CAMBRAI.
"En haut! Montez au numéro sept," shouted a shrill female voice; "c'est
un officier, il faut le mettre au numéro sept."
And so I became No. 7, Hôpital Civil, Cambrai. My room was a small one
on the first floor; the furniture consisted of two beds and two iron
stands. The floor was polished, the walls painted a dull brown, the door
of iron, with upper panel of glazed glass. It was some time before these
surroundings presented themselves to my view. At least forty-eight hours
I remained without much consciousness, thankful in my lucid intervals
that the jolting of the cart which brought me the eight miles from
Caudry had ceased, thankful for the soft bed and the quiet cool room.
I wonder if Dr Debu remembers his first visit to me as well as I do? My
memory of all that happened during these days is very clear.
I could not yet see faces, to me nurse and doctor were different
coloured shadows, yet I remember well the nurse whispering to the
doctor, "He is very bad," and the doctor answering, "Oui! mais je
crois qu'il va s'en tirer." I do not remember exactly when I began to
recognise faces and to speak. They told me later, but at the time I did
not realise that the words came singly and with great difficulty, as if
the language was unfamiliar.
My powers of speech were stimulated by a visit from Madame la Directrice
of the hospital, who came to my bedside speaking with weird gestures in
a strange tongue. It occurred to me that she might perhaps be trying to
speak English, and so I addressed her slowly as follows: "Mettez vous
bien dans la tête, Madame, que je parle le Français aussi bien que
vous." After that day no one in the hospital made any further attempt to
practise English at my bedside.
The adjoining bed was occupied for a short time by a French Colonel, who
had been shot through both thighs and seemed in great pain. The whole
night long he kept up a constant groaning, with intermittent exclamation
in a loud voice, "Je suis dans des souffrances atrrroces." These
Marseillais are a most talkative race. This one was also very deaf.
[Illustration: Le Colonel Faméchon.]
Attempts at conversation with me were hopeless, as he could not hear
my whisper. However, he found consolation by talking to himself about
himself most of the night.
When the nurse came in next morning she paid no attention to the old
Colonel, whose wounds, although severe, were not dangerous, but after
taking my temperature she looked anxiously at the thermometer.
My temperature was up two points!
That morning the Colonel was removed to another part of the hospital.
As the window of my room could not be opened, I was taken into an
exactly similar room on the opposite side of the corridor. This was a
pleasanter room than the other, it got the morning sun, and the window
opened on to the kitchen garden. Shortly after moving into this room two
visitors came to see me. One was M. le Médecin Chef, who was afterwards
imprisoned at the Hôpital 106. At this time, however, he was allowed by
the Germans to visit the hospitals. I was quite unable to speak the day
he came to see me, but was able to recognise and wonder at the French
uniform.
My other visitor was a German officer. I can only vaguely remember that
he was tall, well-built, and I think wore a beard. He spoke English
fluently, and said that he used often to visit Cairo many years ago,
when one of the battalions of my regiment was stationed there. I asked
him if he would send news of me to England. He sat down by my bed, and
put my name and regiment down in his note-book.
The post-card he sent, which reached the War Office _viâ_ Geneva, was
signed von Schwerin. It may seem a small thing to be grateful for, but
the sending of that post-card was a very hard favour to obtain and a
very great favour to be granted.
During the first few months of the German occupation of Cambrai no
messages or letters were allowed to leave the district, and the severest
penalties were imposed on those who were caught attempting to get
letters out of the country. It was said that two German officers were
sent home in disgrace for writing to Geneva on behalf of a wounded
prisoner.
On September 15 a French Red Cross nurse came in to see me at 10 o'clock
in the evening. She was a tall, fine-looking woman, dressed in a large
heavy coat. After asking my name, she said she had a letter to give me
from an officer of my regiment.
The letter, written in pencil, on a page from an exercise book, was as
follows:--
CAUDRY HOSPITAL.
MY DEAR M.,--So glad to hear you are going on all right, as I heard
you had a bad wound in the head, which sounded serious. I saw
a priest a few days ago who told me there was an officer of my
regiment at Cambrai, and I presumed it must be you.
I also heard you were brought to the hospital the day I was brought
in, but had left by the time I got here.
I hear our regiment was captured _en bloc_ at Bertry; they marched
slap into the Germans in the dark, so we may be better off where we
are. I hear M., M., and L. were killed the day we got wounded.
We are very well done here; it is rather an amateur show, but every
one does what they can for us. I got a bullet across my scalp, but
it is nearly healed now, and I am up and about. I expect ---- Btt.
must be in the country by now somewhere, but I don't know.
