MY HORSESHOE WORKING
It was the fourth day of the second battle of Ypres. I was in charge of
my subsection at the guns and the men wanted water. I volunteered and
went to a farmhouse 150 yards off, got the water and had started back
for the guns. I had just stepped outside the door of the farmhouse when
Kr-kr-kr-p! a huge shell came over and blew the gun and gun crew into
kingdom come. A French captain was standing twenty feet from the door
and, following the report, I started for our gun. I had just taken a
step or two when another monster of death came hurtling through the air,
straight for me, as I thought, but, instead, it was a message for the
French soldier; it got him squarely, leaving not a fragment of his body
to be seen.
Immediately after the death of our gun crew and the French captain our
gun position was moved, and that same evening after supper, consisting
of the usual bread, jam and tea, Walter Hope and I were on our way to
the dugout. When half-way there a sudden emptiness entered into my life
and the next thing I knew I was being lifted on to a stretcher. I
rebelled and got to my feet. What had happened was this, as told me by
one of the boys who was standing a short distance off,--a shell had come
and exploded almost at my feet, throwing me in the air for a distance,
as he said, of fully twenty feet. It is impossible for me to personally
make an estimate of the distance, as I was unconscious when I went up
and when I came down.
When I recovered my senses, Hope was hopping around holding his right
hand with his left and exclaiming like a madman. His hand had been
almost severed by a fragment from the shell and was hanging to the wrist
by a shred. He ran to the cookhouse and the cook advised him to go at
once to the dressing station, as he couldn't do anything for him;
instead, in his frenzy, he ran to the gun pits, going from one to the
other, looking for help. Every man there wanted to help him, but he
wouldn't and couldn't stand still; the concussion of the shell had
affected his brain and this accounted for his ungovernableness. Then a
few of us grabbed him and I bandaged it as best I could, walked over to
the road with him and started him on his way to the dressing station; I
could go no further, as we had commenced firing, and he made his way
alone. When nearing the station his senses completely left him for the
time and he plucked off his hanging hand and threw it from him. The poor
lad was then taken into the station, properly attended to and sent to
England.
Thankful am I to tell that he came through all right and is now working
in Toronto earning his living by writing with his left hand, which he
has learned to manipulate with practically the same agility the lost
member possessed. We were deeply regretful at the loss of Hope from the
crowd--fearless Hope, as he was known, and, sometimes, hopeless
Hope--because never in all my experience have I seen a man who was so
utterly regardless of danger; he would expose himself to what seemed
certain death, and, as luck would have it, he got his blighty at a place
that ordinarily would be considered about as safe from harm as could be
found.
On the fifth day of the second battle of Ypres, April 25, 1915, McKay,
an orderly, came up the line with ammunition for the guns as our supply
was exhausted. As soon as the shells were delivered it was his duty to
report at once to the Captain for further orders. The poor fellow was
starving for something to eat and he thought he would steal the time to
slip up to the cookhouse and get a bite of grub. He rode his horse
across and was in the act of leaning over to get a couple of hardtacks
the cook was handing him, when a splinter of a shell that had exploded
at his horse's feet, struck him in the neck, killing him instantly,
slightly wounding his horse and destroying the rations and vessels in
the cookhouse. The Captain yelled, "Ammunition orderly wanted," and I
volunteered. I jumped on the horse, galloped him as well as his limping
leg would permit, and weathered the storm of shells through the fire
zone, making my way to the wagon lines, where I gave the Quartermaster
the order.
Then I had the pleasure of witnessing for the first time the admirable
celerity and effectiveness with which an order of this kind is carried
out.
"Ten loads of ammunition wanted at once, sir; ammunition pretty nearly
exhausted at the guns," was the message I delivered. The Quartermaster
blew his whistle--"Stand to! ammunition up!" he yelled. The Sergeant
then carried on; the men were standing easy by their horses waiting for
the word. In these days, when a battle is on, the men are always ready
for the word at a moment's notice, with their horses fully harnessed,
nothing being removed from the animals except the bit to enable them to
take their feed from the bag, and in no case is an ammunition wagon left
without its guard; at night when the guard would lie down to snatch an
hour's sleep, another one was there ready to carry on. "Prepare to
mount! Mount! Walk--march! Trot!" yelled the Sergeant in quick
succession, each command being executed with clock-like exactness, and
they trotted from under cover of the trees where they were concealed
from the airplanes and proceeded rapidly up the road under shell fire,
bumping and stumbling along.
