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MUD AND KHAKI
MUD AND KHAKI
SKETCHES FROM FLANDERS
AND FRANCE
BY
VERNON BARTLETT
SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON,
KENT & CO. LTD., 4 STATIONERS'
HALL COURT : : LONDON, E.C.
_Copyright_
_First published April 1917_
TO
R.V.K.C.
AND MY OTHER FRIENDS
IN THE REGIMENT
APOLOGIA
There has been so much written about the trenches, there are so many war
photographs, so many cinema films, that one might well hesitate before
even mentioning the war--to try to write a book about it is, I fear, to
incur the censure of the many who are tired of hearing about bombs and
bullets, and who prefer to read of peace, and games, and flirtations.
But, for that very reason, I venture to think that even so indifferent a
war book as mine will not come entirely amiss. When the Lean Years are
over, when the rifle becomes rusty, and the khaki is pushed away in some
remote cupboard, there is great danger that the hardships of the men in
the trenches will too soon be forgotten. If, to a minute extent,
anything in these pages should help to bring home to people what war
really is, and to remind them of their debt of gratitude, then these
little sketches will have justified their existence.
Besides, I am not entirely responsible for this little book. Not long
ago, I met a man--fit, single, and young--who began to grumble to me of
the hardships of his "funkhole" in England, and, incidentally, to
belittle the hardships of the man at the front. After I had told him
exactly what I thought of him, I was still so indignant that I came home
and began to write a book about the trenches. Hence _Mud and Khaki_. To
him, then, the blame for this minor horror of war. I wash my hands of
it.
And I try to push the blame off on to him, for I realise that I have
undertaken an impossible task--the most practised pen cannot convey a
real notion of the life at the front, as the words to describe war do
not exist. Even you who have lost your husbands and brothers, your
fathers and sons, can have but the vaguest impression of the cruel,
thirsty claws that claimed them as victims. First must you see the
shattered cottages of France and Belgium, the way in which the women
clung to their homes in burning Ypres, the long streams of refugees
wheeling their poor little _lares et penates_, their meagre treasures,
on trucks and handcarts; first must you listen to the cheery joke that
the Angel of Death finds on the lips of the soldier, to the songs that
encourage you in the dogged marches through the dark and the mud, to the
talk during the long nights when the men collect round the brazier fire
and think of their wives and kiddies at home, of murky streets in the
East End, of quiet country inns where the farmers gather of an evening.
No words, then, can give an exact picture of these things, but they may
help to give colour to your impressions. Heaven forbid that, by telling
the horrors of war, the writers of books should make pessimists of those
at home! Heaven forbid that they should belittle the dangers and
hardships, and so take away some of the glory due to "Tommy" for all he
has suffered for the Motherland! There is a happy mean--the men at the
front have found it; they know that death is near, but they can still
laugh and sing.
In these sketches and stories I have tried, with but little success, to
keep that happy mean in view. If the pictures are very feeble in design
when compared to the many other, and far better, works on the same
subject, remember, reader, that the intention is good, and accept this
apology for wasting your time.
A few of these sketches and articles have already appeared elsewhere. My
best thanks are due to the Editors of the _Daily Mail_ and the _Daily
Mirror_ for their kind permission to include several sketches which
appeared, in condensed forms, in their papers. I am also grateful to the
Editor of Cassell's _Storyteller_ for his permission to reproduce "The
Knut," which first saw print in that periodical.
VERNON BARTLETT.
CONTENTS
PAGE
APOLOGIA 11
I. IN HOSPITAL 19
II. A RECIPE FOR GENERALS 31
III. MUD 37
IV. THE SURPRISE ATTACK 43
V. "PONGO" SIMPSON ON BOMBS 51
VI. THE SCHOOLMASTER OF PONT SAVERNE 57
VII. THE ODD JOBS 67
VIII. THE "KNUT" 71
IX. SHOPPING 79
X. THE LIAR 87
XI. THE CITY OF TRAGEDY 93
XII. "PONGO" SIMPSON ON GRUMBLER 105
XIII. THE CONVERT 110
XIV. DAVID AND JONATHAN 114
XV. THE RUM JAR 122
XVI. THE TEA SHOP 128
XVII. "HERE COMES THE GENERAL" 133
XVIII. THE RASCAL IN WAR 137
XIX. "PONGO" SIMPSON ON OFFICERS 141
XX. THE HAND OF SHADOW 146
XXI. THE VETERAN 152
XXII. THE SING-SONG 156
XXIII. THE "STRAFE" THAT FAILED 161
XXIV. THE NIGHTLY ROUND 166
XXV. JOHN WILLIAMS, TRAMP AND SOLDIER 171
XXVI. THE CLEARING HOUSE 178
MUD AND KHAKI
I
IN HOSPITAL
Close behind the trenches on the Ypres salient stands part of "Chapel
Farm"--the rest of it has long been trampled down into the mud by the
many hundreds of men who have passed by there. Enough of the ruin still
stands for you to trace out the original plan of the place--a house and
two barns running round three sides of the farmyard that is foetid and
foul and horrible.
It is an uninviting spot, for, close by, are the remains of a dead cow,
superficially buried long ago by some working party that was in a hurry
to get home; but the farm is notable for the fact that passing round the
north side of the building you are out of view, and safe, and that
passing round the south side you can be seen by the enemy, and are
certain to be sniped.
