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WITH CAVALRY IN 1915
[Illustration: THE AUTHOR
_Frontispiece_]
WITH CAVALRY
IN 1915
THE BRITISH TROOPER
IN THE TRENCH LINE
_Through the Second Battle of Ypres_
BY
FREDERIC COLEMAN, F.R.G.S.
(_Author of "From Mons to Ypres with French"_)
_ILLUSTRATED_
LONDON
SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & CO., LIMITED
1916
LONDON:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
DUKE STREET, STAMFORD STREET, S.E., AND GREAT WINDMILL STREET, W.
Dedicated
TO
MY WIFE
Whose bravery and self-sacrifice in the face of trying
circumstances made it possible for me so long
to continue to do the little that lay
in my power to help the
Cause we both
thought
JUST AND RIGHT.
AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
The more than kind reception that Press and Public accorded my first
book on the War, "From Mons to Ypres with French," has encouraged me
to put together a chronicle of further events.
"With Cavalry in 1915" takes up the thread of its narrative where its
predecessor left it--with the closing days of 1914.
If some notes of frank criticism have been included in this volume,
it has been with no unkindly feeling, or with any other object than
to try to give a fair picture of things at the Front as I saw them.
My unbounded admiration for the splendid soldiers of the British
Army, gained in the darker days of the Great Retreat from Mons, has
never wavered in its allegiance to them.
Never have I had occasion to change my opinion, formed in the first
few weeks of the War, that the British Tommy is worth five or six of
any German soldiers with whom he has yet come into contact.
In the machinery and organisation of war, the small British Army was
at a disadvantage, particularly when faced with the necessity of
great and rapid expansion. That mistakes should have been made was
more than natural--it was inevitable.
I would not be so presumptuous as to criticise so freely, but
that "the old order changeth": to write of the past is, I hope,
permissible, and likely to lead to no misconstruction. I mean no more
than that which the plain interpretation of my simple phraseology
will convey. I have no axes to grind.
The right men are in the British Army, and the right men are at the
head of it.
For its work to be crowned with complete and lasting victory, it has
but to have the undivided Empire behind it, and that, thank God, it
has.
The man who cannot see that the Allies will win this war, and win
it conclusively, is indeed blind to what the future holds for
civilisation.
FREDERIC COLEMAN.
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA,
_June, 1916_.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
JANUARY.
PAGES
General De Lisle and the 1st Cavalry Division Staff--Resting--Wet
winter campaigning--Echoes of the Christmas truce--A would-be
Hun prisoner--A visit to Furnes--A Belgian Officer's
standpoint--Luncheon with Colonel Tom Bridges--The Belgian
Army--Nieuport-les-Bains--The trenches along the Yser Canal--The
ruined lighthouse in the sand dunes--Snow's 27th Division in the
line in Flanders--Bad feet--Wrecked Vermelles--The devastation
of "75" shells--"Le Sport"--General Robertson appointed Chief of
Staff 1-36
CHAPTER II.
FEBRUARY.
Army Service Corps vagaries--Motor cars at the
Front--Poperinghe--French Chasseurs--The equipment of the French
foot-soldier--Belgian peasants--Flemish fatalism--The selection
of trench positions--A cavalry counter-attack--French Staff
work--British Staff officers--A run to Ypres--Scenes in the
old Flemish city--On duty in the Salient--The Menin Road--A
humble shop in the shell area--Ypres shelled--Belgian funerals
under fire--The trench-line--General De Lisle has a narrow
escape--The ruined Cloth Hall and Ypres Cathedral--Disappearing
mural paintings--An Irish giant-powder experience--Wonderful
marksmanship of the French "75's"--The way to the firing
line--Past "Cavan's House"--Under fire--Brigade Headquarters in
a dug-out 37-73
CHAPTER III.
MARCH.
Through the mud to the trenches--French reserves in the
woods--Hidden batteries--Unwise photography--Shrapnel
too close for comfort--Chased by shell-fire--In Hooge
dug-outs--Reminiscences of the first Battle of Ypres--A tour
of the first-line trenches in the rain--Loopholes--Views by
periscope--Sharpshooting--A mouthful of glass--Photographs in
Zillebeke Churchyard--Calling down shrapnel fire--A scamper
out of Zillebeke--Hooge at night--A mine explosion--Mixed
plans--Storming the mine-crater--Amusing German prisoners--The
London "'bus" abroad--A timely evacuation of a house in
Ypres--General Haig's order before Neuve Chapelle--Heavy British
gunning--The taking of the town of Neuve Chapelle--The failure to
go on--The reasons--The blame--German attack on St. Eloi--Fine
work by the Rifle Brigade--Territorials--Ploegsteert and the
Ploegsteert Wood--A run from Kemmel to Dickebusch--A shell in
La Clytte 74-120
CHAPTER IV.
APRIL.
Rumours--Lord Kitchener's visit--A horticultural joke--German
hate manufactured in Lille--Red Cross assistance--The peculiar
exploit of Mapplebeck of the Flying Corps--A joy-ride through
Ypres and up the Menin Road--The commencement of the fight for
Hill 60--The first coming of the German gas--The plight of
the French Reservists--The magnificent work of the Canadian
Division--In support of the French line--Tangled traffic on
the road to Ypres--Shelled in Elverdinghe--Deadly howitzer
shells--Poperinghe bombarded--Belgian refugees--The aviation
park evacuated--The want of traffic organisation--The 200
Canadian heroes in St. Julian--Conflicting reports about the
capture of Lizerne--International failure to coincide as to the
results of battle--British infantry attacks to win back the lost
ground--Children at play near a battle-field--Artillery work in
modern warfare--An attack on Lizerne by British field guns and
French Zouaves--The ethics of gun-fire--Lizerne proves a hard
nut to crack--British counter-attacks along the salient line
abortive--17-inch Hun shells--A big shell lights in a château
garden--Shell plus chandelier--A car in a Belgian ditch--Billets
in Wormhoudt--Welcome rest 121-177
CHAPTER V.
