STORIES FROM LE NUMÉRO 106.
Behind one of the hospital wings there is a tiny garden walled in on
all sides by high buildings. Here were some mouldy-looking pear-trees, a
ragged gooseberry bush, and a patch of ragged cabbage-stalks. The ground
was thickly covered with rotten leaves; in one corner empty broken
rabbit-hutches, pieces of broken furniture, broken bottles, and
miscellaneous _débris_ gave an additional note of depression. Still it
was a change from the dulness of the courtyard, and the garden, such
as it was, became the object of my daily excursions. The gardener, now
digging trenches in some distant part of France, might never dig here
again, but his two little children played at soldiers every afternoon
among the decayed leaves. A large shed at the end of the garden, which
had at one time been used as a wash-house, now falling to ruin, still
contained a rusty boiler and some broken wash-tubs. In one corner, piled
one on top of the other, stood six or seven roughly-hewn coffins made
out of old packing-cases.
Le Picard was often a partner in these explorations round the dead
garden, and together we visited the coffins. "Ça voyez vous," said this
one-legged philosopher, "ça c'est le dernier costume."
Entrance to the hospital through an archway under the building was
barred by a massive wooden _portail_. One morning, when the bread-cart
had left the gateway open, Picard and I took up our stand on the
threshold and looked out into the street. The houses opposite the
hospital are modern and uninteresting, walls covered with dirty white
plaster, shutters closed and in need of paint. Farther down on the
right, as you stand at the hospital door, the street, as it nears the
Place Publique, begins to curve, and here were old houses with their
quaint roofs grouped picturesquely against the dull sky, where heavy
clouds prepared to renew their steady downpour.
The street was empty. Farther down there are shops, but they are closed.
A German soldier came clattering along the pavement. Just as he reached
the hospital we two standing at the door caught his eye and aroused his
curiosity to such an extent that he stopped, stared for a moment, then
walked backwards for quite a long way and nearly bumped into an officer.
A few sad-looking women, carrying baskets and bundles, stopped in the
middle of the street and feasted their eyes on Picard. "It stirs the
heart," said they, "to see the French uniform." These poor people made
a collection of their scarce sous and presented Picard with one franc
fifty. The children gathered in such numbers that I had to ask them to
move on for fear of the Germans.
After the children had gone, a little girl, perhaps ten or eleven years
old, came shyly up to the door. Under a threadbare cloak, which in the
cold wind and rain afforded small protection to her tired little body,
she carried a bundle of picture post-cards. Her present errand was not
concerned with asking for charity. She came quite near without speaking
or looking up, and stretched out a thin grimy little hand to give me a
two-sous piece. Having given me the two sous and rendered me speechless
with mixed emotions, she turned to run, but Picard stopped her. "Wilt
thou not show us the pretty post-cards, my little one?" "That I cannot
do," came the resolute answer; "they are not mine to give away, and they
cost two sous each to buy." But I, being obviously the possessor of two
sous, was allowed to see the post-cards, and in exchange for my two-sous
piece chose a view of the Place Publique.
[Illustration: Foundlings from La Bassée.
Photo taken at CAMBRAI.]
At this time the army of occupation at Cambrai was the 6th Bavarians. On
the whole, the behaviour of the Bavarian soldiers was excellent.
Cases of rioting and drunkenness were rare, and we heard no stories of
atrocities such as the Germans were guilty of in Belgium.
Picard and I stood at the hospital gate every morning for several days
in succession, and in no case were we greeted with insults, although I
found later on from personal experience that even a severely crippled
enemy was not safe from the insulting jests of a German soldier. Of
course we always saluted any officer who passed, and our salute was
always punctiliously returned. Sometimes a private soldier saluted, and
one day two tall bearded reservists stopped, crossed the street, and
gave me a packet of cigarettes. Next morning we found the gate closed. A
note had been sent from the Kommandantur stating that "it was forbidden
for soldiers to stand at the door of the hospital." The watchful
"Verboten Department" scored another point and deprived us of a harmless
amusement.
A German orderly came on the 17th December with the following strange
message: "The General is coming to inspect the hospital, and wishes to
know if the Scotch officer would be good enough to wear his uniform."