If you must be sniped, however, you might choose a worse place, for the
bullets generally fly low there, and there is a cellar to which you can
be carried--a filthy spot, abounding in rats, and damp straw, and
stained rags, for the place once acted as a dressing-station. But still,
it is under cover, and intact, with six little steps leading up into the
farmyard.
And one day, as I led a party of men down to the "dumping ground" to
fetch ammunition, I was astonished to hear the familiar strains of
"Gilbert the Filbert" coming from this desolate ruin. The singer had a
fine voice, and he gave forth his chant as happily as though he were
safe at home in England, with no cares or troubles in the world. With a
sergeant, I set out to explore; as our boots clattered on the
cobble-stones of the farmyard, there was a noise in the cellar, a head
poked up in the entrance, and I was greeted with a cheery "Good morning,
sir."
We crawled down the steps into the hovel to learn the singer's story. He
was a man from another regiment, who had come down from his support
dug-out to "nose around after a spud or two." The German sniper had
"bagged" him in the ankle and he had crawled into the cellar--still with
his sandbag of "spuds"--to wait until someone came by. "I 'adn't got
nothing to do but wait," he concluded, "and if I'd got to wait, I might
jest as well play at bein' a bloomin' canary as 'owl like a kid what's
'ad it put acrost 'im."
We got a little water from the creaky old pump and took off his "first
field dressing" that he had wound anyhow round his leg. To my
surprise--for he was so cheerful that I thought he had only a scratch--I
found that his ankle was badly smashed, and that part of his boot and
sock had been driven right into the wound.
"Yes, it did 'urt a bit when I tried to walk," he said, as I expressed
surprise. "That's jest the best part of it. I don't care if it 'urts
like 'ell, for it's sure to mean 'Blighty' and comfort for me."
And that is just the spirit of the hospitals--the joy of comfort and
rest overbalances the pain and the operation. To think that there are
still people who imagine that hospitals are of necessity sad and
depressing! Why, even the children's wards of the London Hospital are
not that, for, as you look down the rows of beds, you see surprise and
happiness on the poor little pinched faces--surprise that everything is
clean and white, and that they are lying between proper sheets;
happiness that they are treated kindly, and that there are no harsh
words. As for a military hospital, while war lays waste the world, there
is no place where there is more peace and contentment.
Hospital, for example, is the happiest place to spend Christmas. About a
week before the day there are mysterious whispers in the corners, and
furtive writing in a notebook, and the clinking of coppers. Then, next
day, a cart comes to the door and deposits a load of ivy and holly and
mistletoe. The men have all subscribed to buy decorations for their
temporary home, and they set about their work like children--for where
will you find children who are younger than the "Tommies"? Even the
wards where there are only "cot cases" are decorated, and the men lie in
bed and watch the invaders from other wards who come in and smother the
place with evergreens. There is one ward where a man lies dying of
cancer--here, too, they come, making clumsy attempts to walk on tip-toe,
and smiling encouragement as they hang the mistletoe from the electric
light over his bed.
And at last the great day comes. There are presents for everyone, and a
bran pie from which, one by one, they extract mysterious parcels wrapped
up in brown paper. And the joy as they undo them! There are table games
and packets of tobacco, writing pads and boxes of cigarettes, cheap
fountain pens which will nearly turn the Matron's hair grey, and bags of
chocolates. They collect in their wards and turn their presents over,
their eyes damp with joy; they pack up their games or their chocolate to
send home to their wives who are spending Christmas in lonely cottage
kitchens; they write letters to imaginary people just for the joy of
using their writing blocks; they admire each others' treasures, and,
sometimes, make exchanges, for the man who does not smoke has drawn a
pipe, and the man in the corner over there, who has lost both legs, has
drawn a pair of felt slippers!
Before they know where they are, the lunch is ready, and, children
again, they eat far more than is good for them, until the nurses have to
forbid them to have any more. "No, Jones," they say, "you can't have a
third helping of pudding; you're supposed to be on a milk diet."
Oh, the happiness of it all! All day they sing and eat and talk, until
you forget that there is war and misery in the world; when the evening
comes they go, flushed and happy, back to their beds to dream that great
black Germans are sitting on them, eating Christmas puddings by the
dozen, and growing heavier with each one.
But upstairs in the little ward the mother sits with her son, and she
tries with all her force to keep back the tears. They have had the door
open all day to hear the laughter and fun, and on the table by the bed
lie his presents and the choicest fruit and sweets. Until quite late at
night she stays there, holding her son's hand, and telling of
Christmases when he was a little boy. Then, when she gets up to go, the
man in bed turns his head towards the poor little pile of presents.
"You'd better take those, mother," he says. "They won't be much use to
me. But it's the happiest Christmas I've ever had." And all the poor
woman's courage leaves her, and she stoops forward under the mistletoe
and kisses him, kisses him, with tears streaming down her face.
* * * * *
Most stirring of all are the clearing hospitals near the firing line.
They are crowded, and all night long fresh wounded stumble in, the mud
caked on their uniforms, and their bandages soiled by dark stains. In
one corner a man groans unceasingly: "Oh, my head ... God! Oh, my poor
head!" and you hear the mutterings and laughter of the delirious.
But if the pain here is at its height, the relief is keenest. For months
they have lived in hell, these men, and now they have been brought out
of it all. A man who has been rescued from suffocation in a coal mine
does not grumble if he has the toothache; a man who has come from the
trenches and death does not complain of the agony of his wound--he
smiles because he is in comfortable surroundings for once.