MAY.
The shortening of the Ypres Salient--More Hun gas--Strange
equipment for fighting the gas--The eve of Rawlinson's attack
along the Fromelles road--Great hopes of winning through to
Lille--The 1st Cavalry Division sent to Ypres--The French
attack at Arras--The British horseshoe around Ypres--Through
the ruined town of Potijze--Scenes of devastation--Under the
shells--Awful smells--Streams of wounded--Shell-splinters--The
G.H.Q. line--The St. Jean dug-outs--The hell of constant enemy
howitzer fire--Preponderance of numbers of German heavy guns
over British--The Auber ridge attack fails--Splendid examples
of heroism among the wounded--The French attack fails to
break through--Holding on at Ypres--Discovery of a dug-out at
Potijze--The solitary old woman in wrecked Ypres--Wonderful
pyrotechnic displays at night in the trenches--Blocked by
shell and conflagration in Ypres--Unable to get through--An
abandoned attempt at photography under bursting shells--A
scared collie--The last inhabitants to escape from the ruins
of Ypres--The "Princess Pat's"--A "Mother" gun and aeroplane
artillery observations--General De Lisle given command of
the eastern portion of the Salient--The remnants of the
Northumberland Brigade--To bed by the light of the fires in
Ypres--The composition of the Salient line on the night of
May 12th 178-222
CHAPTER VI.
MAY (_continued_).
The great German attack on May 13th--Twelve hours of Hun
howitzer fire--Terrible and awe-inspiring spectacle--The niagara
of shell-sound--Around impassable Ypres to Potijze--Close
work by a coal-box--Through a black shell-cloud--The York
and Durham "Terriers"--Bombarded in a Potijze dug-out--The
shell-swept line--Colonel Budworth's wisdom and the German
General's lost opportunity--The super-human work of the
Queen's Bays saves the line--The Life Guards shelled from
their trenches--Bits of position lost wholesale--Good work by
an armoured car--Accurate and invaluable gunning by British
Artillery--German attacks dispersed--Heavy casualties among the
18th Hussars--The splendid charge of the Blues, 10th Hussars and
Essex Yeomanry--David Campbell's 6th Brigade holds a line of
obliterated trenches--Reports of heavy losses--The remnants form
a new line--A talk with two of the Blues on the battle-field--A
plucky Essex Yeoman--Over 1,600 casualties in the two cavalry
divisions engaged--A lost despatch case--In the "huts" near
Vlamertinghe--An unnecessary run up the Menin Road at night--The
flotsam and jetsam of a divisional relief in the dark--A cellar
headquarters on the Menin Road--The position at Hooge--Cheery
K.R.R. cyclists--A gunner's curious story--The composition of
the Salient line on the morning of May 24th--In the thick of
a Hun gas attack--The 28th Division lose their line--The 18th
Hussars outflanked--A "Gas Diary"--The 9th Lancers hold the
trench-line--Fine work by the York and Durham Territorials--The
15th Hussars win laurels--Gas everywhere--A shell demolishes an
ammunition limber--A brave Cheshire sergeant--A wounded Tommy
and his yarn--Huns refuse to take prisoners--A counter-attack by
the Royal Fusiliers--D.S.O.'s and Military Crosses--18th Hussars
casualties--Captain Grenfell and Captain Court of the 9th Lancers
buried at Vlamertinghe--General De Lisle given command of the
29th Division and leaves France for the Dardanelles 223-296
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
THE AUTHOR _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
Members of the Staff outside the headquarters of the
1st Cavalry Division 8
Between Philosophe and Vermelles; on the left, the
château wall 9
A bird's-eye view of shattered Vermelles, January, 1915 28
Major Desmond Fitzgerald of the Lancers and a gas-pipe
trench-mortar 29
A Winter Cavalry shelter in France 32
Construction of Cavalry shelter in France 33
The Rue de Menin in March 1915, looking west over the
Menin Bridge across the canal moat 54
Officers under the stone lion on the Menin Bridge at
Ypres 55
The Grande Place at Ypres and the Cloth Hall, March,
1915 66
The Choir of the ruined Ypres Cathedral 67
Scenes of battle of olden time in colours on the shattered
walls of Ypres Cloth Hall 70
A communication trench leading to the front line position
in the Sanctuary Wood 71
Officers of Lancers in their dug-outs in the front line
trenches 86
A dug-out in front of Zillebeke 87
The Zillebeke Church, March 1915 92
German prisoners in Ypres, captured after the explosion
of a British mine near Hooge 93
Damage caused by a 17-inch shell in Poperinghe, April,
1915 150
Red Cross ambulances on the coast 151
A French "75" in the mud of a Flanders beet-field 172
An ambulance which was struck by a shell while carrying
wounded from east of Ypres 172
View showing depth of 17-inch shell-hole in the garden of
a château between Poperinghe and Elverdinghe. 173
Staff Officers at lunch 176
Looking east over the Menin Bridge at the edge of Ypres 177
Dragoon Guards resting in the huts at Vlamertinghe 212
Graves of Capt. Annesley, Lieut. Drake, and Capt. Peto,
all of the 10th Hussars, in a graveyard on the Menin
Road 213
Officers of the Cavalry Corps 218
A typical farm in Flanders, in which British soldiers were
billeted 219
Hussars' cook-house, Vlamertinghe huts, Vlamertinghe. 248
Group of Cavalry Officers at the huts at Vlamertinghe. 249
View of the 13th century château at Esquelbecque 260
"Jeff" Phipps-Hornby and Frederic Coleman comparing
underpinning outside Ypres, May, 1915: the thinnest
and thickest "supports" in the 1st Cavalry Division 261
Map 296
WITH CAVALRY IN 1915.
