coming for me with a bayonet. He was wounded, too, but he thought he was going to get a stick at me. But I stuck first, and he did not want more than one, I can tell you. You have got some funny jobs to do in fighting:A Private of the Coldstream Guards.
Wine is offered us instead of water by the French people, but we are refusing it. Some of the hardest drinkers in the regiment have signed the pledge for the war. Some of the French tell of miraculous escapes. One man was holding a glass of water to a wounded comrade when a bullet shattered the glass. In another case a man came out of action with two bullets in his pocket. One had travelled through a neighbour’s body before being spent, and the other had struck a cigarette-case and had been deflected:A Private of Withington.
We are issued tobacco, but those who haven’t pipes find it difficult to get a smoke, as cigarette-papers are very scarce. As much as five francs has been offered for a 1d. packet. Thank goodness I have a pipe. It is really marvellous the amount of comfort and enjoyment one derives from a smoke. During the cold nights, when unable to sleep through being on some duty, sitting round the old camp fire thinking, the old pipe of ’bacca has a very soothing effect. There is something missing when one is without it:Sergt. Ibbitson, Cyclist Company.
In the haste of the retreat the Germans abandoned and we picked up bicycles, gramophones, concertinas, accordions, civilian clothes, and provisions of all kinds, and what not. There were a lot of dead Germans behind them. One officer was sitting quite natural, with his head resting on his hands. Another chap had apparently been a bit of a carver, for he had just finished carving a doll’s house, with furniture complete. He had evidently been doing it in his spare time under fire:Pte. Trobe, Royal Artillery.
I have a month’s growth of whiskers, and I look horrid. We are all the same. I have not had a chance of a wash for a week. The last wash I had was after twenty-four chaps had washed in one bucket. At the time of writingI am soaking wet, and am waiting for the sun to dry me. We are all ready for anything. We have lost thirty of our men. Thank God, I am spared, but I am ready to die for the old country. I have been soaking wet for a week, but we are on the move—too exciting to notice anything:Pte. T. Percy, Army Veterinary Corps.
It was raining like blazes and a cold, wretched night. We all knew we were going into action in the morning, and we stood together while shelter was found for us. Suddenly somebody started to sing “Nearer, my God, to Thee,” and the whole battalion took it up, and we sang it right through. Next we had the “Glory Song,” and it was impressive. We went into action the next day, and on the following night twenty-five or thirty of our men who had sung those hymns were buried, and an officer who read the service was in tears:Pte. Baker, Coldstream Guards.
It’s a fine sight to see us on the march, swinging along the roads as happy as schoolboys and singing all the old songs we can think of. The tunes are sometimes a bit out, but nobody minds so long as we’re happy. As we pass through the villages the French come out to cheer us and bring us food and fruit. Cigarettes we get more of than we know what to do with. Some of them are rotten, so we save them for the German prisoners, who would smoke anything they can lay hands on. Flowers also we get plenty of, and we are having the time of our lives:Corporal J. Bailey.
The roads are simply cruel. But the worst is we cannot get a decent smoke. I am in the best of health, what with the feeding and the open-air life, the stars being our covering for the last few weeks. We have seen some of the most lovely country imaginable. Some of the hills were four miles long, with about eight S-bends in them. The people over here go half mad when we go through the villages and towns. They throw fruit and flowers at us, give us wine, and goodness knows what. If we happen to stop they run out to shake hands and hang round us as if we were supreme beings:Driver L. Finch.
I was posted on guard, and after about an hour I began to feel sleepy, so I went to stand beside a wagon, when suddenly I heard a noise. Then I shouted, “Halt! who goes there?” But there was no reply.Again I shouted. Still there was no response. Then I saw a figure move about five yards away from me, but as it was so very dark I could not tell whether it was one of our own men or not, so I shouted for the last time, and as there was no reply I fired. The guard turned out and ran to the place, bringing back the victim, shot through the shoulder. He was a German spy:Driver Renniberg, Army Service Corps.
Wish I could describe all I have seen to you; but have not the time, for one thing, and not allowed to give anything of importance in our letters, of course. The French are fine, generous people. Have seen and conversed as well as possible with their wounded, as we have passed some quantity on our way in trains, and German prisoners with them. From what I have seen of them so far, especially those returning from the front, they are fine fellows. Taking them all round, I believe they are bigger than our fellows. The Germans appear similar to ours, although I could only see them by lantern light for a few seconds as they were lying down in railway goods wagons—they may have been wounded. The French appear to be treating them well. This is a beautiful country—rather flat what I have seen, but well-cultivated soil similar to round Cambridge:Private H. J. Charity.
