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THE IRISH AT THE FRONT
THE IRISH
AT THE FRONT
By MICHAEL MACDONAGH
_Author of "Irish Life and Character"_
_WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY_
JOHN REDMOND, M.P.
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO
1916
PREFATORY NOTE
This narrative of the more signal feats of the Irish Regiments in
France, Flanders, and at the Dardanelles, is based on letters of
regimental officers and men, interviews with wounded soldiers of the
battalions, and those invalided home, and, also, in several cases, on
the records compiled at the depots.
The war is the greatest armed struggle that the world has ever seen,
and when we think of the heroism and resolution shown in it, the
trials and the sufferings, the victories and the disasters, and then
turn to the bald and trite official despatches, the dissimilitude of
things, the contrast, is most abrupt and jarring. But so it is, and
probably we must continue to rely upon the accounts given by the men
in the fighting line for any real appreciation of the nature of the
war.
MICHAEL MACDONAGH.
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFATORY NOTE v
A DAUNTLESS BATTLE LINE ix
The Irish Regiments and their War Honours
INTRODUCTION BY MR. JOHN REDMOND, M.P. 1
Ireland's Part in the War
CHAP.
I.--THE RETREAT FROM MONS 15
How the Munsters Saved the Guns and got Ringed Round
with Fire
II.--BATTLE OF THE RIVERS 29
Rally of the Irish Guards to the Green Flag at
the Marne
III.--CONTEST FOR THE CHANNEL COAST 38
Impetuous Dash of the Leinsters, and Royal Irish,
and Grim Tenacity of Irish Guards and Rifles
IV.--ASPHYXIATING GAS AND LIQUID FIRE 47
Charge of the Liverpool Irish at Festubert; a
Night Surprise by the Inniskillings
V.--THE IMMORTAL STORY 58
Landing of the Dublins and Munsters at the
Dardanelles
VI.--THE 10TH IRISH DIVISION IN GALLIPOLI 73
Landing at Suvla Bay and Capture of Chocolate Hill
VII.--IN THE REST CAMP 84
How the Leinsters Caught a Glimpse of the Narrows
VIII.--FIGHT FOR KISLAH DAGH 91
Gallant Stand and Fall of the 7th Dublins
IX.--FOR CROSS AND CROWN 103
Death in Action of Father Finn, of the Dublins, and
Father Gwynn, of the Irish Guards
X.--THE GREAT PUSH AT LOOS 119
Historical Football Charge of the London Irish, with
the German Trenches as Goal
XI.--THE VICTORIA CROSS 128
A Noble Band of Irish Heroes, Officers and Men
XII.--"FOR VALOUR" 145
Stories of other V.C.'s, including Michael O'Leary,
who Upheld Ireland's tradition of Gallantry
A DAUNTLESS BATTLE LINE
THE IRISH REGIMENTS AND THEIR WAR HONOURS
Ireland is represented in the fighting forces of the Empire by a
regiment of Foot Guards, eight regiments of the Line, each of two
Regular battalions, and with several linked battalions of the Special
Reserve, or old Militia, and many Service battalions raised for
"Kitchener's Army." Altogether, these various battalions of the Irish
regiments number fifty-four. There are two Dragoon regiments and one
regiment each of Hussars and Lancers. The Volunteer or Territorial
system has not been extended to Ireland. Still, the country is not
without representation in the Auxiliary Forces. She has raised two
Yeomanry regiments, the South Irish Horse, and the North Irish Horse,
and in England there are two predominantly Irish Territorial
battalions, the London Irish Rifles (18th Battalion of the London
Regiment) and the Liverpool Irish (8th Battalion of the King's
Liverpool Regiment), both of which have "South Africa, 1900-02" as a
battle honour. There are also tens of thousands of Irishmen in the
English, Scottish, and Welsh regiments, the Artillery, the Engineers,
the Army Medical Corps, as well as in the Royal Navy.
The following are the Irish Infantry and Cavalry regiments, with their
badges and battle honours:--
IRISH GUARDS.
In acknowledgment and commemoration of the brave and honourable part
taken by the Irish troops in the Boer War an Irish regiment of Foot
Guards was added to the Brigade of Guards in 1900 by command of Queen
Victoria. Unlike the Scots Guards, which are largely English, the
Irish Guards are almost exclusively Irish. Badges: the Cross of the
Order of St. Patrick and the Shamrock. Recruiting area: all Ireland.
ROYAL IRISH REGIMENT.
The Harp of Ireland, with the motto _Virtutis Namuriensis Praemium_
("The Reward of Bravery at Namur"), surmounted by a Crown and
enwreathed with Shamrocks. Recruiting area: the Munster Counties of
Tipperary and Waterford, and the Leinster Counties of Kilkenny and
Wexford. Depot: Clonmel.
The Sphinx, superscribed "Egypt." The Dragon, superscribed
"China"; "Namur, 1695"; "Blenheim"; "Ramillies," "Oudenarde";
"Malplaquet"; "Pegu"; "Sevastopol"; "New Zealand"; "Afghanistan,
1879-80"; "Tel-el-Kebir"; "Egypt, 1882"; "Nile, 1884-85"; "South
Africa, 1900-02."
ROYAL INNISKILLING FUSILIERS.
A grenade with the Castle of Inniskilling flying the flag of St.
George inscribed on the ball. Motto: _Nec aspera terrent_ ("The
harshest trials do not affright us"). Recruiting area: the Ulster
Counties of Donegal, Derry, Tyrone, and Fermanagh. Depot: Omagh town.
The Sphinx, superscribed "Egypt." "Martinique, 1762";
"Havannah"; "St. Lucia, 1778, 1796"; "Maida"; "Badajoz";
"Salamanca"; "Vittoria"; "Pyrenees"; "Nivelle"; "Orthes";
"Toulouse"; "Peninsula"; "Waterloo"; "South Africa, 1835,
1846-7"; "Central India"; "Relief of Ladysmith"; "South Africa,
1899-1902."
ROYAL IRISH RIFLES.
The Harp and Crown, with the motto _Quis Separabit?_ ("Who shall
divide us?") on a scroll beneath, and a bugle with strings, the symbol
of a rifle regiment. Recruiting area: the Ulster Counties of Antrim
and Down, including the City of Belfast. Depot: Belfast.
The Sphinx, superscribed "Egypt." "India"; "Cape of Good Hope,
1806"; "Talavera"; "Bourbon"; "Busaco"; "Fuentes d'Onor";
"Ciudad Rodrigo"; "Badajoz"; "Salamanca"; "Vittoria"; "Nivelle";
"Orthes"; "Toulouse"; "Peninsula"; "Central India"; "South
Africa, 1899-1902."