CHAPTER I.
January 1st, 1915, found me in damp, sodden Flanders. I was one of
the dozen remaining members of the original Royal Automobile Club
Corps, which had joined the British Expeditionary Force in France
before Mons and the great retreat on Paris.
I was attached, with my car, to the Headquarters Staff of the 1st
Cavalry Division, Major-General H. de B. de Lisle, C.B., D.S.O.,
commanding. The Echelon A Divisional Staff Mess consisted of General
de Lisle; Colonel "Sally" Home, 11th Hussars, G.S.O. 1; Major Percy
Hambro, 15th Hussars, G.S.O. 2; Captain Cecil Howard, 16th Lancers,
G.S.O. 3; Major Wilfred Jelf, R.H.A., Divisional Artillery Commander;
Captain "Mouse" Tomkinson, "Royals," A.P.M.; Captain Hardress Lloyd,
4th Dragoon Guards, A.D.C.; Lieutenant "Pat" Armstrong, 10th Hussars,
A.D.C., and myself.
We were housed in a château between Cassel and St. Omer. In the
latter town General French and General Headquarters (G.H.Q.) were
located.
The 1st Cavalry Division contained the 1st and 2nd Cavalry Brigades.
The 1st Brigade, under Major-General Briggs, was composed of the
2nd Dragoons (Queen's Bays), 5th Dragoon Guards and 11th Hussars.
Brigadier-General Mullens commanded the 2nd Cavalry Brigade, in which
were the 4th Dragoon Guards, 9th Lancers and 18th Hussars.
These troops were billeted in Flemish farms and villages north of the
road that led from Cassel to Bailleul.
Sir John French's army in the field at that time was composed of
the 1st Army under General Sir Douglas Haig, and the 2nd Army
under General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien. The corps units were as
follows:--1st Corps, General C. C. Monro; 2nd Corps, General Sir
Charles Fergusson; 3rd Corps, General Pulteney; 4th Corps, General
Sir Henry Rawlinson; Cavalry Corps, General Allenby; Indian Corps,
General Sir James Willcocks; Indian Cavalry Corps, General Rimington;
and the Flying Corps under General Henderson. Of the new 5th Corps,
which was to be under the command of General Sir Herbert Plumer, only
the 27th Division was as yet "out," though the 28th Division was
ready to embark.
Most of the news parcelled out to those who were "resting" in billets
back of the line came from the London newspapers.
Typed sheets, dubbed "summaries of information," and issued by
G.H.Q., were distributed daily, but were never valuable and rarely
really informative.
The G.H.Q. information sheet of January 1st, 1915, read: "The Germans
made an attack on the right of our line, south of Givenchy, yesterday
evening, and captured an observation post. This post was retaken by a
counter-attack early this morning, but later on was again captured by
the enemy. The line has now been reorganized."
A friend in the 1st Army, which was covering the part of the line
thus attacked, showed me the 1st Army summary of 7 p.m., January
1st, which added the following to the news on the situation: "All
is quiet in front. Fighting on right of 1st Corps last night was
not as serious as at first reported. Casualties in Scots Guards
believed to be about five officers and fifty other ranks. Most of
these casualties occurred owing to the regiment pushing on beyond
the original trench, and attacking the enemy's position. This wet
weather is entailing great hardship on the men, who are fully engaged
repairing trenches, some of which have had to be abandoned owing to
water. The Germans are reported to be no better off."
Such brief, dry, official summaries applied to most of the wet days
of January, 1915. Trench warfare in winter has a very stoggy sameness
about it.
A 3rd Corps advance in front of the Ploegsteert Wood resulted in
several of our men being drowned while attacking, so deep was the
water in the submerged shell-holes in the flooded area.
Discipline, the capacity to go forward in pursuance of an order, in
spite of the fact that doing so seems utterly futile, is possessed
by the British troops to a remarkable degree. Small operations,
comparatively unimportant in scope and result, served to demonstrate
daily the splendid spirit of the men under inconceivably trying
conditions.
One trench at Givenchy was taken and retaken time after time, and the
men ordered to capture the trench were ever found ready to "go up"
in the same dashing way, though they knew to a man that the assault
meant inevitable loss, and would more than likely be followed by a
further enforced evacuation, by their own comrades, of the untenable
position.
The Huns were well supplied with trench-mortars, bombs and
hand-grenades, and used them with great effect. Our men had
practically none of these indispensable attributes to trench warfare,
or at least had so few of them that their use produced comparatively
negligible results.
The Christmas truce between British and German units confronting
each other in the trenches produced echoes for weeks. The order from
General French stating clearly that "the Commander-in-Chief views
with the greatest displeasure" such fraternizing with the enemy had
produced a partial effect, but instances still occurred where the
Huns took the initiative in the matter of peace overtures for short
periods.
A visit to one part of our front line unearthed the following story:
The opposing trenches were separated by a highway, across which, one
morning, a German soldier shouted, "Let's have a truce for to-day. We
don't want to kill you fellows. Why should we kill each other? We are
to be relieved by the Prussians to-morrow night. You can kill them if
you like. We don't care. We are Saxons."