I hope this finds you in good spirits. I think we may hope to be
relieved soon.
Best luck.--Yours ever,
A. A. D.
A nurse from Cambrai is here who has kindly volunteered to take this
back with her.
* * * * *
The nurse told me that she was returning to Caudry next day and would
take back an answer. She also added that my friend hoped to escape.
Next morning I was able to scrawl two or three lines, holding a pencil
in the right hand and pushing it along with the left.
Major D. succeeded in getting away from Caudry, and after many
adventures crossed safely over the Dutch frontier.
During the first month of my stay in the hospital, with a French
surgeon, French nurses, and French soldier orderlies, there was little
to remind me of the fact that I was a prisoner of war.
No one in the hospital believed that the Germans would remain at Cambrai
for more than a few weeks. The arrival of the French troops was expected
and hoped for from day to day. Optimists declared that in a week the
city would be delivered, and only the most pessimistic put off the
joyful day to the end of September. The prevailing belief that the
Germans would soon be driven out of the country was strengthened by
the vague reports of disaster to the German arms which were current in
Cambrai after the battle of the Marne.
At this time every story, however improbable, found ardent believers.
French and British troops were seen hovering on the outskirts if not at
the very gates of the city. It was even asserted that somebody had seen
Japanese troops! 200,000 of whom had landed at Marseilles some few days
before! The suppression of all newspapers left the universal craving for
news unsatisfied, and the daily paper was replaced by short type-written
notes which were secretly passed from hand to hand. I remember the
contents of one of these compositions which was handed me by a visitor
with great parade of secrecy and importance.
It was composed of brief short sentences: "Cambrai the last town
in German occupation. Germans retiring all along the line. Maubeuge
re-occupied by French and British troops. Revolution in Berlin. Streets
in flames. Death of Empress."
All such absurd stories probably emanated from a German source and
represent some obscure form of German humour.
The most exciting incident which took place at Cambrai in September was
the visit of two aeroplanes, either French or English, which flew over
the town just out of rifle range.
The aviators were greeted with a tremendous fusillade, which was started
by the sentry on the church tower close to my window. For nearly ten
minutes rifles, machine-guns, and artillery kept up a steady fire. The
nurses who had rushed out to see the aeroplanes soon came running back,
as bullets were falling on the hospital roof.
The sequel of this first air raid was long a subject of discussion.
The Germans allege that bombs were dropped by the aviators. The French
declare that German guns fired at them from outside the town, and that
the shells fell and exploded in the town.
The casualties were 7 civilians and 15 Germans killed, and a number of
wounded. Seven horses were killed on the Place du Marché.
When the firing ceased a poor woman and her little child of three years
old were brought into the hospital very severely wounded. The mother's
leg had to be amputated, and the poor little baby had one of its arms
taken off.
Although the German authorities blamed the British, it is hardly likely
that bombs were dropped on Cambrai in September 1914, and there can be
little doubt that the damage was caused by German shells.
During the first two or three weeks of my stay at the hospital I
saw very little of either the surgeon or the two nurses, with whom
afterwards I came to be on terms of great friendship. At that time the
number of wounded was so great that the nurses had not a single minute
to spare.
The hospital was overflowing with the wounded soldiers; many died within
a few hours of arriving, and many more died in the operating-room. The
number of severe cases was so great that it was impossible that all
should receive the needful attention in time. Dr Debu spent twenty-four
hours at a stretch in the operating-room.
More and more wounded kept arriving, until every bed was occupied and
wounded men were lying in the corridors, and many were turned away from
the door because there was no room.
[Illustration: Docteur Debu, Chirurgien-en-Chef, Hôpital Civil,
Cambrai.]
From the 27th of August to the first days of September, the increasing
number of deaths in the hospital made it more and more difficult to make
arrangements for removing the bodies to the cemetery. It was therefore
suggested that graves should be dug in the hospital garden opposite my
window.
The graves were actually dug, but were too shallow and could not be
used. The open trenches remained empty for some weeks, until some of the
wounded soldiers took on the job of filling in the earth.
Two nurses had charge of the ward and rooms on our floor--Mlle. Waxin,
one of the hospital permanent staff, and Mlle. Debu, the surgeon's
daughter.
Mlle. Waxin had also charge of the operating-room; she was as clever as
a surgeon and as strict as a gendarme with her patients. Rather
under the average height, her figure inclined, but very slightly, to
plumpness. Very dark eyes that could sparkle and also look severe. A
young, round, rosy, but very determined face. A typical French girl.
