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THE ESCAPE OF A PRINCESS PAT
GEORGE PEARSON
[Illustration: CORPORAL (NOW SERGEANT) EDWARD EDWARDS, PRINCESS
PATRICIA'S CANADIAN LIGHT INFANTRY.]
THE ESCAPE OF A
PRINCESS PAT
_Being the full account of the capture and fifteen months'
imprisonment of Corporal Edwards, of the Princess
Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, and his
final escape from Germany into Holland_
BY
GEORGE PEARSON
McCLELLAND, GOODCHILD & STEWART
PUBLISHERS :: :: :: TORONTO
COPYRIGHT, 1918,
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
TO THE MEMORY OF
OUR COMRADES WHO FELL
THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED
PREFACE
In order to remove all question of doubt in the mind of the reader it
might perhaps be well to state here that the facts as given are the
bona fide experiences of Corporal Edwards, Number 39, Number One
Company, P. P. C. L. I., and as such were subjected to the closest
scrutiny both by the author and others before it was deemed advisable
to give the account to the public. In particular great pains were
taken to do full justice to all enemy individuals who figure in the
story.
Recognizing the seriousness of the charges implied by the recital, all
those concerned with it are extremely anxious that the correctness of
the account should constitute its chief value: In short the intention
has been to make of the story a readable history.
The main facts--having to do with the destruction of the regiment on
the eighth of May, 1915, the identity and activities of the
individuals mentioned and the more important of the later happenings,
including the final escape into Holland--are matters of official
record and as such have frequently been mentioned in the official
dispatches. The more personal details are based on the recollections
of Corporal Edwards' retentive mind, aided by his very unusual powers
of observation and the rough diary which he managed to retain
possession of during his later adventures.
For the events preceding the capture of Corporal Edwards on the eighth
of May the author has relied upon his own recollections; as he too had
the honor of having been "an original Patricia."
G.P.
Sept. 1, 1917.
Toronto, Canada.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I Polygon Wood 14
II The Fourth of May 20
III Corporal Edwards Takes up the Tale 23
IV Major Gault Comes Back 28
V The Eighth of May and the Last Stand of the Princess Pats 33
VI Prisoners 45
VII Pulling the Leg of a German General 61
VIII The Princess Patricia's German Uncle 70
IX How the German Red Cross Tended the Canadian Wounded 76
X The Curious Concoctions of the Chef at Giessen 81
XI The Way They Have at Giessen 86
XII The Escape 104
XIII The Traitor at Vehnmoor 115
XIV Away Again 123
XV Paying the Piper 140
XVI The Third Escape 158
XVII What Happened in the Wood 177
XVIII The Last Lap 185
XIX Holland at Last 194
XX "It's a Way They Have in the Army" 203
The Evidence in the Case 210
ILLUSTRATIONS
Corporal (Now Sergeant) Edward Edwards, Princess
Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry _Frontispiece_
PAGE
British wounded waiting for transportation to a dressing
station 26
The Princess Patricias in billets at Westoutre, Belgium 26
German prisoners bringing wounded men down a communication
trench 42
Wounded Canadians receiving first aid after an attack 64
Recipes from Corporal Edward's Diary 84
Fellow prisoners at Giessen 98
Fellow prisoners at Giessen 98
Record of second escape and recapture 126
German prisoners at Southampton 136
High explosives bursting over German trenches 136
Salient details of the third escape 170
Private Mervin C. Simmons, C.E.F. 192
The cemetery at Celle Laager Z 1 Camp 206
Corporal Edwards after his escape 206
Homeward bound 220
THE ESCAPE OF A PRINCESS PAT
THE ESCAPE OF A PRINCESS PAT
CHAPTER I
POLYGON WOOD
Ypres and Hill 60--Preparing for the Gas--Why the Patricias
Cheered--The Retirement--The Thin Red Line.
The Princess Patricias had lain in Polygon Wood since the twentieth of
April, mid-way between the sanguinary struggles of St. Julien and Hill
60, spectators of both. Although subjected to constant alarm we had
had a comparatively quiet time of it, with casualties that had only
varied from five to fifty-odd each day.
By day and night the gun-fire of both battles had beat back upon us in
great waves of sound. There were times when we had donned our water
soaked handkerchiefs for the gas that always threatened but never
came, so that the expectation might have shaken less steady troops.