Being deficient of sporran, glengarry, kilt apron, S.B. belt, brogues,
and spats, my "uniform" consisted of the khaki tunic, kilt, kilt pin,
hose-tops and flashes, grey woollen socks, and black cloth snow-boots.
On a black glengarry made by M. Herbin to my design I wore the cap
badge, which I had fortunately taken off and put in my pocket when
sitting in the trenches on the morning of the 26th August. I was making
the best of this strange equipment when the arrival of the General
and his Staff was announced. They were waiting for me in the corridor
outside the Salle cinq. The picture of this group of German Staff
officers is one not easily forgotten. I turned slowly in at the door
with crutch and stick, laboriously dragging one leg after another,
rested against the wall, and saluted. Among the group I recognised Dr
Meyer, scowling and ill at ease; also General Oberarzt Schmidt, who,
eager to show me off as being his own particular prize, was at once
snubbed by the General, and subsided into a dignified silence. These
Staff officers were all big heavy men of the usual German type, but the
General, small, slimly built, with a light grey moustache, had an air
of distinction that was almost French. His manner also was tactful and
dignified.
After a preliminary question about my health and inquiry as to my white
hair, which I had to explain was probably due partly to shock and partly
to my head having been so long bandaged up, the conversation got beyond
the little German I possessed, and one of the big Staff officers came to
the rescue in fluent but guttural English. They could not believe that
the kilt was worn in the winter-time, and seemed to think that it was
only a parade uniform. Many questions were asked about the advantages of
the kilt as fighting kit. I said that it was a very adaptable uniform,
good both for fighting and for running away. This remark was recognised
to be a joke, and translated as such to the General. I was asked how
many regiments in Scotland wore the kilt, and if all the Highland
regiments were composed of Highlanders.
"No," I said in reply to another question, "we do not wear trousers even
in winter."
"Schrecklich kalt im winter," they repeated, nodding at each other
suspiciously.
With a polite wish for my speedy recovery the General intimated that
the parade was at an end. The Staff clicked its heels and saluted--even
Meyer had to swallow his hate and follow the example of the senior
officers.
Outside the corridor, Mme. la Directrice and some of the nurses were
standing at the foot of the stairs ready to accompany the officers round
the hospital, but the General passed by and went out into the court
without taking any notice.
The inspection was over.
A lady who lives near Caudry came to see me. She told me that the graves
of the British soldiers, both in the churchyard and in the fields around
the village, are well cared for by the villagers, and that a
large number of identity discs had, with the consent of the German
authorities, been locked up at the Mairie. Near the little wood between
Audencourt and Caudry, on the spot where we had dug our trenches on
the morning of the 26th August, there are buried seventeen soldiers and
three officers.
About the middle of December the Médecin Chef was taken away to Germany.
A number of causes now contributed to make life at the 106 wholly
unendurable. An entire absence of discipline among the hospital
orderlies and the constant squabbling of the nurses had been points
which the doctor and I used often to discuss and deplore. Now that the
restraining influence of the doctor's age and rank was no longer with
us, the evils of disorganisation became every day more apparent. The
"Directrice," or head matron of the hospital, was wholly incapable, and
by her tactless mismanagement set the whole hospital by the ears. The
orderlies grew noisier and more slovenly every day. Youths who had
no occupation in the hospital, and only appeared at meal-times, were
allowed to air their opinions in endless discussion. Noisy, chattering
visitors strolled in at all hours of the day, and there was no corner of
the hospital safe from invasion. Quarrels among the nurses reached such
a stage of bitterness that many were not on speaking terms. Friends
whose kind visits I had always welcomed now came rarely or not at all.
It was evident that such a state of affairs portended something more
serious than tactlessness or mismanagement. The gossips of Cambrai were
busy with many stories to the discredit of Mme. la Directrice, but it
seemed to me unreasonable that the voice of scandal should be concerned
with a plain-looking woman the wrong side of forty. The whole affair
may have been merely foolishness and vanity, but it was certainly
an indiscretion on the part of Mme. la Directrice to receive in the
courtyard of the 106 Hospital, from the hand of a German orderly,
bouquets of white chrysanthemums presented with the compliments of a
German officer.