Mlle. Debu, although without hospital training and with no previous
experience of nursing, volunteered from the first day of the invasion
to help in her father's hospital. Mlle. Debu showed the true spirit of
France. She was only nineteen. Never for a moment did she lose courage.
From the very start she worked with the skill and endurance of a trained
nurse, and her face, ever quick to smile, never betrayed, even for a
moment, the fatigues and worries of the day.
When the rays of the morning sun lit up the top of the glass door it
was time for breakfast, and punctually to the minute Mlle. Debu appeared
with a cup of chocolate which she made for me herself. "Bonjour,
Monsieur le numéro sept," the brown eyes twinkled and the dimple smiled
at the daily jest.
The days passed very slowly. I was too weak to read, and even the
occasional visit from a wounded French or British soldier was more than
my head could bear. Every afternoon, at about five o'clock, a body of
German infantry marched past the hospital, singing the Wacht am Rhein in
part-song, an unpleasant daily reminder of the conqueror's presence.
In the room opposite there was a German officer who spent most of
the day walking up and down the corridor whistling a hackneyed and
out-of-date waltz tune. He always whistled the same tune, and it got on
my nerves. The nurse told me that there was nothing the matter with
him except an alleged pimple on his foot. This officer must have been a
delicate specimen of German militarism. He was known in the hospital as
"Parapluie," owing to the fact that when setting out one evening to dine
in town he borrowed an umbrella to protect his uniform from the rain.
A regular plague of flies was one of the minor discomforts which had to
be endured during the day. Mlle. Debu stuck a piece of fly-paper to
the gas chandelier which hung in the middle of the room, but only a few
dozen flies fell victims to greed and curiosity, and the others seemed
to take warning from the sad example. At meal-times there were always
crowds of these uninvited guests, who, from the contempt with which they
treated me, were evidently quite aware that I was unable to drive them
away. One fly, rather bigger than the others (Alphonse I called him),
was very persistent in his endeavours to land on my nose. When tired of
this game he would leave me for a while and circle round and round the
fly-paper, always about to land, and yet always suspicious of danger.
The career of Alphonse was cut short by a method of attack which is
probably considered by the insect kingdom as contrary to the rules of
civilised warfare. One afternoon Madame la Directrice brought up a box
of powder which she said was guaranteed to destroy all the flies in
the room in half an hour. The windows were shut, and the powder was
sprinkled all over the room and all over my bed. In about ten minutes it
was impossible to breathe. The powder got into my eyes and lungs, and
I had to ring and ask for the windows to be opened. But the flies had
succumbed, and poor Alphonse was swept up off the floor next morning
along with at least a hundred of his companions.
I gathered a great deal of information about what was going on in the
hospital from watching the glazed window in the door.
One morning I said to Mlle. Debu when she brought in breakfast, "Who was
it died in the ward last night?"
The nurses always tried to hide from me the large number of deaths that
took place in the early days, but I knew all about it from studying the
glazed window through which the outlines of passers-by could faintly be
distinguished. One man followed at a short distance by another meant a
stretcher was being carried past. It is not hard to guess what is the
burden of stretchers which are carried out of the ward when the dawn is
just breaking. At this hour the hospital is at its quietest. But in the
garden the sparrows twitter and chirrup that it will soon be time to
get up. An early and hungry blackbird will sometimes whistle one or
two impatient notes to hasten the coming of day. When the new daylight
enters my room with its fresh, clean morning air, the first picture
shown on the glass door is that of two men marching, with an interval
between. They wear slippers and make no noise. And many months after the
name of the burden they carry on the stretcher will appear on the Roll
of Honour--"Previously reported missing--now reported died of wounds as
a prisoner of war."
It is usually about eight o'clock that the surgeon's visit takes place.
First there is the rattle and jingle of bottles all along the corridor,
which heralds the advance of the portable dressing-table. This table
runs on rubber wheels, and is fitted with an ingenious basin in which
the surgeon can wash his hands under a tap which is turned on by
pressing a lever with the foot. Sometimes, when the door of my room
has been left ajar, I can see as they pass the surgeons in their white
overalls followed by the nurses and orderlies. There are one or two very
serious cases which have to be dressed by the surgeons, but the visit is
chiefly an inspection. Cases where the balance lies between amputation
and death have to be submitted to the sure judgment of Dr Debu.
During the early days there was a long waiting list for the
operating-room, as there was scarcely time even to deal with those who
were in immediate danger of death.
In the majority of the cases brought in the wounds had not been dressed
for several days. Men had remained three or four days at the place where
they had been struck down. Others were put into farmhouses with broken
legs or arms, and left unattended for a fortnight. Others again--and
they were very numerous--had been brought into Cambrai by the Germans
and deposited in some temporary ambulance-shed, and left with scarcely
any medical attention, their wounds dressed perhaps once a week. When
such poor sufferers as these arrived at last at the hospital, it was as
a rule too late for anything but amputation, and often too late even for
that.
