OUR OWN CHEERFUL FASHION
On October twelfth there was a general attack along our front, to try
out some new "smoke bombs" and shells. It was the first time the smoke
barrage was used. We took our guns down about half-way to the front
line and set them up in hedge-rows and other places where we could
sweep the front in case the enemy made a counter-attack and got into
our lines. However, we were not needed, so remained spectators of
about as pretty a show as I have ever seen. At a given signal, every
gun behind our lines dropped smoke shells in a continuous row along
the line, just in front of the enemy's parapet. As each shell struck,
it burst, sending out great streamers of white smoke that soon became
a dense wall through which no one could see. Under cover of this, our
bombers advanced, threw hand grenades into the enemy trenches and then
retired. No attempt was made to take any part of the line; it was
more in the nature of a try-out for the new shells and also for the
purpose of harassing the enemy.
Naturally, the boche, expecting a general attack, commenced to shell
everything in that part of the country and also opened up a heavy
machine-gun and rifle fire, a good deal of which came our way, but no
one was hit. On the way back to the barn, Bouchard and I were walking
side by side, perhaps three or four feet apart, when a "whizz-bang"
came right between us and struck the ground not more than ten feet in
front. In nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand that
would have spelled our finish, but the shell struck on the edge of a
little hump, at the side of a ditch, turned sidewise and spun round
like a top. We stood there, speechless, fascinated by the peculiar
antics of the thing, until it stopped. It was a pretty toy, a 105 mm.,
painted red and with a beautiful brass fuse-cap. I picked it up but as
it was too hot to handle I put on my asbestos gloves, used for
changing barrels of machine guns, and carried it "home" where I put
it away, intending to get some artilleryman to remove the fuse and
explosive so that I might keep it as a souvenir; but a bunch of boys
from the Eighteenth Battalion found it, and taking it back to their
dug-out at Ridgewood, tried to unload it themselves. Some were killed
and several wounded when the thing exploded. I afterward saw one of
those who had been wounded and he told me about it.
At this stage of the soldier's career he is always a "souvenir
hunter," picking up and carrying around with him all sorts of things,
from German bullets to big shells. I was a fiend of the first
magnitude and collected enough stuff to stock a museum, only to have
to abandon it whenever we moved. I had French rifles, bayonets and
other equipment; German ditto and about every size and type of shell
and fuse that was used on our front. Whenever we moved I would bury or
cache the whole lot, in the hope that I could get back for it some
day. But the fever finally wore off, and I got so that I would not
even pick up a German helmet. Now, of course, I wish I had some of
that stuff to show the folks.
On the fifteenth of October we went into the front line; a line which
we, alternating with the Twentieth Battalion, were destined to hold
until the following April. About this time the rains set in "for
keeps" and we were seldom dry or warm or clean for nearly six months.
Mud, mud, nothing but mud--mud without any bottom. We had no trenches,
proper; they were simply sand-bag barricades between us and the enemy
and it was a continual struggle to keep them built up. They would ooze
away like melting butter.
When the deadlock came, in the fall of 1914, and the opposing armies
lay entrenched, from the North Sea to Switzerland, it found the
Germans occupying the dominating heights, with our forces hanging on,
as best they could, to positions on the lower ground.
This was the case at the point where we were located. Our sector
(about eleven hundred yards for the battalion frontage) extended from
the Voormezeele-Wytschaete road, northward to the bottom of the hill
at the top of which was the village of St. Eloi. Directly opposite our
left was Piccadilly Farm, located on a hill about ten meters higher
than our lines. From there toward the right, the enemy line gradually
descended until, at the right of our line, it was only about two
meters higher. The distance between the front lines varied from about
seventy yards, at the right, to about two hundred and fifty yards at
the left. The net result of this situation was that the Germans could
dig trenches of considerable depth, draining the water out under their
parapets or into two small streams which ran from their lines to ours.
They had a playful habit of damming up these streams until an
unusually hard rain would come, when they would open the gates and
give us the benefit of the whole dose. I have seen the water in these
streams rise seven feet within less than an hour and there were times
when in one of our communication trenches it was over a man's head. A
soldier of the West York's regiment was drowned in this trench one
night.
Under such conditions, it was impossible for us to dig. All we could
do was to construct sand-bag parapets or barricades, while our
so-called "dug-outs" consisted of huts constructed of sand-bags,
roofed with corrugated iron and covered with more sand-bags. They
afforded protection from shrapnel and small shell fragments, but, of
course, not against direct hits from any kind of shells. Even a little
"whizz-bang" would go through them as though they were egg-shells. All
the earth thereabouts was of the consistency of thick soup and our
parapet had a habit of sloughing away just about as fast as we could
build it up. As a matter of fact, our communication trenches did
become completely obliterated and we had no recourse but to go in and
out of the trenches "overland." At night this was not so bad, although
we were continually losing men from stray bullets. But when it was
necessary, as it sometimes was, to go in or out in daylight why, it
was a cinch that some one was going to get hit, as the enemy had had
many good snipers watching for just such opportunities. At one time,
for over two weeks more than two hundred yards of our parapet were
down, and if you went from one end of the line to the other you must
expose yourself to the full view of enemy snipers. My duties required
me to cover this stretch of trench at least twice a day.
Our conduct in taking short cuts across the fields when the trenches
were knee-deep with mud, was scandalous in the eyes of our neighbors
of the Imperial army, as the troops from the British Isles are known.
Quite frequently we were subjected to the most scathing tongue-lashing
from officers of the old school, but we won the astonished admiration
of the Tommies by our disregard of instructions and advice. I well
remember one day when a party of us were going out through the P. & O.
communication trench and, finding the mud too deep, we climbed out and
walked across the open, whereat an old Colonel of some Highland
regiment gave us a "beautiful calling." His discourse was a
masterpiece of fluent soldier talk and, as a Scot usually does when
excited, he lapsed into the "twa-talk" of his native Hielans. I can
remember his last words, which were to the effect that: "Ye daft
Cany-deens think ye're awfu' brave but I tell ye the noo it's no
bravery; it's sheer stupidity." Of course he was right, but we could
not allow the small matter of a bullet or two to stand in the way of
our getting out in time for tea, and finally they gave it up in
disgust and allowed us to "go to hell in our own cheerful fashion," as
they said.
With the assistance of the engineers, we finally succeeded in
constructing a new line, slightly in the rear of the old one which was
abandoned except for a couple of machine-gun positions and a listening
post. We also managed to get out a fairly good barbed-wire
entanglement along most of the front. Fritz appeared to be having his
troubles, too, so did not bother us much at night. We always got a few
shells every day and usually quite a number of rifle grenades and
"fish-tail" aerial torpedoes, but they did very little damage. Here
was where the mud was our friend, for, unless a shell dropped squarely
on the top of you, it would do no harm.