CUINCHY AND GIVENCHY
Throughout October and November our battalion was in the firing-line.
This meant that we spent life in an everlasting alternation between the
trenches and our billets behind, just far enough behind, that is, to be
out of the range of the light artillery; always, though, liable to be
called suddenly into the firing-line, and never out of the atmosphere
of the trenches. Always before us was dangled a promised “rest,” and
always it was being postponed. Rumours were spread, dissected, laughed
at, and eventually treated with bored incredulity. The battalion had
had no rest, I believe, since May. Men, and especially N.C.O.‘s, who
had been out since October, 1914, were tired out in body and spirit.
With the officers and certain new drafts of men, it was different. We
came out enthusiastic and keen. On the whole, I thoroughly enjoyed
those first two months. I am surprised now to see how much detail I
wrote in my letters home. Everything was fresh, everything new and
interesting. And things were on the whole very quiet. We had a few
casualties, but underwent no serious bombardment. And, most important
to us, of course, we had no casualties among the officers.
Givenchy and Cuinchy are two small villages, north and south,
respectively, of the La Bassée Canal, which runs almost due east and
west between La Bassée and Béthune. Givenchy stands on a slight rise in
the flattest of flat countries. A church tower of red brick must have
been the most noticeable feature as one walked in pre-war days from
the suburbs of Béthune along the La Bassée road. Cuinchy is a village
straggling along a road. Both are as completely reduced to ruins as
villages can be, the firing-line running just east of them. Between
them flows the great sluggish canal.
During an afternoon in Béthune one could do all the shopping one
required, and get a hair-cut and shampoo as well. Expensive cocktails
were obtainable at the local bar; there was also a famous tea-shop. We
were billeted in one of the small villages around. Sometimes we only
stayed one night at a billet: there was always change, always movement.
Sometimes I got a bed; often I did not; but a valise is comfortable
enough, when once its tricks are mastered. Anyhow it is “billets”
and not “trenches,” that is the point; a continuous night’s rest in
pyjamas, the facilities of a bath, very often a free afternoon and
evening, and no equipment and revolver to carry night and day! It was
in billets the following letters were written, which are really the
best description of my life at this period.
“19th October, 1915. Our battalion went into the trenches on the 14th
and came out on the 17th. Our company, ‘B,’ was in support. The front
line was about 300 yards ahead, and we held the second line, everything
prepared to meet an attack in case the enemy broke through the first
line. Half-way between our first and second lines was a kind of
redoubt, to be held at all costs. Here you are:
[Illustration: The arrows indicate the direction in which the
fire-trenches point.]
The line here forms a big salient, so that we often used to get spent
bullets dropping into the redoubt, from right behind, it seemed. Here,
another drawing will show what I mean:
[Illustration]
The dotted line is the German front trench. If the enemy A fires at the
English B, the bullet will go on and fall at about C, who is facing in
the direction of the arrow, in the support line. So C has to look out
for _enfilading spent bullets_.
For three days and nights I was in command of this redoubt, isolated,
and ready with stores, ammunition, water, barbed wire and pickets,
bombs, and tools, to hold out a little siege for several days if
necessary. I used to leave it to get meals at Company H.Q. in the
support line; otherwise, I had always to be there, ready for instant
action. No one used to get more than two or three hours’ _consecutive_
sleep, and I could never take off boots, equipment, or revolver.
Here is a typical scene in the redoubt.
_Scene._ A dug-out, 6´ × 4´ × 4´: smell, earthy.
_Time._ 2.30 a.m.
I awake and listen. Deathly stillness.
_A voice._ ‘What’s the time, kid?’
_Another voice._ ‘Dunno. About 2 o’clock, I reckon.’
‘Past that.’
Long silence.
‘Rum job, this, ain’t it, kid?’
‘Why?’
‘Well, I reckon if the ---- Huns were coming over, we’d know it long
afore they got ’ere. I reckon we’d ’ear the boys in front firing.’
Long pause.