Every morning at 11 o'clock I paid a visit to the Salle cinq. Many of
the older inhabitants had gone, some to Germany, others now rested in
what Picard calls le dernier costume. No. 6 still complained unceasingly
from his corner bed. No. 3, the Chasseur Alpin with a bullet through the
chest, had recovered from various complications and was now able to
sit up in a chair. Among the newcomers were three English soldiers. Ben
Steele, a reservist from Manchester, had one bullet through his arm
and one through his leg. Both wounds were healed, but the leg remained
stiff, swollen, paralysed, and the pain was ceaseless.
The story of his wound is one of those ugly tales of atrocities
committed by individual German soldiers, for which the German Army,
with its perfect discipline, cannot escape responsibility. Ben was badly
wounded in the arm, and was left lying in the trenches when his company
retired. "I got that in fair fighting," said Ben, pointing to his
wounded arm. He told me the rest of the story briefly, and did not care
to refer to it again. "When the Germans came along they shouted 'Hands
up.' I was lying in the bottom of the trench. I lifted my left hand, but
a German soldier, jumping over the trench, fired down at me point-blank,
and the bullet, which went through my right thigh, knocked me
unconscious." Ben was sent back to England a few months later, and will
probably be crippled for life.
On December 5th a party of convalescent British soldiers arrived from
the Civil Hospital, among them R. Anderson, a reservist from my own
battalion, L.-Cpl. M'Donald, Royal Irish, and James Prime, Rifle
Brigade.
I can never forget the four days these men spent with me at the
106--first, because they were such good companions, and second,
because two of these men subsequently met death at German hands under
circumstances of revolting inhumanity.
[Illustration:
Pte. R. ANDERSON.
L.-Cpl. M'DONALD. Mme. BUQUET. Pte. JAMES PRIME.
British Soldiers at the "106."]
Prime represented all that is best in the typical English soldier. He
came from the Midlands, the heart of England. It was a treat for me to
sit and listen to the story of his short battle experience, which, a
plain and common tale in these times, acquired enthralling interest from
the graphic language and quiet humour of the speaker.
Irish, Scotch, and English, we all gathered in the Salle cinq and forgot
our troubles, present and impending.
Prime was a born story-teller. He possessed the rare faculty of making
pictures in the minds of his hearers. He showed me a photograph of his
wife and children, and I can well remember the description of his home
in England. We found a subject of mutual interest in the keeping of
poultry on the "intensive" system, and discussed the respective merits
of Wyandottes, Leghorns, and Buff Orpingtons.
"Bob" Anderson, when I first saw him, was sitting dressed in blue coat
and red kepi at the refectory table with Prime, M'Donald the Irish
Lance-Corporal, and half a dozen French soldiers. Right glad I was to
hear the familiar accents of my native land!
Anderson could give me no news of the battalion, as he had been knocked
out at the same time and place as myself. On the whole, the Germans had
so far treated him fairly well. "It was surely the whole German army,"
said Bob, "that marched along the road near Audencourt when I was lying
in the ditch with a broken leg, smoking my pipe. They didn't take much
notice. At one of the halts a German stepped out of the ranks--'Hullo,
Jock, what's ado wi' you?' said he, and gave me a drink out of his
water-bottle. This was a German who had lived for fifteen years in
Glasgow! The next halt was a different story. Several of the Germans
gathered round, shook their fists at me, and one of them snatched the
pipe out of my mouth and threw it away."
M'Donald, who soon after died a hero's death at Wittenberg, was a
young fellow not more than twenty-one or twenty-two, quiet, sad, and
delicate-looking. He had quite recovered from a dangerous wound in the
chest, though he was still weak and walked with difficulty.
A photographer came and took a group of the British soldiers, who were
mostly dressed in French uniform, and next day they were all taken off
to Germany. Their departure for Germany was such a day of sadness for
us who were left behind, that it seems as if we must have had some
premonition of the future. The men went off loaded with as many parcels
as they could carry--shirts, socks, tobacco, food, a bottle of wine in
each greatcoat pocket, and five francs each from the Hospital Funds.
Of the three soldiers, Anderson is the only one who has lived to tell
the story of what befell after leaving the courtyard of the 106 on
Dec. 7, 1914. Anderson survived, was eventually exchanged, and we met a
year later in Millbank Hospital. The following is the story in his own
words, taken down in shorthand. It is a story which bears the stamp of
truth in every word, and is corroborated in every detail by a Government
report published in all the daily papers on April 10, 1916:--
"When we left Cambrai Station, we were sent in a hospital train to
Giessen; it took us three days. We had one basin of soup each day, and a
piece of bread.