One evening, about the 10th of September, a German officer arrived at
the hospital with an order that all wounded Germans should be at once
taken to the station. There was at this time, in one of the rooms
adjoining mine, a German officer who had been shot in the bladder. Mlle.
Waxin had charge of the case, and, thanks to her careful nursing, there
seemed to be some chance of his recovery. When the order came to move
all Germans, Mlle. Waxin protested that if this officer were moved he
would die. But the Germans refused to listen to her, and took their
officer off to the station. That same evening the poor fellow was taken
back from the station, and died in the hospital within an hour of his
return. Next day a large number of French and British wounded were taken
away to Germany.
The vacant beds were at once filled with cases brought in for operation
from the various temporary hospitals. Among the new arrivals were
several British officers, two of whom, Irvine in the King's Own and
Halls in the Hampshire Regiment, were put in the room opposite mine.
Halls had been shot through both ankles, but after a few days managed to
hobble across the corridor to pay me a visit. A French officer, wounded
in the knee, used sometimes to come and see me, but I have forgotten his
name.
It was on a Sunday that the sad announcement was made that my two
newly-found friends were to be taken away to Germany. Halls said it was
such bad luck to be carried away just as the French were about to enter
the town!
The French soldier-orderlies all left the hospital at the same time
as Halls and Irvine, and the duty of looking after my room fell to an
individual named François. Cheerfulness was his only virtue; laziness
and dirt were his principal and more obvious vices. François was a young
fellow of nineteen, formerly a bargee working on a neighbouring canal.
Owing to an accident which happened about a year before war broke
out, his leg had to be taken off, and he was afterwards kept on in
the hospital to act as handyman. In spite of his wooden leg he was
wonderfully active, and when aroused was capable of doing a lot of work.
François invariably wore a very large and very dirty cap, tilted right
on to the back of his thick, black, curly hair. The cap and the fag-end
of a cigarette sticking to his under lip were permanent fixtures. His
breath smelt of garlic and sour wine. The only person in the hospital
to whose orders he paid the least attention was Mlle. Waxin, and it was
only under her severe eye that François made any use of broom or duster.
On fine afternoons during the last week of September I was taken out on
to the Terrace on a stretcher. Irvine was also lifted out in a chair,
and looked very thin and pale. Like most of us in the hospital, he had
been wounded on the 26th August; the wound was a very severe one, the
bullet having actually hit the edge of his identity disc. Two other
subalterns in the Manchester Regiment were both lying out on stretchers,
and we had a talk with Captain Beresford of the Worcesters, who was
already so far recovered from a bullet in the lung that he was able to
walk. Several wounded French and British soldiers were also taken out to
enjoy the sun.
One of the Frenchmen I at once recognised to be a Curé. His figure was
more suited to the soutane than to the uniform of a Pioupiou, and a very
pronounced accent betrayed the fact that he belonged to the Auvergne
country. His comrades were evidently in the way of teasing him about his
accent, and a great discussion was going on (with much winking at me by
the other soldiers). In what part of France was the best French spoken?
M. le Curé addressed me as an impartial witness: "N'est pas, mon
capitaine, nous autres dans le midi de la France nous parlons plus
grrammaticalemaing que les habitans du Nord--nous avons un peu
_d'assent_ mais nous parlons grrammaticalemaing." My verdict being in
M. le Curé's favour, he entered into animated conversation, delighted,
he said, to meet "_enfaing_" some one who could explain to him a
question in which he was much interested but of which he understood
nothing: "Qu'est que ce que le 'homme-roulle'?" It was time to go in,
so we parted, and my inability to answer his question remained
undiscovered. I never saw the Curé again, and was told he had been taken
off to Germany.
Among the lesser discomforts of the early days in the Civil Hospital was
the ordeal of being washed, which I only went through twice in the first
three weeks. The nurses could not think of washing patients, as they
had not time to dress all the wounds that required urgent attention, and
therefore the washing was done by François, and it was a sort of job to
which he was evidently quite unaccustomed.
The impossibility of getting any sleep, the pain from lying in one
position, and the irritation of repeated mustard plasters (which were
brought up and applied by François), soon became relatively unimportant
in the presence of a new trouble. One evening something in my head began
to throb. It felt like the steady regular beat of a pulse deep inside.