Quick on the heels of the first news of the gas the women of Britain,
their tears scalding their needles, with one accord had laboured, sans
rest, sans sleep, sans everything, so that shortly there had poured in
to us here a steady stream of gauze pads for mouth and nostril. For
the protection of our lungs against the poison of the gas they were at
least better than the filthy rags we called handkerchiefs. We wore
their gifts and in spirit bowed to the donors, as I think all still
do. We soaked them with the foul water of the near-by graves and kept
them always at our side, ready to tie on at each fresh alarm.
Once there had come word in a special army order of the day: "Our
Belgian agent reports that all enemy troops on this front have been
directed to enter their trenches to-night with fixed bayonets. All
units are enjoined to exercise the closest watch on their front; the
troops will stand to from the first appearance of darkness, with each
man at his post prepared for all eventualities. Sleep will not be
permitted under any circumstances."
The consequence had been that that night had been one of nervous
expectation of an attack which did not materialise. We always carried
fixed bayonets in the trenches but the Germans were better equipped
with loopholes, as they were with most other things, and were forced
to leave their bayonets off their rifles in order to avoid any danger
of the latter sticking in their metal shields when needed in a hurry,
to say nothing of the added attention they would draw in their exposed
and stationary position at the mouth of a loophole. The "Stand-to" had
come as a distinct relief that morning.
And always there had been the glowering fires of a score of villages.
The greater mass of burning Ypres stood up amongst them like the
warning finger of God. Occasionally the roaring burst of an ammunition
dump flared up into a volcano of fiery sound. The earth under our feet
trembled in convulsive shudders from a cannonade so vast that no one
sound could be picked out of it and the walls of dug-outs slid in,
burying sleeping men. But like the promise of God there came to us in
every interval of quietness, as always, the full-throated song of many
birds.
Our forces consisted of the French who held the left corner of the
Ypres salient, then the Canadian division in the centre, next the 28th
Division of the regular British Army and then our own, the 27th, with
Hill 60 on our right flank. The enemy attacked both at Hill 60 and at
the line of the Canadian Division and the French, and we held on to
the horse-shoe shaped line until the last possible moment when one
more shake of the tree would have thrown us like ripe fruit into the
German lap.
So near had the converging German forces approached to one another
that the weakened battery behind our own trenches had been at the
last, turned around the other way and fired in the opposite direction
without a shift in its own position. For our own protection we had
nothing. And later still these and all other guns left us to seek new
positions in the rear so that only we of the infantry remained.
Daily there had come orders to "Stand-to" in full marching order, to
evacuate; at which all ranks expostulated angrily. And then perhaps
another order--to stick it another day; at which we cheered and
slapped one another boisterously on the back so that the stolid
Germans over yonder must have wondered, knowing what they did of our
desperate situation.
But the dreaded order came at last and was confirmed, so that under
protest and like the beaten men that we knew we were not, we slunk
away under cover of darkness on the night of the third of May to
trenches three miles in the rear, and with us went the troops on ten
more miles of British front.
The movement as executed was in reality a feat of no mean importance
on the part of the higher command. Faced by an overwhelmingly superior
force, our badly depleted three divisions had barely escaped being
bagged in the net of which the enemy had all but drawn the noose in a
strategetic surrounding movement.
In detail, the movement had consisted of withdrawing under cover of
darkness with all that we could carry of our trench material, both to
prevent it falling into hostile hands and equally to strengthen our
new position. A small rearguard of fifteen men to the regiment had
held our front for the few hours necessary for us to "shake down" in
the new position. Their task was to remain behind and to give a
continuous rapid-fire from as many different spots as possible in a
given time, thereby keeping up the illusion of a heavily manned
trench. Then, they too had faded quietly away, following us.
Our new trenches were three miles behind those we had just evacuated
in Polygon Wood. Zillebeke lay just to the left and beyond that,
Hooge. We were in the open, with Belle-waarde Wood and Lake behind us.
We continued to face vastly superior forces. To make matters worse the
trenches were assuredly a mockery of their kind and there was even
less of adequate support than before. And at that the drafts arrived
each day--if they were lucky enough to break through the curtains of
fire with which the enemy covered our rear for that very purpose, as
well as for the further one of curtailing the arrival of all necessary
supplies of food and ammunition.
Every camp and hospital from Ypres to Rouen and the sea and from
Land's End to John O' Groat was combed and scraped for every eligible
casualty, every overconfident office holder of a "cushy" job, and in
short, for all those who could by hook or crook hold a rifle to help
stem this threatening tide. And in our own lot, even those wasteful
luxuries, the petted officers' servants were amongst us, doing
fighting duty for the first time, so that we almost welcomed the
desperate occasion which furnished so rare and sweet a sight.