Besides, there is a great feeling of expectation and hope, for there is
to be a convoy in the morning and they are all to be sent down to the
base--all except the men who are too ill to be moved and the two men who
have died in the night, whose beds are shut off by red screens. The "cot
cases" are lifted carefully on to stretchers, their belongings are
packed under their pillows, and they are carried down to the ambulances,
while the walking cases wander about the wards, waiting for their turn
to come. They look into their packs for the fiftieth time to make sure
they have left nothing; they lean out of the windows to watch the
ambulance roll away to the station; they stop every orderly who comes
along to ask if they have not been forgotten, or if there will be room
for them on the train; they make new acquaintances, or discover old
ones. One man meets a long-lost friend with a huge white bandage round
his neck. "Hullo, you poor devil," he says, "how did you get it in the
neck like that? was it a bullet or a bit of a shell?" The other swears,
and confesses that he has not been hit at all, but is suffering from
boils.
For, going down to the base are wounded and sick of every sort--men who
have lost a limb, and men who have only the tiniest graze; men who are
mad with pain, and men who are going down for a new set of false teeth;
men with pneumonia, and men with scabies. It is only when the boat
leaves for England that the cases can be sorted out. It is only then
that there are signs of envy, and the men whose wounds are not bad
enough to take them back to "Blighty" curse because the bullet did not
go deeper, or the bit of shrapnel did not touch the bone.
* * * * *
It is a wonderful moment for the "Tommies" when they reach their
convalescent hospital in England. Less than a week ago many of them were
stamping up and down in a slushy trench wondering "why the 'ell there's
a bloomin' war on at all." Less than a week ago many of them never
thought to see England again, and now they are being driven up to the
old Elizabethan mansion that is to be their hospital.
As the ambulance draws up outside the porch, the men can see, where the
hostess used to welcome her guests of old, the matron waiting with the
medical officer to welcome them in. One by one they are brought into the
oak-panelled hall, and a nurse stoops over them to read their names,
regiments, and complaints off the little labels that are fastened to
their tunic buttons. As they await their turns, they snuff the air and
sigh happily, they talk, and wink, and smile at the great carved
ceiling, and forget all they have gone through in the joy of that
splendid moment.
Away in one of the wards a gramophone is playing "Mother Machree," and
the little nurse, who hums the tune to herself as she leans over each
man to see his label, sees a tear crawling through the grey stubble on
one's cheek. He is old and Irish, and had not hoped to hear Irish tunes
and to see fair women again. But he is ashamed of his emotion, and he
tells a little lie. "Sure, an' it's rainin' outside, nurse," he says.
And the nurse, who knows the difference between a raindrop and a
tear--for was she not standing on the step five minutes ago, admiring
the stars and the moon?--knows her part well, and plays it. "I thought I
heard the rain dripping down on the porch just now," she says, "I hope
you poor men did not get wet," and she goes on to her next patient.
* * * * *
How they love those days in hospital! How the great rough men love to be
treated like babies, to be petted and scolded, ordered about and
praised! How grand it is to see the flowers, to feel one's strength
returning, to go for drives and walks, to find a field that is not
pitted by shell holes! And how cheerful they all are, these grown-up
babies!
The other day I opened the door of the hospital and discovered a
"convoy" consisting of three legless and two armless men, trying to help
each other up the six low steps, and shouting with laughter at their
efforts. And one of them saw the pity on my face, for he grinned.
"Don't you worry about us," he said. "I wouldn't care if I 'ad no arms
nor eyes nor legs, so long as I was 'ome in Blighty again. Why"--and his
voice dropped as he let me into the secret--"I've 'ad a li'l boy born
since I went out to the front, an' I never even seed the li'l beggar
yet. Gawd, we in 'orspital is the lucky ones, an' any bloke what ain't
killed ought to be 'appy and bright like what we is."
And it is the happiness of all these men that makes hospital a very
beautiful place, for nowhere can you find more courage and cheerfulness
than among these fellows with their crutches and their bandages.
There was only one man--Bill Stevens--who seemed despondent and
miserable, and we scarcely wondered--he was blind, and lay in bed day
after day, with a bandage round his head, the only blind man in the
hospital. He was silent and morbid, and would scarcely mutter a word of
thanks when some man came right across the ward on his crutches to do
him a trifling service, but he had begged to be allowed to stay in the
big ward until the time came for him to go off to a special hostel for
the men who have lost their sight. And the men who saw him groping about
helplessly in broad daylight forgave him his surliness, and ceased to
wonder at his despondency.
But even Bill Stevens was to change, for there came a day when he
received a letter.
"What's the postmark?" he demanded.
"Oxford," said the nurse. "Shall I read it to you?"
But Bill Stevens clutched his letter tight and shook his head, and it
was not until lunch-time that anything more was heard of it. Then he
called the Sister to him, and she read the precious document almost in
a whisper, so secret was it. Private Bill Stevens plucked nervously at
the bedclothes as the Sister recited the little love sentences:--How was
dear Bill? Why hadn't he told his Emily what was wrong with him? That
she, Emily, would come to see him at four o'clock that afternoon, and
how nice it would be.
"Now you keep quiet and don't worry," said the Sister, "or you'll be too
ill to see her. Why, I declare that you're quite feverish. What have you
got to worry about?"
"You see, it's like this 'ere," confided Bill Stevens. "I ain't dared to
tell 'er as 'ow I was blind, and it ain't fair to ask 'er to marry a
bloke what's 'elpless. She only thinks I've got it slightly, and she
won't care for me any more now."