When Mlle. Waxin came to see me that night I told her about it. Of
course, as all good nurses do, she said it was nothing, but she would
speak to the surgeon. Next morning Dr Debu, after examination, declared
that an abscess had formed in the wound owing to the presence of a bone
splinter. This would necessitate a small operation.
My first acquaintance with the movable dressing-table, which carried a
fearsome collection of surgical weapons, took place at nine o'clock that
evening. Mlle. Waxin started the proceedings with a shaving-brush. After
lathering the top of my head, she then shaved the hair off all round the
wound, and I was ready for the surgeon's visit. When Dr Debu came in, he
said it would be better if I could manage to do without an anæsthetic.
"How long are you going to be?" I asked.
"Not more than a minute."
The apprehension was worse than the reality. A quick movement of the
lancet laid open the abscess and disclosed the jagged splintered edge
of the skull. With a pair of pincers the surgeon broke off one or two
pieces of bone about the size of a tooth, then jammed in a piece of lint
soaked in iodine. The whole affair lasted two minutes. From now onwards
my head had to be dressed every day, and a piece of lint nearly a
foot long was pushed in every morning to keep the wound open, and any
splinters that could be found were snipped off with the pincers.
Now that the pressure of work in the hospital was somewhat relieved, my
two nurses would sometimes come and sit in my room, and I was cheered
with a regular afternoon visit from some of the nurses from neighbouring
hospitals. Mlle. L'Etoile and her friends used to bring me books,
boxes of the sweets known as "Bétises de Cambrai," peaches, nectarines,
grapes, and long, fat, juicy "poires Duchesse," the largest and sweetest
pears I have ever tasted. Afternoon tea "avec le numéro sept" was a
cheerful and often noisy meal. It was such a relief to forget for a
moment the presence of the Boche and to hear the sound of laughter.
In addition to my friends who were regular visitors, we had occasional
visits from curious but well-meaning strangers. Some people find it
impossible when visiting hospitals to get beyond the everlasting phrase,
"Where were you wounded?"
The limit of conversational inanity was reached by one of these casual
visitors, a stout blonde dame. Our conversation ran as follows:--
"Bonjour, bonjour; vous êtes un officier anglais, n'est-ce pas?"
"Mais oui, Madame!"
"Où avez-vous été blessé?"
"A la tête...."
"Vous restez couché comme ça toute la journée?"
"C'est que j'ai la jambe paralysée."
"Et vous n'avez pas eu de blessure à la jambe?"
"Rien du tout."
"Alors vous étiez donc paralysé avant la guerre!!!"
"Ce qui prouve," as one of my nurses said, "que toutes les bétises de
Cambrai ne sont pas dans les boîtes à bonbons."
It was about this time that a visit was paid to the hospital by Mgr.
l'Archevêque de Cambrai, who went round all the wards with kind words of
consolation for each one. The Archbishop hesitated on the threshold of
my room, and was about to pass on, fearing no doubt to disturb me, and
perhaps foreseeing the probable difficulties of conversation.
"Entrez donc, Monseigneur," I said; "Veuillez prendre la peine de vous
asseoir."
The Archbishop was quite taken aback, and I could see Mlle. Waxin behind
was convulsed with inward mirth. She said to me afterwards, "Où êtes
vous allé chercher de si grandes phrases?"
His lordship came and sat by my bedside for a few moments. He is a man
of great personality and charm, who gives an impression of strength and
tact.
After the Archbishop had gone, Mlle. Waxin told me that the vacant bed
in my room was to be occupied by a British officer. This turned out to
be Wilkinson in the Manchester Regiment. The manner of his arrival next
morning was somewhat peculiar. The door opened slowly, and a large,
very tall man, dressed like a nigger minstrel in black-and-white striped
pyjamas, and covered with bandages, hopped across the room on the left
leg; with three vigorous hops he was sitting on the bed. His right foot
was bandaged, also one of his hands. Nothing could be seen of his face
but a nose and one eye.
"Thank goodness there is some one to talk to," was what the strange
figure said. Then followed the necessary mutual explanations.
The only method of movement possible to Wilkinson was hopping, at which
he had become quite an expert. Shrapnel bullets had lodged themselves
all over his body, fortunately avoiding vital spots. The worst of his
wounds was a fractured jaw, which gave him a great deal of pain, and
made chewing of food impossible.
When Mlle. Waxin came in to dress my wound, some of the other nurses
sometimes came out of curiosity, as the working of the brain was quite
visible. The pushing in of long pieces of lint and the removal of
splinters, which took place every morning, was quite painless, and only
took a few minutes. But it usually took the two nurses half an hour to
dress the various wounds of the new arrival, and on the first morning Dr
Debu extracted a bullet from just under the skin below the small of the
patient's back.
