THE END OF THE WAR.
(_October 31st, 1918, to January 12th, 1919._)
We returned from the bustle of active warfare, the sharp interest of
solving immediate problems, the pleasantness and at times the comfort
of clean country, to a squalid village on the edge of old, rotting
trench systems. It was as if the offensive had failed miserably, and
we had been thrust back to '16. At first we were exhilarated by the
prospect of billets and faint incredible rumours that the end of the
war was near....
On the 31st I established my headquarters in a farm at Bailleulmont,
the squalid village. The tanks crawled in on the morning of the 1st.
The men were distributed among ramshackle barns and leaky huts. We set
ourselves at once to make the place tolerable, and were, perhaps, a
little successful. Other tank units were not so fortunate. No villages
could be found for them in northern France, and they were compelled to
spend weeks in erecting laboriously new huts.[41]
On November 10th there was some excitement at Brigade Headquarters--it
was possible that an Armistice might be arranged, but "we had heard
that tale before." On the 11th a telegram was brought to me before
breakfast, while I was in bed, that hostilities would cease at "11
hours."
The news was so overwhelming that I could not absorb it, and I am
inclined to think now that, because there had been no anticipation, we
lost at first the fine savour of it. I could not understand--until two
of my officers started to ring the bell of the village church. The day
became a smiling dream. I found myself walking up and down the village
street, stopping everybody I met and saying--
"Do you realise that in one hour the war will be over?"
At 11 A.M. I stood opposite the church and exclaimed in a loud voice to
nobody in particular--
"Gentlemen, the war is now over--absolutely!"
The company, naturally enough, had begun already to celebrate the
occasion with appropriate rites, and its steadiness on parade, when
before lunch the General came round to make a little speech, was truly
remarkable. Only one officer in the rear was humming a little ditty
to himself, and only one man interrupted the speech by a faint "hear!
hear!" Salutes at the conclusion of the parade were superb....
We had a cold lunch, but one faithful mess waiter served us nobly with
a set face. The two cooks with arms around each other's waists were
strolling up and down outside the window. I think they must have been
singing.
In the afternoon we went for a long walk--the news had come too early
in the day. We returned a little refreshed. At night there was a
bonfire; but I cannot do better than quote from the vivid narrative of
one of my most trusted officers:--
"November 11th was a great day--and a greater night. The dreariness and
loneliness of the place vanished suddenly on the receipt of the news
of the enemy's capitulation. Would we not soon all be back in Blighty?
The thought came like champagne to our thirsting souls. Imagination
responded promptly. The bareness of officers billets vanished before
visions of cosy sofas and arm-chairs, carpeted floors and clean-sheeted
beds. Better still, faces of those we longed to see, especially of
those we longed to kiss, came to us. Their owners moved amidst the
pictured cosiness, sat in those arm-chairs, shared their sofas.... What
a picture after the gritty holes and cramping caves of earth-covered
ammunition boxes in the Cérisy Valley, or the stuffy, fly-ridden
dilapidation of billets in Fouilloy! And it was the same with the men.
No doubt their visions were as fair. The delight of these things shone
in every one's faces. Unwonted cheerfulness was general. Every one
smiled.
"And at night every one cheered. A way must be found to give free
and full expression to bounding spirits. A huge bonfire was decided
upon.... At twenty hours the massed logs that had been heaped on the
top of the fallen masonry were saturated with petrol, a match was
thrown, and a sheet of flame shot up. A war of cheering followed.
Songs burst forth. Every one sung who could or thought he could. The
rest shouted. It didn't matter--noise was the thing. Half an hour
later the officers joined the shouting throng. The din grew louder.
Some one shouted Speech!... Next the Adjutant, and in turn every other
officer was called. Reversing the order, the officers then called upon
the sergeant-major and senior N.C.O.'s. Finally, the 'other ranks'
vociferously sang of the officers, 'For they are jolly good fellows,'
and the officers in similar fashion paid compliments to the men.
By this time the flames had died down. Flickering light and shadow
replaced the ruddy glow, and slowly the crowd broke up. But for hours
yet a small group of enthusiastic maffickers sat around the dying
embers...."
I should like to leave you with that picture--I feel that after "dying
embers" the word "Finis" might suitably be written--but, if this
halting chronicle is to present an honest picture, it must stumble on
for a few more paragraphs just as my Company dragged out a wearisome
existence for a few more months.
