disagreeable discovery that fatigues were rampant. Men began
to vanish in all directions. Mahy, doing the glide from one
Quarter-Master-Sergeant (the Q.M.S. is an individual who allots ten of
you to a one lb. loaf, and who endeavours to convince you that your
clothing issue must last for ever, and that you are far better rationed
than you deserve. P.S.--We are officially informed that there are no
Q.M.S.'s among the angels!)--to resume, Mahy did the gaby from one
exasperated Q.M.S. right into the yawning arms of another. An enormous
box was instantaneously bundled on to his shoulders, nearly bending him
double.
"You'd better be careful with that little lot," the N.C.O. advised.
"Why?" with a gasp.
"Becos (drily) it's full of bombs." The hair crinkled upwards into the
lad's steel helmet and he carried that box to its destination with all
the lavish care and tenderness of a mother for her babe. Placing it
gingerly down and unable to overcome the strong trait of inquisitiveness
latent in all soldiers, he forced up the lid and peeped upon--two heavy
sets of large transport waggon implements!
The march from Equancourt up to the "jumping off" point of the advance
was neither so long nor arduous as on the two previous nights. As mile
after mile was reeled off the incessant thunder of guns ten or twelve
miles northward became more and more distinct, but on the sector of the
line towards which the miles of marching columns were heading not a
sound disturbed the night from hour to hour. The rumble of that distant
artillery mingled with the jingle of unseen harness and the pad, pad, of
countless feet. Hazy starlight faintly lit up row upon row of men,
glinted dimly on brighter portions of the equipment and distinctly
silhouetted each breath on the damp night air. A tense, silent march:
nerves highly strung. A march to live long in memory.
Within five minutes of leaving the road for the downs there enveloped
you that indefinable sense that a fighting area has been entered.
Nothing could be seen, heard or felt, yet the proximity of trenches and
wire was frequently "scented," like the first approaches of a sea after
a long march inland.
Brigade Headquarters marched on--and with it the Duo--to where a long
line of duck-boards led into a line of wide trenches. The Ten Hundred
came to a halt in the immediate rear, received the order to lie
down--and waited.
A night of wondrous calm and quiet. Within one mile of a watchful foe
and not a sound. Once or twice a machine gun awoke wild echoes with
brief spluttering bursts ... in silence more acute for the interruption
hearts beat faster, hands tightened involuntarily about rifles.
Thus the young, full-blooded Normans awaited their first fray. Even as
the mighty Ragnar Lodbrok and his fierce men in mail launched merciless
onslaught with the breaking of day, so did Sarnia's young warriors look
eastward for the Dawn.
V
CAMBRAI OFFENSIVE
NOVEMBER 20th, 1917
THE ADVANCE
It was just after six in the morning of November 20, 1917, and the dew
lay thick on the soil. Men were quietly roused, rifles slung, and with
fast tattooing pulse paused for orders. First wave "over" stamped feet
impatiently in those interminable hours of waiting blended in what was
only a few short minutes; an almost frenzy of anxiety to get through the
waiting possessed them. Then the tanks, faintly outlined forms in the
grey light, moved ponderously forward.
A nerve-straining silence held momentary sway.
From point to point at a few yards' interval a milliard blinding flashes
of dull crimson flames leapt from out the gloom like one gigantic
sunset, casting sinister glares in ceaseless succession upon the heavy
mist. Roar upon roar, blending, echoing and re-echoing like unto the
roll of countless mighty drums, throbbed in one great deafening
crescendo. It was futile to count explosions: they all merged one into
another. But words are fatuously inadequate and convey little.
"Stand by." Your pipe is in your mouth, unlit, empty. You don't want to
smoke, really, but still ... the eye glances along the line of strained
white faces. Someone MUST go under; still, it might not be you. Anyhow,
if it is, funk will make no difference, so--one wild scramble over
the top, an almost imperceptible pause and then forward. A cry, a fall
here or there, and then on again. As in a dream you find yourself still
carrying on unhurt ... it's not so bad.
The Undertaking had commenced.
The Ten Hundred moved forward grouped in artillery formation, C., D.,
and B. Companies moving onward in that line from right to left; A.
Company and Battalion Headquarters followed in reserve.
The staggering surprise of the British attack completely shattered the
morale of what German elements were holding the sector. They surrendered
in twenties to the oncoming tanks and rapidly advancing lines of
infantry. Hun artillery started into frenzied action by this phenomenal
development commenced to hastily lob over an erratic series of shells.