‘I dunno. ’Spose there’s some sense in it, else we wouldn’t be ’ere.’
Silence.
‘---- cold on this ---- fire step. Guess it’s time they relieved us.’
Long silence.
‘Don’t them flares look funny in the mist?’
‘Yus, I guess old Fritz uses some of them every night. Hullo, there
they go again. ’Ear that machine-gun?’
Long pause, during which machine-guns pop, and snipers snipe
merrily, and flares light up the sky. Trench-mortars begin behind us
‘whizz-sh-sh-sh-h-h’--silence--‘THUD.’ Then the Germans reply, sending
two or three over which thud harmlessly behind. The invisible sentries
have now become clearly visible to me as I look out of my dug-out. Two
of them are about ten yards apart standing on the fire-platform. Theirs
is the above dialogue.
With a sudden _thud_, a trench-mortar shell drops fifteen yards behind
us.
‘Hullo, Fritz is getting the wind up.’
‘Getting the wind up’ is slang for getting nervous: this stolid comment
from a sentry is typical of the attitude adopted towards ‘Fritz’ (the
German) when he starts shelling or finding. He is supposed to be a bit
jumpy! It seems hard to realise that Fritz is really trying to kill
these sentries: the whole thing seems a weird, strange play.
I make an effort, and crawl out of the dug-out. The ‘strafing’ has died
down. Only occasional flares climb up from the German lines, and ‘pop,’
‘pop’ in the morning mist. I go round the sentries, standing up by them
and looking over the parapet. It is cold and raw, and the sentries are
looking forward to the next relief. Ah! there is the corporal on trench
duty coming. I can hear him routing out the snoring relief.
‘Ping-g-g-g’ goes a stray bullet singing by--a ricochet by its sound.
‘A near one, sir.’
‘Yes, Evans. Safer in the front line.’
‘I guess it is, sir.’
Then, the sentries changed, I turn back again to my dug-out. Sleeping
with revolvers and equipment requires some care of position.
‘Half-past four, sir,’ comes after a pause and some sleep.
Out I get, and everybody ‘stands to’ arms for an hour, each man taking
up the position allotted to him along the fire-platform. Gradually it
gets light. Some brick-stacks grow out of the mist in front, and ruined
cottages loom up in the rear, and what was a church. The fire-platform
being here pretty high, one can look back over the parados over bare
flat country, cut up by trenches and run to waste terribly. ‘Parados,’
by the way, is the name given to the back of a trench; here is a
drawing in section:
[Illustration:
A. Bottom of trench. C. Parapet. B. Fire-step. D. Parados.]
At 5.30 ‘Stand down and clean rifles’ is the order given; and the
cleaning commences--a process as oft-repeated as ‘washing up’ in
civilised lands, and as monotonous and unsatisfactory, for a few hours
later the rifles are a bit rusty and muddy again, and need another
inspection.
7.30. ‘Tell Sergeant Summers I’m going down to Company Headquarters.’
‘Very good, sir.’ Then I take a long mazy journey down the
communication trench, which is six feet deep at least, and mostly
paved with bricks from a neighbouring brick-field. There are an
amazing lot of mice about the trenches, and they fall in and can’t
get out. Most of them get squashed. Frogs too, which make a green and
worse mess than the mice. Our C.O. always stops and throws a frog
out if he meets one. Tommy, needless to say, is not so sentimental.
These trenches have been built a long time, and grass-stalks, dried
scabious, and plantain-stalks grow over the edges, which must make them
very invisible from above. ‘H----Street,’ ‘L---- Lane,’ ‘C----Road,’
‘P----Lane’ are traversed, and so into ‘S---- Street,’ where, in
the cellar of what was once a house, are two hungry officers already
started on bacon and eggs, coffee (with condensed milk), and bread and
tinned jam. We are lucky with three chairs and a table. A newspaper
makes an admirable tablecloth, and a bottle a good candlestick, and
there is room in a cellar to stand up. Breakfast done, a shave is
manipulated, Meadows, my servant, getting ready my tackle and producing
a mug of hot water.