We enjoy the hard life all right because it’s full up with excitement, and we are doing our little bit towards squaring off that big account with the Germans. They’re not doing the fine things they promised to do, and it must make them sick to think of their failure to wipe out our army, for you can take it from me that they had their orders direct from the Kaiser that the British force was to be punished at any cost for daring to come over here without his orders. There’s been punishment enough, God knows, but it hasn’t all been on the one side. There’s many a German could tell of being punished for all he was worth, and they won’t be in a hurry to deal out punishment to us again:Private E. Wood.
After marching and fighting nearly every day we are all feeling like veterans now, and we are ready to keep the ball rolling for just as long as it takes to give the Kaiser’s lads a lesson in soldiering that is likely to be remembered in their precious Fatherland so long as there are Germans alive. We are not kidding ourselves about what wehave before us, but we are bracing ourselves for it, and we will certainly put our best foot forward and get our backs into the work as you would expect British soldiers to do. This is going to be the biggest thing we’ve ever taken on, and there’ll be many an English home in mourning before it’s through; but you simply must make up your minds to face it as bravely as we are facing it, because that’s the only way to win, and we’re out to win at any price. We can’t and we won’t allow the Germans to get the best of us in this fight, and they will have to trample on our dead bodies first before they get a chance of trampling on our flag, as they say they will. The dead won’t all be Britons, and we have no doubt about who’s going to win, if it takes us a century to do it:Private S. Hobson.
In the hospital there were twenty wounded, including three Germans, in charge of an English doctor. After our troops had retired to their base, some distance in the rear, the hospital was raided by a party of fifty Germans. They were all more or less under the influence of drink, and they demanded that we should tell them where our regiment was. Not one of us would give the game away, and they thereupon said they would shoot us all. They commenced flourishing their revolvers and shouting, and I can tell you that I began to shake. I was really afraid then, and I thought our numbers were up. But the unexpected happened. The three wounded Germans implored their comrades to spare us, pointing out that they had been most kindly treated by the English doctor:A Private of the Hussars.
I am sitting on the grass in a huge encampment of some thousands of men who, despite all kinds of adverse circumstances, are still as jolly as the proverbial skylark. It is quite remarkable to see the philosophical way in which Tommy takes everything. Here is a little example which may, perhaps, be amusing to some of the Merrie Villagers next Sunday. A huge field, inches thick in mud, nice clay soil, which hangs on to you like grim death; wet shirts, due to a steady downpour all night; no tea for breakfast, owing to the rain having put all fires out; and the troops sitting as best they can on their waterproof sheets on wet earth, doing what? Why, singing, at the top of their voices, “It’s a long, long way to Tipperary!”:Bombdr. Barron, of Finsbury Park.
Just now we suffer more fromthe plague of spies than we did from flies in South Africa. “Kill that spy” is a cry as necessary as “Kill that fly” at home. Scarcely a day passes without the arrest of Germans or Austrians engaged in their low trade. They get short shrift. A chap can’t be sorry for them; they are such dirty dogs. They are going about circulating lies of all kinds. One of their yarns is to tell of whole regiments wiped out. Sometimes it is a French regiment and sometimes a British one. One of the kidney tried it on in a café here to-night. He made free with the name of a regiment actually quartered here. When we had done with him he had practical proof that this scurvy German method of killing off your enemies is only satisfactory so long as you can avoid a meeting with the “killed and wounded.” We are all comfortable here, and there is no shortage of any kind, so if you hear from the born “grousers” of hardships don’t believe them:Corporal G. Robbins.
I was about the last man that got hit, and I got a proper one too. An explosive bullet got me behind the knee, and blew away my knee and part of thigh and shin. I lay there for a time in the forest with no one but the Germans, who were not at all unkind to me; they gave me water and wine to drink, and two of their Red Cross bandaged my leg up temporarily until the ambulance came along about ten hours later. Well, dad, if I ever prayed I prayed during that time; I was in sheer agony the whole time. Eventually the ambulance came along and brought me back (a prisoner, of course) to a Roman Catholic chapel, which was converted into a temporary hospital, and I lay there till I was brought out to a château, where two German doctors amputated my leg. They did their best for me, but in a rough way. I was there for about ten days with hardly any food, as they hadn’t it for themselves, only dry bread and black coffee. Our own people released us, and took all the Germans who were there prisoners:Sergt. O’Dwyer, Irish Guards.
