gone 150 yards when a terrific fire broke out. We got behind a little
ruined hut to escape the bullets, and I made ready to return in case
it was a serious attack. But it died down in ten minutes, and we
pursued our way in more or less peace, for it was only a case of
firing at reliefs, and I think the Germans were rather jumpy.
The Château of Beukenhorst was a square white block of a place, and
merits perhaps some description, as we were there for a most
uncomfortable fortnight--uncomfortable as far as events and fighting
went, though not so as regards living.
It belonged to some people whose name I have forgotten--Baron
something (Belgian) and his German wife, and it was due to this lady's
nationality--so the story went--that the place had suffered so little.
Personally I think that it was due to the house only being indicated
on the map, whilst the stables, 200 yards off, which were perpetually
being shelled, were marked in heavy black, and were a cockshy for the
German guns, which were evidently laid by map and not by sight; yet
the house was on a fair elevation, and must have been visible from
certain points on the German side. By the same token, General Capper
had had his Headquarters there for a few days, but had cleared out, I
believe, because of shells. Half a dozen shrapnel had certainly hit
it, but they had only chipped off some bits of stone and broken all
the windows at the eastern end.
We lived in a room half below ground at the western end, which must
evidently have been the housekeeper's room or servants' hall, next to
the kitchen. About half the Signal Section lived in some sort of
cellars close by, the other half being away with the transport. Two of
these cellars were also used as a dressing station for the 7th
Brigade, and wounded used to be brought in here frequently and tended
by a sanitary Highlander, a corporal whose exact functions I could
never discover, but who worked like a Trojan. The wounded were visited
by a medical officer in the evening, and removed on stretchers every
night to the ambulances who came to fetch them. Our own wounded did
not come here, but were looked after just behind the trenches near the
Herenthage Château, and taken away from there at night by our own 15th
Field Ambulance, who worked all night in circumstances of much danger,
but were luckily hardly ever hit.
The owners had evidently had plenty of notice before clearing out, for
they had removed all the smaller articles and most of the furniture,
and had rolled up the carpets and curtains and blinds, leaving only
big cupboards and bare bedsteads and larger bits of furniture. These
were, oddly enough, in very good taste--Louis XV. style--and only
sand-papered and not polished or painted. There was a good bathroom
too, and a lavatory with big basins, but much of it had been smashed
by shrapnel, as it was at the east end. Our bedrooms were on the first
floor, and most of them had good beds and washhand-stands, but no
linen or blankets. I need hardly say that we carefully selected those
at the western end of the house, whither few bullets had penetrated.
But the windows there were mostly untouched, and consisted of good
plate glass. Altogether the whole place gave one the idea of comfort,
money, and good taste, and was an eminently satisfactory abode--bar
the shells.
I know that, as far as looking after the Brigade was concerned, we got
through three times as much satisfactory work in the morning after we
arrived as we did during all the three days we were in the little
dug-out. For we could now communicate not only by wire but by
messenger and by personal contact with the authorities and commanders
in our rear and on our flanks, and could discuss matters _re_
artillery and defences and plans in a way which had been quite
impossible in our advanced position.
General Wing[19] used to come and see us most evenings, and I used to
communicate personally with Shaw (9th Brigade), and Fanshawe
(Artillery), and M'Cracken (7th Brigade), about combined movements,
&c. Every morning before daylight, and at a good many other times
besides, I, or Weatherby, or Moulton-Barrett, used to go down to the
trenches and confabulate with Griffith--always cool and resourceful,
who was in immediate command--or Frost and Burfeild, who were running
the Cheshires excellently between them. It was not always a very easy
business getting down to the trenches, for there were nearly always
shells bursting in the woods and on the open field which lay between
us and the trench wood; and we had generally to hurry in order to
leave the château precincts unperceived by the beastly Taubes who
hovered overhead, always on the lookout for headquarters to shell; so
we cut down orderlies and staff to a minimum, and absolutely forbade
any hanging about outside.
[Footnote 19: To everybody's great regret, he was killed in
October 1915.]