9.30 finds me back in the redoubt and starting a ‘working party’ on
repairing a communication trench and generally improving the trenches.
Working parties are unpopular; Tommy does not believe in improving
trenches he may never see again. And so the day goes on. Sentries
change and take their place, sitting gazing into a scrap of mirror.
Ration parties come up with dixies carried on wooden pickets, and the
pioneer generally cleans up, sprinkling chloride of lime about in white
showers, which seems as plentiful as the sand of the seashore, and the
odour of which clings to the trenches, as the smell of seaweed does to
the beach.
* * * * *
The redoubt was in the Cuinchy trenches, and that old cellar was really
a delightful headquarters. The first time we were in it we found a cat
there; on the second occasion the same cat appeared with three lusty
kittens! These used to keep the place clear of rats and get sat on
every half-hour or so. I soon learned to get used to smoke; on one
occasion the smoke from our brazier became so thick that Gray, the
cook, threatened to resign. For all the smoke gathers at the top of a
dug-out and seems impossibly suffocating to anyone first entering; yet
it is often practically clear two or three feet from the ground, so
that when lying or sitting one does not notice the smoke at all; but a
new-comer gets his eyes so stung that it seems impossible that anyone
can live in the dug-out at all! (Gray, by the way, was not allowed to
resign.)”
* * * * *
Here follows a letter describing the front trenches at Givenchy:
“7th November. On the 29th we marched off at 9.0 and halted at 11.0
for dinner. Luckily it was fine, and the piled arms, the steaming
dixies, and the groups of men sitting about eating and smoking formed
a pleasant sight. Our grub was put by mistake on the mess-cart which
went straight on to the trenches! Edwards, however, our Company
mess-president, came up to the scratch with bread, butter, and eggs.
Tea was easily procured from the cookers. Then off we went to our
H.Q. There we got down into the communication trench, and in single
file were taken by guides into our part of the trenches: these guides
were sent by the battalion we were relieving. I told you that all the
trenches have names (which are painted on boards hung up at the trench
corners). The first thing done was to post sentries along our company
front: until this was done the outgoing battalion could not ‘out-go.’
Each man has his firing position allotted to him, and he always
occupies it at ‘stand to’ and ‘stand down.’ We were three days and
three nights in the trenches. Each officer was on duty for eight hours,
during which he was responsible for a sector of firing-line and must be
actually in the front trench. My watch was 12 to 4, a.m. and p.m. Work
that out with ‘stand to’ in the morning and also in the evening and you
will see that consecutive sleep is not easy! On paper 6-12 (midnight)
looks good; but then, remember, dinner at 7.0 or 7.30 according to the
fire, while you may have to turn out any time if you are being shelled
at all. For instance, one night I was just turning in early at 7.0,
when a mine went up on our right, and shelling and general ‘strafing’
kept me out till 9.30, after which I couldn’t sleep! So at midnight I
was tired when I started my four hours, turned in at 4.0, out again for
‘stand to,’ 8.0 breakfast, 9.0 rifle inspection, and so it goes on!
That is why you can appreciate _billets_, and bed from 9.0 to 7.0 if
you want it.
Imagine a cold November night--with a ground fog. What bliss to be
roused from a snug dug-out at midnight, and patrol the Company’s line
for four interminable hours. It is deathly quiet. Has the war stopped?
I stand up on the fire-step beside the sentry and try to see through
the fog. ‘Pip-pip-pip-pip-pip’ goes a machine-gun. So the war’s still
on.
‘Cold?’ I ask a sentry. ‘Only me feet, sir.’ ‘Why don’t you stamp your
feet, then?’ This being equivalent to an order, Tommy stamps feebly
a few times until made to do so energetically. Unless you _make_ him
stamp, he will not stamp; would infinitely prefer to let his feet
get cold as ice. Of course, when you have gone into the next bay, he
immediately stops. Still, that is Tommy.