"When we got to Giessen we were taken to a waiting-room at the station
and bad used. All the English were put on one side, called 'English
swine' and that kind of thing. We were then taken in a motor ambulance
to the Town Hall in Giessen. We were three weeks in that hospital and
the food was all right there, but we, especially the English, were
bad used all the time by the orderlies. There were four English
altogether--M'Donald, Prime, and myself, and another chap in the Wilts.
We went from there to Giessen camp, a great big French camp, and had
to march two and a half miles with two sticks; I was nearly dead when I
reached that camp; it was all uphill, and a crowd behind us shoving us
on. We were there three days, then had orders to fall in and march to
the station again. We started to march to the station, but I was not fit
to do it, and some one stopped me in the town, put me on a car, and took
me to the station in the car. We got to Wittenberg the next day, and as
soon as we arrived in Wittenberg all the people were at the station,
a big crowd, men and women. They all had big sticks, some had bars of
iron, and we had to run the gauntlet of this,--of course I could not do
so. I got one terrible kick, but anyhow I managed to get into camp, and
as soon as we got into camp we got knocked about by the Germans, and
everything was taken from us.
"Of course the food was horrible all the time. We had heard stories
about typhus in the camp, and the French doctors inoculated us. I
took ill about the beginning of February, and the Frenchman took my
temperature, which was very high. He ordered me to the hospital, but
there were no stretchers to be got. Six men carried me down to the
bottom of the camp, about half a mile, and dragged me into an empty
bungalow. It was in the same camp; there was no isolation. I was put on
the floor amongst a lot of Russians; there were very few beds, and I was
on the bare floor. In the camp there was one bed between three men,
and I had left my bed in the camp. I lay on the bare floor all the
afternoon; no orderlies were there; nobody came near me. The soup came
up at night--just the same ordinary rations as we got in camp. The soup
came up in a wooden tub without a cover, and they had to carry it about
half a mile from the cook-house, and it arrived at the hospital full of
dust and dirt--at the door of the hospital. The strongest that were able
to get it got it, and the weakest lay without. That is a fact. I lay
there about three or four days, when some Englishmen volunteered to come
down and look after us.
"I took typhus first: when I was in hospital four or five days, Prime
was carried there; he was put down on the floor, and died four or five
days afterwards. Sergeant Spence of the Scots Guards was with him when
he died. Just before the end they got him a ramshackle bed made up with
boards, no mattress.
"The place was a long, narrow hut, whitewashed all over, and about one
hundred men in it, absolutely packed, and not more than half a dozen
beds at the first. We lay on the floor. There were stoves, but hardly
any coal. No one brought in any food. You had to go outside to get
it, and the orderly would give you some soup in your basin if you were
there. Those not fit to rise from the floor got none unless a comrade
brought it to them.
"The French doctors came round, but what could they do? They had nothing
to give you, and could do absolutely nothing.
"The Germans had all left the camp as soon as typhus broke out. They
built up wooden shoots to put the food down. When parcels from home came
they went down the shoot.
"When the beds came in carts they were lifted over the barbed wire. No
Germans came in.
"There were never enough beds, and men were lying on the floor all the
time.
"We had nearly 100 deaths a day at one time. The total population of
the camp was about 16-17,000, with only about six doctors, French and
Russian. Then we had six British R.A.M.C. doctors--Captain Sutcliffe,
Major Fry, Captain Fielding, Captain Vidal, and Mr Lugard. Major Fry,
Captain Fielding, and Captain Sutcliffe took the typhus and died. I
never got a wash all the time I was there until I was able to go to the
tap. There was one fellow, a private in the Gordons, who never had his
wound dressed; it was running all the time. He died of pure neglect and
typhus. A man died next me with his clothes on, never had them off, even
his greatcoat on. Our clothes were running with vermin--millions!
"You could not get dressings or bandages. I have seen men with open
wounds who have had to wash their bandages, and hang them up to dry
before they could put them on again.