It is no use going into or describing our proceedings day by day:
"Plus ça changeait, plus c'était la même chose." I have the detail of
it day by day in my diary, but it was always, in the main, the same
thing--minds and bodies at high tension throughout the day and most of
the night; perpetual artillery fire--if not by the enemy then by
ourselves; shells bursting round the château and hardly ever into it,
mostly shrapnel near the house and Black Marias a bit further
off--chiefly into a walled garden 200 yards off which, for some
unknown reason, the Germans were convinced held some of our guns,
though, as a matter of fact, our batteries were in our right rear, in
well-covered positions just inside (or even outside, in some cases)
the woods. But we got shells on the other side of the house as well,
over the bare half-grown lawn and flower-beds between the château and
the Hooge-Menin road.
It was rarely "healthy" to take a stroll in the grounds, however much
we might be in want of fresh air. Even on days which were
exceptionally quiet--and there were not many of them,--when one would
move out to look at the grounds with a view to future defences in case
we were driven back, or with a desire to ease a torpid liver, suddenly
there would be a loudening swish in the air and a crash which would
send one of the tall pine-trees into smithereens, with a shower of
broken branches in all directions, followed by another, or half a
dozen more; and we would retire gracefully--sometimes even
rapidly--behind the shelter of our house.
There were some late roses in the garden, or rather in the scattered
flower-beds near the house, which lasted out even when the snow was
on them; but about the only live beings who took any interest in them
were three or four goats, who haunted the precincts of the château,
and were everlastingly trying to get inside. Indeed, when
Moulton-Barrett first came to take possession, there were two goats in
the best bedrooms upstairs, who peered out of the windows at the
undesired visitors, and had to be evicted after a display of
considerable force.
Also pigs; for half a dozen great raw-boned pink and dirty swine
rootled about in the woods near by for sustenance. They were, however,
shy, and did not seek the shelter of the château. Stray cattle there
were too; but neither these nor the pigs paid any attention to the
shells which fell near them with impartial regularity, but did them,
as far as I could see, no damage whatever.
There was a stable a couple of hundred yards in rear of the house, and
here at first we put what horses there were in the neighbourhood.
Having Squeaky and Silver there one night--I forget why, but I know
they were there--I put them into a couple of loose-boxes. Silver went
in all right, but Squeaky, generally a most sensible mare, shivered
and sweated with terror, had almost to be forced in, and refused to
feed when there. So I let her out again, and picketed her outside. Two
nights after, a doctor's horse which was in there was all but killed,
for a shrapnel burst through the window and drove fourteen bullets
into his head and neck. They wanted leave to kill the poor beast, but
I refused permission, as he was not hit in any vital spot, and he
recovered, more or less, in a few days.
As mentioned above, this stable was marked in black on the map, whilst
the château--a far bigger building, of course--was hardly indicated. I
take it that this accounted for our comparative immunity, for the
stable was shelled (and hit) with great regularity, whilst the château
was hardly ever touched. We had, however, a couple of small H.E. shell
through the eastern end whilst we were in the western; one of these
bored clean through the wall of a room where there was a big cupboard
against it on the far side and exploded forthwith. But the cupboard
was not even scratched; it was blown into the middle of the room and a
table or two upset, but, strange to relate, nothing serious in the way
of damage was done.[20] On another occasion, however, a few shrapnel
exploded just outside the kitchen window. At the sound of the first we
all bolted to the other side of the house, and called to the servants
to do the same. They came out; but Brown, our excellent cook, who had
come out in his shirt-sleeves, must needs go back, without orders, to
fetch his coat: for which he promptly received a jagged piece of shell
in his left arm, which put a stop, alas, to his cooking for good and
all, as far as we were concerned, for he was sent away, and, although
he recovered, never came back to us.
[Footnote 20: This is a fact, though I cannot explain it.]