I gaze across into No Man’s Land. I can just see our wire, and in front
a collection of old tins--bully tins, jam tins, butter tins--paper, old
bits of equipment. Other regiments always leave places so untidy. You
clean up, but when you come into trenches you find the other fellows
have left things about. You work hard repairing the trenches: the
relieving regiment, you find on your return, has done ‘damn all,’ which
is military slang for ‘nothing.’ And all other regiments, it seems,
have the same complaint.
‘Swish.’ A German flare rocket lights up everything. You see our
trenches all along. Everything is as clear as day. You feel as
conspicuous as a cromlech on a hill. But the enemy can’t see you, fog
or no fog, if you only keep still. The light has fallen on the parapet
this time, and lies sizzling on the sand-bags. A flicker, and it is
gone; and in the fog you see black blobs, the size and shape of the
dazzling light you’ve just been staring at.
‘Crack--plop.’ ‘Crack--plop.’ A couple of bullets bury themselves in
the sand-bags, or else with a long-drawn ‘ping’ go singing over the
top. Why the sentries never get hit seems extraordinary. I suppose
a mathematician would by combination and permutation tell you the
chances against bullets aimed ‘at a venture’ hitting sentries exposing
one-fourth of their persons at a given elevation at so many paces
interval. Personally I won’t try, as my whole object is to keep awake
till four o’clock. And then I shall be too sleepy. Only remember, it is
night and the sentries are invisible.
‘Tap--tap--tap.’ ‘There’s a wiring party out, sir. I’ve heard ’em these
last five minutes.’ Undoubtedly there are a few men out in No Man’s
Land, repairing their wire. I tell the sentries near to look out and
be ready to fire, and then I send off a ‘Very’ flare, fired by a thick
cartridge from a thick-barrelled brass pistol. It makes a good row, and
has a fair kick, so it is best to rest the butt on the parapet and hold
it at arm’s length. Even so it leaves your ears singing for hours. The
first shot was a failure--only a miserable rocket tail which failed
to burst. The second was a magnificent shot. It burst beautifully,
and fell right behind the party, two Germans, and silhouetted them,
falling and burning still incandescent on the ground behind. A volley
of fire followed from our waiting sentries. I could not see if the
party were hit; most of the shots were fired after the light had died
out. Anyhow, the working party stopped. The two figures stood quite
motionless while the flare burned.
The Germans opposite us were very lively. One could often hear them
whistling, and one night they were shouting to one another like
anything. They were Saxons, who are always at that game. No one knows
exactly what it means. It was quite cold, almost frosty, and the
sound came across the 100 yards or so of No Man’s Land with a strange
clearness in the night air. The voices seemed unnaturally near, like
voices on the water heard from a cliff. ‘Tommee--Tommee. Allemands
bon--Engleesh bon.’ ‘We hate ze _Kron_prinz.’ (I can hear now the
nasal twang with which the ‘Kron’ was emphasised.) ‘D---- the Kaiser.’
‘Deutschland _unter_ Alles.’ I could hear these shouts most distinctly:
the same sentences were repeated again and again. They shouted to one
another from one part of the line to another, generally preceding
each sentence by ‘Kamerad.’ Often you heard loud hearty laughter. As
‘Comic Cuts’ (the name given to the daily Intelligence Reports) sagely
remarked, ‘Either this means that there is a spirit of dissatisfaction
among the Saxons, or it is a ruse to try and catch us unawares, or it
is mere foolery.’ Wisdom in high places!
Really it was intensely interesting. ‘Come over,’ shouted Tommy.