"M'Donald volunteered as an orderly in the Typhus Ward, and when he came
along he was only one day on duty when he took typhus. He got better,
but declined because of the starvation diet. I had him out walking for
a little bit up and down, but he was very weak, a living skeleton. He
would fall down, and I told him to try and get up and walk a little bit.
'Oh, Jock,' he says, 'I'm no' fit.' 'Come on,' I said, 'try.' He got a
parcel from home--one from his mother--just before he died. It was just
from hunger and neglect.
"Things were getting that bad about the month of April that the Germans
began to get a little afraid, and started a new hospital--about half a
dozen of huts. It was isolated from the camp, and we moved there about
the beginning of May.
"Things gradually got a little better after that, but January, February,
and March were three awful months.
"The Germans did not come back into the camp till the month of August.
"After I was better of the typhus I was back in the same camp. All food
was thrown over the barbed wire. Even packets were sent down the shoot.
The Germans never came near; you would see them outside the wire. Just
before the American Ambassador came there was a new thing for carrying
down the food--something like a dustbin with a lid on. The shoot is
still there, but is not used. After the Ambassador came we put in a
claim, saying we had been passed as unfit for military service, and men
who ought to have gone home last August had had it cancelled at the last
moment; but we heard no more. The American Ambassador said that must
be the Government's fault; he would see about it. He sent us a lot of
games. We were only allowed to play games between the huts.
"The camp was run by the Russians, and nobody to look after us. The
Germans never came in; you could do what you liked as long as you did
not go too near the wire, when they used to sound the alarm. When the
alarm sounded at night we had to run into the park, and if you did not
get into the park soon enough they fired at you. They fired one night
and killed six Frenchmen. One of the Royal Irish who came up with me had
a bullet right past his ear,--I suppose it made him pretty nippy.
"We got no clean clothing or a change. The English were all in rags:
you would not know they were soldiers at all to look at them. Just three
days before the American Ambassador came, when they heard he was coming,
they paraded us all up and looked at our underclothing. We got a shirt
and a pair of socks to smarten us up. You could never get hot water; but
the day that the American Ambassador came the Germans came round in the
morning and told us that if any of us wanted hot water, to send two men
out of each room to the cook-house and get as much boiling water as we
wanted. We wondered what was up: we were saying there was something up
that day. The Ambassador asked us what clothing we had. He made a
great improvement: we got shirts and overcoats, but they took all our
overcoats away.
"He asked a lot of men if they had had typhus; he seemed to know all
about it. Just previous to that, a Mr Jackson from the American Embassy
came. It is wonderful how things got about the camp. This was shortly
after the typhus was cleared out, but he did not come into the camp.
There were about thirty yards of space between the wires, and he
could not speak to any of us; he just went round. There was a crowd of
Germans; but when Mr Gerard came himself he came into the barrack-room
and asked one man a question, then another.
"There was a German who could speak English, but he never came near
them. Mr Gerard seemed to go about the thing very business-like: he was
not afraid. He was very keen on getting hold of any man who had been out
working and had come in again to camp. Some had not been paid. They were
only paid 30 pfennigs (3d.) a day for a hard day's work. The camp was
working at a big factory, and you had to get up at 4 in the morning,
and they drove you into a big square like a sheep-pen and put all the
English together. We called it the Slave Market. They drove you into
this pen, and the gangers would come in the morning and take you out. 'I
will have you,' and 'You come along with me,'--just like a slave market.
We had to get up at 4 and went out at 5. You were put in the slave
market at 5.30, and worked from then till 6 at night--and very hard work
too. We were working on building a big factory where they were making
hand-grenades--very intricate machinery. Nobody seemed quite to know
what they were manufacturing there. The men were carrying the stone for
the building. One German who could speak English told one of my chums
that the factory was for making hand-grenades.
"They gave out an order that there was to be no smoking in the
barrack-room, as the French had refused to allow German prisoners in
France to smoke, so they would stop it there. If they caught a man
smoking, and they had a stick, he got it. There were no orders printed
to tell us what we had or had not to do. They never deliberately tied an
Englishman to a post, but I have seen them doing it to Russians, tying
them up to the post. If you did anything that did not please them, you
were put in the coal-hole, we used to call it, the place where they get
the coal-briquettes from, and kept without food for three days--only
bread and water, solitary confinement. Many an Englishman got that. We
used to carry down some of our dinner and slip it into them.