ROYAL IRISH FUSILIERS.
A grenade with a French Imperial eagle and a wreath of laurel on the
ball, surmounted by the Gaelic motto, _Faugh-a-Ballagh_ ("Clear the
Way"), the whole being set in a wreath of Shamrocks and surmounted by
the Plume of the Prince of Wales. Recruiting area: the Ulster Counties
of Armagh, Monaghan, and Cavan, and the Leinster County of Louth.
Depot: Armagh town.
The Sphinx, superscribed "Egypt." "Monte Video"; "Talavera";
"Barrosa"; "Java"; "Tarifa"; "Vittoria"; "Nivelle "; "Niagara";
"Orthes"; "Toulouse"; "Peninsula"; "Asia"; "Sevastopol";
"Tel-el-Kebir"; "Egypt, 1882, 1844"; "Relief of Ladysmith";
"South Africa, 1899-1902."
CONNAUGHT RANGERS.
The Harp and Crown, with the motto, _Quis Separabit?_ Recruiting area:
all the Counties of Connaught--Galway, Roscommon, Mayo, Sligo, and
Leitrim. Depot: Galway.
The Elephant. The Sphinx, superscribed "Egypt." "Seringapatam";
"Talavera"; "Busaco"; "Fuentes d'Onor"; "Ciudad Rodrigo";
"Badajoz"; "Salamanca"; "Vittoria"; "Pyrenees"; "Nivelle";
"Orthes"; "Toulouse"; "Peninsula"; "Alma"; "Inkerman";
"Sevastopol"; "Central India"; "South Africa. 1877-8-9"; "Relief
of Ladysmith"; "South Africa, 1899-1902."
LEINSTER REGIMENT.
The Plume of the Prince of Wales, encircled by a wreath of maple
leaves, and surmounted by a Crown. Recruiting area: the Leinster
Counties of Longford, Meath, Westmeath, King's County, and Queen's
County. Depot: Birr.
"Niagara"; "Central India"; "South Africa, 1900-02."
ROYAL MUNSTER FUSILIERS.
The Shamrock and a grenade with the Royal Tiger on the ball.
Recruiting area: the Munster Counties of Cork, Kerry, Limerick, and
Clare. Depot: Tralee.
"Plassey"; "Condore"; "Masulipatam"; "Budara"; "Buxar";
"Rohileund, 1774"; "Sholinghur"; "Carnatic"; "Rohileund, 1794";
"Guzerat"; "Deig"; "Bhurtpore"; "Ghunzee, 1839"; "Afghanistan,
1839"; "Ferozeshah"; "Sobraon"; "Chillianwallah"; "Goojerat";
"Punjaub"; "Pegu"; "Delhi, 1857"; "Lucknow"; "Burma, 1885-87";
"South Africa, 1899-1902."
ROYAL DUBLIN FUSILIERS.
A grenade with the motto, _Spectamur Agendo_ ("We are known by our
deeds"), surmounted by a Crown; also the Arms of the City of Dublin
set in a wreath of Shamrocks. Recruiting area: the Leinster Counties
of Dublin, Kildare, Wicklow, and Carlow. Depot: Naas.
The Royal Tiger, superscribed "Plassey"; "Buxar." The Elephant,
superscribed "Carnatic"; "Mysore"; "Arcot"; "Condore";
"Wandiwash"; "Pondicherry"; "Guzerat"; "Sholingbur"; "Nundy
Droog"; "Amboyna"; "Ternate"; "Banda"; "Seringapatam"; "Kirkee";
"Maheidpoor"; "Beni Boo Alli"; "Asia"; "Aden"; "Mooltan";
"Goojerat"; "Punjaub"; "Pegu"; "Lucknow"; "Relief of Ladysmith";
"South Africa, 1899-1902."
4TH (ROYAL IRISH) DRAGOON GUARDS.
The Harp and Crown, and the Star of the Order of St. Patrick.
"Peninsula"; "Balaklava"; "Sevastopol"; "Tel-el-Kebir"; "Egypt,
1882."
6TH (INNISKILLING) DRAGOONS.
The Castle of Inniskilling with the St. George's flag, and the word
"Inniskilling" underneath.
"Dettingen"; "Warburg"; "Willens"; "Waterloo"; "Balaklava";
"Sevastopol"; "South Africa, 1899-1902."
5TH (ROYAL IRISH) LANCERS.
The Harp and Crown with the motto _Quis Separabit?_
"Blenheim"; "Ramillies"; "Oudenarde"; "Malplaquet"; "Suakim,
1885"; "Defence of Ladysmith"; "South Africa, 1899-1902."
8TH (KING'S ROYAL IRISH) HUSSARS.
The Harp and Crown with the motto _Pristinae virtutis memores_ ("We
are mindful of our ancient glory").
"Leswarree"; "Hindoostan"; "Alma"; "Balaklava"; "Inkerman";
"Sevastopol"; "Central India"; "Afghanistan, 1879-80"; "South
Africa, 1900-02."
THE IRISH AT THE FRONT
INTRODUCTION
"Though I am an Englishman, I must say the Irish soldiers have fought
magnificently. They are the cream of the Army. Ireland may well be
proud of her sons. Ireland has done her duty nobly. Irishmen are
absolutely indispensable for our final triumph."--Letter from
Brigadier-General W.B. Marshal, of the 29th Division, on service at
the Dardanelles.
"Your Irish soldiers are the talk of the whole Army.... Their landing
at Suvla Bay was the greatest thing that you will ever read of in
books. Those who witnessed the advance will never forget it.... God!
the men were splendid."--Captain Thornhill, of the New Zealand Force.
"As you know, I am not Irish. I have no Irish connections whatever. In
fact, I was rather opposed to the granting of Home Rule; but now,
speaking honestly and calmly, after having witnessed what I did--the
unparalleled heroism of these Irishmen--I should say nothing is too
good to give the country of which they are, or rather were, such
worthy representatives. My God! it was grand. It filled one with
admiration and envy.... I have no religion, but it was most charming
and edifying to see these fine chaps with their beads and the way in
which they prayed to God. We are all brothers, but to my dying day I
bow to the Irish."--Letter from a Scottish soldier at Gallipoli.
"Tell Ireland she may well be proud of the Irish Division. No men
could have fought more gallantly or achieved better results. More of
our countrymen are required to beat the Germans. I am certain that
Ireland will respond as enthusiastically now as she has always done
throughout her past history. Eire go brath!"--Lt.-General Sir Bryan
Mahon, Commanding the 10th (Irish) Division.