The Normans, crossing a sunken road in column, fell again into correct
formation on the higher ground, progressed a few hundred yards beyond
what had an hour before constituted the Fritz front line, and halted.
Four light shells burst around and about the reserve Company; no one
stopped anything. One piece of iron crashed into a boulder near Le
Page's foot. He sprang a yard into the air and nearly put two men out of
mess with his bayonet. In the hot argument that ensued they almost
forgot that there was a war on and that the advance was moving on
without them.
A lad with half a leg hanging and placed by two bearers on a stretcher,
rose from a lying posture as the Royal Guernseys passed.
"'Ere, Guernseys," he hailed, "I was with you at Canterbury--Buffs. Jus'
got in the way of a Blighty. Anybody got a fag?" It was supplied and the
party moved on. About to descend into the sunken road the bearers
ducked to that fatal shell whine ... too late. Three blood-soaked
figures were visible through the lifting-smoke stretched inert on the
ground.
"If only 'e 'adn't stopped," muttered several hoarsely. Life is chance!
The first great onslaught of artillery fire slackened towards mid-day,
sharper crack of rifles and wicked splutter of machine guns becoming for
the first time noticeable. Enemy shells became fewer and fewer, his
power of resistance--weak from the opening--deteriorated to little more
than a rout. The prisoners were swelling an already long roll ... nine
or ten thousand on the nine-mile front.
Ribecourt, on the Normans' front, had fallen after a brief skirmish, the
German last line of defence reached and artillery support was still far
to the rear when the Ten Hundred, passing through the Division ahead,
took upon their own shoulders the responsibility to carry the Push
through its last two miles and to force the capitulation of Nine Wood,
now plainly visible at the top of the next long incline.
They went for it, hell for leather, in a long line of skirmishers. Their
rifles cracked with the rapidity that tells the marksmen--and they COULD
shoot. But Fritz would not have any. They did not like (those who had
time to look back on their record sprint) the nasty gleam of those
Norman bayonets. It was a soft thing; they moved onwards unchecked even
as during the rehearsal. Tanks ahead reached the hill-crest and stood
black and ugly against the sky; further to the right one was burning
with high leaping flames. The Normans panted up the slope, poured into
the two quarries in one bloodthirsty rush to find "nothing doing,"
scrambled out again, and reaching the Wood's edge calmly pushed their
way through with all the phlegm of veterans to their objective some
thirty yards beyond the last row of trees and commenced to dig in.
Someone spotted a sniper post, coolly stretched himself out on the
ground, muttered: "Three hundred yards," and squinted along the sights.
Ping, ping ... two bodies fell limp from a platform--up a leafy tree.
The Private slowly cut two notches on his rifle-butt.
Two black, charred figures grinned hideously from out of the smouldering
remains of a British aeroplane as the two Guernsey Brigade Scouts
hastened back to their Headquarters, to report the objective carried
with ONLY TEN CASUALTIES. Away by the narrow bridge above Marcoing one
living and three dead machine gunners were lying in a mangled heap.
Still further back a shattered lad, unable to move, stretched out right
in the track of an oncoming tank, shrieked frenziedly for succour ...
then abrupt silence as of a whistle shut off even while the eyes were
rivetted fascinated on the inexorable crushing machine. A ghastly heap
of tangled, mutilated bodies, unrecognisable as such except by the grey
German uniform, were lying beneath a tank blown in by a shell--the crew
huddled inside in a gruesome mass.
At the bottom of a hollow a grey-cloaked figure was bunched in that
strange posture bearing the hall-mark of fast approaching death. His
dull eyes filled with terror at the sound of my footsteps ... strange
ingrained knowledge of the Hunnish method of dealing with similar cases
pervaded his mind.
"It is--finish," he whispered pitifully in bad English.
"Where are you hit?" He shook his head slowly.
"It is finish," he reiterated weakly.
"Want anything--any water?"
"No." A battery of artillery rumbled noisily down the adjacent roadway.
His eyes brightened.
"You never win," he muttered, defiance strong in his tone. But one
glance took in those stoic mounted Britishers, five miles deep in the
enemy lines, yet unexcited, unmoved. Thus would they fall back thirty
leagues if need be, phlegmatic and unconcerned--knowing not when
defeated and therefore never beaten.