"The day the American Ambassador came, Captain Vidal looked well after
it, and anything that was done he reported it at once. I think he had
been saying something to the American Ambassador, and one of the Germans
had overheard it. When the Ambassador went away, he struck Captain Vidal
with his sword. We heard that was the reason why Captain Vidal did not
come with us, as there was an inquiry about it at the time. Then Major
Priestly was in solitary confinement for a while--I don't know what he
had done; we heard that he was found with a revolver, but we could not
say. He was isolated away from the officers altogether for close on
two months--never saw him. He is back again in camp now. We read in
the 'Continental Times' that he was going home on the 3rd September--or
August--but some proceedings were being taken against him. It said in
the 'Continental Times' misbehaviour,--I suppose in looking well after
the wounded--or something like that.
"One day we had to pass the German doctor and then went back to
barracks. Heard no more until six days afterwards, and the 1st December
a German came up about 8 A.M. and formed us up in the barrack-room. Some
of those going home had a new shirt given them. A Russian was stopped
and told to take off his clogs and give them to that Englishman. Then we
went to Aachen. A complaint had been sent to Wittenberg about us;
they were kicking up a terrible row for sending us away like that. The
officer commanding the camp asked us where we came from. When we said
Wittenberg, he said he thought so. We looked such awful sights--filthy;
and we were supposed to be dressed coming away. We were very well
treated at Aachen--they always do so. Every one was nicer than another,
to try and create a good impression. We knew what it was.
"I was sorry for two chaps. One of the London Scottish had been there
fourteen months, and had a bad wound in his leg, and could not move his
leg. He was sent back because he was a non-commissioned officer. Another
man, a sergeant, with his leg off, could speak Hindustani, and I think
that was the reason he was sent back, but I am not sure. His leg was off
to the thigh. He was with the Lugard party. A lance-corporal, with
his arm off, was also sent back, after thinking he was going to be
exchanged. None of the non-commissioned officers got away from that
place."
* * * * *
There is a corner of the hospital courtyard where in December the rays
of the sun will fall for the space of an hour, illuminating first the
big high wall which shuts off light and air from the north-west, then
throwing upon the ground itself a triangle of light which gradually
broadens, loses shape, and fills at last the narrow passage between
the courtyard and the dead garden, but stops short of the broken wooden
paling, throwing no cleansing ray on the dismal rubbish-heaps, leaving
undisturbed the sepulchral clamminess of the shadows beyond.
In days of peace this corner was surely favoured by the school children.
From the high wall to the gable of the main building stretches a single
heavy beam, which had perhaps once been painted green, but was now green
with the mould of decay. A few rusty rings and hooks, from one of which
a piece of sodden rope still hung, showed to what purpose the beam had
served.
The rain, which had been falling steadily, as it seemed, day and night
during November, was checked by the first threat of frost, and during
the fortnight before Christmas we had bright and cheerful weather. A few
convalescent patients were tempted to take a seat in the sun, and came
to notice the hour, early in the afternoon, when the triangle of light
first strikes the high wall.
We had a bench placed against the wall (it was a very tiny one, and
belonged to one of the junior classrooms). Picard, myself, and two
French soldiers from Salle un were at first the only _habitués_; none of
the British soldiers remaining at the 106 were able to leave their beds,
and most of the other Frenchmen were either too weak or too frightened
of fresh air to come out and sit in the yard.
It is a common failing of human nature to feel comforted at the sight of
other people's misfortune. So it was that the sight of a French soldier
who had been shot in the head aroused in me not only the interest of
pity, but also, I must confess, a sense of superiority at finding some
one worse off than myself. Jean was the name we called him by. No one
knew his real name or his regiment, or the place where he was born, or
any details of how he had been wounded. His wound in the head was on the
left side, almost exactly in the same place as my own--the bullet had
made the same furrow, all the symptoms were identical, the right leg
dragging, the right arm hanging, the slow elephantine movement; but
there was a difference, said Dr Debu, between the two points of impact.
In the case of Jean the impact of the bullet was a hair's-breadth more
to the front of the head, only the difference of perhaps a tenth of a
millimetre. And so it was that poor Jean had lost not only the power of
motion on the right side, but also speech, memory, and understanding.
