AN INFANTRY RECONNAISSANCE
Once more I must refer to Germany's railways. A line runs parallel with
the entire borderland at an average distance of about twenty
versts--that is, one day's march for an army. This parallel line is
connected with a highly elaborated railway system, extending to every
part of the German Empire: and there are scores of short lines, running
to towns on the actual frontier, where they terminate; with the very few
exceptions where they run on into Russia. Of course, these short lines
have a commercial importance; but their real value to Germany is that
they permit a fighting battle-line to be rapidly reinforced at many
points simultaneously. The Russians never successfully passed this
parallel border railway: that is, they never held it in force, and for a
considerable distance. It had, for Germany, a precisely similar value as
a defensive line that the Vistula had for Warsaw and the interior of
Russia. The railway-line stopped the Russian advance, as the Vistula did
that of the Germans, yet in different ways. The actual railway could not
stop the Russians; but the power of concentration it gave her opponents
did. On the other hand, the River Vistula did stop the Germans. They
could not force it, strongly held as it was by the Muscovite troops and
their heavy artillery. The contributary streams, with their deep, steep
banks, also hindered the attack, and greatly assisted the defence.
When I reached Lovicz I found the state of affairs much what it had been
two months previously, when the Russians were defending the course of
the great river against the Germans entrenched on the ground between it
and the Pilica. What extent of country was now reoccupied by the enemy I
had no means of learning with much exactitude; but it was certain that
they were again on the left bank of the Vistula, on the Pilica: and were
renewing their determined efforts to reach Warsaw. Lovicz was
threatened; but as this place is a railway junction, and of great
importance to Russia, preparations were in progress to defend the place
as long as possible.
I was in something of a predicament. At Lovicz I could find nobody who
knew me. The 40th Siberian regiment was said to be now in front of
Przemysl; and the Cossacks with whom I had been most frequently in
contact were departed, nobody knew whither. I could not see my way to
trying to rejoin the 40th; but it was necessary that I should have some
sort of official recognition, as it was contrary to regulation to have
loiterers about camp, to say nothing of the danger one would run of
being thought a spy and being dealt with accordingly. My friends, the
Cossacks, would probably put a wrong interpretation upon my inability to
give prompt and clear answers in their mother-tongue; and I should have
a similar difficulty with any officer who should happen to interrogate
me, besides running the risk of trouble with any civil officials I might
chance to meet.
So I began to look about me. I had papers, testimonials and a permit.
How could I utilize these?
Among the comrades with whom I had returned to the front was an officer
of the Tomski regiment. I applied to him, and he introduced me to a
Staff Captain named Muller. Muller, as we all know, is a very common
German name; but many Russians are of German stock. Muller, in spite of
his name, was a thorough Russian: and he stated my case to another Staff
Officer, Colonel Simmelchok, who proposed that I should apply for
recognition as a newspaper correspondent. The difficulty was that I
could not name any paper to which I was a contributor, or potential
contributor. Finally, the General commanding the troops at Lovicz was
applied to. Having expressed the opinion that I had better go home, he
refused to give me permission to join any Russian corps, and said that
if I remained at headquarters I must do so at my own risk. In view of
the excellent recommendations which I possessed from several Russian
commanders he would not positively order my departure: and in view of my
ignorance of the Russian language, he could not advise that I should be
given a commission in any Russian unit. I might enlist as a private if I
liked.
I saw at once that if I enlisted in a Russian regiment, my liberty of
action would be stopped immediately; and I should see no more of the war
than what the tip of my own bayonet could show: and I had serious
thoughts of departing, and trying some other commander. Colonel
Simmelchok came to the rescue. I might remain at my own risk. Very well:
Colonel Krastnovitz, commanding the 2nd battalion of the Vladimir
regiment was a friend of his, and would make me a member of their mess.
Nothing could have met my views better, except a remittance of ready
cash: but I was generously told that I need not trouble my head about
that: we were soldiers on campaign, and would mostly enjoy campaign fare
only; and so it proved. For we had few luxuries, except an occasional
fowl, or duck, obtained from the country-people, a batch of eggs or a
joint of pork. We never ran short of tobacco; but wine was almost
unknown in the mess.