The extraordinary proposal was taken in good part, and the truce kept
for thirty-six hours. No men of either army left their trenches, but
not a shot was fired from German or English trench at that point.
A few miles from the scene of this incident the men of the opposing
armies became quite accustomed to calling across the intervening
ground to their enemies. Each side, one day, boasted of the
excellence of its food supply. A British Tommy declared his lunch
ration included an incomparable tin of sardines. A German soldier
shouted his disbelief that Tommy possessed any such delicacy.
Thereupon an empty sardine tin on the point of a bayonet was raised
above the British trench parapet in proof of Tommy's statement.
"That's a sardine _tin_," yelled a Hun derisively, "but there is no
sardine in it, mein friend."
A few minutes passed, then a tin of sardines, unopened and temptingly
whole and sound was thrown from the English trench towards the trench
of the enemy. It fell short. Over his parapet vaulted a big German,
who dashed at the tin with outstretched hand. As his fingers were
closing over it, it jumped from his grasp. Again he stooped and
reached for it. Again it leaped away. Tommy had attached a thin but
stout line to his sardine tin, willing to prove his assertion, but
with no idea of losing his luncheon.
Two or three times the big Hun grabbed wildly at the elusive prize,
amid the shouts and laughter of the men of both armies, who cheered
in unison as Hans was at last convinced of the futility of further
effort and retired in confusion to his trench.
In the early hours of the New Year a trench full of Westphalians
and a party from a section of our line held by the 4th Corps,
fraternised to such an extent that visits were paid by each
contingent to the "no-man's land" between the trenches. When the
British soldiers returned to their trench, they found a man curled up
in the bottom of it. Investigation showed him to be a German soldier.
"'Ere, git out o' this," said Tommy indignantly. "You're bloomin'
well in the wrong 'ouse."
"No," said the Hun decidedly, "me prisoner, prisoner!"
"Not you," was the indignant reply. "Play the gime, you silly old
'Un, an' 'ook it."
But such was not the intention of the Saxon lad. With hands in air
to indicate his abject surrender, he insisted he was a prisoner and
refused to budge.
Nonplussed, the Tommies shouted over to the Germans: "'Ere's one o'
your chaps 'ere as won't go 'ome, the silly beggar. 'E's lorst 'is
way, poor chap, an' don't know where 'e are."
"Send him back to us, please," was the prompt request from the
Deutschers.
[Illustration: Members of the Staff outside the headquarters of the
1st Cavalry Division]
[Illustration: Between Philosophe and Vermelles; on the left, the
château wall]
But not a move would the Hun make, until at last half a dozen stout
Tommies hoisted him over the parapet with the butts of their rifles.
Still he tarried. With an oath a burly British corporal called two of
his comrades. They leaped out of the trench, grabbed the hesitating
Hun, and marched him at quick time to his own lines. There they
turned him over to his officer, presented arms in salute, wheeled and
marched gravely back to their own trench.
"What did the German bloke say when you chucked the chap to him?" was
asked the corporal.
"Thynks," laconically replied that worthy, "an' no more, except
to sye, 'We'll fix the rotter.' An' so they bloomin' well
should--desertin' durin' a bally troose that wye--the dirty dog."
As the 1st Cavalry Division was "resting," visits to points of
interest were the order of the day. On Monday, January 4th, General
de Lisle, Captain Hardress Lloyd, and I ran, _viâ_ quaint old Bergues
and Dunkirk, to Furnes, where King Albert of the Belgians had his
Headquarters.
Belgian sentries were plentiful after Dunkirk. They frequently
stopped us, but generally the word "Anglais" was a sufficient
passport. Now and again Lloyd produced a British pass, at which the
Belgians would invariably look blandly, if uncomprehendingly, then
salute and urbanely wave us on our way. Any sort of pass would have
served with ninety-nine out of a hundred such sentries.
The coast district in Belgium was not interesting in itself. Roadways
ran between sluggish, morbid-looking canals and flat, dispirited
fields--a sad, soggy, flabby land, in very truth.
Furnes was a picturesque relief. The architectural beauties of the
Hotel de Ville and one or two other buildings in its fine old square
were undeniable. Not long after our visit Furnes was viciously
shelled by the Huns. Later it was practically devastated by big
howitzer shells. Three or four days before our visit to the town a
Black Maria had landed in a busy spot near the square one noontide,
killing ten people and wounding a dozen others.
Nieuport, not far away, was under a heavy bombardment when we arrived
in Furnes. Three days before sixty French soldiers had been killed
in one day in Nieuport, which had proved so great a death-trap that
all troops had been moved to dug-outs outside the town.
I had a chat with one of King Albert's Staff whom I had previously
met in London. He was a very outspoken critic of the Belgian
officers, and of the policy that had resulted in the Belgian
evacuation of Antwerp before such a _débâcle_ was absolutely
necessary.
We had lunch in Furnes with Colonel Tom Bridges. I had seen much of
Bridges during the first months of the War, when he was attached to
the 4th Dragoon Guards as a major. He led a charge at Tour de Paissy,
on the Aisne, which saved the British line. Promoted to the rank of
Colonel, he was given command of the 4th Hussars. A very few days
afterwards, while on a night march, he was sent for by General Sir
John French. Arriving at G.H.Q., Bridges, who had been the British
Military Attaché in Belgium prior to the War and knew the Belgian
Army well, was given certain instructions, placed in a Rolls-Royce
car, and at once started for Antwerp. He arrived late at night, after
a continuous run of over 600 kilometres, and saw King Albert, who at
once convened a Council of War. Bridges then jumped into the work at
hand without a moment's delay.