"I think we will if--"; but life had passed from out the other's tired
body. A rush of pity surged over one on looking into the pale boyish
face: eighteen, perhaps nineteen. Little grey, bloodstained German
warrior in the first flush of Youth: honour to you for the life you gave
your Fatherland; for the staunch patriotism so high in your breast. May
the Dawn into which you were ushered while a foe watched your passing
have great compensation.
Near the unscarred Crucifix a diminutive khaki figure, an inch or so
shorter than his rifle with bayonet fixed, stood peering haughtily from
beneath a steel helmet, several sizes too large, balanced on his ears.
"'Allo, Guernsey," he greeted, "what price my tame outangs?" indicating
a dozen grubby prisoners, "this one yere swallowed 'is false teeth wiv
fright an' this porker yere 'as got 'is knees out of joint wiv shaking."
"Why are they holding up their----?"
"Oh, becos I cut the braces. Even a prisoner won't run away if his
trousers are COMING DOWN. Nar then, Jerry--march. No comprene? Pushey
alongay roadie pour tootsie--see?" He, fag-end in mouth, helmet far on
the back of his head, rifle slung and hands in pocket, swaggered along
behind his "outangs" on their journey to the cages.
In Marcoing we of Brigade established comfortable Quarters with the
plentiful material Fritz had good naturedly (?) left behind for the
purpose. His blankets when you have none of your own are a decided
advantage. His jam, butter and potatoes were excellent eating, his
spring beds utilised especially for two German Staff Officers--made a
delightful sofa for two dirty, unshaven and grinning Tommies.
But his BREAD! Ye saints, the nightmare of that one rancid mouthful, not
three times the customary ration of rum could rinse out the flavour:
Martin, however, was of the opinion that another pint would do much to
save his life, and on being refused sadly observed that he could not
believe anyone could be so heartless....
* * * * *
Drizzle, light during the afternoon, increased to a moderate downpour as
the Normans were digging, not the elaborate sandbagged trenches so very
familiar at home (and but little elsewhere), but mere shallow
excavations providing just sufficient cover for the body. An interesting
operation provided with a little mild excitement in the form of enemy
snipers, who, however, greatly assisted in the rapid and hurried
completion of the work. (N.B.--This undertaking in training required
half a morning!) Stumpy crawled up and down the line for a yard or two
in the vague hope that someone might have made a hole too large; nothing
doing, he started on one himself, grumbling audibly.
"That's it ... poor Tommy. Making a 'ole," pessimistically, "diggin' a
grave for his bloomin' self."
Normans gaze westward where the vague grey earth meets the overcast sky.
Five miles deep in less than twelve hours. The thrill of it--and what
you have you will HOLD.
With the coming of the night came the reaction. Wild excitement and vim
of victorious advance gave way for calm reflection and with it the
certain knowledge of counter-attack. They realised abruptly that they
were physically and mentally worn, the body clamoured madly for food and
drink, the mind for rest and sleep. Rain trickled incessantly down each
man's face and glistened in dusty beads upon foreheads, clothing at last
gave way to complete saturation, and water, collecting in pools until
over ankle deep, oozed slushily in and out of the eyelet holes.
Cold rapidly fastened its grip; dull agony pervaded the entire being
until nothing more than a mechanical row of figures staring tiredly out
upon No Man's Land, grasping rust-flaked rifles in numb, stiff hands.
Thinking not, caring not, moving not--only that uncertain stare into the
void. And over all the night, the wild shrieking of lost spirits in the
trees, the sharp crack of an occasional rifle or fitful bursts from the
poorly-timed enemy shrapnel.
Patrols were sent out into No Man's Land, groped blindly to and fro for
two hours and returned in the very last stage of complete exhaustion to
report "All Clear." Simple, is it not, to go on patrol from a line you
cannot see towards another line you also cannot see ... sometimes you
lost touch with the others and gazed round into the blackness with that
primordial fear of the unknown inspired by the night. Lost! God, it
nearly unmans you. With fast-thumping heart you hear the approach of
guttural Hun voices ... DOWN and QUIET. At last calm thinking points out
that yon burning house is in your own lines. Make for it and all is
well. Aye. Scouts, does the pulse quicken even now?
What is the thin veneer of a mere nine hundred years semi-civilisation?
Two thousand years before the Conquest the fierce warrior Northmen lived
by the might of the halbert, fighters one and all from the days when the
war-inspired mother croned of the battle-axe to her babe. And in the
Normans was that Norse spirit dormant; but one night of such hardship as
yet undreamt of had sufficed for an awakening.