"You needn't be frightened," said the Sister. "If she's worth anything
at all, she'll love you all the more now." And she tucked him up and
told him to go to sleep.
Then, when Emily arrived, the Sister met her, and broke the news. "You
love him, don't you?" she asked, and Emily blushed, and smiled assent
through her tears.
"Then," said the Sister, "do your best to cheer him up. Don't let him
think you're distressed at his blindness," and she took the girl along
to the ward where Bill Stevens lay waiting, restless and feverish.
"Bill darling," said Emily. "It's me. How are you? Why have you got
that bandage on?" But long before poor Bill could find words to break
the news to her she stooped over him and whispered: "Bill dear, I could
almost wish you were blind, so that you'd have to depend on me, like. If
it wasn't for your own pain, I'd wish you was blind, I would really."
For a long time Bill stuttered and fumbled for words, for his joy was
too great. "I am blind, Em'ly," he murmured at last.
And the whole ward looked the other way as Emily kissed away his fears.
As for Bill Stevens, he sang and laughed and talked so much that evening
that the Matron had to come down to stop him.
For, as my legless friend remarked, "We in 'orspital is the lucky ones,
an' any bloke what ain't killed ought to be 'appy and bright like we
is."
II
A RECIPE FOR GENERALS
Everyone is always anxious to get on the right side of his General; I
have chanced upon a recipe which I believe to be infallible for anyone
who wears spurs, and who can, somehow or other, get himself in the
presence of that venerated gentleman.
I sat one day in a trench outside my dug-out, eating a stew made of
bully beef, ration biscuits, and foul water. Inside my dug-out, the
smell of buried men was not conducive to a good appetite; outside, some
horrible Hun was amusing himself by firing at the sandbag just above me,
and sending showers of earth down my neck and into my food. It is an
aggravating fact that the German always makes himself particularly
objectionable about lunch-time, and that, whenever you go in the trench,
his bullets seem to follow you--an unerring instinct brings them towards
food. A larger piece of earth than usual in my stew routed the last
vestige of my good-humour. Prudence warning me of the futility of
losing my temper with a Hun seventy yards away, I called loudly for my
servant.
"Jones," I said, when he came up, "take away this stuff. It's as bad as
a gas attack. I'm fed up with it. I'm fed up with Maconochie, I'm fed up
with the so-called 'fresh' meat that sometimes makes its appearance. Try
to get hold of something new; give me a jugged hare, or a pheasant, or
something of that kind."
"Yessir," said Jones, and he hurried off round the traverse to finish my
stew himself.
It never does to speak without first weighing one's words. This is an
old maxim--I can remember something about it in one of my first
copy-books; but, like most other maxims, it is never learnt in real
life. My thoughtless allusion to "jugged hare" set my servant's brain
working, for hares and rabbits have, before now, been caught behind the
firing line. The primary difficulty, that of getting to the country
haunted by these animals, was easily solved, for, though an officer
ought not to allow a man to leave a trench without a very important
reason, the thought of new potatoes at a ruined farm some way back, or
cherries in the orchard, generally seems a sufficiently important reason
to send one's servant back on an errand of pillage. Thus it was that,
unknown to me, my servant spent part of the next three days big-game
hunting behind the firing line.
My first intimation of trouble came to me the day after we had gone back
to billets for a rest, when an orderly brought me a message from Brigade
Headquarters. It ran as follows:--
"Lieut. Newcombe is to report at Brigade Headquarters this afternoon
at 2 p.m. to furnish facts with reference to his servant, No. 6789,
Pte. Jones W., who, on the 7th inst., discharged a rifle behind the
firing line, to the great personal danger of the Brigadier, Pte.
Jones's Company being at the time in the trenches.
"(_Signed_) G. MACKINNON,
"_Brigade Major_."
"Jones," I cried, "come and explain this to me," and I read him the
incriminating document.
My servant's English always suffers when he is nervous.
"Well, sir," he began, "it 'appened like this 'ere. After what you said
the other day abaht bully beef, I went orf ter try ter git a rebbit or
an 'are. I seen sev'ral, sir, but I never 'it one nor wired one. Then,
on Friday, jest as I was shootin' at an 'ole 'are what I see, up kime an
orficer, one o' thim Staff gints. 'Who are you?' 'e asks. I told 'im as
I was a servant, and was jest tryin' ter git an 'are fer my
bloke--beggin' yer pardon, sir, I mean my orficer. Then, after a lot
more talk, 'e says, 'Do yer know that yer gone and nearly 'it the
Gen'ril?' That's all as I knows abaht it, sir. I never wanted ter 'it no
Gen'ril."
"All this, and not even a rabbit!" I sighed. "It's a serious business,
and you ought to have known better than to go letting off ammunition
behind the firing line. However, I'll see what can be done," and my
servant went away, rather crestfallen, to drown his sorrows in a glass
of very mild, very unpleasant Belgian beer.
An hour or two later, I strolled across to a neighbouring billet to see
a friend, and to tell him of my coming interview.
"You'll get hell," was his only comfort. Then, as an afterthought, he
said, "You'd better wear my spurs; they'll help to impress him. A clink
of spurs will make even your salute seem smart."
Thus it was that I, who am no horseman, rode over to Brigade
Headquarters, a mile away, with my toes turned in, and a pair of bright
and shining spurs turned away as far as possible from my horse's flanks.