Tom Bridges arrived in Antwerp on November 3rd. The city was
evacuated by the Belgians on November 8th.
Having heard so much of the prominent part Bridges had played in
the affairs of the Belgians, I looked forward with all the more
anticipation to again meeting him.
Major Prince Alexander of Teck, attached to Colonel Bridges' mission,
and Mrs. Bridges, who had recently been at work in the Duchess of
Sutherland's hospital at Dunkirk, were at luncheon.
Colonel Bridges talked of King Albert. "The King gives to a stranger
the impression that he comes to a decision slowly. I have heard men,
who have met him, say they thought him extremely deliberate, but all
recognise his solid foundation of determination. But for that rock
on which the King's stern determination is set, there would be but
little Belgian Army left to-day. To King Albert personally much more
is due than is likely ever to be known."
The more I saw of the Belgian Army along the Yser, the more I
appreciated what Bridges had said of the King.
After luncheon, I drove General de Lisle, Colonel Bridges and
Hardress Lloyd to Nieuport-les-Bains, once a sea-coast summer resort
at the mouth of the Yser. The Allied trench line was roughly the line
of the canal. On the coast in the sandy dunes, the Allies' trenches
had been pushed a bit to the Ostend side, but Dixmude was still in
German hands.
Not a single inhabitant of Nieuport-les-Bains was in the town--not
a man, woman or child. The French Tirailleurs d'Afrique, part of
a splendid division of French Colonials that had been sent by
Foch to "stiffen" that part of the line, occupied the ruins of
the summer resort that was. The typical French summer hotels in
Nieuport-les-Bains were, for the most part, shapeless piles of
_débris_.
The Huns never succeeded in actually penetrating the town, though Von
Beseler's troops tried hard to take it. The Germans reached the river
bank which formed the town's boundary on the north.
The main thoroughfare was blocked at frequent intervals by great
barricades made from bathing machines, hauled in a row and filled
with sand and paving stones. Asphalt tennis courts were scarred
with shell-holes. No open space had been spared during the weeks of
itinerant bombardment.
As we approached the town French batteries of "75's" were firing hard
from positions in the dunes by the roadway.
The French General Officer Commanding arrived as we alighted from our
car. But one house was standing in the northern edge of the town.
Into it we filed on the heels of the French General, up its stair
to the garret, and still up a rickety ladder to a point of vantage
under the very eaves. Through shell-holes in the tile roofing, French
observers directed the fire of the batteries below. Across the Yser,
in front of us, we would see the French and German trenches among the
low sand hills. For long spaces they ran but fifteen to twenty yards
apart and in one sector a German sap was but five yards from the
French escarpment.
For a time we watched the shells from the "75's" bursting over the
German trenches. Descending, we crossed the Yser practically at
its mouth. A pontoon bridge, vaunting a placard showing it had been
christened the "Pont Gal Joffre," led between twin piers. The bridge
swayed and tossed like the deck of a channel steamer as we picked our
way gingerly across it. Some months later a Jack Johnson, luckily
placed by the enemy, entirely smashed that pontoon bridge.
Gaining the northern bank we zig-zagged through deep trenches in
the sand, reinforced here and there with timbers and stone. An open
crater and a pile of _débris_ marked what had once been a lighthouse.
Dug-outs, shelters in miniature, lined the sides of the crater
nearest the Huns. The open bowl of sand was about forty feet in
diameter. Near its centre gaped a shell-hole in the soft sand made by
an unwelcome visitor which had come less than a half hour previously.
Digging for a few moments, I unearthed the still warm timing-fuse of
the 105-millimetre shell that had made the hole.
The lighthouse position was, the sergeant of Tirailleurs said, a
_mauvais place_. From morning until night of the day before the Huns
had shelled it. Many shells had fallen in the hours just preceding
our arrival. General de Lisle and Colonel Bridges left Hardress Lloyd
and me there, "for safety," while they walked through the front line
positions, which were from a hundred to a hundred and sixty yards
further forward.
I investigated the interiors of the tiny dug-outs during the
General's absence. No shell fell near, however, and soon we were all
retracing our steps to Nieuport-les-Bains. Once a sniper spied one of
the party, and a bullet from his rifle kicked up a spurt of sand a
few feet from my head. We acknowledged the attention by an additional
foot or so of "stoop" thenceforth.
Over a cup of tea at Colonel Bridges' headquarters, I met an old
acquaintance in Lady Ross, who had that day handed to the Queen of
the Belgians a cheque for £1,000 for Belgian sufferers. Lady Ross
told me of an interesting conversation with King Albert at luncheon.
After discussing at length the general subject of the difficulty of
realisation of war's hardships and atrocities by those whose homes
have been far from the actual scenes of war, the conversation
drifted to the refugee question. King Albert agreed that all
able-bodied Belgians of military age should be with the Army, and
declared emphatically his intention to press for steps that would
lead to such a consummation.
The result of my visit to Furnes and Nieuport-les-Bains was to
confirm my impression that the Germans had fortified their positions
along the coast, and so entrenched themselves that to take Ostend by
direct land attack was impossible, except at very great cost indeed.
The assistance that could be given by the Admiralty to such a project
was greatly discounted by the fact that the ships available were out
of range when outside the sandbanks that lay near the coast, and
outclassed by the enemy's land batteries when inside the banks.
Many folk visited the Belgian Army in the trenches during those
January days. Less than a week after we had visited Furnes, a couple
of us ran to Dunkirk on Sunday to buy some fresh fish, a delicacy as
rare as it was wholesome. While in Dunkirk I saw Lord Northcliffe
and my old friend Max Pemberton, who had come over for a "weekend at
the Front" with the Belgians. The next day eighteen German aeroplanes
flew over Dunkirk and dropped several bombs, doing some material
damage and killing one civilian.