Shortly after Wilkinson's arrival a most tragic event took place in the
adjoining ward.
In some mysterious manner the electric bells ceased to ring every
evening about nine o'clock. This was a very serious matter, especially
as the night nurse that particular week--Mme. Z--was very slack about
her duties, and never went round the hospital during the night to see if
all was well. The disturbance started about eleven o'clock, with a dull
thud as of a body falling, followed by shouting and rattling of the iron
tables on the floor of the ward. The noise, heard through closed doors,
was sufficient to wake Wilkinson. The shouting ceased for a moment, only
to start afresh with new vigour. Wilkinson took two hops across the room
and opened the door; the tables still rattled, and the calls for help
continued. A French soldier, with one arm in a sling, clothed in nothing
but a nightshirt, came walking gingerly down the corridor in his bare
feet. When he saw our door open, he came in to tell us all about it. A
soldier who was badly wounded in the head had suddenly become delirious,
torn off his bandages, and fallen out of bed. There was no one in the
ward able to help the poor fellow, who lay moaning on the floor in a
state too awful for description. The bells did not ring, and there
was nothing to be done except shout. The French soldier went along the
corridor to the head of the staircase to call for the night watcher.
After quite a long time some one downstairs woke up to the fact that
there was something wrong. The night nurse appeared, followed by the
night porter. They lifted the dying man on to the bed, bandaged up his
poor head, and gave him a strong injection of morphia. One of the
French soldiers told me some time after that the poor fellow died quite
noiselessly in the middle of the night, but I knew early that morning
when a stretcher passed the glass door that the tragedy was over.
Mlle. Waxin used often to tell me about the different cases under her
charge.
I was never able to get the name of one of her favourites whom she
called her "petit anglais." This was a young Irish boy badly shot in the
stomach. Dr Debu told me that he might live for several months, but that
there was no hope of recovery. The dressing of his wounds was nearly
always done by Mlle. Waxin, under whose gentle hand he never complained
of the awful agony from which morphia was the only relief. Although the
ward in which he lay was on the ground floor, we could sometimes hear
the screams of agony upstairs, screams which no one but Mlle. Waxin
could silence. "C'est mon petit anglais qui m'appelle," she used to say.
It is remarkable that no matter how badly a soldier is wounded, even
when he can neither eat nor drink, he will be soothed by a cigarette.
The Frenchman above mentioned, unable to eat, unable to speak, and
scarcely conscious, his brain bleeding from a great hole in the skull,
was yet able the day before he died to smoke a cigarette. "Le petit
anglais," who was never free from pain, found his greatest joy in the
few cigarettes that Mlle. Waxin, in spite of the shortage of tobacco,
brought to his beside every morning. It was very hard to get any tobacco
in Cambrai until late in October, when the Germans allowed it to be
imported from Belgium.
One of the nurses who was able to speak English used sometimes to come
and see me, and one day she brought me the following note from a soldier
in my own regiment who was in one of the wards downstairs:--
No. 0000, Pte. N. N.,
B Co.,
1st ---- Highlanders.
DEAR SIR,--I was sorry to hear that you had been one of the unlucky
ones, along with myself, to be put aside and away from the regiment.
I hope that you will pull through all right. I am getting on, but
it is my legs that are all the hinder. It was a very bad place I was
wounded in the stoumick. Now, dear sir, I hope that you won't think
me forward in asking you for a favour. If you would let me have
the advance of 2s. so that I could get some tobacco, as I have lost
everything.
N. N.
This man recovered, and was exchanged many months afterwards.
Another young Irishman, who was a great favourite, had been badly
wounded in the foot. It was found necessary to take the foot off, and
after the operation, when Mlle. Waxin went to console him, she found him
lying with his face to the wall, silently weeping.
"I was going to scold him for being such a baby," she said to me
afterwards, "but when the English-speaking sister explained to me the
reason of the tears, I felt like crying myself."
"It is not the pain, sister, that troubles me," he said to them,
"but you see with a wooden leg I can never go back again to the old
regiment."
On 9th Oct. we had a very strict inspection of the hospital, and a great
number of the remaining British wounded were put down on the list of
"transportables." The French nurses always sent off the British wounded
dressed in French uniform, as it was a fact notorious at Cambrai that
the Germans robbed British wounded of their uniform. In many cases
German soldiers took greatcoats away from wounded men and gave a
five-mark piece in exchange. The ill-treatment which was specially shown
to British soldiers on the journey to Germany was the principal reason
why the French, whenever they could get a chance, disguised our wounded
soldiers in French uniforms. The fact that, in the early days of the
war, British prisoners were invariably treated worse than the French
cannot be denied, and will be amply proved from the evidence of returned
prisoners, and from other sources of information at present unavailable.