I was guide for the party. We passed through Breeland, but could not
make the best kind of speed as the traffic was terribly congested. On
the left hand side of the road long lines of ambulances bearing wounded
men were going down, stretcher bearers were carrying their suffering
burdens and wounded men who were able to walk were making their way
around and through the wagons as best they could, among them being men
from every branch of the Imperial service, together with French and
Algerians; on the other side of the road supply wagons of all
descriptions were going forward. In the course of our journey the
harness of one of the horses rubbed the animal until he was lame,
stopping up the wagon. Immediately the Sergeant who was riding alongside
ordered the wagon to one side, removed the horse, installed his own,
jumped on the wagon and caught up with the others. The speed with which
he did the trick almost made me gasp with astonishment; in all my life I
never saw work of the kind handled so smoothly and swiftly. A dash of
the picturesque was added to the scene by the Algerian ration-bearers
winding their way in and out of the wagons, carrying trays of hot food
on their heads and shoulders. It was nothing short of marvelous, the
skillful manner in which they carried their precious burden of food, for
never did they have a spill unless killed or wounded.
One of the funniest sights a man can see was the way my chums of the
ammunition wagons defied the explicit and peremptory order, "No smoking
on the road at or around Ypres." There is something in the rise and
fall of the lighted cigarette when being smoked that attracts the
attention at long distances and many a man has had to pay the penalty,
which was most severe,--28 days field punishment, which means 28 days
without pay and breaking your back at fatigue duty around the camp, the
cookhouse and the wagon lines, in addition to four hours extra drill
each day. The temptation to smoke is so compelling that the punishment
does not deter most men and they take the chance. By taking the collar
of their coat and tucking it around their faces, lighting the match
under their coat next to their ribs, burying their faces in their coat,
they get a light without much danger of detection. In puffing it a man
will hold the fag in his closed fist to his mouth, take the inhale, and,
if there should happen to be a provo or other suspicious guardian of the
rules in sight, down into his stomach would go the smoke. I don't know
why it is but it has always seemed to me that the more stringent the
rules are against the forbidden luxury, the more chances men will take
to get their smoke.
We made the run to Ypres Square in an hour and a half. As soon as we
entered I noticed a woman clinging tightly to a little girl and hugging
the wall of the Nunshouse, a building standing immediately opposite the
town hall in the square. The square itself was a large open place in the
city about 350 feet long by 150 wide. I jumped off my horse, gave it to
the driver and went over. In broken English I learned they wanted to
cross, but on account of the fire continually bursting the woman would
not, so I picked up the child and carried her across to a cellar about
five doors out of the square. A chunk had been blown out of the building
and there was no difficulty in getting into the cellar, and as soon as I
got to this place the child murmured, "_Bon! bon!_" and indicated she
would go in there. I set her down and she turned her pretty little face
to me for a kiss. She then caught my arm as I was about to go and
slipping off a tiny locket from her little neck, handed it to me,
indicating that she wanted me to keep it. I have it to this day and I
prize it tenderly. It has a small picture of the patron saint of France,
Joan of Arc.
I ran back to her mother, pointed out where the child was, but she still
seemed afraid to venture across. Although my little adventure did not
occupy over three minutes, I could wait no longer, and jumped on my
horse and the train of wagons trotted sharply out of the square. As the
last wagon was leaving, I heard a sound like a train leaving a
depot--choo! choo! choo! choo! growing louder each instant, and as the
tail-end of the last wagon was trotting out of the square a shell, the
largest ever employed by the German command and called the Ypres
Express, landed full in the square, killing every living thing there and
destroying ambulances and wagons of every kind, catching our rear wagon
and blowing it up, wounding the driver and destroying the magnificent
Cloth Hall, the last vestige of this most beautiful piece of
architecture being destroyed by the resulting fire. That shell was from
one of two guns that were expressly manufactured for the purpose of
destroying the city of Ypres, a couple of months being taken to build
cement platforms in which to set the ordnance, and the death-dealing
monsters started on their mission of destruction from Dixmude, about 22
miles distant.
[Illustration: British Battery in Action]
Not long after, an airplane located these monsters and succeeded in
destroying one by a downpour of explosives he dropped on it, and the
other one, a couple of days following, when being fired by its crew,
the shell exploded in the gun itself, tearing it from its cement
foundation and destroying itself and crew. These were the only guns of
that caliber that have ever been used, so far as is known. The passage
through the air of those missiles of death, heralded by their choo!
choo! sent a shiver of dread up and down the lines as far as the sound
would reach, and deep and lasting was the satisfaction of all ranks when
the last of these mammoths of destruction wended its final flight.