During the chief hours of the day, when not (or whilst) being shelled,
we were pretty busy with telegrams and reports and queries and
excursions and alarums. We were comfortable enough in the
housekeeper's room, and got our meals "reg'lar," and we even had two
or three arm-chairs, and newspapers and mails fairly well, and news
from outside, which used to arrive with our rations at 9 P.M. or
thereabouts. But a minor trial was the fact that two out of our five
panes of glass had been blown in by shell, and let in an icy draught
on most days. So we got some partially-oiled paper, and made some
paste, and stuck up the panes.
The first shell explosion made the paper sag, the second made it
shiver, and the third blew it out. The paste would not stick--it was
the wrong sort of flour or something.
Then we used jam--that glutinous saccharine mess known as "best plum
jam"--and blue sugar paper, and it stuck quite fairly well. But it
wouldn't dry; and tears of jam used to trickle down the paper panes
and mingle with the tin-tacks and the bread-crumbs on the sill.
The room was even then fairly dark, but the shell-bursts again
shivered the jam paper and burst it, and we had to take to cardboard
and drawing-boards. This made it still darker, and was not even then
successful, for the explosions still shook the boards down and
eventually broke another pane: it was most trying. On the last day but
one four panes had been broken, and on the last day, as will be
recounted, all were broken and the whole window blown in. Then we
left.
But what was of much vaster interest, of course, than these trifles,
was the desperate fighting which was being waged along our front,
not 1000 yards from the château. Our two battalions, being entrenched
in the wood, did not receive such a severe hammering as the brigades
on either side--the 7th and 9th respectively on our right and
left,--who were more in the open. And the shelling and attacks on them
were incessant, as well as on troops still further off on the other
side of them.
The 11th November was a typically unpleasant day. It started with a
touch of comedy, Weatherby arriving stark naked in my room at 6.30
A.M., just when I was shaving, saying, "I say, sir, may I finish my
dressing in here? They're shelling the bathroom!" He had a towel and a
few clothes on his arm, _et præterea nihil_. (He, M.-B., and St André,
though sleeping in different rooms, used to dress in the bathroom,
where there were excellent taps and basins, though no water was
running.)
The shelling continued till 10. It was on this morning that Brown was
damaged and lots of windows blown in.
About that time I saw, to my consternation, a number of British
soldiers retiring towards the walled garden. I sent out at once to
stop them and turn them back, thinking they were Cheshires or
Bedfords. To my relief they were neither, but belonged to a brigade on
our right. They had been heavily shelled, and, though in no sort of
panic, were falling back deliberately, though without orders. There
were no officers with them--all killed or wounded, I believe. My
efforts were successful, though I grieve to say that a nice boy,
Kershaw of the Signallers, who volunteered to carry a message to them,
was hit by shrapnel in the thigh and brought in by our clerk, Sergeant
Hutchison, and another, bleeding profusely. Burnett, commanding the
Cyclist Corps, had been knocked down by a falling tree and his back
damaged--also internal damage, I believe (for he was not really fit a
year afterwards); he also was brought in, as well as Cooper of the
Royal Fusiliers. A number of Zouaves and some more troops also
trickled slowly back from the left with stories of appalling losses
(mostly untrue) and disaster to the trenches (ditto). They were also
stopped--the Zouaves by St André--and sent back. Certainly the
Frenchmen's nerve was not damaged, for I remember that several had
playing-cards in their hands, and when they got to what they
considered a fairly quiet spot they stopped, sat down, and went on
with their game. Norman M'Mahon, commanding Royal Fusiliers, had,
however, been killed, just as he had been appointed Brigadier to
another Brigade, besides a lot more good men of the 9th Brigade. Shaw,
commanding the Brigade, had also been wounded, and Douglas Smith
succeeded him. Both the 1st and 9th Brigades had lost several
trenches, and intended to try and retake them at night, but both had
been pushed back some distance.
A company of Wiltshires was sent to reinforce us in case we were
seriously attacked. But they were not used by us for fighting--only
for digging extra trenches near the château in case the front
battalions had to fall back. But the front battalions had no intention
of falling back, and the Cheshires got in a very heavy fire on the
flank of some Germans who were attacking the 7th Brigade, and,
together with the Gordons on our right, killed a great number. The
Cheshires reported afterwards that the Germans walked slowly forward
to the attack without enthusiasm and in a sort of dazed way, with
their rifles under their arms, as if they were drugged. I wonder
whether they were: we several times received reports to the same
effect.