‘We--are--not--coming--over,’ came back. Loud clapping and laughter
followed remarks like ‘We hate ze _Kron_prinz.’ Then they would yodel
and sing like anything. Tommy replied with ‘Tipperary.’ They sang,
‘God save the King,’ or rather their German equivalent of it, to the
familiar tune. Then, ‘Abide with us’ rose into the night air and
starlight. This went on for an hour and a half; though almost any night
you can hear them shout something, and give a yodel--
[Music]
It is the strangest thing I have ever experienced. The authorities now
try and stop our fellows answering. The _entente_ of last Christmas
is not to be repeated! One of the officers in our battalion has shown
me several German signatures on his pay-book (he was in the ranks
then), given in friendly exchange in the middle of No Man’s Land last
Christmas Day.
I have had my baptism of mud now. It tires me to think of it, and
I have not the effort to write fully about it! The second time we
were in these trenches the mud was two feet deep. Even our Company
Headquarters, a cellar, was covered with mud and slime. Paradoses and
communication trenches had fallen in, and the going was terrible. The
sticky mud yoicked one’s boots off nearly, and it felt as if one’s
foot would be broken in extricating it. We all wore gum-boots, of
blue-black rubber, that come right up to the waist like fishermen’s
waders. But the mud is everywhere, and we get our arms all plastered
with it as we literally “reel to and fro” along the trench, every now
and again steadying ourselves against slimy sand-bags. One or two men
actually got stuck, and had to be helped out with spades; one fellow
lost heart and left one of his gum-boots stuck in the mud, and turned
up in my platoon in a stockinged foot, of course plastered thick with
clay! We worked day and night. Gradually the problem is being tackled.
Trench-boards, or ‘mats,’ are the best, like this:
[Illustration]
They are put along the bottom of the trench, the long ‘runners’ resting
on bricks taken from ruined houses, so as to raise the board and allow
drainage underneath. If possible, a deep sump-pit is dug under the
centre of the board. (The shaded part represents the sump-pit: the
dotted lines are the sides of the trench; the whole drawing in plan.)”
* * * * *
Weariness. Mud. The next experience (not mentioned in my letter) was
Death. On our immediate right was “C” Company. Here our trench runs
out like this __Ʌ_, more or less, and the opposite trenches are very
close together. Consequently it is a great place for “mining activity.”
One evening we put up a mine; the next afternoon the Germans put up a
countermine, and accompanied it with a hail of trench-mortars. I was
on trench duty at the time, and had ample opportunity of observing
the genus trench-mortar and its habits. One can see them approaching
some time before they actually fall, as they come from a great height
(in military terms, “with a steep trajectory”), and one can see them
revolving as they topple down. Then they fall with a _thud_, and black
smoke comes up and mud spatters all about. Most of them were falling
in our second line and support trenches. I was patrolling up and down
our front trench. We were “standing to” after the mine, and for half an
hour it was rather a “hot shop.” I was delighted to find that I rather
enjoyed it: seeing one or two of the new draft with the “wind up” a
bit steadied me at once. I have hardly ever since felt the slightest
nervousness under fire. It is mainly temperament. Our company had four
casualties: one in the front trench, the three others in the platoon
in support. “C” Company suffered more heavily. At 6.0 Edwards came on
duty, and I was able to go in quest of two bombers who were said to be
wounded. Getting near the place I came on a man standing half-dazed in
the trench. “Oh, sirrh,” he cried, in the burring speech of a true
Welshman. “A terench-mohrterh hass fall-en ericht in-ter me duck-out.”
For the moment I felt like laughing at the man’s curious speech and
look, but I saw that he was greatly scared: and no wonder. A trench
mortar had dropped right into the mouth of his dug-out, and had half
buried two of his comrades. We were soon engaged in extricating them.
Both had bad head wounds, and how he escaped is a miracle. I helped
carry the two men out and over the debris of flattened trenches to
Company Headquarters. So, for the first time I looked upon two dying
men, and some of their blood was on my clothes. One died in half an
hour--the other early next morning. It was really not my job to assist:
the stretcher-bearers were better at it than I, yet in this first
little bit of “strafe” I was carried away by my instinct, whereas later
I should have been attending to the living members of my platoon,
and the defence of my sector. I left the company sergeant-major in
difficulties as to whether Randall, the man who had so miraculously
escaped, and who was temporarily dazed, should be returned as “sick” or
“wounded.”
