THE STRUGGLE ON THE SOMME
I was not fated to hear the end of Edgecumbe's story. I had barely
finished reading the letter, when events happened in quick succession
which made it impossible for me to hear those things which he declared
made all life new to him.
It must be remembered that we were in the early part of July, when the
great battle of the Somme was gaining intensity at every hour, and when
private experiences were at a discount. Each day the tornado of the
great guns became more and more terrible, the air was full of the
shrieks of shells, while the constant pep-pep-pep of machine-guns
almost became monotonous. Village after village south of the Ancre
fell into our hands, thousands of German prisoners were taken, while
deadly fighting was the order of the day. It is no use trying to
describe it, it cannot be described. Incidents here and there can be
visualized, and to an extent made plain by words; but the movement as a
whole, the constant roar of guns, the shriek of shells, the sulphur of
explosives, the march of armies, the bringing in of prisoners, and our
own wounded men, cover too vast a field for any one picture.
It was not one battle, it was a hundred battles, and each battle was
more intense than the other. Position after position was taken, some
of which were lost again, only to be retaken, amidst the thunder of
guns and the groans of dying men.
If ever Tennyson's martial poem were true, it was true in that great
struggle. Not that cavalry had much to do with it, neither was there
any pageantry or any of the panoply of war. It was all too grim, too
ghastly, too sordid for that. And yet there was a pageantry of which
Tennyson never dreamed. The boom of guns, the weird light of the star
shells, the sulphurous atmosphere, the struggle of millions, formed a
pageant so Homeric, and on such an awful scale, that imagination reels
before it.
It was towards the middle of July when my battalion was ordered south
of the Ancre. What had become of Edgecumbe I did not know, and it was
impossible to find out. Each battalion, each company, and each
platoon, had its little scene of operations, and we knew nothing of who
might be a few hundred yards from us. As an infantry officer, I was,
during the advance, for the most time in the trenches. Then, after the
artillery had done its work, we leapt the parapets, and made our way
across the open, oft-times through a hailstorm of bullets, while
shrieking shells fell and exploded at our feet. Now we were held up by
barbed wire, which here and there had not been swept away by our
artillery, or again we stumbled into shell holes, where we lay panting
and bruised. But these are only small incidents in the advance.
I think it was toward the end of July when a section of my battalion
lay in the trenches not far from Montauban. We had been there, I
remember, a considerable time; how long, I can scarcely tell, for hours
and sometimes days passed without definite note being taken. Above our
heads aircraft sped through the heavens, mostly our own, but now and
then Germans! We saw little puffs of cloud forming themselves around
them, as shells exploded in the skies. Now and then one of the
machines would be hit, and I saw them swerve, as I have seen birds
swerve before they fall, at a shooting party. Behind us our guns were
booming, while a few hundred yards away in front of us, the German
trenches were being levelled. It was a fascinating, yet horrible
sight. More than once I saw machine-gun emplacements, with the
gunners, struck by the projectiles from our great howitzers, and hurled
many feet high.
Not that we had it all our own way, although our artillery was superior
to that of the enemy. If we had located their positions, so had they
located ours, and their shells fell thick and fast along our lines,
decimating our ranks.
How long we had waited, I don't know. We knew by the artillery
preparations that the command for advance must soon come, and we
crouched there, some quivering with excitement, others cracking jokes
and telling stories, and most of the men smoking cigarettes, until the
word of command should pass down the line. We knew what it meant. It
was true our barrage would make it comparatively safe; but we knew,
too, that many of the lads who were joking with each other, and telling
stories of what they did in pre-war days, would never see England
again, while many more, if they went back, would go back mutilated and
maimed for life. Still, it was all in the day's work. The Boches had
to be beaten, and whatever might happen to us we must finish our job.
The soldiers talked calmly about it, and even joked.
'Think your number's up, Bill?'
'I don't know. I've been home to Blighty twice. Perhaps I shan't have
such good luck next time. But what's the odds? We're giving Fritz a
rare old time.'
'Fritz ain't got no more fight in him.'
'Don't you be so sure of that, old cock. Fritz is chained to his guns,
that's what _he_ is.'
'Is it true the Kaiser and old Hindenburg have come up to see this job,
I wonder? Wouldn't I just like to take 'em prisoners!'
And so on, minute after minute, while the heavens and the earth were
full of the messengers of death.
The command to go over came at length, and I heard a cheer pass down
the line. It sounded strangely amid the booming of the guns, and the
voices of the men seemed small. All the same, it was hearty and
confident. Many of them, I knew, would have a sense of relief at
getting out into the open, and feel that they were no longer like
rabbits in their burrows. Helter, skelter, we went across the open
ground, some carelessly and indifferently, others with stern, set
faces. Here one cracked a joke with his pal, while there another
stopped suddenly, staggered, and fell.