It is these soldiers of ours, with their astonishing courage and their
beautiful faith, with their natural military genius, with their
tenderness as well as strength; carrying with them their green flags
and their Irish war-pipes; advancing to the charge, their fearless
officers at their head, and followed by their beloved chaplains as
great-hearted as themselves; bringing with them a quality all their
own to the sordid modern battlefield; exhibiting the character of the
Irishman at its noblest and greatest--it is these soldiers of ours to
whose keeping the Cause of Ireland has passed to-day. It was never in
worthier, holier keeping than that of these boys, offering up their
supreme sacrifice of life with a smile on their lips because it was
given for Ireland. May God bless them! And may Ireland, cherishing
them in her bosom, know how to prove her love and pride and send their
brothers leaping to keep full their battle-torn ranks and to keep high
and glad their heroic hearts!
I find it hard to come within the compass and key suitable for a Preface
when I am asked to write a few pages to introduce a book about our Irish
soldiers. Too many things surge up demanding expression--gratitude,
appreciation of the significance of what they are doing, anxiety that
Ireland may play the part to them that history has assigned to her. I
must only do the best I can and select a few points to remark upon.
And, first, let me remark upon this point about which there is now
universal agreement. The war has brought into view again what had been
somewhat obscured of late: the military qualities of the Irish race.
There are now, throughout the armies in the field and throughout the
world which follows their fortunes, no two opinions upon this point. I
quote among the words at the head of this Preface the tribute of an
English General at the Dardanelles which I have seen in a recent
letter, because it is typical of the military opinion one hears on
every hand, and because for his generous praise he has found an
expression which well sums up the general verdict. The Irish soldiers,
he says, are "the cream of the Army." On the Western front I heard the
same idea put in another pointed phrase; "We always look upon an Irish
regiment as a _corps d'elite_." The war, in short, is proving anew the
experience which other wars--and other armies under other flags--have
so often tested, and which makes it a maxim with British Generals, as
it was in Sir Ralph Abercrombie's day, always to try and have some
Irish troops included in their commands, if possible, to be on hand
for work about which no risks of failure can be taken and for which an
inspiring lead is essential. It is proving again that the Irish
people, like their racial kinsmen the French, are one of the peoples
who have been endowed in a distinguished degree with a genuine
military spirit, a natural genius and gift for war which produces born
soldiers and commanders, and which is the very reverse of the brute
appetite for slaughter. Irish soldiers may be few in comparison with
the scale of modern armies. They bulked larger in the armies of
Wellington, of which they formed the backbone, when the proportions of
population were different. They may be comparatively few, but their
quality is admittedly precious. As the English General above quoted
says, they are an "absolutely indispensable" ingredient.
I shall have to talk about the Irish soldiers in this Preface; and I
want any comrade of theirs who is not Irish who may chance to see
these lines, and any other reader who is not Irish, to bear in mind
that it is about Irish soldiers I am intended to talk here, and not
about others; that that is my business here; and I would beg them to
understand that in fulfilling this duty I am not overlooking for a
moment the renown of English, Scottish, Welsh, or Dominion soldiers.
Also, I would like to tell them this: that it is from the Irish
soldiers--and I have listened to it from their lips again and
again--you will hear the heartiest and warmest tributes to the valour
and staunchness of their British and Dominion comrades. These gallant
comrades, I know, will be the last to begrudge us the pious task of
making some record of the Irishmen's work who have fought and died by
their side, and of trying to add, as her sons would wish, to Ireland's
honour through their deeds. The official record has not been copious,
and Ireland may be pardoned the watchfulness of a mother's pride.
Let me turn from the soldiers themselves for a moment to look at the
significance of the part they are playing before history. It is
important for Ireland, and I am sure it is also important for the
British Empire, and perhaps for America as well, to appreciate the
part taken by the Irish troops in this war. The war, which in a night
changed so many things, offered to Ireland a new international place,
and her brave sons, not hesitating, acting upon a sure and noble
instinct, have leaped forward to occupy it for her. After long
struggles the Irish people had won back from England a series of
rights--ownership of the land, religious equality, educational
freedom, local self-government--an advance which had coincided with
and been helped by the emancipation and rise of British democracy. The
culmination was reached when in the session of 1914 the Imperial
Parliament passed the Act to establish national self-government.
Ireland had said, "Trust me with this, and I will wipe out the past
and be loyal to the Empire"; and the answer--somewhat long delayed, no
doubt, but still it came--was the King's signature to the Government
of Ireland Act. Thus when the war arrived Ireland had at once a
charter of rights and liberties of her own to defend, and, like
Botha's South Africa, her plighted word to make good. The war by a
most fortunate conjunction united in a common cause the defence of
England against a mighty danger and the defence of principles for
which Ireland, to be true to herself, must ever be ready to raise her
voice or draw her sword. Besides her honour and her interest--her
interest, always the last thing to move her, but now happily involved
in the same cause--human Freedom, Justice, Pity, and the cry of the
small nationality crushed under the despot's heel appealed to her.
These things she has followed throughout her history, mostly, up to
now, to her bitter loss, but not to the loss of her soul; in that is
her distinction now. Her sons, fighting for her honour and her
interest, are fighting for these things too. It is for these
things--Honour, Justice, Freedom, Pity--she will stand in that new
place of influence she is winning in the world's councils. There,
acting with and through her sister democracies, Canada, Australia, New
Zealand, South Africa, and Great Britain--in all of which, as in the
great Republic of the West, her children are a potent leaven--her
spirit will help to bend the British Empire to a mission of new
significance for humanity. That is the heritage of her tradition. It
was in that spirit her sons went throughout Europe influencing the
world of a thousand years ago. That is the spirit her sons are
illustrating upon the field of war to-day.
Ireland has chosen this path. I would pause for a moment further to
ask people to think a little on this: suppose she had, as well she
might with her history, and as some of her sons both at home and in
America have wanted her to do, chosen a different alternative?
Ireland's strength as an international factor is not to be measured
only by her political position at the heart of the Empire or her
strategic position in the Atlantic, or by the size of her population
at home, but also by the millions of her kin throughout the Empire and
America, whose deep and enduring sentiment for her, linked as it is
with their distinguished and never-tarnished loyalty to the new lands
of their adoption, is one of the striking facts of modern history.
Germany understands this factor; and keeps on making unceasing and
ingenious efforts, especially in the United States, to make her
account with it.
For Ireland to have chosen the opposite alternative, or to be flung
into it by the fortune of war, would in my opinion be for her an
unmixed calamity, the worst in her history. Her fate as a possession
of Germany, as Germany's western fortress, naval base, Heligoland of
the Atlantic, would from the nature of the case be far worse than that
of Prussian Poland, Schleswig, and Alsace for the last forty years.