[Illustration: A Ward at the "106."]
All these faculties might return in time (doctors are optimists _par
métier_), but at present understanding was limited to questions of the
most primitive order--cold and heat, hunger and thirst; speech to a moan
which signified no; memory to events of the past forty-eight hours, so
that Jean knew nothing of the war, of his regiment, of his home; his
face with his dropped jaw and vacant look was already the face of an
idiot.
One morning in the refectory Jean fell off his chair on to the floor,
grew purple in the face and foamed at the mouth. Urgent messengers flew
off to fetch Dr Debu, and we all thought it was the end of Jean, until
my nurse of the Salle cinq suggested epileptic fits, an opinion
which was subsequently ratified by the doctor's verdict, "epilepsie
Jacksonienne." Jean did not appear again in the yard until nearly a
fortnight after this incident, and his place on the bench in the sun
was taken by another whose name, according to his own statement, was
"Mahamed, son of Mahamed."
Mahamed was still limping badly from a shot wound in the calf. He did
not look more than nineteen, and came from near Oran. His knowledge
of French was confined to "Merci le Madam," with a shining smile, and
"Alleman grand cochon."
Mahamed, having discovered my knowledge of a few words of his native
tongue and my acquaintance with his native country, followed me
about like a shadow. For many months his feelings had perforce been
suppressed, and now presuming too greatly on my supposed fluency in
Arabic conversation, the poor fellow sat on the little bench in the sun
pouring out his story.
We had the story nearly every day, and I began to put bits of it
together. Of one thing he was quite certain, namely, that the "Alleman"
was a pig and son of a pig, and that his other ancestors were of most
infamous repute. In the mixed lingo of the bench, the same declaration
was made every day at the close of the sitting, when the sun went
behind the high wall: "Alleman no bon, kif kif cochon Yhoudi ben Yhoudi,
Sheitan ben Sheitan, Halouf ben Halouf."
"Ça c'est tout de même vrai," said Picard the one-legged, patting his
stump thoughtfully and pulling volcanoes of smoke from his clay pipe.
"Alleman kif kif cochon." "Le Boche voyez vous," said Picard, addressing
the bench party, which was slowly moving back to hospital, "le Boche ça
a des petits yeux de cochon, c'est blanc et rose, comme le cochon,
ça mange.... Ah, les Boches Halouf ben Halouf," and Picard hurriedly
finished his discourse out of respect for M. le Vicaire-General, who had
just joined the group.
"Bonjour, M. le Vicaire, you're just in time," I said. "Nous disions du
mal de notre prochain." "Il n'y a pas de mal à ça, Monsieur le Curé,"
interrupted Picard, "puisque nous ne parlions que des Boches." "Voyons,
M. le Curé," this aggressively, "the Gospel tells us to love our
enemies. Do you love the Boches?" This question, and the spirit in which
it was asked, was significant of the new atmosphere which had begun to
permeate the Salle cinq after the arrival of the French soldier who
had declared himself an enemy of fresh air. Gradually this man's evil
influence pervaded the whole ward, just as the evil thing he stood for
had permeated all France before the war.
M. le Vicaire-General came to the Salle cinq nearly every day, visiting
each man's bedside, and no man, except one, however unspiritual his
past, could resist the charm of the old priest, in whose smile shone an
unselfish soul.
The "enemy of fresh air" was known to the British soldiers in the ward
as "Judas Iscariot." When the priest came near his bed, Judas shook his
head slightly and smiled an almost imperceptible smile, with all the
air of saying, "La religion c'est pour les enfants, les femmes et les
imbéciles."
It was some sneer from Judas that prompted Picard's question.
"Voyons, M. le Curé, aimez vouz les Boches?"
The old priest looked at Picard's honest troubled face and answered
slowly--
"Mais puisque l'évangile nous ordonne de nous aimer les uns les autres
et surtout d'aimer nos ennemis, il faut toujours faire son possible
pour suivre ce divin conseil et je peux dire que j'aime les
Boches--mais--chez eux--pas chez nous."
In Germany, just as in England, Christmas is kept with great feasting
and rejoicing, and during the week preceding Christmas M. Vampouille was
hard at work making sausages for his German customers, who were to hold
a festive meeting at the Kommandantur. Great preparations were also
being made at the 106, and the staff of the hospital, forgetting for the
time being their private squabbles, joined with our friends in the town
in preparing a Merry Christmas.