There were compensations. Christmas brought its festivities; we played
football desperately, and all but won the Brigade Cup; we were second
in the Brigade Cross Country Run; a Concert Party visited us; a
lecturer was heckled by our pet Socialist. It was, however, an almost
impossible task to find the men something to do. We heard vaguely of an
Army Education Scheme, or, more correctly, we read much about it in the
newspapers, and we endeavoured to organise classes to shorten the long
evenings, but we had no lamps or candles, no paper, no pencils, and no
books.
We could think only of demobilisation, and soon my orderly-room
staff was allowed to think of little else. We were overwhelmed with
complicated regulations. We struggled through them, and discovered
that Pte. X., who, entering the Army notoriously under pressure, had
arrived in France quite recently, was due to go at once, while Sergt.
T., an old and trusted N.C.O., was to remain in France indefinitely.
The system of demobilising men by classes could not possibly have
been meant to apply to a company billeted in a filthy village on the
edge of an old trench system. Such a system disregarded entirely the
natural feelings of the men--"First out, first back,"--and it was
very necessary to consider such feelings after the Armistice. The men
were no longer soldiers; they were civilians impatient of control
and eager to get home. Only an army, which was undoubtedly the best
disciplined army in France, could have suffered such a system of
demobilisation with so little disturbance. It was astonishing to us
that the _émeutes_, the existence of which is now common knowledge,
were not more numerous. The system, admittedly perfect in theory from
the standpoint of industrial reconstruction, could not be administered
strictly without disregarding entirely the ordinary soldier's sense of
justice.
Well, after four years of war we amateur soldiers were not dismayed
by regulations. We made no fuss. We would receive an instruction
to despatch a certain number of men to be demobilised at certain
specified centres, and the men were despatched to time and in good
order. By some mischance Sergt. T. went into the first batch and
the demobilisation of Pte. X. was unaccountably delayed. It was
unfortunate, but I was not sorry. The Company remained happy and
contented. Further, we found to our amazement and delight that the vast
majority of officers and men belonged to certain favoured classes,
with the result that the demobilisation of the Company proceeded with
remarkable rapidity....
The days were long and indescribably monotonous, until on January 11th
I received the bunch of papers for which every officer and man in
France was yearning, and on the 12th I slipped away from my already
depleted Company.
I was desperately sorry to leave my men and my tanks. It must break
the heart of a man to retire from a famous regiment in which he has
spent his life, but the regiment continues to live. A Carrier Company
was a humble, temporary unit in a vast organisation, a momentary
improvisation. Like every other Company, it had found itself and
created its own personality. It had fought for its existence against
the ignorance and laughter of the more conservative elements in the
Tank Corps. I knew that soon the remnants of the Company would return
home and the Company finally be dissolved. Yet there it was--something
which I had "formed" though not created. From an odd crowd of men
with a few obsolete tanks and some cases of equipment it had become
a "Company" of whose honour we were jealous, whose achievements we
extolled, whom all of us could leave only with lasting regret....
I was motored into Arras, and travelled down to the coast in a
cattle-truck with thirty-one soldiers and civilians of all ranks and
classes and four nationalities. The train was bound for Calais, but
the driver in answer to my appeal said that he might be able to pass
through Boulogne. I do not know whether he had any choice in the
matter--strange things happened on the railways in France--but at 10
A.M. on the morning of the 13th the train did stop outside Boulogne,
and the stoker ran hastily down the line and helped me to throw my
luggage off the truck.
A train-load of prisoners from Germany had just arrived--childishly
feeble, still shamefaced, and so emaciated that when I saw a man
stripped to the waist washing, I could have cried for the pity of it.
Outside the station three of these men, excited by their release, were
jeering at two shabby cowed German boys pushing a barrow....
I crossed that afternoon a little sadly, and as usual obtained a seat
in the Pullman by climbing in on the wrong side,--I shall never be able
to afford a Pullman again. At 10.25 A.M. on the 16th I was demobilised
at the Crystal Palace. I felt that I should have been demobilised twice
as I enlisted twice....
Now I travel daily to St James's Park station by the 9.31, and when a
"file" returns to me after many days, I sometimes wonder how I ever
managed, without writing a single "minute," to command a Company of
Tanks.
PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Every intelligent person in every French village or town knew the
numbers of all the divisions in the neighbourhood.
[2] Detached posts, which could not be approached by day, in front of
the main trench system.
[3] Now Major-General Lord Edward Gleichen, K.C.V.O., C.B., C.M.G.,
D.S.O.
[4] A famous dug-out.
[5] Now Major-General H. J. Elles, C.B., D.S.O.
[6] Major R. Cooper, M.C., Royal Fusiliers, had replaced Captain R.
Haigh, M.C.
[7] Now Brigadier-General J. Hardress Lloyd, D.S.O.
[8] Paget, the Corps Camouflage Officer, was of the greatest assistance.
[9] We learned later that they had been heard.
[10] An airman who flew over the battlefield is inclined to doubt this
story. We must wait for the official history.
[11] Major R.O.C. Ward, D.S.O., killed at Trescaut in November while
leading his tanks forward.
[12] This paragraph was written in the comfortable days before the
lorries disappeared into battalion or brigade "pools." In the spring
of 1918, when movement was necessarily hurried, my company had to do
without--higher formations had so much of value to move.
[13] Major P. Johnson, D.S.O.
[14] The Tank Corps was always the very soul of economy.
[15] The regimental officer always appreciated our difficulties,
praised our achievements, and sympathised with us in our misfortunes.
[16] S. entirely retrieved his reputation as a skilful and gallant tank
commander by attacking a field-gun single-handed at Flesquieres on
November 20th.
[17] It was incorrectly reported later that the tank had fallen through
the bridge. I have obtained the facts from Major P. Hamond, D.S.O.,
M.C., who was in command of the tanks at the bridge.
[18] He was seriously wounded and captured.
[19] Captured.
[20] But it was "G" Battalion that captured the wood a year later.
[21] It was known later that the two attacking forces were instructed
to meet at Metz, a mile or so from my camp.
[22] I quote from memory, but I am certain of the words "will attack."
[23] It was in fact intended to inform the General that two battalions
of the 2nd Tank Brigade would attack from the directions indicated.
[24] See p. 169.
[25] See 'Adventures of a Despatch Rider,' p. 15 _et seq._
[26] An average time for detraining twelve Mk. IV. tanks is thirty
minutes.
[27] The 2nd and 8th Battalions were armed with the Mk. V. tank, a
swifter and handier tank than the Mk. IV., and the 15th Battalion with
the lengthy Mk. V. Star.
[28] Certain Canadian battalions only reached the "start-line" in time
by doubling.
[29] It was, of course, only the luck of the game. This particular
battery of Horse Artillery was brigaded with the Australian Artillery
and went where it was told. It finished the day in close support of the
infantry at Morcourt.
[30] Sergeant Bell was awarded the D.C.M. He was killed in action on
September 28.
[31] Lieut. F. M. Holt was one of my most promising and gallant
subalterns, who, if he had lived, would certainly have received early
promotion. He was a charming companion in the mess. We could ill afford
to lose him.
[32] At that period the sponsons of Carrier tanks were made of
boiler-plate, which was not proof against bullets.
[33] The numbers include orderlies, cooks, batmen, &c.
[34] For the actual carrying--cooks, &c., excluded.
[35] Lieutenant (later Captain) S. A. Thomas, M.C.
[36] It was in these local attacks that tanks suffered most severely.
[37] In any case it was bad policy for Mk. IV.'s and Mk. V.'s to move
in the same convoy.
[38] We could always obtain rum: every tank carried a supply to revive
its exhausted crew. At Cambrai each of my tanks carried a bottle
of whisky in place of rum, but this innovation tended to bunch the
infantry--Argylls--dangerously near to the tanks, and in subsequent
actions we reverted to rum.
[39] I hope I shall be forgiven if I mention the fact that this village
was commonly known as "Teddie Gerard."
[40] These were easily distinguished, as my tanks were the only Mk.
IV.'s in the neighbourhood. Mk. V.'s and "whippets" leave a different
track.
[41] One battalion, or at least one company of it, spent the first
Christmas after the Armistice in building a camp for itself, although
there were several pleasant villages in the neighbourhood.
Transcriber's Notes:
Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant
preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected.
Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.
Page 90: "workshops" was misprinted as "workships".
Page 216: "A little later" was misprinted as "latter".
Page 267: "sections-commanders" was printed that way.