Only those who are ignorant of Prussianism and its most recent
methods--methods followed long ago by every tyrannical Power,
including the England of the past, but which Prussia still maintains
as a menacing anachronism in the age of democracy--have any illusions
upon this matter. The Irish people, with a few insignificant
exceptions, have no such illusions. They have, for the first time in
their history--a memorable fact--put a national army into the field, a
glorious army! And they have put that army in the field for the
express purpose of defending Ireland from such a fate and of doing
their share in helping to rescue the unfortunate and heroic peoples
who have already fallen under it.
With the Irishmen already serving, or who obeyed the call as reserves
when war was declared, and those who have volunteered since the war,
the Irish army in the field has amounted to 154,038 men to this date,
and this number is being increased and replenished at the rate of
about a thousand men a week. More than a hundred thousand have
volunteered since the war, and before the year is out it is our hope
that at least half another hundred thousand will have followed their
example. To these may be added for Ireland's credit the officially
acknowledged Irish units in Great Britain, such as the "London Irish,"
the "Liverpool Irish," the "Tyneside Irish" (a brigade). But account
cannot be taken, though their existence may be noted, of the many
thousands of Irish in English and Scottish regiments and in the
Canadian and Australian forces. There are some special Irish Colonial
units, too, apart from the Irish, in practically every Colonial
battalion, such as the Vancouver Irish Fusiliers and the Quebec Irish
Regiment. A short time ago General Botha's wife at Capetown presented
green flags to a South African Irish regiment. But it is the army
raised in Ireland itself which is our more special concern here, for
that is the army which it is Ireland's privilege and duty to maintain
at its full strength in the field; and that consists of the regular
battalions of the historic Irish regiments and of three specific new
Irish Divisions with "service" battalions of the same regiments. Each
of the new Divisions is under the command of a distinguished Irish
General. The three together would constitute an Army Corps. The
formation of these three Irish Divisions is a fact of great note. It
is the first time Ireland is officially represented in the field by a
larger unit than the regiment.
It is to be noted that this book only deals with the achievements of
the old Irish regiments, and one of the new Irish Divisions, namely,
the 10th. The 16th Irish Division, the 36th Irish Division, and the
Tyneside Irish Brigade have only recently gone to the Front.
From letters home from men and officers, from the speeches of Generals
delivered immediately after an action, and sometimes sent home in a
letter or an order of the day, from the spontaneous testimony of
onlookers of other corps rather than from official reports, the
record, so far, of these Irish levies, old and new, is put together.
Official mentions are scant. The official account given by Admiral de
Robeck of the landing and taking of "V" Beach, with its sunken wire
entanglements, one of the most extraordinary of deeds, and valuable in
results in spite of the appalling cost to the Irish battalions who
accomplished it, for it rendered the landing of the troops that
arrived later safe--a feat which General Sir Hunter Weston next day
declared to be "without parallel in the history of feats of arms"--did
not even mention the names of the glorious Irish regiments--although
the names of the regiments concerned in all the other landings were
given with eulogies. General Hamilton, in explanation of his meagre
references to the Tenth Division at Suvla, says he found it difficult
to obtain "living human details." I do not refer to this by way of
complaint, though I hope this omission may yet be officially set
right. The thing is past, and there is going, we hope, to be a great
change in such matters in future. Besides, the facts get known. Such
deeds cannot be hidden--they are too great. I refer to the matter to
explain why it is that books like this, imperfect as it is, have to be
compiled. Other volumes like it will have to supplement the tale. We
Irish are determined that henceforth the doings of our armies in the
field shall not be in vain in any sense. Piously shall we glean the
record, whether official or unofficial, and what our men, our
officers, and our Generals think ought to be known shall no longer, so
far as we can help it, remain unknown. Our brave lads in the
battle-line may rest assured that their country is lovingly and
proudly watching them, and that the sacrifice they make in her name
will, as they wish it--for their wish is the same as the dying
Sarsfield's on the field of Landen--go to her profit.
The record so far brings Ireland great honour. And this excites no
jealousy in the Army--for it is from the other corps in the Army
itself comes the most generous testimony to the work of the Irish
soldiers and the most comrade-like regret where it is thought there
has been lack of recognition. What stands out is that on every front,
and whether new levies or regulars, the work of the Irish troops has
not only been of great merit in every instance, but of exceptional
merit, and they have to their credit some of the most splendid and
astonishing achievements. The Irish Guards at Mons, the Royal Irish
Regiment at Ypres, the London Irish at Loos (dribbling a football
before them as they charged--the boys in the trenches, before the
charge, holding out the matches with which they had lit their
cigarettes to show each other that their hands were not shaking), the
regular battalions at "V" Beach, the new "service" battalions of the
Tenth Division at Sulva, I name out of a long list to illustrate this
statement. To General Mahon's Division, composed exclusively of new
levies who were civilians when the war began--thousands of Nationalist
families in Leinster, Munster, and Connaught represented its
ranks--the terrific open fighting at Suvla Bay (which began with the
shelling of the lighters at the landing and the bursting of chains of
contact mines as they set foot on shore) was their first experience of
being under fire. Undismayed, their coolness undisturbed, they formed
for attack as if on the parade ground. These were the "freshies"
spoken of in the letter partly quoted above of Captain Thornhill,
himself a representative of those magnificent Australian and New
Zealand troops whose prowess has been another of the revelations of
the war. "The Empire can do with a heap more 'freshies' of the Irish
brand," he writes. "Their landing at Suvla Bay was the greatest thing
you will ever read of in books by high-brows. Those that witnessed
the advance will never forget it. Bullets and shrapnel rained on them,
yet they never wavered.... God! the men were splendid. The way they
took that hill (now called Dublin Hill) was the kind of thing that
would make you pinch yourself to prove that it was not a cheap wine
aftermath. How they got there Heaven only knows. As the land lay,
climbing into hell on an aeroplane seemed an easier proposition than
taking that hill."[1] It may be well to point out, for it bears upon
one of the popular fallacies about Irish character, that it is not
only in the desperate charge or the forlorn hope that Irish soldiers
have proved their worth in this or other wars. They have shown it
equally in the tenacity, grim yet cheerful, with which for days and
weeks and months difficult positions are held and bitter hardships
borne. Again, let it be noted what this whole young Tenth Division
proved itself fit for after its months at Gallipoli. When it was
decided to occupy Salonika and to march to the aid of the Serbian army
it was to the Irish Division, under their splendid Irish commander,
General Sir Bryan Mahon, that the place of honour for this desperate
enterprise was given. Coming straight from their hard service in the
Peninsula, they performed in the Serbian mountain passes above Lake
Doiran what General Sarrail, the eminent French Commander, the
vanquisher of the Crown Prince's Army at Verdun, has pronounced to be
one of the most striking feats of arms of the whole war. Acting as a
rearguard against an army ten times their number, they did what was
neither expected nor counted upon. But their instinctive military
genius, as well as their courage and determination, came into play,
and they held up the overwhelming enemy for so long and with such
skill that the entire French and British forces were able to withdraw
safely to their defensive positions without the loss of a single gun
or a single transport wagon.