Another death that came into my close experience was that of a
lance-corporal in my platoon. I had only spoken to him a quarter
of an hour before, and on returning found him lying dead on the
fire-platform. He had been killed instantaneously by a rifle grenade.
I lifted the waterproof sheet and looked at him. I remember that I
was moved, but there was nothing repulsive about his recumbent figure.
I think the novelty and interest of these first casualties made them
quite easy to bear. I was so busy noticing details: the silence that
reigned for a few hours in my platoon; the details of removing the
bodies, the collecting of kit, etc. These things at first blunted my
perception of the vileness of the tragedy; nor did I feel the cruelty
of war as I did later.
Weariness. Mud. Death. So it was with great joy that we would return
to billets, to get dry and clean, to eat, sleep, and write letters;
to drill, and carry out inspections. Company drill, bayonet-fighting,
gas-helmet drill, musketry, and lectures were usually confined to the
morning and early afternoon. We thought that we had rather an overdose
of lecturing from our medical officer (the M.O.) on sanitation and
the care of the feet. “Trench feet,” one lecture always began, “is
that state produced by excessive cold or long standing in water or
liquid mud.” We soon got to know too much, we felt, about the use of
whale-oil and anti-frostbite grease, the changing of socks and the
rubbing and stamping of feet. We did get rather “fed up” with it; yet I
believe we had only one case of trench feet in our battalion throughout
the winter; so perhaps it was worth our discomfort of attending so
many lectures! Our C.O.’s lectures on trench warfare were always
worth hearing: he was so tremendously keen and such a perfect and
whole-hearted soldier.
A chapter might be written on billet-life. Here are a few more extracts
from letters:
“Oct. 13th. All day long this little inn has shaken from top to bottom:
there is one battery about a hundred yards away that makes the whole
house rattle like the inside of a motor-bus. The Germans might any
time try and locate the battery, and a shell would reduce the house to
ruins. Yet the old woman here declares she will not leave the house as
long as she lives!
It is a strange place, this belt of land behind the firing-line. The
men are out of the trenches for three days, and it is their duty, after
perhaps a running parade before breakfast and two or three hours’
drill and inspection in the morning, to rest for the remainder of the
day. In the morning you will see all the evolutions of company drill
carried out in a small meadow behind a strip of woodland; in the next
field an old man and woman are unconcernedly hoeing a cabbage-patch;
then behind here are a battalion’s transport lines, with rows of horses
picketed. Along the road an A.S.C. convoy is passing, each lorry at
regulation distance from the next. In the afternoon you will see groups
of Tommies doing nothing most religiously, smoking cigarettes, writing
letters home. From six to eight the _estaminets_ are open, and everyone
flocks to them to get bad beer. They are also open an hour at midday,
and then the orderly officer, accompanied by the provost-sergeant,
produces an electric silence with ‘Any complaints?’ It does not pay an
_estaminet_-keeper to dilute his beer too much, or else he will lose
his licence.
I often wonder if these peasants think much. Think they must have done
at the beginning, when their men were hastily called up. But now, after
fifteen months of war? It is the children, chiefly, who are interested
in the aeroplanes, shining like eagles silver-white against the blue
sky; or in the boom from the battery across the street. But for their
mothers and grandparents these things have settled into their lives;
they are all one with the canal and the poplar trees. If a squad starts
drilling on their lettuces, they are tremendously alert; but as for
these other things, they are not interested, only unutterably tired of
them. And after awhile you adopt the same attitude. The noise of the
guns is boring and you hardly look up at an aeroplane, unless it is
shrapnelled by the ‘Archies’ (anti-aircraft guns); then it is worth
watching the pin-prick flashes dotting the sky all round it, leaving
little white curls of smoke floating in the blue.”