The ground, I remember, was flat just there, and I could see a long way
down the line, men struggling across the open space. There was no
suggestion of military precision, that is in the ordinary sense of the
word, yet in another there was. Each man was ready, and each man had
that strange light in his eyes which no pen can describe.
We took the first trench without difficulty. The few Germans who
remained were dazed, bewildered, and eager to surrender. They came up
out of their dug-outs, their arms uplifted, piteously crying for mercy.
'All right, Fritz, old cock, we won't hurt you! You don't deserve it.
But there, I suppose you had to do what you was told.'
Now and then, however, no mercy was shown. Many of the machine-gunners
held up one hand, and cried for mercy, while with the other they worked
the guns. However, the first line of trenches was taken, a great many
prisoners captured, and then came the more difficult and dangerous
business. The second line must be taken as well as the first, and the
second line was our objective.
By this time we did not know where we were, and we were so mixed up
that we didn't know to what battalion or regiment we belonged. In the
gigantic struggle, extending for miles, there was no possibility of
keeping together. The one thing was to drive the Germans out of the
second line of trenches, or better still to make them prisoners. But
every inch of ground became more dangerous. German shells were blowing
up the ground around us, and decimating our advancing forces.
It was here that I thought my number was up. A shell exploded a few
yards from me, shook the ground under my feet, threw me into the air,
and half buried me in the _débris_. It was one of those moments when
it seemed as though every man was for himself, and when, in the mad
carnage, it was impossible to realize what had happened to each other.
I was stunned by the explosion, and how long I lay in that condition I
don't know.
When I became conscious, I felt as though my head were going to burst,
while a sense of helplessness possessed me. Then I realized that,
while my legs were buried, my head was in the open. Painfully and with
difficulty I extricated myself, and then, scarcely realizing what I was
doing, I staggered along in the direction in which I thought my boys
had gone.
Evening was now beginning to fall, and I had lost my whereabouts.
Meanwhile, there was no cessation in the roar of artillery. As I
struggled along, I saw, not fifty yards away, a group of men. And then
I heard, coming through the air, that awful note which cannot be
described. It was a whine, a yell, a moan, a shriek, all in one.
Beginning on a lower note, it rose higher and higher, then fell again,
and suddenly a huge explosive dropped close where the men stood. A
moment later, a great mass of stuff went up, forming a tremendous
mushroom-shaped body of earth. When it subsided, a curly cloud of
smoke filled the air. I was sick and bewildered by what I had passed
through, and could scarcely realize the purport of what I had just
seen. But presently I saw a man digging, digging, as if for his life.
Half mad, and bewildered, I made my way towards him. In different
stages of consciousness I saw several soldiers lying. When I arrived
close to the spot, I recognized the digger. It was Paul Edgecumbe.
Never did I see a man work as he worked. It seemed as though he
possessed the strength of three, while all the energy of his being was
devoted to the rescue of some one who lay beneath the heap of _débris_.
In a bewildered sort of way I realized the situation. Evidently the
enemy had located it as an important spot, for shell after shell
dropped near by, while the men who had so far recovered their senses as
to be able to get away, crawled into the shell hole.
'Come in here, you madman!' one man said. 'You can't get him out, and
you'll only get killed.'
But Paul Edgecumbe kept on digging, heedless of flying bullets,
heedless of death.
'He can't get him out,' said a soldier to me in a dazed sort of way;
'he's buried, that's what he is.'
'Who is it?' I asked.
'Captain Springfield,' replied the man. 'Come in here,' he shouted to
Edgecumbe, 'that fellow ain't worth it!'
Scarcely realizing what I was doing, and so weak that I could hardly
walk, I crawled nearer to my friend.
'You have a hopeless task there,' I remember saying. 'Leave it, and
get into the hole there.'
'Is that you, Luscombe? I shall save him, I am sure I shall. I was
buried once myself, so I know what it means. There, I have got him!'
He threw down the tool with which he was digging, and with his hands
pulled away the stones and earth which lay over the body.
I don't quite recollect what took place after that. I have a confused
remembrance of lying in the shell hole, while the tornado went on. I
seemed to see, as in a dream, batches of soldiers pass by me in the
near distance; some of them Germans, while others were our own men.
Everything was confused, unreal. Even now I could not swear to what
took place,--what I thought I saw and heard may not be in fact a
reality at all, but only phantoms of the mind. Flesh and blood, and
nerves and brain were utterly exhausted, and although I was not
wounded, I was more dead than alive.