On Tuesday, January 12th, General de Lisle ran to Boeschoeppe,
south-west of the St. Eloi area, to see General T. O'D. Snow and his
27th Division. While waiting for the General I had good opportunity
to see and talk to some of the newly arrived men. They had been
marched about fourteen miles before being put into the trench-line,
then marched back to billets when relieved. Some had come back from
eight to eleven miles on foot. As they were not supplied with changes
of socks or any sort of patent solution for their feet, and as the
trenches were at places knee-deep in water, a general epidemic of
frost-bitten feet could but be expected.
Limping along the frozen road, with socks wound about their poor
feet, I felt great sympathy for the Tommies. Before three days had
passed I heard that the 27th Division sick-list had been augmented
by over two thousand cases of "bad feet." One Brigade Major in the
Division told of over one thousand cases in his Brigade alone. A bad
business, entailing great suffering and more permanent disablement
than a little, all for want of proper foresight.
Small engagements with the enemy all along the line were constantly
taking place. Official reports teemed with briefly and baldly told
stories such as the following:--
"The following are details of the capture of a German trench to
the north of La Bassée on the night of the 3rd-4th January.
"Time--8 p.m. January 3rd, 1915.
"Artillery--Nil.
"Strength of attack--One officer, twenty-five men.
"Distance between opposing trenches--150 to 200 yards.
"Enemy's trench consisted of a short length of trench which had
been dug outwards from a saphead, and which was occupied by one
officer and twenty-five to thirty men. (Two sentries.)
"Attack--The attack crept forward noiselessly to the trench A A,
two German sentries were awake and were bayoneted, the occupants
were asleep and were all bayoneted; the officer's head was broken
in with the butt end of a rifle--not a shot was fired--some men
set to work at once and cut the ground A B, thus flooding the
trench A A.
[Illustration]
"The attackers were only fifteen minutes in the German trench and
left the bayoneted Germans in the water, which was then running
in from the water ditch. A A was only a short length of trench
without wire.
"British casualties--One wounded and two missing. The latter may
have since returned."
Quiet days found many a British soldier hard at work over a
French-English "conversation-book." Some of these were hurriedly
prepared and of a character truly extraordinary. One such book, made
up for the benefit of an industrious young man, contained a question
that, translated, ran thus:--
"Q. Where is the cat of my mother's aunt?"
"A. No, but the kittens are drowned."
In Vermelles, on January 15th, I took a dozen photographs showing the
devastation that can be worked by French high explosive shells.
Vermelles was an object lesson. Held by the Germans as strongly as
any town was held in front of the French position south of the La
Bassée canal, trenched and barricaded with wonderful skill, and well
supported by a mass of guns, its capture was only effected after
weeks of sapping and an artillery bombardment that had up to that
time been without parallel. Its ruins held texts for innumerable
sermons on the newer strategy of present-day warfare.
A French officer of standing had told me that he considered the
taking of Vermelles from the Germans a most hopeful sign that the
French could take any and all German positions in like manner, if
they cared to pay the price in men and ammunition.
Geographically, Vermelles was in what was bound to prove a "warm
corner." The German thrust westward from La Bassée, with Bethune as
an objective, had cost the British Expeditionary Force some of the
hardest fighting it had seen.
In that area our Second Corps, then the Indian Corps, and lastly our
First Corps, with the French troops at times in action with us, had
withstood a battering that no other point in the long line from the
sea to the Vosges, save possibly the Ypres Salient, had been called
upon to stand.
The German advance to the westward had reached Vermelles, and there
been held. Their farthermost line was in front of the western edge of
the town, and close to the main road that led through it. The enemy
was in possession of Vermelles for a couple of months.
As no English troops had participated in the taking of Vermelles from
the Huns, except for the assistance rendered by some of our heavier
batteries, we knew little of what had happened in that theatre
save that six weeks of sapping, a mad rush after an unprecedented
bombardment, and terrific hand-to-hand bayonet fighting in the
streets, had resulted in the French occupation of the town on
December 7th.
Our visit had been arranged for us by Captain Fresson, the French
liaison officer attached to 1st Cavalry Division Headquarters.
General de Lisle, Colonel Home, Major Hambro, Fresson and I were in
the party.
Coming out of Bethune, on the Lens road, we passed through Beuvry,
then through Shilly-Labourse.
In the fields by the roadside were trenches, increasing in frequency
along the road from Sailly to Noyelles-lez-Vermelles.
When Noyelles was passed, and we could glance across the slightly
rolling fields that led eastwards to Vermelles, a mile distant, a
little world of trenches met the eye. Some giant, prehistoric mole,
crazed with pain and bent on expending his agony on the surface of
Mother Earth, might have so ripped the fields.
Not rows of trenches, but curved and twisting galleries upon
galleries of them. For the first time I began to get an inkling of
what real trench warfare--the battles of the pick and shovel--meant.
At the headquarters of the French General who was in command of that
section of the line a most elaborate _déjeuner_ had been prepared
for the party, with the result that it was well into the afternoon
before we left the hospitable Frenchman and, in tow of a member of
his staff, commenced our tour of sight-seeing.
Most buildings thereabouts were shell-scarred; some were burned. No
inhabitants were to be seen. The boom of distant shells was ever
present, and now and then one burst in sight of us. Detachments of
French infantry marched past frequently.
We ran to Noyelles, which was full of hard-as-nails-looking French
soldiers.
There the party alighted, and guided by a young French infantry
officer, who had seen the fighting over that ground, walked across
the trench-scarred battle-field eastward to Vermelles.