It is the truth that nearly all British soldiers taken prisoners and
sent to Germany during the first months of the war were made the object
of special contempt, neglect, or cruelty. Such conduct undoubtedly
constitutes a departure "from laws of humanity, and from the dictates
of the public conscience," which are supposed to govern the conduct
of civilised nations.[1] To ill-treat or insult a wounded and helpless
enemy is the most despicable offence a soldier can commit. Men who do
these things dishonour the name of soldier.
[1] See Convention concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land: The
Hague, 1907, p. 47.
The meaning of war without chivalry was first brought home to the
inhabitants of Cambrai when they saw the way the victorious Germans
treated the unfortunate wounded who had been brought into the town
from the neighbouring battlefields. During the first week of September
hundreds of wounded, French and English, were sent to Germany packed
in cattle trucks, with no medical attendance, no food, no water. It was
only natural that in our hospital both nurses and patients should dread
the days when German officials came round searching for cases that could
be considered "transportable." The inspections which took place on
the 9th and 11th of October were carried out with great severity. My
companion Wilkinson was taken away, and many were put down on the list
who were quite unfit to travel.
Great consternation was created in the hospital on the evening of the
11th, when an order arrived that the whole male staff of the hospital
was to report forthwith at the Kommandantur. This was the end of
the Civil Hospital as a French hospital. The doctors (except Debu),
orderlies, and assistants were marched off to the Kommandantur at seven
o'clock that evening, and spent the whole night in a cold unfurnished
room without food or drink. Next morning the whole party, with two
exceptions, were told that they were prisoners, and had to leave at once
for Germany. The two exceptions were one of the surgeons, who was able
to make up a plausible story, and François, whose wooden leg saved him
from a German prison. Next morning the hospital was taken over by the
Germans, and French orderlies were replaced by German soldiers.
The operating-room was shared between the French and German surgeons.
Dr Debu operated in the morning on the French and British, and in the
afternoon the room was occupied by German surgeons, the chief of whom
was Professor Fessler, a celebrated authority on gunshot wounds. The
French nurses at Cambrai told me that they found the German surgeons
were, as a rule, quite indifferent and careless in causing pain to the
wounded, of which fact the following incident from my note-book is an
example.
"_Oct. 16th._--Dreadful screams from downstairs, lasting two or three
minutes. Mlle. Waxin tells me it is only the German surgeon starting to
operate before the ether had taken effect."
An exception must be made of Professor Fessler, who was always most
humane in the operating-room. Professor Fessler once said to Mlle.
Waxin, "If the men who are responsible for war could be made to realise
the horror of the operating-room, war would always be avoided." A
dying Frenchman was brought in one afternoon in the hope that instant
operation might save his life. Professor Fessler performed the operation
at once, working with the utmost care, as Mlle. Waxin told me, to avoid
giving the poor sufferer unnecessary agony.
The numbers of German patients in the hospital increased day by day,
which we took as a hopeful indication that the Germans were not having
things all their own way. We had several German officers about this
time, and I used to hear about them from Mlle. Waxin. One of them, who
was very seriously wounded, insisted upon being dressed by the French
nurse, and would not allow the Schwester to touch him. The officer in
the room next mine was dying of chest wounds complicated by pneumonia.
During the night, through the thin partition, I could follow every sound
of his death agony--the groaning, whistling laboured breathing, the
whispering of nurses, the low steady tones of prayer, and then silence.
A very different death scene took place in the hospital a few days
later. A German officer was brought in badly shot in the stomach.
After his operation he was told that food or drink during the first
twenty-four hours would be fatal. He ordered his servant to fetch him a
bottle of champagne, drank half of it down and died within five minutes.
A bestial and truly Hunnish death.
Now that the Germans had installed themselves in the hospital, there was
an end to the pleasant afternoons on the sunny terrace. I was no longer
lifted out of bed to sit in a chair, nor was I able even to sit up
in bed lest some German should see me and mark my name down as
"transportable." The hospital gate was now guarded by a sentry, and
no visitors could enter without a written permit from the German
authorities, who imposed their authority throughout the whole hospital,
without meeting any effective resistance until they encountered Mlle.
Waxin. German authority said that a German Schwester would, in future,
assist the French nurse in the operating-room. Mlle. Waxin declaring
that she would allow no one to interfere with her work, locked the room
up and put the keys in her pocket. German authority, after threatening
imprisonment, exile, and other dreadful punishments, had to climb down.