One seems to be verging on exaggeration in these accounts, but the
thing is bare truth, and I am striving to bring out what has been done
for Ireland by the character of these troops. I have indicated their
martial quality. But they have brought another quality into the field
which is equally characteristic and therefore should at least be
mentioned here, and which, perhaps, in the circumstances of the time,
deserves a special reference. That is, their religious spirit.
Everybody has remarked it. The Irish soldier, with his limpid faith
and his unaffected piety, his rosary recited on the hillside, his Mass
in the ruined barn under shell-fire, his "act of contrition" in the
trench before facing the hail of the assault, his attitude to women,
has been mostly a singular impression. And his chaplain! The Irish
battalion must have its chaplain as well as its colonel, and both must
be of the best. The chaplains of every denomination and of every corps
have made a noble name for themselves in this war; but I am speaking
here only of the Irish chaplains--of the men like Father Finn, killed
at "V" beach, refusing to stay behind on the ship because, as he
answered, "The place of the chaplain is with the dying soldier"; and
like Father Gwynn, of the Irish Guards, killed at the French front, of
whom his battalion commander, a Protestant Irishman, writes these
words: "No words of mine could express or even give a faint idea of
the amount of good he has done us all out here, or how bravely he has
faced all dangers, and how cheerful and comforting he has always been.
It is certainly no exaggeration to say that he was loved by every
officer, N.C.O. and man in the battalion. The Irish Guards owe him a
deep and lasting debt of gratitude, and as long as any of us are left
who saw him out here, we shall never forget his wonderful life, and
shall strive to lead a better life by following his example." This
quality of our soldiers appears to have impressed observers, as well
as their fighting quality. It is referred to again and again, and the
same transference of thought from the character of the men to the
cause of their country, as appears in one of the letters above quoted
from a Scottish soldier, a spectator of "V" beach, occurs repeatedly:
"The race that can produce such men, who did such glorious work for
the Empire, has the most perfect right to get the freedom of its
country and the right to rule it.... There is not a man in the service
but who would willingly do anything now for the Irish people--yes, the
Irish Catholics."
Thus we see that our Irish troops in this war are fulfilling a
mission. As I said at the outset, it is into their keeping, with the
eyes of the world upon them, that the cause of their country for the
time being has passed. The influence of their action upon her fortunes
will extend far beyond the immediate effects which will appear the
moment the war is over. No people can be said to have rightly proved
their nationhood and their power to maintain it until they have
demonstrated their military prowess; and though Irish blood has
reddened the earth of every continent, never until now have we as a
people set a national army in the field. I have written vainly if I
have not shown, moreover, that never was a people more worthily
represented in the field than we are to-day by these Irish soldiers.
It is heroic deeds entering into their traditions that give life to
nations--that is the recompense of those who die to perform them--and
to Fontenoy, Cremona, Fredericksburg, and the rest, these soldiers of
the Irish people to-day have added Mons, Ypres, Loos, "V" beach, Suvla
Bay, Lake Doiran. How do the Irish people regard their armies in the
field? How do their brothers at home regard these brothers in the
battle line, who, at the call of danger and national opportunity, by
passing into the soldier's panoply have lifted the name of Irishmen to
a new plane in the world's eyes, and opened to their country's cause a
new outlook? To themselves the same opportunity of ennoblement comes.
The ranks of their brothers in the field are thinning under the
wastage of war. Will they keep them filled? Aye, will they! I have
given my lifetime, such as it has been, to the service of Ireland in a
deep faith in the essential nobility and wisdom of the Irish people. I
should be untrue to that faith if for a moment I had any doubt on this
matter--if I could harbour for a moment the idea that the young men of
Ireland could think unmoved of the wistful bewildered faces of their
noble brothers while they held back, could watch the ranks of the
Irish armies thinning, and the glorious regiments, brigades, and
divisions gradually filling up with others than Irish soldiers until
their character as Irish armies finally vanished and ceased to
exist--and something, I fear, would go with that character which
Ireland might never get back. No, the Irish race has not changed, as
these very soldiers have proved. Chivalry is of its essence, and
nations who do not want to die, but to live, as Ireland does, must act
through their essential qualities. Those brave sons in the field need
not fear for the honour they have won for their country. Their
brothers are coming to them. Ireland's armies will be maintained.
J.E. REDMOND.
_February, 1916_
FOOTNOTES:
[1] One is reminded of tributes to Meagher's Brigade at Fredricksburg
in the American Civil War. "Braver men," writes Horace Greely, in his
"American Conflict," "never smiled at death. Never did men fight
better or die, alas! more fruitlessly than did Hancock's corps,
especially Meagher's Irish Brigade, composed of the 63rd, 69th, and
88th New York, 28th Massachusetts, and the 116th Pennsylvania, which
dashed itself repeatedly against those impregnable heights, until
two-thirds of its numbers strewed the ground" (vol. ii., p. 345). In
the same book Greely quotes the following from the correspondent of
the London _Times_, watching the battle from the heights, and writing
from Lee's headquarters: "To the Irish Division commanded by General
Meagher was principally committed the desperate task of bursting out
of the town of Fredricksburg and forming under the withering fire of
the confederate batteries to attack Marye's Heights. Never at
Fontenoy, Albuera, or at Waterloo was more undoubted courage displayed
by the sons of Erin than during those six frantic attacks which they
directed against the almost impregnable position of the foe."
CHAPTER I
THE RETREAT FROM MONS
HOW THE MUNSTERS SAVED THE GUNS AND GOT RINGED ROUND WITH FIRE
Regular battalions of all the Irish regiments were included in the
British Expeditionary Force which left for France, at the outbreak of
war, in the early weeks of August, 1914. For its size it was the
finest Army that the world has ever seen, in equipment, discipline,
and martial ardour. It was commanded by Field-Marshal Sir John French,
the scion of an Irish family long settled in Roscommon, of which Lord
De Freyne is the head, and a soldier who made a brilliant reputation
as a cavalry leader in the South African War.