Christmas morning. Mass at 10 o'clock in Salle un. M. le Vicaire-General
preaches a tactful sermon on "resignation." After Mass candles on the
Christmas tree are lit and presents distributed.
The altar was erected at the extreme end of Salle un, and very
artistically decorated with palms, laurel branches, and holly; behind
the altar were two large flags (home-made) of England and France; on the
right was a large Christmas tree.
[Illustration: M. le Vicaire-Général.]
All patients who were fit to be moved, except Judas Iscariot, were
carried up from the Salle cinq and grouped near the altar. In the bed
nearest the altar a British reservist lay with a shattered spine, still
alive, still conscious, still able to speak, the lower half of his body
lifeless since the 26th of August 1914. This was his last week on earth.
"Here's a funny kind of Christmas," he whispered; "next Christmas we'll
be at home, shan't we?"
On my right, close to the altar steps, sat Picard, beyond him Mahamed
ben Mahamed looking puzzled and depressed, and at the end of the row a
lady on crutches, dressed in deep mourning, who had lost a leg during
the aeroplane fight in September. The other wounded were seated in beds,
packed in double row, half-way down each side of the ward, the remainder
of which was filled with friends from the town.
Madame Tondeur was busy in the kitchen with three turkeys to roast and
carve into very small pieces, so that every one might get a taste. The
plum pudding being very small, was reserved for the Salle cinq. Printed
directions on the tin suggested that the pudding could be eaten cold or
boiled for "half an hour." Perhaps this was a misprint for "half a
day." After the half-hour's boiling, the pudding still seemed to have a
compressed appearance, and looked very diminutive under its large stick
of holly. Madame Tondeur herself carried the flaming pudding into the
Salle cinq, divided it up into twelve portions, the indigestible but
fortunately small fragments were duly eaten, and the ancient tradition
of Christmas remained for us unbroken.
Between Christmas and the New Year it was decided that my name was to go
down on the list of "transportables," and that I would have to join the
next party for Germany. Thinking over the last few days spent at the
106 Hospital, I remember first of all the parting words of my nurse:
"In days to come try and remember the bright side of your stay here and
forget the days of darkness." And here I may say in plain words what I
feel most deeply, although these words cannot be read for many months,
perhaps years, by those to whom I would wish to address them.
Many a limbless British soldier owes his life to the surgeon of the
Civil Hospital. The question in those days was not merely "Will an
operation save life?" but rather, "Is there time to operate on those
whose lives might be saved?" Dr Debu proved himself to be the man for
such an emergency. United to great skill, he possessed great physical
strength and powers of resistance to fatigue. For three days and three
nights he operated almost without taking time for meals or sleep.
For the devoted kindness of the French doctors and nurses, both of
the Hôpital Civil, the 106, and the other ten or twelve hospitals of
Cambrai, who for many months under conditions of great difficulty and
danger, without many of the most necessary medical appliances, worked
night and day to save the lives of British soldiers and to ease the
last moments of the mortally wounded, I feel that this very inadequate
expression of gratitude must be set down.
There are many other kind friends at Cambrai whose kindness I can never
forget.
Consider my situation at Cambrai: unknown, cut off from all intercourse
with the world, about to start off for a German prison, and without a
sixpence. I did not like to ask a loan from my kind friends, who
had already given me a complete outfit of underclothing and toilet
necessaries. On New Year's Day the subject of money was broached by
M. Rey in a straightforward business-like manner. "You are shortly going
to Germany," he said; "even in prison money is useful; you will need
some money; we have brought you some." The sum M. Rey proposed to give
me was £50! We decided that half this sum would be ample, and I gave
M. Rey a receipt "payable après la guerre."
After these true friends in need had left, M. Vampouille came in to sit
with me, and he made the same suggestion about money, and insisted on my
accepting a further sum, the loan of which, he said, is granted on
one condition only: "You must not pay me by cheque, you must come
yourself--after the war!"
Next morning a decrepit omnibus driven by a German soldier came to take
me from the Hôpital 106 to M. Brunot's Hôpital Annexe, from where, after
three days, I was sent off to Germany.