It would have been easy to take the keys or to force the door, but
the services of Mlle. Waxin were indispensable, and it was obviously
impossible to compel her to work against her will. So the German
Schwester was dismissed. The morning after this matter had been settled
another storm arose, when Mlle. Waxin's father came to pay his daily
visit and was stopped by the sentry. The determined young girl went to
the German Head Surgeon and declared that she refused to work in the
hospital unless her father was allowed to visit her at any time of the
day or night without hindrance.
After the first few days the friction between the French and German
hospital staff began to grow less. The German nurses, although good at
sweeping and cleaning, had little or no training at Red Cross work, and
were very glad to leave the dressing of complicated injuries to Mlle.
Waxin or Mlle. Debu. The night orderlies were stolid, silent, very
willing and obliging. The German surgeons from all accounts behaved with
tact and courtesy.
This comparatively peaceful state of affairs was upset by the visit of
an extremely ugly, very cross and disagreeable individual, with a grey
ragged beard, whom we christened "le père grigou." His chief business at
Cambrai was to compile lists of "transportables." Grigou, a personage
of high rank, was the senior medical officer at Cambrai. To our great
horror he made the Hôpital Civil his headquarters, and on the day of
arrival paid a surprise visit to my room. But not quite a surprise
visit, for Mlle. Waxin had wind of his coming and had made all
preparations. She bound an extra bandage round my head, took my pillow
away, and drew the window curtains. When Grigou arrived I was lying flat
on my back in semi-darkness, breathing heavily. My eyes, bloodshot from
ten minutes' hard rubbing, looked vacantly up at the ceiling. As Grigou
bent over the bed I heaved a long tremulous sigh. Grigou consulted with
his colleague, and the verdict was that it was doubtful if I would
live till next morning! My name was of course put down on the list of
"non-transportable." If Grigou, who visited our floor every day, had
seen me, or any German had reported that I had been seen sitting up in
bed, our harmless trick would have resulted in my immediate departure
for Germany, and my nurses would have got into serious trouble, so I had
to live up to my supposed dying condition. Grigou did not remain with us
more than a few days, but even when he had left the nurses did not dare
to take me out on a stretcher or even to put me into a chair.
At this time the other bed in my room was occupied by a soldier of the
Middlesex Regiment. His case was an example of the terrible results
which came from delay in attending to shell wounds. After lying out two
days he was taken to Cambrai, and remained for more than a week in a
German ambulance with little or no attention. A German surgeon opened
his leg without using an anæsthetic. Perhaps there was none to be had.
As a result of this the poor fellow's nerve was completely shattered.
When he came under Dr Debu's care it was hoped that his leg might be
saved, and a further opening was made just below the knee. The dressing
of this man's wounds was a sight not easily forgotten. When the nurses
entered the room with the dressing-table he begged them to leave him to
die. While the bandage was being unrolled he sat with chattering teeth,
his face twitching with nervous apprehension; the leg was dreadful to
look at, the flesh just above and below the knee lay folded back, raw
and discoloured, with rubber tubing protruding from both sides of the
calf. It was a hopeless case, and the attempt to save his leg had to
be given up. After the amputation he suffered far less pain, but never
recovered his self-control. On 20th October he was taken away to Madame
Brunet's Convalescent Hospital, reserved for amputated cases, where he
died just before Christmas.
It had been decided by the German authorities that beds in the Hôpital
Civil were to be reserved solely for cases requiring operation. Dr
Debu therefore found that it was no longer possible for me to stay, and
arranged for my being sent to another hospital.
On the 21st October I was taken away from my kind friends, and for
the first time carried by Germans on a German stretcher. Outside the
hospital a motor ambulance was waiting. The night was dark, wet, and
very cold. My leg was soon numbed with cold, as the ambulance did not
start for nearly a quarter of an hour. Through the open end I could see
a flickering street lamp which threw glinting reflections on the wet
cobble-stones.
A martial step, with the clink of spurs, woke echoes down the silent
street; a German officer passed, came into view for an instant under the
lamp, then clanked away into darkness.
The ambulance driver and another soldier, who had been conversing
together in low tones, stood rigidly to attention until the sound of the
officer's steps had died away in the distance. Then the French soldier
for whom we were waiting was carried down and placed in the ambulance
beside me, the door was closed, shutting out the cold air and the
dripping street. "Eh bien, mon lieutenant," said a voice from the
stretcher, "nous voila partis! My father was taken prisoner in 1870,
and voila, I am now also a prisoner, but that is nothing--_on les aura_,
cette fois ci, on les aura ces sales têtes d'alboches!"