I followed sufficiently far to gain an idea of the lie of the land,
then returned to Noyelles and took my car to Vermelles by road,
arriving in advance of the others. This allowed me a long stroll of
inspection, to be augmented later by a second tour in the company of
the General, with a French Staff officer as escort.
The German first line trenches to the west of the town were well
constructed. Though they had been considerably damaged by the rain
of shells that had been poured on them, they were not as badly
demolished as one might expect. Back of this first line of defence
was a second line, weaving in and out--here in front, now behind, now
through, the string of houses on the west of Vermelles' main street.
In the southern portion of the town were the ruins of the Château
Watteble. The grounds of the once imposing château allowed a
sufficiently clear space for still another formidable trench-line.
Behind that the enemy had placed other lines, burrowing here and
there at points of vantage through the town. Adjacent to the château
were piles of bricks that once had been a fine farm, the Ferme Brion,
and in front of it, completely demolished, and bearing no semblance
of shape or form that would indicate its original outlines, was
a chapel, where a German gun had been placed. This gun, a French
officer told me, had been served gallantly until the French were but
fifty yards distant, when a battery of the famous "75's" found the
range and totally annihilated the gun, the chapel, and any of the
enemy who were so unfortunate as to be in its vicinity.
The church, its square tower battered out of shape, was still the
most conspicuous landmark of the country round. Another sample
of devastation was the brewery, and attached to it an elaborate
dwelling, one portion of which was built over a metal frame. All
the covering had been torn from the iron girders, leaving the mere
skeleton of the framework practically intact, a weird sight.
The German trenches and communications burrowed so consistently
everywhere from the western edge of the town, and on through to the
eastward, that every foot of ground afforded opportunity for study.
These lines of defence, all connected and fed by approach trenches,
cleverly constructed, with their traverses and reserve off-shoots,
led away for hundreds of yards to the rear of the front line.
That, then, was the town the French had to face, defended by
machine-guns in splendid emplacements, every position well manned.
The first line commanded an open front of slightly rising ground,
clear of all obstacles and capable of being swept for 800 to 1,000
yards. Military science in trench construction had been aided by
ingenuity of a high order, and hours of wandering over and through
the rabbit warrens made for men, as cleverly as ever rodent designed
his burrow, found one discovering new wonders at every step.
The trenches proper were for the most part deep and narrow, stout of
wall, reinforced with every manner of material likely to strengthen
the defensive ramparts and bastions. Here the thickness of a piece of
house wall had been doubled by sandbags. There the face of a trench
had been reinforced by huge stones, interspersed with all sorts of
receptacles, such as water-buckets, cooking utensils, wheel-barrows,
and all manner of tins, filled with brick, small stones or cement.
A woman's bodice neatly tied about a few pounds of stone, the wooden
cover of a household sewing-machine, loaded with brick, and even
a stout brown-paper cardboard box full of mortar, caught my eye
as I searched the stoutly-built wall curved round and back and
round again through what had once been a house-yard. Traverses that
demanded admiration from the most apathetic student of engineering,
loops of trenches that commanded every front, approach trenches that
wriggled like some great yellow-brown snake off toward the rear, were
perfect each one in its own way.
Practically every point in the town could be reached by a German on
tour of inspection of its defences, without the necessity of his
leaving cover, save to cross the roadway of the main thoroughfare.
Beside all this under-the-surface protection, the shelter of the
buildings, all constructed of brick or stone and strongly built, was
by no means to be despised.
Truly, when the French officer said no place could be made more
secure, there was some reason for his words. But strong as it was,
and in spite of its splendid artillery support, the position was
one that the French had to take, whether or no. Six long weeks of
constant work was represented by those torn and wounded fields that
stretched away westward to Noyelles. Sapping their way, entrenching
and consolidating every forward step, the little men in red and
blue crept up to a line varying by from one to two hundred yards, and
even nearer at one point, to the German front.
[Illustration: A bird's-eye view of shattered Vermelles, January, 1915]
[Illustration: Major Desmond Fitzgerald of the Lancers and a gas-pipe
trench-mortar]
But sapping and mining, and entrenching and consolidating, so
valuable in themselves, responsible for the finely fortified position
of the Germans in Vermelles, and the splendid mole-advance against
them by the French, was not the chief factor that was to play the
decisive part in the war-game that culminated in the capture of the
town on December 7th.
Gun-fire was the decisive element. To the beloved "soixante-quinze"
was to go the chief honour. Only a careful personal inspection of
the town could tell one the real story of Vermelles as I saw it on
January 15th. The camera might assist, and, in spite of the dull
weather, I obtained a few pictures with that end in view, but the
camera could give one the story only haltingly and in part.
Not one building in all the town was unwrecked. The French "75's,"
with some aid from the British howitzers, reduced Vermelles to ruins
in the most literal and complete sense. Every edifice, from the
piles of brick around the few tottering walls that was once a proud
château to the humblest barn or outbuilding, was in itself a study.
The evidence left by such shell-fire of its power for evil is of
fascinating interest owing to its infinite variety. One wall had
withstood half-a-dozen punctures of varying diameter, holes four or
five feet in width, some of them, while its fellow beside it had
crumbled into a formless mass of _débris_. Side by side were two
houses, one with front practically intact, its roof gone and its
interior and back portion blown to bits, the other minus front wall,
but still standing, its roof at a crazy angle, resting insecurely on
the remainder of the building, which, save for a scar here and there,
escaped comparatively untouched.
It is this caprice of shell-fire that makes such a veritable hell of
it.