The Germans have a topsides gun we call “Archibald.” He shoots extraordinarily well on some days and damn badly on others. They always get our height correct, but so far have brought nobody down. Several machines have been hit by his shrapnel bullets and bits of his shell. He also flies a sort of parachute which he uses to range on. The other day we pulled his leg properly by getting between himand a bright sun so that he could not see us properly. He sent up his parachute, height exactly correct, fuse well timed, and proceeded to pepper it no end, all about half a mile away from us. Once I heard his beastly shells whistling above the noise of the engine when we came out of the clouds, so he must have been jolly near. He has a twin brother named “Cuthbert,” who is a large howitzer. His first shot is good, but the remainder always miles behind. “Archibald” certainly is a drawback, as one has to be rather careful to circumvent him, as the blighter’s shooting has improved wonderfully:An Army Airman.
It is amusing to hear some soldiers speak when they come down the line, and it is becoming quite a joke to say, “Here comes the last of such-and-such a regiment,” for invariably they claim to be the last—all the others are cut up. It is no doubt the case that some battalions have been severely handled. I met one of the Dorsets—but here hangs a tale. You will know the old bookshop in Churchwallgate. On the day I left Macclesfield I called in to wish the bookseller good-bye. It was mentioned incidentally that he had a relative who had been called up; I had met him on one occasion, and would I be likely to see him again? Of course this was highly improbable, but I did meet him. After we had retired from —— I jumped up on a truck-load of biscuits along with others, and said not a word, being too busy admiring the magnificent beauty of the country in this district. At last we talked of things in general, of the inferior rifle-shooting of the Germans, but with respect of his shrapnel, and I mentioned Macclesfield, hoping to be back at Christmas. A man of the Dorsets cocked his ears. “Macclesfield! Put it there, Corporal,” he said, holding out his hand. “Put it there. I have been weighing you up for the last ten minutes, wondering where I had seen you before. Now I know.” This was the man whom I never expected to see, and we met under difficult conditions on a truck racing hell for leather through a country which a few days later was the grave of many a German soldier:Pte. Dickenson, Army Service Corps.
A smart young corporal accompanied me to reconnoitre, and we went too far ahead, and were cut off in a part of the country thick with Uhlans. As we rode in the direction of —— two wounded men were limping along, both with legs damaged, one from the Middlesex and the other Lancashire Fusiliers, and so we took them up. The men were hungry and tattered to shreds with fighting, but in fine spirits. We soon came across a small village, and I found the curé a grand sportsman and full of pluck and hospitality. He seemed charmed to find a friend who was English, and told me that the Germans were dressed in the uniforms of British soldiers, which they took from the dead and from prisoners in order to deceive French villagers, who in many places in that district had welcomed these wolves in sheep’s clothing. We were warned that the enemy would be sure to track us up to the village. The curé said he could hide the two wounded men in the crypt of his church, and put up beds for them. It has a secret trapdoor, and was an ancient treasure-house of a feudal lord, whose castle we saw in ruins at the top of the hill close by. Then he hid away our saddlery and uniforms in the roof of a barn, and insisted upon our making a rest-chamber of the tower of his church, which was approached by a ladder, which we were to pull up to the belfry as soon as we got there. He smuggled in wine and meat and bread and cakes, fruit and cigarettes, with plenty of bedding pulled up by a rope. We slept soundly, and the owls seemed the only other tenants, who resented our intrusion. No troops passed through the village that night. In the morning the curé came round at six o’clock, and we heard him say Mass. After that we let down the ladder, and he came up with delicious hot chocolate and a basket of rolls and butter. Our horses he had placed in different stables a mile apart, and put French “fittings” on them, so as to deceive the enemy:A Non-Commissioned Officer in the Dragoons.
We, whose work commences only after the battle, have learned to know things that baffle description. Waiting all day long in more or less sheltered positions is sad enough: with the noise of rifle fire and the roaring of the guns we cannot but constantly think of the poor fellows who are being hit. The din of the battle grows less, the night draws on, the moment has now come for us to do our task. With acetylene lamps to light us, we cross the battlefield in all directions and pick up the wounded. As to the dead, alas! how numerous they are! We find them petrified in their last attitude in their lastélan. And the crying and moaning of the wounded scattered in the cornfields and among the damp meadows! I know of nothing more poignant than that. Thebullets nearly always go right through; wounds in the chest or in the abdomen are almost certainly mortal. Fortunately, such wounds are comparatively few in number. German shells are more noisy than efficient, and their splinters generally only cause small wounds. I must add that the bullets of our rifles are as deadly as those of the Germans, while our shells are far more dangerous than theirs. The poor devils who are hit by them are to be pitied. A good many Germans allow themselves to be made prisoners; they know we will treat them humanely:A Member of the Ambulance Corps.