In the dawn they looked out with nearly bloodshot eyes towards the
German front. He would counter-attack, would he? Let him come!
He came! They poured one long volley into the long-coated line. It
wavered, broke, thinned. At the junction with the Middlesex an
Englishman gazed in unfeigned astonishment at the ugly, set features of
his Norman companion.
"But," he said, "they might have wanted to be prisoners."
"Oh." Ozanne grunted, "don't want none," and squinting down the sights
let loose another trio. "This," he added, "is the Great Undertaking."
"Yes, well?"
"I am the undertaker. For my job ... must 'ave bodies ... and I,"
grimly, "I'm getting 'em."
The other shuddered slightly. War is war, but these wild unkempt men of
a strange tongue were something he could not quite grasp. Anyhow, they
knew how to fight. That is all that matters.
Duggie Le Page went into No-Man's Land and pluckily brought in a wounded
N.C.O. from one of the mounted regiments, but too late to save a life
fast nearing its ebb.
A weakly sun crept up from amid thick grey clouds and shone wanly on the
mud-spattered creatures lying each in his own water-logged trough. Hour
followed hour without further sign of hostile movement from the
enemy--nothing could be seen of him, and had the cavalry got through the
attack could have been continued and Cambrai taken.
Casualties (the supreme sacrifice in two instances) began to trickle
away from the Norman ranks, the majority from the attention of a sniper
in the long grass who held on alone with plucky audacity. Unfortunately
for his own welfare he was over-confident, exposed himself too long; and
ten rifles cracked spitefully--all who fired hotly claiming the right to
a notch.
Before mid-day it became apparent that Fritz had neither the heart nor
the troops for launching a counter-attack on a scale large enough to
make a definite impression on the newly-won area. His "strafing" was
fitful, poorly sighted, and of small calibre. Here and there he still
had the use of a machine gun or two and had concentrated a number of men
at Noyelles. This village was attacked by a company of the Royal
Fusiliers; fought for desperately in one brief, mad melee, during which
blood ran freely, but remaining in the hands of the British, formed the
nearest point in the Line to Cambrai.
At Nine Wood all was quiet--except for the unearthly sounds emanating
from the nostrils of one Tich sleeping in the reserve troughs with one
side of his features buried in an inch of brown mud. Desultory
conversation came down from the wide trough "Old man Casey" had dug and
had adorned with an empty whisky bottle found in the grass. He was
looking at it lovingly where it stood mouth downwards: for the obvious
reason, he observed, that its spirits were like his own--all run out.
The Ten Hundred were tired, dead-beat. Marching all Sunday night,
fatigue for hours on Monday, again marching in the night. Finally the
attack and its holding ... eyes were heavy with ache for sleep.
Between eight and nine they were relieved, stumbled away from the wood
until feet rang noisily on the rough surface of a sunken road winding
Marcoing-wards.
Near a side road a number of houses were used as billet--Marcoing was
untouched by shells on that date--and into these buildings Ten Hundred
unshaven, unwashed, worn-out Normans entered slowly, found corners for
the long-wished-for rest and threw down equipment and packs. Some jerked
off boots, some faked up pillows, but the majority turned on one side,
head on valise, and fell straightway into an oblivion that nothing could
disturb.
Lying across a doorway, his boots and equipment still on, a veritable
boy breathed regularly in the same attitude into which he had sunk the
moment he had passed inside. His pale, tired face was dimly visible in
the hazy starlight and one wondered at the peaceful serenity.
The last boot clattered loudly on the floor, the last rattle of a rifle
placed by the owner's side, the last long-drawn sigh of relief ...
Silence. Above them all Woden wove the magic spell Oblivion, the Rest of
the war-worn warrior.
Daybreak had long since passed and still no sound of movement from the
rows of tangled sleeping MEN. Tangle! They were lying in all directions
and at every angle; it was impossible to define whose feet were whose
or what had become of the chest and head of a pair of long legs leading
from a jumbled heap. Duport had his feet fast in the heel of someone
untraceable further than the knee--the first-named had munchers of the
star-like (removable) variety. No. 2, unfortunately, struck out in his
sleep, awakening the other to the fact that his teeth were promenading
about at the top of his throat. He struggled to a sitting posture with a
gasp, felt frenziedly for his "adjustables" and looked round upon the
mixture of dirty, frowsy figures. He stirred Nobby into wakefulness by
the simple expedient of tickling him beneath the chin with a grimy big
toe protruding from a rent in an obsolete and far from odourless sock.