A particularly cheery item of intelligence, on good authority, was
that fifteen German Guards battalions were being specially brought up
in order to break through our line here at all costs. I thought at the
time that this was false news, and that nothing like so many would be
available, but it was not far out. As part confirmation, some papers
taken off a dead German officer were brought in; they belonged to A.
von Obernitz, 2nd Garde Grenadier Regiment, 2nd Division Guard Corps,
but there was nothing of interest in them.
About that date Weatherby, who had been seedy for several days, became
seriously ill with a sort of light typhoid fever, and had to be
evacuated. Moulton-Barrett therefore added the duties of Brigade-Major
to his already heavy ones as Staff Captain, and did excellently well
in the double capacity.
To finish up with, the weather, which had been calm and fine up to
date, broke that evening, and there were violent rain-storms from the
south-west all night.
We went to bed in no very happy state of mind, expecting a serious
night attack by overwhelming forces. But no attack came, for probably
the enemy was as exhausted as ourselves. All the same we had to fall
back by order, on the following night, for many trenches on our right
and left had been driven in, and we did not want to be cut off.
So we fell back about 200 yards through the wood, and straightened up
our line--in a much worse defensive position as regards our own bit,
but it could not be helped. My suggestions as to the line were
overruled, and we took up our second line of trenches and constructed
a little réduit in the wood, ringed around with barbed wire and
holding about twenty-five men, who would--we were sanguine enough to
expect--hold off any serious rush that came.
I forgot to mention that Singer, commanding the 17th Fd. Co. R.E., had
arrived, and did an extraordinary amount of good work with his company
in circumstances of the greatest difficulty and danger. He told me
that the first night he went out, in order to put up some wire
entanglement in a dangerous place, it was as black as pitch. He made
his sections hold on to each other's coats, but within ten minutes
they had not only lost each other in the dense black woods--chiefly
through tumbling into trenches and falling over telephone wires,--but
Singer had lost the whole company, and after wandering helplessly in
what he thought the right direction for some time, he discovered that
he had lost himself as well. He said he felt inclined to sit down and
have a good cry, so utterly miserable did he feel!
In falling back to the second line we had a fairly easy job, but for
the 9th Brigade it was a regular Chinese puzzle, for by this time some
of their trenches were in German hands at one end and English at the
other, whilst Northumberland Fusiliers, Lincolns, Sussex, West
Ridings, Cavalry, and even part of the 2nd Grenadiers,[21] who had
turned up from goodness knows where, were inextricably tangled up; not
to mention that a party of Northumberlands, numbering about 120, under
one gallant subaltern called Brown, had been holding out for three
days in front of our line, with no food or drink, and Germans in
trenches only 30 yards off them. I believe this lot eventually got
away in safety, but the retirement of all was about as difficult as
it could be. This was on the 13th.
[Footnote 21: My old battalion.]
On the 14th the Bedfords were heavily attacked, and the Germans pushed
a machine-gun right forward through the wood and enfiladed the
Cheshire left. These stood it for some time and then retired further
down their trench, being unable to let the Bedfords know. Consequently
this beastly gun got in a heavy fire on the Bedfords right as well and
forced them to retire. The réduit was no good--the wood was too
thick--and some of the garrison were captured. So the Bedfords had to
fall back, fighting, on to their third line 50 yards back, where they
held the enemy.
Edwards, who commanded the advanced Bedford company, came up to the
château to report, and gave a most cheery and amusing account of the
whole thing, but the result was not at all amusing, as we had lost
ground and a lot of men.
Meanwhile the big attack by the German Guards was being made on the
brigades on our flanks, but, as all the world knows, it was completely
repulsed, though the 15th Brigade was not very heavily engaged as a
whole. The fighting was terribly confused in the woods, and nothing
but the individual grit of our men held the line, for it was
practically impossible to give directions or exercise control in this
horrible terrain.
