We remained in Landrecies until Saturday, August 29, expecting daily
to be returned to our own people in accordance with the terms of the
Geneva Convention. Our destination, however, was fated to be in the
opposite direction. Under an escort of half a dozen German soldiers,
commanded by an under-officer, we marched out of the town, up the hill
where the battle had taken place, to Bavay. It was a tiring journey for
the wounded men lying in ambulance wagons. The Hon. R. Keppel was the
only wounded officer. He traveled in a wagon with certain men of his
regiment, with whom he appeared to be on exceedingly friendly terms.
Two of the occupants of that wagon had lost an arm each, and they were
the cheeriest of our party.
It was dark when we reached Bavay, and everyone was tired out. The
journey seemed to be quite twenty miles. The first thing we did was
to see the wounded safely into the hospital, which was a young men's
college. M. L'Abbé J. Lebrun, the Superior, and his colleague were at
the door to welcome us. I was at once taken into the English ward, and
arrived just in time to commend the soul of a dying man, a private
of the 12th Lancers. His officer--though wounded--had got out of bed
to see the last of him, and besought me as I entered to visit his
dying comrade without delay. His anxiety on his friend's behalf was a
touching sight.
On the morrow, Sunday, August 30, I held a service, at the request of
the patients, in the English ward. I spoke on "Be of good cheer," or,
as we had so often heard it put by our French friends along the road,
"_Bon courage_."...
At the funeral of the 12th Lancer that afternoon we had an imposing
procession. The body was laid on a stretcher covered over with a Union
Jack and the French national flag. I led the way before the coffin,
robed in a cassock and surplice which had been presented to me by a
French priest to replace my own lost robes. After the coffin came the
three R.C. priests of the town and a number of the French Red Cross
nurses; then Major Collingwood and the men of the 4th Field Ambulance.
One of the nurses, noticing that I had no stole, on returning from the
funeral made me one of black material with three white crosses, and
presented it within a couple of hours.
The next day we were marched under escort to Mons. This is a large,
well-built town of about 35,000 inhabitants. We were paraded through
the cobbled streets to the barracks, then (evidently by a mistake) to
the station, and finally back again to the barracks, where, in some
dirty rooms over a filthy stable, we spent the night. Here we met the
Hon. Ivan Hay, of the 5th Lancers, who had narrowly escaped being shot
after his capture by the Germans, but he was not allowed to accompany
our party. The following morning we were marched once more to the
station, and were bundled into the station-master's office, which was
littered with looted papers. The men meanwhile were herded in a shed.
A sentry was posted at the entrance of the station to prevent anyone
going to the town. Just outside the station were the ambulance wagons
and our servants. Whyman, my soldier-servant, was amongst them with my
horse. That was the last I saw of either of them. I parted from them
with a very sad heart.
During the afternoon an ill-mannered under-officer bade us hand over
knives, razors, and sticks. At 6 P.M. we were entrained with about
1,000 wounded, of whom some forty or fifty were ours, the rest being
Germans. The train must have been a quarter of a mile long. In the
middle of the night we passed through Brussels, and in the early
morning through Louvain and Liège. Louvain seemed to be a heap of
ruins; hardly a house visible from the station was intact.... We looked
with great interest upon Liège as we passed through it, and recalled
the gallant defence of the town by the Belgians. A few more miles
brought us over the border into Germany.
At Aachen a hostile demonstration took place at our expense. There
happened to be a German troop train in the station at the time. A
soldier of our escort displayed a specimen of the British soldier's
knife, holding it up with the marline-spike open, and declared that
this was the deadly instrument which British medical officers had
been using to gouge out the eyes of the wounded Germans who had fallen
into their vindictive hands! From the knife he pointed to the medical
officers sitting placidly in the train, as much as to say, "And these
are some of the culprits." This was too much for the German soldiers.
They strained like bloodhounds on the leash. "Out with them!" said
their irate colonel, pointing with his thumb over his shoulder to
the carriages in which these bloodthirsty British officers sat. The
colonel, however, did not wait to see his behest carried out, and a
very gentlemanly German subaltern quietly urged his men to get back to
their train and leave us alone. The only daggers that pierced us were
the eyes of a couple of priests, a few women and boys, who appeared to
be shocked beyond words that even a clergyman was amongst such wicked
men. The enormity of the crimes which had necessitated my capture I
could only conjecture from their looks.
At Düsseldorf we crossed the Rhine--a beautiful sight. At Essen I was
permitted to visit one of our wounded men who was dying of tetanus. The
unfortunate patients lay in rows on the floor of luggage vans, with
straw beneath them. When the train stopped at a station the doors of
these vans were sometimes flung open in order that the crowd might have
a look at them....
Even the Red Cross ladies at the stations steeled their hearts against
us, giving us not so much as a cup of coffee or a piece of bread. But
for the haversack rations and chocolate, which most of us carried with
us, we should have fared badly. Now, however, we were to receive our
first meal from our captors. This consisted of a plate of hot soup
and a slice of bread and butter, which we ate ravenously. Two kind
ladies brought us this food, and we were duly grateful. One of them
was standing near me as we ate the meal, and I thanked her cordially
in English. She paid no attention, so I asked her if she understood
English. "I do, but I don't mean to," was her laconic reply, which
seemed highly to amuse my companions....
At length, on Friday morning, the journey came to an end on our
arrival at Torgau. We were ordered out of the train and drawn up on
the platform in fours. Each officer carried what articles of clothing
he possessed. Several of them had preserved their medical panniers,
and, heavy as these were, they had to be carried or left behind. On
either side of us a German guard with fixed bayonets was drawn up,
and then was given the word, "Quick march!" With our bundle on our
shoulder, there was no man could be bolder, yet this same bundle and
the burning sun prevented there being anything "quick" about our march.
The townsfolk evidently had heard that we were coming, and they were at
the station gate in scores to show us how pleased they were to welcome
us to their town. In fact, they told us quite freely what they thought
of us and the nation which we represented. They walked beside us every
inch of the way, keeping up our spirits by telling us the particular
kind of _Schweinhunds_ they believed the _Engländer_ to be. Not until
they had crossed the massive bridge which spans the Elbe and reached
the Brückenkopf fortress did they turn back home, and the doors of the
fortress closed behind us.