There was a very decided change in the weather. The mud had disappeared
and the ground was frozen hard: the trees sparkled with frost particles,
and the ground was coated, every morning, with rime. The air was "shrewd
and biting," and we had some boisterous north winds which chilled me to
the marrow. Meanwhile desperate fighting was going on, and the Russians
seemed to be giving ground in several places. The ground was becoming so
hard that trench-making became difficult, and a good deal of the
fighting was in the open under old-fashioned conditions: the losses,
therefore, were exceptionally heavy, especially in killed and wounded.
More prisoners are taken in trench warfare than in any other form of
military action owing to the fact that if the men do not escape before
an assault takes place they have no chance of doing so when the enemy
is actually amongst them. The broad hind-quarters of a Deutschman
crawling over the crest of a trench affords a remarkably fine butt for a
bayonet thrust: and Huns usually prefer surrender to cold steel.
For several days we were left in doubt of what was taking place in our
neighbourhood, though daily glowing accounts reached us of the progress
of Russian arms in the Austrian area of the war. The general impression
seemed to be that matters were not going on so well in the West Polish
district as they should be.
On the 20th we made a night march to a village, the name of which did
not transpire. It was deserted, with the exception perhaps of a dozen
miserable starving creatures, and had been partly burnt down. We arrived
about four o'clock in the morning, at which time it had been snowing
heavily for two hours.
We remained hiding in the village all day, fires and even smoking being
strictly forbidden. There were about 800 of us: and I do not know if
there were other infantry detachments near us, but I heard from the
Colonel that a force of Cossacks was reconnoitring some eight or nine
versts in front of us; and we could hear the distant booming of heavy
guns, a sure sign that the contending parties were in contact, as
artillery do not fire at nothing.
The greater part of the day snow was falling, and though it cleared up
in the evening it was only for a few hours. We had brought three days'
rations in our haversacks. The food consisted of biscuit, and fat
boiled mutton, which is excellent diet for marching men. Our drink was
water only, which we had to procure where we could find it; not an easy
task, as the rivers were full of putrid bodies and carcasses of horses,
and the Germans had polluted many of the wells.
On the 21st we made another night march over an open plain on which were
many small pine-woods. We kept under cover as much as possible, and
finally halted in a pine-wood, where we hid ourselves all day, not
seeing a soul of any kind. In the afternoon a Cossack arrived, and
delivered a written message to the Colonel, the contents of which he did
not divulge; but at night he called for a dozen volunteers who, he said,
must be men of enterprise, not afraid to sacrifice themselves if
necessary. These men were placed under the command of a young officer,
Captain Folstoffle, and proceeded along the bed of a frozen brook, our
feet being muffled with pieces of sheep's skin. Naturally I supposed
that we were near the enemy; but Folstoffle spoke not a word of either
French or English, and no communication of any kind was made to me or to
the men: we were left to glean information from the "march of events."
The booming of the guns continued, at intervals, all night, and to the
north-west the sky was crimson with the reflection of a large fire--a
burning town, I imagined. The only sign of life I saw was a large animal
(a wild boar, I think), which rushed out of the cover of some rushes
when disturbed by our approach.
The whole country was covered with snow, which was loose, and about a
foot deep. This was a drawback, as we must have shown up darkly to an
enemy: at the same time it increased our chances of seeing the approach
of persons or soldiers, not clothed in white, though this hue was often
used by the Germans to conceal themselves when the country was
snow-clad. We had left our bivouac at about nine o'clock, and marched on
until 2 a.m., when Folstoffle decided to halt for a rest. The spot
chosen for this purpose was a clump of bushes with a small two-storied
farm-house about 300 yards distant. It was necessary to examine this
house, and I volunteered for the service, making myself understood by
signs and the few words of Russian I was now master of. I started alone,
but one of the men followed close behind me, holding his rifle at the
"Present," ready to fire instantly if need should require it, though it
seemed improbable that any of the enemy were in the house. As we
approached, however, I was astonished to see a man hanging out of one of
the windows, and another leaning over him from behind. Both were partly
covered with snow, and it hardly required more than a glance to show
that they were dead. A few yards nearer, and I could see that their
clothing was in tatters, and fluttering in the night breeze.