Unhappy and ill at ease, I was shown into the General's room.
"Mr. Newcombe," he began, after a preliminary glance at a paper in front
of him, "this is a very serious matter. It is a serious offence on the
part of Private Jones, who, I understand, is your servant."
"Yes, sir."
"It is also an example of gross carelessness on your part."
"Yes, sir."
"I was returning from the trenches on your right on Friday last, when a
bullet flew past my head, coming from the direction opposed to the
Germans. I have a strong objection to being shot at by my own men, right
behind the fire trenches, so I sent Captain Neville to find out who had
fired, and he found your servant."
"Yes, sir."
"Well, can you give any explanation of this extraordinary event?"
I explained to the best of my ability.
"It is a very unusual case," said the General, when I had finished. "I
do not wish to pursue the matter further, as you are obviously the real
person to blame."
"Yes, sir."
"I am very dissatisfied about it, and you must please see that better
discipline is kept. I do not like to proceed against officers under my
command, so the matter drops here. You must reprimand your servant very
severely, and, I repeat, I am very dissatisfied. You may go, Mr."--here
another glance at the paper before him--"Newcombe. Good afternoon."
I brought my heels together for a very smart salute ... and locked my
spurs! For some seconds I stood swaying helplessly in front of him, then
I toppled forward, and, supporting myself with both hands upon his
table, I at length managed to separate my feet. When I ventured to look
at him again to apologise, I saw that his frown had gone, and his mouth
was twitching in a strong inclination to laugh.
"You are not, I take it, Mr. Newcombe, quite accustomed to wearing
spurs?" he said presently.
I blushed horribly, and, in my confusion, blurted out my reason for
putting them on. This time he laughed unrestrainedly. "Well, you have
certainly impressed me with them." Then, just as I was preparing to go,
he said, "Will you have a glass of whisky, Newcombe, before you go?
Neville," he called to the Staff Captain in the next room, "you might
ask Andrews to bring the whisky and some glasses."
"Good afternoon," said the General, very affably, when, after a careful
salute, I finally took my leave.
Let anyone who will try this recipe for making friends with a General. I
do not venture to guarantee its infallibility, however, for that depends
entirely on the General himself, and, to such, rules and instruction do
not apply.
III
"MUD!"
Those at home in England, with their experience of war books and
photographs, of Zeppelin raids and crowded hospitals, are beginning to
imagine they know all there is to know about war. The truth is that they
still have but little idea of the life in the trenches, and, as far as
mud is concerned, they are delightfully ignorant. They do not know what
mud is.
They have read of Napoleon's "Fourth Element," they have listened to
long descriptions of mud in Flanders and France, they have raised
incredulous eyebrows at tales of men being drowned in the trenches, they
have given a fleeting thought of pity for the soldiers "out there" as
they have slushed home through the streets on rainy nights; but they
have never realised what mud means, for no photograph can tell its slimy
depth, and even the pen of a Zola or a Victor Hugo could give no
adequate idea of it.
And so, till the end of the war, the old story will be continued--while
the soldier flounders and staggers about in that awful, sucking swamp,
the pessimist at home will lean back in his arm-chair and wonder, as he
watches the smoke from his cigar wind up towards the ceiling, why we do
not advance at the rate of one mile an hour, why we are not in Berlin,
and whether our army is any good at all. If such a man would know why we
are not in German territory, let him walk, on a dark night, through the
village duck-pond, and then sleep in his wet clothes in the middle of
the farmyard. He would still be ignorant of mud and wet, but he would
cease to wonder and grumble.
It is the infantryman who suffers most, for he has to live, eat, sleep,
and work in the mud. The plain of dragging slime that stretches from
Switzerland to the sea is far worse to face than the fire of machine
guns or the great black trench-mortar bombs that come twisting down
through the air. It is more terrible than the frost and the rain--you
cannot even stamp your feet to drive away the insidious chill that mud
always brings. Nothing can keep it from your hands and face and clothes;
there is no taking off your boots to dry in the trenches--you must lie
down just as you are, and often you are lucky if you have two empty
sandbags under you to save you from the cold embrace of the swamp.
But if the mud stretch is desolate by day, it is shocking by night.
Imagine a battalion going up to the trenches to relieve another
regiment. The rain comes beating pitilessly down on the long trail of
men who stumble along in the blackness over the _pave_. They are all
well loaded, for besides his pack, rifle, and equipment, each man
carries a pick or a bag of rations or a bundle of firewood. At every
moment comes down the line the cry to "keep to the right," and the whole
column stumbles off the _pave_ into the deep mud by the roadside to
allow the passage of an ambulance or a transport waggon. There is no
smoking, for they are too close to the enemy, and there is the thought
of six days and six nights of watchfulness and wetness in the trenches.
Presently the winding line strikes off the road across the mud. This is
not mud such as we know it in England--it is incredibly slippery and
impossibly tenacious, and each dragging footstep calls for a tremendous
effort. The men straggle, or close up together so that they have hardly
the room to move; they slip, and knock into each other, and curse; they
are hindered by little ditches, and by telephone wires that run, now a
few inches, now four or five feet from the ground. One man trips over an
old haversack that is lying in his path--God alone knows how many
haversacks and how many sets of equipment have been swallowed up by the
mud on the plain of Flanders, part of the equipment of the wounded that
has been thrown aside to lighten the burden--and when he scrambles to
his feet again he is a mass of mud, his rifle barrel is choked with it,
it is in his hair, down his neck, everywhere. He staggers on, thankful
only that he did not fall into a shell hole, when matters would have
been much worse.