On the morning of Sunday, August 23rd, two of the three Army Corps
which composed the Force were extended along a front of twenty-five
miles east and west of Mons, a Belgian town of 25,000 inhabitants and
the centre of coal mining, iron, and glass works. In the First Corps,
under Sir Douglas Haig, were the 1st Irish Guards, the 2nd Munster
Fusiliers, and the 2nd Connaught Rangers. The Second Corps, under Sir
Horace Smith-Dorrien, included the 2nd Irish Rifles and the 2nd Royal
Irish Regiment. The 4th Royal Irish Dragoons were with the cavalry. An
Irish trooper of that regiment on outpost duty had the distinction of
opening the Great War between England and Germany by firing the first
shot, which brought down a Uhlan officer, in the early hours of
Saturday, August 22nd, fifteen miles beyond Mons, on the road to
Brussels.
The Battle of Mons, the first encounter in force between the British
and the Germans, commenced at twenty minutes to one o'clock on Sunday,
August 23rd. Not a German was then in sight. But an enemy aeroplane
hovered overhead, like a hawk peering for prey in the fields and
hedges, and there was a burst of shrapnel over the British lines,
followed by the booming of distant artillery. An attack so soon was
unexpected. The bells of Mons had been ringing for the Sunday
services, as usual, all the morning, and the Cathedral was crowded
with worshippers at the High Mass when the sound of the German guns
broke startlingly in upon their devotions. It was a beautiful day, and
many of the men in one of the Irish regiments billeted in a farmyard
close to the town were bare but for their trousers--availing
themselves of the warm sunshine to wash and dry their shirts and socks
after their long tramp in France and Belgium--when the bugles rang out
"Stand to arms." The Germans were unseen, but having on Saturday
beaten the French at Charleroi--to the British right--they were
advancing in overwhelming numbers, under Von Kluck, in the cover of
the woods, railway embankments and hedgerows. Soon the sharp crackle
of musketry was added to the cannonading of the guns, and the sabre
and lance of cavalry gleamed in the sun.
The first of the Irish regiments to exchange shots with the enemy's
infantry were the 2nd Rifles, who suffered severely, holding a
position in the suburbs of Mons. The 2nd Royal Irish Regiment
defended a village behind the town, and on the main road leading
south. A Gordon Highlander named Smiley says the Irish were "fearfully
cut up" when his company, about two miles behind, were directed to
advance to their relief. The Gordons crept up the road, and reached
the trenches of the Irish at dusk. Another Gordon says:--"When we got
to the trenches the scene was terrible. The Irish were unprepared for
the sudden attack. They were having dinner when the Germans opened on
them, and their dead and wounded were lying all around."
The Irish Guards, who lay to the east of Mons, on the British right,
had, as the regiment's first experience of warfare, to meet the shock
of a cavalry charge. One of the most popular recruiting posters in the
early days of the war was a picture of a comical-looking Tommy on the
field of battle. He was represented striking a match to light his pipe,
and saying, with a devil-may-care glint in his roguish eye, "Half a
mo', Kaiser," while German horsemen in the background were charging
towards him. The idea was suggested to the artist by an incident in the
encounter between the Irish Guards and the Germans at Mons. "I am
told," says an English newspaper correspondent, "that when the German
cavalry were only 200 yards away one Irish Guardsman momentarily put
down his rifle and begged a cigarette of a comrade, which he coolly
lit. Then they 'prepared to receive cavalry,' and did it in better
order and with much less excitement than if they had been about to
witness the finish of a St. Leger." In this we have an example of the
easy bearing in the presence of the advancing foe for which, by all
accounts, the Irish are remarkable. Such imperturbability springs not
so much from contempt of the enemy, as from confidence in their own
prowess. The two front ranks were kneeling, and presenting a double
row of steel. Their virgin bayonets, seen now for the first time on a
field of battle, glittered as sharp and terrible as if they had around
them the halo of a hundred victories. Standing behind were two other
ranks who poured a stream of rifle fire into the German horsemen. So
the Irish Guards met the whirlwind of galloping horses and flashing
swords, and drove back the survivors in a ragged, straggling line. They
were eager to start winning battle honours for their banners, and Mons
is a brilliant opening of a list that promises to be lengthy and
crowded before this Great War terminates.
Then came the order for a general retreat of the British forces. In
the evening Sir John French found out that he was vastly outnumbered
in men and guns--250,000 Germans to 82,000 British--and saw that if
his Army were to escape being outflanked and annihilated they must
retire until they got behind some substantial line of natural defence
which they could hope to hold against such fearful odds.
The retreat lasted twelve days. It was one long drawn-out rearguard
action. The fighting took place along a line of about twenty-five
miles and backwards for a distance of about eighty miles, which was
covered by forced marches at night as well as by day. Hardly for an
hour were the British permitted any rest or respite. They were
continually harassed by enormous masses of the enemy who by thundering
at their heels and striking at their flanks sought to turn the retreat
into a rout. In that the Germans completely failed. The retirement was
a splendid military achievement. It was also an episode of intense
dramatic interest, and though I am necessarily concerned only with the
part taken by the Irish regiments in the ordeal, it was made memorable
for all time by feats of unparalleled heroism and endurance by every
arm of the Service, and each and all of the nationalities represented
in it.
The British rearguard frequently gave battle to their pursuers,
holding them in check or sending them staggering back with the
vehemence of the blow. On Wednesday, August 26th, the first stand was
made on the Cambrai--Le Cateau--Landrecies line. Here it was that the
2nd Connaught Rangers gave the Germans another unpleasant taste of the
fighting quality of the Irish. "It was a grand time we had, and I
wouldn't have missed it for lashin's of money," says a private of the
regiment in a racy account of the episode. "The Germans kept pressing
our rearguard all the time. They were at least five to one, and we
were in danger of being cut off. At last the Colonel could stand it no
longer, so the word was passed round that we were to give them hell
and all. 'Rangers of Connaught,' says he, 'the eyes of all Ireland are
on you to-day, and I know you never could disgrace the old country by
allowing Germans to beat you while you have arms in your hands and
hearts in your breasts. Up, then, and at them, and if you don't give
them the soundest thrashing they ever got you needn't look me in the
face again in this world--or the next!' And we went for them with just
what you would know of a prayer to the Mother of Our Lord to be
merciful to the loved ones at home if we should fall in the fight. We
charged through and through them until they broke and ran like
frightened hares in terror of hounds."
That same day one Division of the Third Army Corps was brought
hurriedly up by train to Le Cateau. In it were three other Irish
regiments--1st Irish Fusiliers, 2nd Dublin Fusiliers, and 2nd
Inniskilling Fusiliers. They went straight into action to protect one
of the flanks of the resumed retirement. In a fight near Le Cateau the
Inniskillings lost many officers and men. The Dublins were at
Cambrai. They appear to have been uproariously and outrageously Irish.