The weather had cleared up, and was now bright; and the reflection from
the snow enabled one to see objects with considerable distinctness,
though some distance away; and I noticed several curious-looking heaps,
or mounds, near the house, from which a horrible stink emanated, as it
did from the building itself.
The place had been subjected to a bombardment; all the windows were
smashed out, and one door lay flat on the ground; the other hung by a
single hinge only, and we had no difficulty in entering. The soldier had
a pocket-lamp, and he struck a light by means of flint and tinder, a
contrivance which is still in use in Russia. The body of a huge man lay
at the foot of the stairs. He was nearly naked, and much decayed; and we
could not tell if he had been friend or foe. The whole place was in much
confusion. There had evidently been hand to hand fighting in all the
rooms; and upstairs there were the remains of about a dozen men heaped
together in the apartment where the two corpses first noticed were
hanging out of the window. All were in an advanced state of decay, and
must have been dead weeks, if not months. The horrible fetor of the
place was unendurable, and we were glad to return into the fresh air,
the soldier being greatly upset. I thought it advisable to return and
report before making a further search of the house and its environs; and
Folstoffle decided to wait until the morning before examining the
neighbourhood.
The spot where this discovery was made was between Klodava and
Krasuyvice. No doubt there had been fighting all over this district, but
none of those composing our party had taken a part in it. In the morning
we found nearly a hundred bodies scattered about, and lying in two
heaps in what appeared to have been the garden and orchard of the farm:
but the place was completely wrecked. The sight was, on a small scale,
as dreadful as any I witnessed during the war. Many of the dead were
skeletons, or nearly so: animals, probably dogs and pigs, had been at
work on others; and all were pretty well in the last stage of putridity.
Many retained the positions in which they had died and stiffened. One
man, with no eyes left in the sockets of his skull, was holding one arm
straight up in the air; another had both arms and legs raised as he lay
on his back--a position which would have been comical if it had not been
so dreadful and tragical. In one heap were two men clasping each other
in what had evidently been a death struggle. Another still grasped the
bayonet with which he had killed a foe: and an officer had his sword
raised and his mouth wide open as if giving an order at the instant of
his death. The appearance of all was so extremely ghastly that it cannot
be described. Though mostly covered with snow I saw many faces which
were blue, green, black in hue, and had lost all resemblance to human
features. Russians and Germans lay there in about equal proportions; and
there we were compelled to leave them: for we had no tools, nor was the
ground in a condition for rapid grave-digging. There may have been more
bodies in some of the neighbouring ravines and woods; but we had no time
to look for them. From what I afterwards saw, I have no doubt that the
dead were often left unburied; a dreadful thing, for there is always a
host of ravenous dogs in Russian villages; and as many of these were now
ownerless, they had run wild. Besides these there were wild boars and
wolves, always ready to take toll of the battlefield; to say nothing of
the crow and the raven.
Folstoffle's orders had been to return before midday on the 23rd; but it
was after that hour before we turned to rejoin our main body. About four
o'clock we met a section coming to look for us, as Colonel Krastnovitz
had become anxious.
The object of the reconnaissance was said to be accomplished; we had
found that there were no enemies in that district; or, at any rate, in
our immediate neighbourhood; and this information was corroborated by
that of half a sotnia of Cossacks, who, it seems, had been acting in
conjunction with us, though we had seen nothing of them since starting
on our little expedition.
But our leaders must have had a belief that the enemy was at hand: for
we received orders to fall back on our deserted village, and put it into
a state of defence, which we did by loopholing what remained of the
walls, and digging trenches round the outskirts.
In cases like this the trenches are held and defended while the enemy is
using his artillery; but when the actual assault takes place, and he can
no longer use his guns for fear of injuring his own troops, the
defenders retire to the loop-holes as a second line of defence; and as
they can fire into the trenches, these are seldom tenable by the enemy.