I have an indistinct remembrance of a dark night, and of being led over
ground seamed with deep furrows, and made hideous with dead bodies. I
had a fancy, too, that the sky was lit up with star shells, and that
there was a continuous booming of guns. But this may have been the
result of a disordered imagination.
When I came to consciousness, I was at a clearing-station, suffering, I
was told, from shell shock.
'You're not a bad case,' said the M.O. to me, with a laugh, 'but
evidently you've had a rough time. From what I can hear, too, you had
a very great time.'
'A great time!' I said. 'I scarcely remember anything.'
'Some of your men do, anyhow. Yes, the second line was taken, and the
village with it. Not that any village is left,' he added with a laugh.
'I hear that all that remains is one stump of a tree and one chimney.
However, the ground's ours. Five hundred prisoners were taken. There
now, you feel better, don't you? It's a wonder you are alive, you
know.'
'But I was in no danger.'
'Weren't you? One of your men, who couldn't move, poor chap, because
of a smashed leg and a broken arm, watched you crawl out of a great
heap of stuff. He said that only your head was visible at first; but
the way you wormed yourself through the mud was as good as a play.'
'I knew very little about it,' I said.
'Very possibly. Corporal Wilkins watched you, and shouted after you,
as you staggered away; but you took no notice, and then, I hear,
although you were half dead, you did some rescuing work.'
'I did rescuing work!' I gasped.
'Why, of course you did, you know you did.'
'But I didn't,' I replied.
'All right then, you didn't,' and the doctor laughed again. 'There
now, you're comfortable now, so be quiet. I'll tell some one to bring
you some soup.'
'But I say, I--I want to know. Is Captain Springfield all right?'
The doctor laughed again. 'I thought you didn't do any rescuing work?'
'I didn't,' I replied, 'it was the other man who did that; but is
Springfield all right?'
'He's very bad. He _may_ pull through, but I doubt it.'
'Private Edgecumbe,--what of him? He did everything, you know.'
'I think he has gone back to duty.'
'Duty!' I gasped. 'Why--why----'
'The fellow's a miracle, from what I can hear. No, he wasn't wounded.
The man who told me about it said that he might have a charmed life.
He's all right, anyhow. Now be quiet, I must be off.'
For the next few days, although, as I was told, I was by no means a bad
case, I knew what it was to be a shattered mass of nerves. A man with
a limb shot away, or who has had shrapnel or bullets taken from his
body, can laugh and be gay,--I have seen that again and again. But one
suffering from shell shock goes through agonies untold. I am not going
to _try_ to describe it, but I shall never forget what I suffered. As
soon as I was fit, I was moved to another hospital nearer the base, and
there, as fortune would have it, I met Edgecumbe's colonel. By this
time I was able to think coherently, and my spells of nerves were
becoming rarer and less violent.
'Yes, my boy, you are a case for home,' said Colonel Gray. 'You are a
lucky beggar to get out of it so well. I was talking with your C.O.
yesterday; you are going back to England at once. I won't tell you
what else he told me about you; your nerves are not strong enough.'
'There's nothing wrong, is there?'
Colonel Gray laughed. 'No, it's all the other way. Don't your ears
tingle?'
'Not a tingle,' I said. 'But what about Edgecumbe?'
'He's a friend of yours, isn't he?' asked the colonel.
'Yes,' I replied.
'Who is he?'
'I don't know,--I wish I did.'
'He's a wonderful chap. I've had my eye on him for a long time, and I
haven't been able to make him out. What really aroused my interest in
him was the way--but of course you know all about that, you were in
that show. I never laughed so much in my life as when those Boches
were brought in. Of course you know he's to get his decoration? It
couldn't be helped after that Springfield affair.'
As it happened, however, I did not cross to England for several days,
but stayed at a base hospital until, in the opinion of the M.O., I was
fit to be removed. Meanwhile the carnage went on, and the great battle
of the Somme developed according to the plans we had made, although
there were some drawbacks. At length the day came when I was to go
back to England, and no sooner had I stepped on board the boat than, to
my delight, I saw Edgecumbe.
'I _am_ glad to see you!' I cried.
'Thank you, sir.'
'Got it bad?'
'A mere nothing, sir. Just a bruised arm. In a few days I shall be as
right as ever.'
It was a beautiful day, and as it happened the boat was not crowded. I
looked for a quiet spot where we could talk.
'You didn't finish telling me your story when we met last,' I said
presently. 'I want to hear it badly.'
'I want you to hear it,' was his reply, and I noted that bright look in
his eyes which had so struck me before.