A few weeks later the London correspondent of the _Manchester
Guardian_ gave some interesting extracts from a letter written by an
English officer of the Dublins. He said that while the men were
waiting for the Germans they sang "The Wearing of the Green" and "God
Save Ireland." One of the officers remarked, by way of a joke, "We
have heard enough all day of your damned Fenian songs, boys; give us
something else." The boys then struck up, the officer says, a song
called "Dear Old Ireland." This ballad, by T.D. Sullivan, tells in
stirring verses and chorus, set to a rousing air, of some of the
habits and customs of Ireland, and of the affection she inspires. One
verse runs:--
"We've seen the wedding, and the wake, the pattern and the fair,
The well-knit frames at the grand old games in the kindly
Irish air;
The loud 'Hurroo,' we've heard it, too; and the thundering
'Clear the way!'
Ah, dear old Ireland, gay old Ireland, Ireland, boys, hurrah."
It was not the first time that the song was heard on a field of
battle. On that night in December, 1863, in the American Civil War,
when the Federals and Confederates were bivouacked on the banks of the
Rappahannock awaiting the dawn to commence the bloody fight for
Fredericksburg, an Irish regiment in the service of the North sang the
song as they sat by their camp fires. Was that a tremendous echo that
came across the river?--
"For Ireland, boys, hurrah; for Ireland, boys, hurrah!
Here's dear old Ireland; fond old Ireland--
Ireland, boys, hurrah!"
The Irishmen of the North listened intently. Then it came upon them
with wild surprise that the chorus had been taken up by an Irish
regiment in the service of the South!
The officers of the Dublin Fusiliers at Cambrai were not scandalised,
nor did they put on a severe air, when they heard these rebelly songs,
survivals of a dead past, and yet deeply moving for the national
memories clustering round them. On the contrary, like good regimental
officers, they welcomed them, as they would probably have welcomed
anything that helped to raise the hearts of their men in their hour of
trial. "As my old brother-officer observes," says the writer of the
letter, "'These confounded Fenians can fight. Four times within one
hour my blackguards drove a charge home with the bayonet.'"
That day was a most critical one for the British. The Second Army
Corps was streaming southwards. But Von Kluck was making a determined
effort to outflank and envelop the First Army Corps. The Corps escaped
the net with the loss of one of their finest regiments, the 2nd
Munster Fusiliers, killed, wounded, and made prisoners. It was the
most tragic event of the retreat. A day or two previously the Munsters
were entrenched behind six guns of Field Artillery. Uhlans swept down
upon the battery and killed the gunners. Then two companies of the
Munsters charged with fixed bayonets, and put the Germans to flight.
But what was to be done with the guns? All the horses had been killed,
and time was pressing. Were the guns to be lost after all? The thought
never entered into the heads of the Munsters. By putting themselves
into harness, with a few light cavalry horses which they had captured
from the Uhlans, they pulled the guns away. "As we had not enough
horses," said a wounded Munster in hospital at Tralee, "we made mules
of ourselves, for we were not such asses as to leave the guns to the
enemy." The guns were brought back five miles, where horses were
available to relieve the Munsters.
On the night of August 26th the regiment were rearguard to the
retiring First Army. They held two cross-roads between Chapeau Rouge
to the north, and Fesney to the south, and had orders to keep watch
over these important positions until they got word to fall back. It is
said the word was sent not once, but thrice--the first during the
night--but only one reached them the following afternoon, and then it
was too late. The other despatch-riders lost their way, or were shot
or made prisoners. The result was that the Munsters were left in the
lurch while the mass of the First Corps, unaware of their comrades'
desperate position, were hurrying away to the south. At dawn, as the
regiment lay concealed behind the hedgerows and in the beet fields of
the farmsteads and in the orchards laden with fruit, they were
discovered by a German patrol. The enemy at once surrounded them on
three sides and attacked with vastly superior forces. "The Germans
came at us from all points, horse, foot and artillery and all," said
one of the survivors, "and the air was raving with shouting, screaming
men waving swords and rifles and blazing away at us like blue murder."
To add to their troubles the rain was falling in torrents, drenching
the men to the skin.
The officers decided to withdraw to the village of Etreux, a few miles
back, where they hoped to find the shelter of a position of defence
which might help them to hold up the Germans, despite the terrific
odds on the side of the enemy. The battalion retired by companies--two
companies covering the withdrawal of one another in turns. In fighting
these rearguard actions the men sought cover wherever they could find
it--crouching in farm buildings, and behind wagons, walls, and heaps
of stones, firing at the ever-advancing Germans. The Munsters were
grimly silent until it came to bayonet fighting between khaki and
grey, and then the air was rent with yells of rage and hate, shrieks
of pain, and the low wailing sobbing of the Irish keen.
During the retirement a despatch-rider reached the Munsters. He had a
message for them to retire "at once." It was not timed, but it was
probably the last of the three orders sent from Headquarters, and was
therefore written hurriedly. It seems also to have been written many
hours before it was delivered, as the bearer said he had been
compelled to hide for a long time from the Germans. But it was too
late. The Munsters were encircled by a ring of fire. The enemy had
worked round to their rear and now barred the way to the village of
Etreux. Major Paul Charrier, described as a hearty, genial Kerryman,
was in command of the Munsters. Three times he gallantly led his men
in an attack upon the key of the German position, a large mansion that
was loopholed and turned into a fortress. He was twice wounded, yet he
continued to lead, and in the last assault he fell to rise no more
with a bullet in his head. Eight other officers were also dead. Six of
the survivors were disabled. Between four and five hundred of the rank
and file were killed or wounded. Ammunition was run out. Not another
cartridge was to be found by the men in the bandoliers of their dead
and dying comrades. It was then 9 p.m. The men listened for sounds of
approaching relief, but none was heard. There was nothing left for the
remnant of the battalion, reduced to four officers and 256
non-commissioned officers and men, but to surrender. Only 155 men got
out of the trap, and most of these belonged to the regimental
transport. It came out afterwards that the Munsters had been engaged
against seven battalions of German infantry, three batteries of
artillery, many cavalry, and many Maxim guns.
So impressed were the Germans by the bravery of those Irish lads that
they paid every respect to the living and the dead. Captain H.S.
Jervis, the senior surviving officer, in letters written to the
bereaved wives and mothers of his fellows, states that the next day
the Germans allowed him to send out a burial party of his own men.
"They found Paul Charrier lying as he had fallen, head towards the
enemy," he tells Mrs. Charrier. "The sergeant told me he looked as if
he were asleep. They buried him, with eight other officers of the
regiment, in a grave separate from the men." More than that, when the
Germans learnt that their prisoners were Irish and Catholic they sent
for one of their own Catholic chaplains to read the service for the
dead at the graveside of the rank and file.