During this period we got much "mixed" as regards our machine-guns. We
took over some from the 7th Division and lost some of those. Then we
borrowed some more from other units in rear and recovered some of the
lost ones. Sergeant Mart of the Bedfords did a splendid thing, and
recovered two of the lost Bedford guns practically by himself,
stalking the Germans with only one other man and rushing their trench,
killing the few men in it. I wanted to recommend him for the V.C., but
had such difficulty in getting sufficient evidence about it that an
official recommendation would not have held water. Meanwhile poor Mart
was shot through the neck. I got him a D.C.M., but do not know whether
he lived to receive it.
Then three out of our five guns got damaged by shells and bullets and
mud and stopped work. So we borrowed some more, and had some
difficulty in working them, as they were a new pattern. By the time we
understood them two other guns were _hors de combat_,--it was a real
nightmare, and it needed strenuous efforts to keep even one or two
guns[22] going; yet they were of enormous importance, and accounted
for a lot of the enemy, especially on the right flank of the
Cheshires.
[Footnote 22: It does indeed seem extraordinary now that in
those strenuous days of 1914 we only had about three
machine-guns to two battalions. Nowadays we should have at
least twenty!]
Meanwhile the weather had turned beastly cold--snowstorms and sleet
during the day and a hard frost at night. The men suffered terribly in
the trenches--especially the Cheshires, whose trenches were very wet.
Although we kept the wet ones occupied as lightly as possible, we
could not abandon them altogether and dig others further forward or
back, as there was water everywhere only a foot below the ground.
Breastworks were attempted, but they were very visible and attracted
large numbers of shells: altogether the Cheshires had a very poor
time, I fear. The Bedfords were rather better off, their trenches in
the wood being on rather higher and sandy ground, but they were not
dry by any means.
It was very awkward getting to the trenches, even in broad daylight,
by this time, for such numbers of trees had been blown down by the
shells, there were so many shell-holes and so much wire about, and the
mud and pools of water so universal, that it was really quite a
physical effort to get through at all.
About this time--the 17th--the Germans in our immediate front appeared
to have retired a bit, but they certainly had not gone far, for our
scouts on pushing on for 50 yards or so were greeted with a heavy
fire, so we were unable to get on as much as we wanted. But though the
rifle-bullets were rarer for a day or two, shells certainly were not,
and continued with the utmost regularity.
On the evening of the 17th, by the way, the enemy, annoyed perhaps at
our scouts pushing on, made what was probably meant to be a
counter-attack. It was not made in much strength, and we repelled it
with ease. But it appeared to us at the château to be more serious
than it was, for a messenger from the trenches arrived with the
information that the Bedfords were being very severely pressed, and
the Cheshires had had very heavy losses, and could not hold their
trenches for more than ten minutes unless they were supported at
once. I had no supports to send them. A message to Griffith by
telephone for confirmation of this alarm produced no result, for the
wires were, of course, broken at that critical moment. So I wired to
General Wing asking him to send me some supports if he could, and got
200 Royal Fusiliers shortly afterwards. But I did not use them, for
the news of the messenger--who protested that he had been sent with a
verbal message (not likely) by an officer whose name he did not
know--turned out to be grossly exaggerated, and by the time the
Fusiliers arrived the fighting was over. I never could trace whether
any officer was responsible for the original message: I believe not.
Anyhow, there was trouble for the messenger.
On the 18th and 19th we had comparatively quiet days--except for
nervousness about our left flank, where certain troops who had joined
the 9th Brigade were very heavily shelled and lost one or two of their
trenches. They managed, indeed, to get most of the lost ground back,
but I was not entirely happy about it, for the ground between us and
them was extremely difficult and could not be properly covered by
either of us. There was a pond hereabouts, with a little island on it
with a summer-house; and we found, on extending our left to take it
over, that there must have been a German sniper there for several
nights, for many empty Mauser cartridge-cases were found in the
summer-house, and a very dicky punt was discovered in the rushes. This
latter we sank, and were no more troubled; but it shows the cool pluck
of the enemy's snipers in getting right into our lines by themselves
(and also--I regret to add--certain other things as well).