Just when the men are waiting in the open for the leading platoon to
file down into the communication trench, a German star shell goes up,
and a machine gun opens fire a little farther down the line. As the
flare sinks down behind the British trench it lights up the white faces
of the men, all crouching down in the swamp, while the bullets swish by,
"like a lot of bloomin' swallers," above their heads.
And now comes the odd quarter of a mile of communication trench. It is
very narrow, for the enemy can enfilade it, and it is paved with
brushwood and broken bricks, and a little drain, that is meant to keep
the floor dry, runs along one side of it. In one place a man steps off
the brushwood into the drain, and he falls headlong. The others behind
have no time to stop themselves, and a grotesque pile of men heaps
itself up in the narrow, black trench. One man laughing, the rest
swearing, they pick themselves up again, and tramp on to the firing
line.
Here the mud is even worse than on the plain they have crossed. All the
engineers and all the trench pumps in the world will not keep a trench
decently dry when it rains for nine hours in ten and when the trench is
the lowest bit of country for miles around. The men can do nothing but
"carry on"--the parapet must be kept in repair whatever the weather; the
sandbags must be filled however wet and sticky the earth. The mud may
nearly drag a man's boot off at his every step--indeed, it often does;
but the man must go on digging, shovelling, lining the trench with tins,
logs, bricks, and planks in the hope that one day he may have put enough
flooring into the trench to reach solid ground beneath the mud.
All this, of course, is only the infantryman's idea of things. From a
tactical point of view mud has a far greater importance--it is the most
relentless enemy that an army can be called upon to face. Even without
mud and without Germans it would be a very difficult task to feed and
look after a million men on the move; with these two discomforts
movement becomes almost impossible.
It is only after you have seen a battery of field artillery on the move
in winter that you can realise at all the enormous importance of good
weather when an advance is to be made. You must watch the horses
labouring and plunging in mud that reaches nearly to their girths; you
must see the sweating, half-naked men striving, with outstanding veins,
to force the wheels round; you must hear the sucking cry of the mud
when it slackens its grip; and you must remember that this is only a
battery of light guns that is being moved.
It is mud, then, that is the great enemy. It is the mud, then, and not
faulty organisation or German prowess that you must blame if we do not
advance as fast as you would like. Even if we were not to advance
another yard in another year, people in England should not be
disheartened. "Out there" we are facing one of the worst of foes. If we
do not advance, or if we advance too slowly, remember that it is mud
that is the cause--not the German guns.
IV
THE SURPRISE ATTACK
"Do you really feel quite fit for active service again?" asked the
President of the Medical Board.
It was not without reason that Roger Dymond hesitated before he gave his
answer, for nerves are difficult things to deal with. It is surprising,
but it is true, that you never find a man who is afraid the first time
he goes under fire. There are thousands who are frightened
beforehand--frightened that they will "funk it" when the time comes, but
when they see men who have been out for months "ducking" as each shell
passes overhead they begin to think what brave fellows they are, and
they wonder what fear is. But after they have been in the trenches for
weeks, when they realise what a shell can do, their nerve begins to go;
they start when they hear a rifle fired, and they crouch down close to
the ground at the whistle of a passing shell.
Thus had it been with Roger Dymond. At the beginning of the war he had
enjoyed himself--if anyone could enjoy that awful retreat and awful
advance. He had been one of the first officers to receive the Military
Cross, for brilliant work by the canal at Givenchy; he had laughed and
joked as he lay all day in the open and listened to the bullets that
went "pht" against the few clods of earth he had erected with his
entrenching tool, and which went by the high-sounding name of "head
cover."
And then, one day a howitzer shell had landed in the dug-out where he
was lunching with his three particular friends. When the men of his
company cleared the sandbags away from him, he was a gibbering wreck,
unwounded but paralysed, and splashed with the blood of three dead men.
Now, after months of battle dreams and mad terror, of massage and
electrical treatment, he was faced with the question--"Do you feel quite
fit for active service again?"
He was tired to death of staying at home with no apparent complaint, he
was sick of light duty with his reserve battalion, he wanted to be out
at the front again with the men and officers he knew ... and yet,
supposing his nerve went again, supposing he lost his self-control....
Finally, however, he looked up. "Yes, sir," he said, "I feel fit for
anything now--quite fit."
* * * * *
Three months later the Medical Officer sat talking to the C.O. in the
Headquarter dug-out.
"As for old Dymond," he said, "he ought never to have been sent out here
again. He's done his bit already, and they ought to have given him a
'cushy' job at home, instead of one of those young staff blighters"--for
the M.O. was no respecter of persons, and even a "brass hat" failed to
awe him.
"Can't you send him down the line?" said the C.O. "This is no place for
a man with neurasthenia. God! did you see the way his hand shook when he
was in here just now?"
"And he's a total abstainer now, poor devil," sighed the Doctor with
pity, for he was, himself, fond of his drop of whisky. "I'll send him
down to the dressing station to-morrow with a note telling the R.A.M.C.
people there that he wants a thorough change."
"Good," said the C.O. "I'm very sorry he's got to go, for he's a jolly
good officer. However, it can't be helped. Have another drink, Doc."