Trenches with sides blown in; here a hole like a good-sized cellar;
there a traverse filled to the level of the ground around it; a
gap in the defence wall in front; iron-work twisted into grotesque
shapes; stone-work pulverised; _débris_ in piles; with clothing,
bedding, household implements, farm machinery and gear, child's
toys, religious emblems, personal effects, and bundles of every
description, all jumbled together in such an odd, unnatural way, that
a laugh and a catch in the throat often came together.
Vermelles on that sodden day in January was full of French soldiers
in reserve--men of the 131st and 262nd Infantry Brigades, some from
16th and some from 18th Corps units. The firing line proper was from
three to four kilometres to the eastward. On the west side of the
town a French battery was firing regularly, the shells singing over
our heads. The German shells were falling frequently half a mile in
front of us.
It was my good fortune to discover a French soldier who had seen the
actual final bayonet attack which won the position. His story was
graphic, but told in few words. The creeping up to the forward French
trenches, the fierce bombardment, the wild charge, the discovery
that in spite of the fact that the place had been literally blown to
bits, and German dead strewn everywhere, some defenders still held
on and manned the murderous machine-guns, until they felt the cold
steel--it all seemed so matter-of-fact, and such a matter-of-course
sort of story in such surroundings.
In each of the yards of the better-class dwellings and farms,
including the grounds of the château and brewery, were graves of
German soldiers. Many of these were marked with rude crosses bearing
touching inscriptions. One such epitaph that caught my eye described
the dead soldier as a good comrade; another as a brave man who had
died for the Fatherland. Many of them bore a simple religious touch.
One grave covered a German officer, buried by the French after the
capture of the town. The French soldiers had marked his name and a
respectful word or two on the rude cross above it, in obvious keeping
with the inscriptions the Germans had written on adjacent crosses
raised while they were in occupation.
In an effort to tell me how full the redoubts were of German dead,
when Vermelles was at last taken, my soldier guide found that words
failed him. They were everywhere, he said.
[Illustration: A winter Cavalry shelter in France]
[Illustration: Construction of Cavalry shelter in France]
Many of the graves, particularly those of the French soldiers buried
thereabouts, were headed by black or white metal wreaths.
"It cost dear," said my soldier, "and we paid. But a Boche who lived
through the last few days of the fighting here, and escaped from that
last charge, will be able to tell a story."
The deep cellar of a ruined house--a mere brick arched cell of a
place without a ray of daylight--had been quite habitably fitted up
as a cave-dwelling by the Germans, who had saved a piano from one of
the wrecked rooms above and cosily stowed it away in a corner.
One or two underground caves just back of the German front line of
trenches, bomb-proofs for the officers apparently, were ingeniously
secure.
Though Vermelles at the time of our visit had been in French hands
for more than a month, one could find many such souvenirs as
shell-heads and timing-fuses without troubling to stir the piles of
wreckage.
I could, I thought, sit in Vermelles and write reams of detail in
description of the terrible havoc of war, but I found that mere
generality as to the scenes of desolation wrought in the town soon
used up my vocabulary. The place was no less a graveyard of brave men
than of strenuous human effort, none the less to be admired because
it proved abortive. Over all brooded the horror of war and the more
specific and tangible horror of gun-fire. "Low trajectory and high
explosive are twin demons, and this is their devil's work," the
shattered town seemed to say.
Knots of French soldiers or visiting British officers walked about
sombrely and spoke in low tones, as if in the actual presence of the
dead, in spite of the weeks that had flown by since Vermelles had
echoed to the crash of a bursting shell.
The French soldiers were a tough-looking lot of customers. A bit
nondescript as to uniform, and universally campaign worn, unshaven,
and mud-plastered, they looked stout and fit for anything. A friendly
class of men, respectful to British officers to a degree, a fact that
spoke not only of good discipline, but of fine French traditions of
politeness. They impressed me as splendid war material, and more, as
men of fine character and indomitable determination.
Sport behind the lines began to assume quite a healthy state in
January. Packs of beagles and hounds and pairs of greyhounds were
brought "out" by enthusiasts, and cross-country courses with rare
jumps were carefully mapped out.
Alas! for "Le Sport." An order came along one day from G.H.Q. which
stated that "the Commander-in-Chief regrets that it is necessary to
prohibit any more hunting, coursing, shooting, or paper-chasing. This
order comes into effect at once."
The 2nd Cavalry Brigade drew up a splendid steeplechase programme,
which the state of the ground would not have allowed, had no order
from G.H.Q. been promulgated.
A card of "beagle-meets" was issued, and formed the following
somewhat pretentious propaganda:--
"THE 2ND CAVALRY BRIGADE BEAGLES WILL MEET--
SUNDAY Jan. 3rd, C Squadron 4th Dragoon Guards.
TUESDAY Jan. 5th, St-Jans-Cappel, Berthen, Cross Roads.
THURSDAY Jan. 7th, Headquarters 9th Lancers.
SATURDAY Jan. 9th, Berthen.
MONDAY Jan. 11th, H Battery.
WEDNESDAY Jan. 13th, Headquarters 18th Hussars.
FRIDAY Jan. 15th, St-Jans-Cappel Church.
SUNDAY Jan. 17th, Headquarters 4th Dragoon Guards.
Each day at One o'clock."
The Prince of Wales ran more than once with that pack of beagles, and
ran well.
Football matches were allowed, and were daily fought out between the
various regimental teams.
General Robertson succeeded General Murray as Chief of the Staff
at G.H.Q., a change generally welcomed, as Robertson was held in
very high esteem throughout the Army. Many of us considered him the
greatest man the British Army had produced throughout the campaign.
That is certainly how I should describe him.