NO MAN'S LAND
In the French Army, now, I had a different standing than at first. Our
unit in its entirety was taken over and we became _brancardiers_, or
stretcher bearers, in the Second Army of France. Accordingly we were
quartered in the army barracks. For some time after I got back from
Belgium there were days of blood and thunder as a fearful offensive had
been launched by the Germans.
An entire change of heart had now come over me. I who had been a kind of
peaceful milk and water ecclesiastical pacifist to now stand beside the
boys with the guns and even sleep with the poilus whose main object is
to kill Germans, and approve of it, was unusual to say the least, and I
thought it would shock some of the deacons back in my tranquil church at
home. I was ready to even risk a guess that some of my befrocked
clerical friends would be surprised. But I figured that when universal
freedom was at stake, as I now clearly saw it was, I could not afford to
be a neutral even though I was a Presbyterian preacher. I could not
resist my conscience.
As I look at it now, I wish they would put a number of these
"conscientious objectors" into the same kind of service. That experience
was the best thing that ever happened to me. I became enthusiastic for
the Allies and the war, and dead against the Kaiser and his gang.
Soon after this I was dispatched to a certain place near L---- for duty.
I found a man who had just been out on a wire-cutting expedition. As I
lifted him on to the stretcher he said, "Well, I did it anyhow." Then
with some effort he related the following experience to me:
"When the order was given that we would go 'over the top' at three
o'clock in the morning, and take the Germans' first line trench, our
boys were ready. There was no 'try to take it' nor 'attack it,' but 'we
will go over the top and take it.' There was a note of finality in the
wording of the order, which we well understood. Our lieutenant then came
down to our fire bay and asked who would volunteer to go out at midnight
and cut the lanes. He was looking right at me, and said 'Vincent, how
about it?' I timidly replied, 'I'll go, sir.' There was no way out. I am
frank to confess that after I got to thinking about it, my knees began
to shake. The more I thought, the worse they got. I had given my word,
though, and I wouldn't be a quitter. I don't think there is any yellow
streak in me, but there is a lot of human nature. I love life. I got to
thinking of my past and the words of Shakespeare ran in my mind,
'Conscience doth make cowards of us all.' I wasn't scared, I was
paralyzed.
"I realized what it meant that I had promised to do. It meant that I was
to climb up a scaling ladder over our parapet, go out into the full
exposure of the enemy, crawl on my stomach slowly--slowly again--an inch
at a time--so slowly that if a German saw me, he would not know I was
moving at all, and would suppose me dead. I must cover the distance
between our parapet and our entanglement, which was perhaps a dozen
yards, with a tripping wire in between, then noiselessly cut a lane
through twenty feet of knotted and gnarled barbed wire, fastening it
back so that it could not curl up and entangle our men as they rushed
through. Then I must creep and crawl on my stomach, hugging the ground
until I got back and slid into our trench. If I were seen, it was all
day with me. I'd go to Blighty--for good.
"Well, twelve o'clock came around--all too soon. I went. When I had cut
my first wire, a German star shell fell, lighting up the barbed-wire
entanglement for rods around. Luckily for me it fell short of the
parallel in which I was, to the trenches. If it had fallen back of me,
it would have thrown my body into bold relief."
For the readers' benefit be it said that a star shell is something like
a sky rocket or a roman candle. It is sent up into the air and falls to
the ground, lighting up everything around it. The purpose of it is to
betray any action of the enemy in No Man's Land. Obviously, if it falls
short, it blinds the sender to what is going on beyond it, just as a
light in the window of a house will not throw the objects in the room
into view from the outside, especially if the spectator is some distance
away. But objects can be plainly seen in the room by a person across the
street, if the light is on the far side of the room. This is
particularly true if the object should move. So with the star shell. But
it must frighten one at best to be lying on his stomach and have the
whole world illuminated about him even if he is behind the light.
In slower and lower tones the poilu continued:
"I had just cut my last wire and folded it back on the post--I don't
think thirty seconds had passed--when a star shell came down between me
and my own trench and glimmered away as if it never would go out. It may
have burned for thirty seconds, but that thirty seconds seemed like
thirty years to me.
"I was less than forty yards from the German trenches, and I believe
within thirty yards of their barbed wire. As that star shell came down,
I had my hand upon a post about a foot from the ground. And as it was, I
was really grasping the barbed wire, wrapped around the post, and thus
assisting myself to crawl back to our trenches. Although the wire was
cutting my fingers fiercely, I dared not let loose of that post, for
fear the Germans would detect the motion and let me have it hot and
heavy. Just before the star shell burned out, I distinctly heard some
German voices. One man said, 'There, look there!' Then the star shell
went out. Expecting another immediately, I dared not move or withdraw my
hand. It came. Again I could hear those Germans talking, this time
arguing about me, instead of shooting me, and when that star shell went
out, I pulled myself up by the aid of that post and ran as I never ran
in my life before. I believe I broke the world's record.
"And then, at last, they began to shoot, and just as I fell into our
trenches, one of them caught me here." His breathing was labored as he
placed his hand on his side.
"But somehow, when a fellow is out there--alone--facing death in the
solitude, it seems so much worse than it is two hours later, when the
boys go 'over the top,' dozens of them together, with bayonets gleaming
and with yelling and shooting and barrage fire. It doesn't seem nearly
so bad in a crowd. I don't mean that the men like it. No man ever likes
to go 'over the top,' but there is a hypnotism when the crowd goes with
you. It is what the professors call mob psychology. It's the thing that
will make a man jump into a scrimmage on the football field eagerly,
knowing that he will get hurt, without thinking anything about it. But I
went alone. I'm all right but I feel----" Here his breath came hard.
"The charge was set for three o'clock. A fearful bombardment was opened
up. The barrage fire was terrific. Word was finally passed along from
mouth to mouth, 'ten minutes till we go over the top!' All the while the
bombardment had been going on more fiercely and the firing was let
loose, the like of which was never seen before.
"At last it was five minutes of three. The 'death ladders' were put in
place, so the men could scale the parapet, and at exactly three o'clock
the whistles blew a mighty blast. Up the boys went like monkeys over a
garden wall. The curtain fire was thrust forward. Through the lanes they
went. Across No Man's Land they rushed, and men were falling all about.
At this moment some of the Germans made a kind of countercharge, and a
few got very near our trenches. One big German was almost falling into
our trench on top of me, when I heard him yell at me. I could not tell
what he said, but as his mouth opened in yelling, amazement and fear
gripped me, for, like the shiny tongue of a snake, there stuck out of
his mouth a long, glistening object. I thought he was making faces at
me. But only a second elapsed, until his yell merged into a fiendish
shriek and he pitched toward me. One of our men had jammed his bayonet
through the big Boche from behind, and it had come out of his mouth. It
was the last of him. I know our boys got there. But it sure is hell.
But--it--is glorious!" I then realized that he was weakening and when I
asked him if he was badly hurt he answered, "No--not bad--I
reckon--only--'goin' West.'" As the poor fellow spoke these last words
his breath was coming hard. Life was slowly ebbing out and as I stood
with his hand clasped in mine he passed over the Great Divide. In solemn
reflection I stood beside him for a moment. Yes, it was glorious, in a
way, yet for my part it sickened me. I had had enough. I was fed up with
the war and I longed for rest.