It is bad policy to refuse the offer of a senior officer, and the M.O.
was a man with a thirst, so he helped himself with liberality. Before
he had raised the glass to his lips, the sudden roar of many bursting
shells caused him to jump to his feet. "Hell!" he growled. "Another
hate. More dirty work at the cross roads." And he hurried off to the
little dug-out that served him as a dressing station, his beloved drink
standing untouched on the table.
Meanwhile, Roger Dymond crouched up against the parapet, and listened to
the explosions all around him. "Oil cans" and "Minnewerfer" bombs came
hurtling through the air, "Crumps" burst with great clouds of black
smoke, bits of "Whizz-bangs" went buzzing past and buried themselves
deep in the ground. Roger Dymond tried to light his cigarette, but his
hand shook so that he could hardly hold the match, and he threw it away
in fear that the men would see how he trembled.
Thousands of people have tried to describe the noise of a shell, but no
man can know what it is like unless he can put himself into a trench to
hear the original thing. There is the metallic roar of waves breaking
just before the rain, there is the whistle of wind through the trees,
there is the rumble of a huge traction engine, and there is the sharp
back-fire of a motor car. With each different sinister noise, Roger
Dymond felt his hold over himself gradually going ... going....
Next to him in the trench crouched Newman, a soldier who had been in
his platoon in the old days when they tramped, sweating and half-dead,
along the broiling roads towards Paris.
"They'm a blasted lot too free with their iron crosses and other
souvenirs," growled that excellent fellow. "I'd rather be fighting them
'and to 'and like we did in that there churchyard near Le Cateau,
wouldn't you, sir?"
Dymond smiled sickly assent, and Newman, being an old soldier, knew what
was the matter with his captain. He watched him as, bit by bit, his
nerve gave way, but he dared not suggest that Dymond should "go sick,"
and he did the only thing that could be done under the circumstances--he
talked as he had never talked before.
"Gawd!" he said after a long monologue that was meant to bring
distraction from the noise of the inferno. "I wish as 'ow we was a bit
closer to the devils so that they couldn't shell us. I'd like to get me
'and round some blighter's ugly neck, too."
A second later a trench-mortar bomb came hurtling down through the air,
and fell on the parados near the two men. There was a pause, then an
awful explosion, which hurled Dymond to the ground, and, as he fell,
Newman's words seemed to run through his head: "I wish as 'ow we was a
bit closer to the devils so that they couldn't shell us." He was aware
of a moment's acute terror, then something in his brain seemed to snap
and everything that followed was vague, for Captain Roger Dymond went
mad.
He remembered clambering out of the trench to get so close to the Huns
that they could not shell him; he remembered running--everybody running,
his own men running with him, and the Germans running from him; he had a
vague recollection of making his way down a long bit of strange trench,
brandishing an entrenching tool that he had picked up somewhere; then
there was a great flash and an awful pain, and all was over--the
shelling was over at last.
* * * * *
It was not until Roger Dymond was in hospital in London that he worried
about things again. One evening, however, the Sister brought in a paper,
and pointed out his own name in a list of nine others who had won the
V.C. He read the little paragraph underneath in the deepest
astonishment.
"For conspicuous gallantry," it ran, "under very heavy shell fire on
August 26th, 1916. Seeing that his men were becoming demoralised by
the bombardment, Captain Dymond, on his own initiative, led a
surprise attack against the enemy trenches. He found the Germans
unprepared, and at the head of his men captured two lines of trenches
along a front of two hundred and fifty yards. Captain Dymond lost
both legs owing to shell fire, but his men were able to make good
almost all their ground and to hold it against all counter-attacks.
"This officer was awarded the Military Cross earlier in the war for
great bravery near La Bassee."
He finished the amazing article, and wrote a letter, in a wavering hand
that he could not recognise as his own, to the War Office to tell them
of their mistake--that he was really running away from the enemy's
shells--and received a reply visit from a general.
"My dear fellow," he said, "the V.C. is never awarded to a man who has
not deserved it. The only pity is that so many fellows deserve it and
don't get it. You deserved it and got it. Stick to it, and think
yourself damned lucky to be alive to wear it. There's nothing more to be
said."
And this is the story of Captain Roger Dymond, V.C., M.C. Of the few of
us who were there at the time, there is not one who would grudge him the
right to put those most coveted letters of all after his name, for we
were all in the shelling ourselves, and we all saw him charge, and
heard him shout and laugh as he made his way across to the enemy. The
V.C., as the general said, is never given to a man who has not deserved
it.
V
"PONGO" SIMPSON ON BOMBS
"Pongo" Simpson was sitting before a brazier fire boiling some tea for
his captain, when the warning click sounded from the German trenches.
Instinctively he clapped the cover on the canteen and dived for shelter,
while the great, black trench-mortar bomb came twisting and turning down
through the air. It fell to ground with a dull thud, there was a
second's silence, then an appalling explosion. The roof of the dug-out
in which "Pongo" had found refuge sagged ominously, the supporting beam
cracked, and the heavy layer of earth and bricks and branches subsided
on the crouching man.
It took five minutes to dig him out, and he was near to suffocation when
they dragged him into the trench. For a moment he looked wonderingly
about him, and then a smile came to his face. "That's what I likes about
this 'ere life, there ain't no need to get bored. No need for pictcher
shows or pubs, there's amusements for you for nothing." And as he got to
his feet, a scowl replaced the smile. "I bet I knows the blighter what
sent that there bomb," he growled. "I guess it's old Fritz what used to
'ang out in that old shop in Walworth Road--'im what I palmed off a bad
'arf-crown on. 'E always said as 'ow 'e'd get 'is own back."