"'Ere," he said, "got any change."
"Any wha'," sleepily, "any, phew, wot a bloomin' niff. Put them blessed
feet of your out of the winder. Change, wot of?"
"This yere trouser button."
"Funny, ain't it, like your face? 'It ole Wiffles there over the 'ead
wid your rifle an' tell 'im breakfus' is up." This kindly action having
succeeded, the victim looked around.
"Breakfus', where? What is it?"
"Oh, tin of Brasso; what d'you expect, 'am an' eggs or a filleted
sausage."
VI
MARCOING--MASNIERES
The Ten Hundred awoke, gazed about and laughed until the echoes rang
from rafter to rafter as the eye took in each black-featured, bearded
and grubby individual. Stumpy was requested to "leave that foot of
fungus on his face, as it hid what for weeks had been an infliction,"
and to which he cuttingly replied that the other gentleman had features
that would make a bomb burst.
But there could be detected in these rallies an undercurrent of strong
mutual respect, of which they had all hitherto had no cognisance. They
were each one intensely proud of what had been so efficiently carried
out; although very little WAR was spoken they were keenly alive to the
fact that personally and collectively the Ten Hundred had opened the
innings with an abundance of "runs" as far as the enemy was concerned.
Rations came up fairly regularly in the advanced areas unless the
ration-party becomes lost, drops a portion or makes an appointment with
a 9.2. There is a constant daily issue of hard-wearing substance
camouflaged as "biscuit," intended originally for the heel of concrete
ships and for bomb-proof blockhouses. It can be further utilised as a
body-shield, for paving roadways, or with the aid of a hammer and three
chisels (why three? In case the first two break) this "biscuit" could
be, and was, eaten.
Tea and sugar, enclosed in one tin, were soaked in water: boiled over a
small round tin of a form of solidified paraffin, set alight beneath the
mess tin.
Then bacon--Your issue might be red--and it might NOT. Perhaps the
faintest suspicion of lean fringed it or you might moodily survey a
square inch of fat--if there was not a buckshee inch of rind. The
flowing locks of hair with which this bacon was sometimes adorned has
convinced one that a number of farmers fatten their porkers on
"Thatcho"--it could be combed with a fork!
Bully Beef is, ugh! IT was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall
be ... NEVER AGAIN.
Bread!
"Something attempted, someone done,
A one-pound loaf among twenty-one."
Had the biscuit been again as hard the famished Ten Hundred would have
got their teeth deep into it. Hunger. A mad craving for food that cannot
be swallowed, because of a dry stickiness in the mouth a tongue that
somehow would not function; a moisture that would not come.
That tea! warm, refreshing, life-inspiring liquid. Drink, to drink long
and thirstily ... the relief, the new vitality. Food vanishes with
abnormal rapidity, every crumb, however minute, is carefully searched
for, gathered into the hand and eaten.
And afterwards you are still hungry, still thirsty.
The "schemers" slipped away quietly from the billets, crossed into the
main thoroughfare and commenced a scrounging expedition for grub.
("Scrounging," an exciting operation whereby the required article is
obtained by any means otherwise than legal.)
Winterflood, Mace and the Duo found their way by instinct born of
experience to an advanced dressing station where buckshee tea was being
doled out. Cups were not to be had, a milk can having to deputise in
three instances while the fourth dug his features deep into a foot long
tin with a quarter-inch layer of tea. Then Fritz dropped a shell,
kru-ump, clean into the centre of the courtyard. The jar caused a pint
of the tea to run caressingly down two tunics then again the genial
enemy sent over another. Si-izz-krump! One of the four scroungers
grunted.
"Boo--want, want any more tea?"--chuckling. They didn't! A third, a
fourth, and a fifth followed. Men looked significantly at each other.
"Bringin' his guns up."
"Yes--heavy stuff, too."
"Be as hot as Hades round 'ere soon."
It was. Hun artillery were adepts at "shooting off the map" (e.g.,
calculating the angle of elevation for concentration on a certain spot
by means of a map), and began to drop near the roadways and cross-roads
a series of heavy calibre shells. Here and there, as his guns went
searching across the town, a house crumbled under with a grinding,
spluttering crash. Hun aeroplanes, also, made an unpleasant announcement
of their presence above Marcoing, directing their artillery fire upon a
number of points.