Sir Conan Doyle, in a lecture on "The Great Battles of the War,"
delivered in London, made the remark: "If ever surrender was
justifiable it was so in these circumstances." That was said before
full and authentic reports of what happened, including the composition
of the overwhelming forces that surrounded the Munsters, had come from
the officers imprisoned in Germany, which will be found in a little
pamphlet called "The Munsters," written by Mrs. Victor Rickard, the
widow of a brave man who afterwards commanded the battalion and fell
at Rue Du Bois. The military lesson of the episode, in the opinion of
Conan Doyle, is that great attention should be paid to making known
the real situation to troops operating at a distance, and the
miscarriage of the messages sent to the Munsters makes pertinent the
telling here of a story, on the authority of a wounded corporal of the
Gloucestershire Regiment, of a splendid example of Irish resolution
and endurance in the operations on the Aisne later on in September:--
"Orders had to be given to a battalion holding an advanced
position to fall back. The only way was to send a man with
orders through a murderous fire. Volunteers were asked for from
the Royal Irish Fusiliers. All wanted to go, but by tossing for
it a selection was made at last. He was a shock-headed lad who
did not look as if there was much in him, but he had grit.
Ducking his head in a way that made us laugh, he rushed into the
hail of shot and shell. He cleared the first hundred yards
without being hit; but in the second they brought him down. He
rose again and struggled on for a few minutes, was hit once
more, and then staggered a bit before finally collapsing.
"Two more men of the Irish Fusiliers dashed into the fire and
rushed across while the Germans were doing their best to pink
them. One picked up the wounded lad and started back to the
trenches, and the other, taking the despatch, ran ahead. Just as
the wounded man and his mate were within a few yards of our
trenches and we were cheering them, there came another hail of
bullets, and both went down dead. Meanwhile, the man with the
despatch was racing for all he was worth. He got through all
right till the last lap, when he was brought down. He was seen
from the other trenches, and half a dozen men ran to his aid.
They were all shot; but the man with the message was now
crawling towards the battalion in danger. With assistance he
reached them and the object was gained; they were withdrawn to a
new position before the Germans succeeded in their plan of
cutting them off."
By August 29th the British had fallen back to the line
Compiegne-Soissons, before the German hordes. The weather generally
was intensely hot, making the retreat still more trying to the Army.
The situation was further complicated by the flight southwards of
almost the entire population, thronging and blocking the roads. When
the British fell back the inhabitants had just commenced the saving of
the harvest which, undreaming of war, they had tended with solicitude
and saw growing with joy. But the corn and grass were to be garnered
by a dissolute and predatory foreign soldiery whose hands, in many
instances, were red with the innocent blood of those who had sown
them. So, accompanied by tens of thousands of fugitives--wailing women
and children for the most part, distracted by the dread and terror of
this calamity which had so incomprehensibly fallen upon them--the
British hastened on towards Paris.
On Tuesday, September 1st, the 4th Guards Brigade--Grenadiers,
Coldstreams, and Irish--had to sustain at Villers-Cotterets the brunt
of another of these fierce onslaughts which the Germans delivered
against such of the British troops as attempted to stem the pursuit.
The Brigade had had little rest since the commencement of the retreat
with the enemy ever at their heels. Only the day before, August 31st,
the Irish Guards had the longest and most trying of their forced
marches. Hardy, wiry, and fleet-footed, they covered thirty-five miles
with very little food, as their transport had to keep far in advance
of the column to avoid capture. At a parade of the battalion on the
roadside at Villers-Cotterets on the morning of September 1st, the
commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Morris, addressing them on
horseback, congratulated his men on their grit and vitality. He made
the very interesting statement that whilst a substantial percentage of
the other regiments in the Guards' Brigade had succumbed to the heat
and fatigue of the march, only five men of the Irish Guards had fallen
out from exhaustion.
Then all of a sudden, as the tale is told by Private Stephen
Shaughnessy of Tuam, the men got orders to "Fix bayonets." The news
was brought that the Germans were approaching under cover of the woods
which abound in this part of France. Colonel Morris rode through the
ranks, shouting, "Irish Guards, form up! Remember you are Irishmen!"
The Irish Guards entered one of the woods and almost immediately
caught sight of the Germans. Both sides blazed away at one another
with the rifle, through the trees and undergrowth, and frequently came
into grips at the point of the bayonet. Sergeant Patrick Joseph
Bennett, in a letter to his sister at Thurles, gives another instance
of the unruffled mood and quiet confidence of the men during the three
hours of fighting in the wood. "The Irish boys," he says, "were very
cool when the shots were flying round us. They were calmly picking
blackberries." In the end the Germans were beaten off, but at the
heavy loss to the Irish of 150 of the rank and file and several of the
officers. Morris was among the fallen. The last that Private
Shaughnessy saw of the Colonel was on the road beside the wood giving
orders, mounted on horseback and smoking a cigarette. He was the
younger son of Lord Morris and Killanin, a famous Irish judge and
humorist, and brother and heir-presumptive of Lord Killanin. He left a
son, Michael, who was born ten days before his father left for the
Front, and was just a month old when his father fell on the field of
honour. Colonel Morris was of the finest type of soldier, and was long
mourned by the regiment.
A good idea of the dangers and hardships of the retreat, apart from
the fighting, and also the humours which relieved it, is given by a
private of the 2nd Irish Rifles:--"It wasn't the fault of the Germans
if we got away alive. They were after us night and day," he says. The
greatest trouble of the regiment was to find their way through woods
and strange country by night. "We got on like the Babes in the Wood,
holding each other's hands, so as not to lose touch with each other.
We dare not light a match or make a sound that would betray our
presence, and when we saw lights in the distance twinkling like
will-o'-the-wisps, we had to send our scouts to find out the meaning
before we approached." Sometimes it was the Germans, and then the
scouts did not get back, and the regiment had to dodge the enemy as
best they could. "Once when they were looking for us their
searchlight played in the open just where we were, only we were in the
shade, and if we had moved another inch our shadows would have been
seen. We heard them talking and shouting to each other, but they gave
no chase, thinking we had got away in another direction. We had no
food for hours, except such fruit as we could pick up on the way."
Does it not read as if the pursuers and the pursued were playing some
monstrous game of hide-and-seek?
By September 3rd the Marne was crossed, and the long retreat of the
British was brought to an end without any grave disaster. French had
out-generalled and out-marched Von Kluck. But the Germans were also
over the river by the 5th and practically at the gates of Paris. The
British Army then fell back upon the Seine. So black did the prospect
appear that the French Government and Legislature thought it prudent
to remove from Paris to Bordeaux.