* * * * *
That billet was close to the firing-line. Here is a letter from a
village, eight miles back:
“20th Oct., 1915. We came out here on Monday. The whole division
marched out together. It was really an impressive sight, over a mile
of troops on the march. Perfect order, perfect arrangement. Where
the road bent you could often see the column for a mile in front, a
great snake curling along the right side of the road. Occasionally an
adjutant would break out of the line to trot back and correct some
straggling; or a C.O. would emerge for a gallop over the adjacent
ploughland.
Our company is billeted in a big prosperous farm. The men are in a
roomy barn and look very comfortable. We are in a big room, on the
right as you enter the front door of the farm: on a tiled floor stands
a round table with an oilcloth cover, originally of a bright red
pattern, but now subdued by constant scrubbings to the palest pink with
occasional scarlet dottings. There are big tall windows, a wardrobe
and sideboard, a big chimney-place fitted with a coke stove, and on
the walls hang three very dirty old prints. The only war touch (beside
our scattered possessions) is a picture from a French Illustrated of
_L’Assaut de Vermelles_. Outside is a yard animated by cows, turkeys,
geese, chicken, and ducks: also a donkey and a peacock, not to mention
the usual dogs and cats. At 5 a.m. I am awakened by an amazing chorus.
The ‘patron’ is a strong, competent man, with many fine buxom
daughters, who do the farm work with great capacity and energy.
Henriette with a pitchfork is strength and grace in action. Tommy is
much in awe of her. She hustles the pigs relentlessly. The sons are
at the war. Etienne and Marcelle, aged ten and eight respectively,
complete the family; with Madame, of course, who makes inimitable
coffee; and various grandparents who appear in white caps and cook and
bake all day.
I have just ‘paid out’--all in five and twenty-franc notes. ‘In the
field’ every man has his own pay book which the officer must sign,
while the company quartermaster-sergeant sees that his acquittance
roll is also signed by Tommy. We had a small table and chair out in
the yard, and in an atmosphere of pigs and poultry I dealt out the
blue-and-white oblongs which have already in many cases been converted
into bread. For that is where most of the pay money goes, there and in
the _estaminets_. The bread ration is always small, the biscuit ration
overflowing. Bully beef, by the way, is simply ordinary corned beef. I
watched cooking operations yesterday, and saw some fifty tins cut in
half with an axe, clean hewn asunder, and the meat deftly hoicked with
a fork into the field-kitchen, or ‘cooker,’ which is a range and boiler
on wheels. This was converted into a big stew, and served out into
dixies (camp kettles) and so to the men’s canteens.
This afternoon our company practised an attack over open country. I
was surprised to find the men so well trained. I had imagined that
prolonged trench-warfare would have made them stale. The country is
_very_ flat. There are no hedges. The only un-English characteristics
are the poplar rows, the dried beans tied round poles like mother-gamp
umbrellas, and the wayside chapels and crucifixes.
Yesterday afternoon Edwards and I got in a little revolver practice
just near; and afterwards we had an energetic game of hockey, with
sticks and an empty cartridge-case.”
Altogether, billet life was very enjoyable. On November 1st Captain
Dixon joined our battalion and took over “B” Company. For over four
months I worked under the most good-natured and popular officer in the
battalion. We were always in good spirits while he was with us. “I
can’t think why it is,” he used to say, “I’m not at all a jolly person,
yet you fellows are always laughing; and in my old regiment it was
always the same!” He was a fearful pessimist, but a fine soldier. His
delight used to be to get a good fire blazing in billets, sit in front
of it with a novel, and then deliver a tirade against the discomfort
of war! The great occasion used to be when the arch-pessimist, our
quartermaster, was invited to dinner. Then Edwards, the Mess president,
would produce endless courses, and the two pessimists would warm to
a delightful duologue on the fatuity of the Staff, the Army, and the
Government.
“By Jove, we are the biggest fools on this earth!” Dixon would say at
last.
“We’re fools enough to be led by fools,” Jim Potter would reply.
And somehow we were all more cheerful than ever!