Five minutes later he had exchanged the battered wreck of his canteen
for a new one belonging to Private Adams, who was asleep farther down
the trench, and had set to boiling a fresh lot of tea for his captain.
"Darned funny things, bombs and things like that," he began presently.
"You can't trust them no'ow. Look at ole Sergeant Allen f'r example. 'E
went 'ome on leave after a year out 'ere, and 'e took an ornary time
fuse from a shell with 'im to put on 'is mantelpiece. And the very first
night as 'e was 'ome, the blamed thing fell down when 'e wasn't lookin',
and bit 'im in the leg, so that 'e 'ad to spend all 'is time in
'orspital. They're always explodin' when they didn't ought to. Did I
ever tell you about me brother Bert?"
A chorus in the negative from the other men who stood round the brazier
encouraged him to continue.
"Well, Bert was always a bit silly like, and I thought as 'ow 'e'd do
somethin' foolish when 'e got to the front. Sure 'nough, the very first
bloomin' night 'e went into a trench, 'e was filin' along it when 'e
slipped and sat right on a box of bombs. It's gorspel what I'm tellin'
you--nine of the blighters went off, and 'e wasn't killed. 'E's 'ome in
England now in some 'orspital, and 'e's as fit as a lord. The only thing
wrong about 'im now is that 'e's always the first bloke what stands and
gives 'is place to a lady when a tram's full--still a bit painful like."
Joe Bates expectorated with much precision and care over the parapet in
the direction of the Germans. "It ain't bombs wot I mind," he said,
"it's them there mines. When I first kime aht ter fight the 'Uns, I was
up at St. Eloi, an' they blew the 'ole lot of us up one night. Gawd, it
ain't like nothin' on earth, an' the worst of it was I'd jest 'ad a box
of fags sent out by some ole gal in 'Blighty,' an' when I got back to
earth agen there weren't a bloomin' fag to be found. If thet ain't
enough to mike a bloke swear, I dunno wot is. 'As any sport 'ere got a
fag to gi' me? I ain't 'ad a smoke fer two days," he finished, "cept a
li'l bit of a fag as the Keptin threw away."
Private Parkes hesitated for a minute, and then, seeing Joe Bates's eyes
fixed expectantly on him, he produced a broken "Woodbine" from
somewhere inside his cap.
"Yes," resumed "Pongo," while Joe Bates was lighting his cigarette,
"this ain't what you'd call war. I wouldn't mind goin' for ole Fritz
with an 'ammer, but, what with 'owitzers and 'crumps,' and 'Black
Marias,' and 'pip-squeaks' and 'whizz-bangs,' the infantry bloke ain't
got a chanst. 'Ere 'ave I been in a bloomin' trench for six months, and
what 'ave I used my bay'nit for? To chop wood, and to wake ole Sandy
when 'e snores. Down the line our blokes run over and give it to the
Alleymans like 'ell, and up 'ere we sits jest like a lot of dolls while
they send over those darned bombs. I'll give 'em what for. I'll put it
acrost 'em." And he disappeared round the traverse with the canteen of
tea for his officer.
Ten minutes later he turned up again with a jam tin bomb in his hand. "I
bet I can reach their bloomin' listening post with this," he said, and
he deliberately lit a piece of paper at the brazier fire and put it to
the odd inch of fuse that protruded from the bomb. The average jam tin
bomb is fused to burn for three or four seconds before it explodes, so
that, once the fuse is lit, you do not keep the bomb near you for long,
but send it across with your best wishes to Fritz over the way. "Pongo"
drew his arm back to throw his bomb, and had begun the forward swing,
when his fingers seemed to slip, and the weapon dropped down into the
trench.
There was a terrific rush, and everyone disappeared helter-skelter round
the traverse.
Just as Corporal Bateman rounded the corner into safety he glanced back,
to see "Pongo" sprawling on his bomb in the most approved style, to
prevent the bits from spreading. There was a long pause, during which
the men crouched close to the parapet waiting, waiting ... but nothing
happened.
At length someone poked his head round the traverse--to discover "Pongo"
sitting on the sandbag recently vacated by Corporal Bateman, trying to
balance the bomb on the point of a bayonet.
"'Ullo!" said that individual. "I thought as 'ow you'd gone 'ome for the
week-end. 'E wouldn't 'urt me, not this little bloke," and he fondled
the jam tin.
"Well," said Joe Bates when, one by one, the men had crept back to the
fire, "if that ain't a bloomin' miracle! I ain't never seen nuffin' like
it. Ain't you 'arf 'ad an escape, Pongo?"
"Pongo" rose to his feet, and edged towards the traverse. "It ain't such
an escape as what you blokes think, because, you see, the bomb ain't
nothin' more nor an ornary jam tin with a bit of fuse what I stuck in
it."
And he disappeared down the trench as rapidly as had his comrades a few
minutes before.
VI
THE SCHOOLMASTER OF PONT SAVERNE
I
"So, you see, Schoolmaster," said Oberleutnant von Scheldmann, "you
French are a race of dogs. We are the real masters here, and, by Heaven,
we have come to make you realise it. Your beloved defenders are running
for their lives from the nation they ventured to defy a month ago. They
are beaten, routed. What is it they say in your Latin books? 'Vae
Victis.' Woe to the conquered!"