to the plains and the Northwest, and they showed the Germans on some
occasions what a blizzard is like when expressed in bullets instead of
in snowflakes, by men who know how to shoot. I had continental pride in
them. They had the dry, pungent philosophy and the indomitable optimism
which the air of the plains and the St. Lawrence Valley seems to
develop. They were not afraid to be a little emotional and sentimental.
There is room for that sort of thing between Vancouver and Halifax.
They had been in some “tough scraps” which they saw clear-eyed, as they
would see a boxing-match or a spill from a canoe into a Canadian rapids.
As for the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, all old
soldiers of the South African campaign almost without exception,
knowing and hardened, their veteran experience gave them an earlier
opportunity in the trenches than the first Canadian division. Brigaded
with British regulars, the Princess Pats were a sort of _corps
d’élite_. Colonel Francis Farquhar, known as “Fanny,” was their
colonel, and he knew his men. After he was killed his spirit remained
with them. Asked if they could stick, they said, “Yes, sir!” cheerily,
as he would have wanted them to say it.
I am going to tell you about the work of the Princess Pats on May
8th, not to single them out from any other regiment, but because it
is typical of the kind of fighting which many another regiment has
known and I have it in illustrative detail. Losses, day by day losses,
characteristic of trench warfare, they had previously suffered in
holding a difficult salient at St. Eloi--losses that added up into the
hundreds. Heretofore as one of them said, they had been holding down
the lid of hell, but on May 8th they were to hold on to the edge of the
opening by the skin of their teeth and look down into the bowels of
hell after the Germans had blown off the lid with high explosives.
It was in a big château that I first heard the story and felt the
thrill of it told by the tongues of its participants. There were twenty
bedrooms in that château. If I wished to stay all night I might occupy
three or four--and as for that bathroom, paradise to men who have been
buried in filthy mud by high explosives, the Frenchman who planned it
had the most spacious ideas in immersions. A tub or a shower or a hose
as you pleased. Some bathroom, that!
For nothing in the British army was too good for the Princess Pats
before May 8th; and since May 8th nothing was quite good enough. Five
of us sat down to dinner in a banquet hall looking out on a private
park, big enough to hold fifty. The talk ran fast.
“Too bad Gault is not here. He’s in England recovering from his
wound. Gault is six feet tall and five feet of him legs. All day in
that trench with a shell wound in his thigh and arm. God! How he was
suffering! But not a moan--his face twitching and trying to make the
twitch into a smile--and telling us to stick.”
“Buller away, too. He was the second in command. Gault succeeded him.
Buller was hit on May 5th--and missed the big show--piece of shell
in the eye.”
“And Charlie Stewart, who was shot through the stomach. How we miss
him. If ever there were a ‘live-wire’ it’s Charlie. Up or down, he’s
smiling and ready for the next adventure. Once he made thirty thousand
dollars in the Yukon--and spent it on the way to Vancouver. The first
job he could get was washing dishes--but he wasn’t washing them
long. Again he started out in the Northwest on an expedition with
four hundred traps to cut into the fur business of the Hudson’s Bay
Company. His Indians got sick; he wouldn’t desert them--and before
he was through he had a time which beat anything yet opened up for us
by the Germans in Flanders--but you have heard such stories from the
Northwest before. Being shot through the stomach the way he was all the
doctors agreed that Charlie would die. It was like Charlie to disagree
with them. He always has his own point of view. So he is getting well.
Charlie came out to the war with the packing-case which had been used
by his grandfather, who was an officer in the Crimean War. He said that
it would bring him luck.”
The 4th of May was bad enough--a ghastly forerunner for the 8th. On
the 4th the P. P’s, after having been under shell-fire throughout the
second battle of Ypres--the “gas battle”--were ordered forward to a
new line to the southeast of Ypres. To the north of Ypres the British
line had been driven back by the concentration of shell-fire and the
rolling, deadly march of the clouds of asphyxiating gas.
The Germans were still determined to take the town which they had
showered with four million dollars’ worth of shells. It would be big
news--the fall of Ypres as a prelude to the fall of Przemysl and of
Lemberg. A wicked salient was produced in the British line to the
southeast by the cave-in to the north. It seems to be the lot of the
P. P’s to get into salients. On the 4th they lost 28 men killed and 98
wounded from a gruelling all-day shell-fire and stone-walling. That
night they got relief and were out for two days, when they were back
in the front trenches again. The 5th and the 6th were fairly quiet;
that is, what the P. P’s or Mr. Thomas Atkins would call quiet. Average
mortals wouldn’t. They would try to appear unconcerned and say they had
been under pretty heavy fire--which means shells all over the place
and machine guns combing the parapet. Very dull, indeed. Only three men
killed and seventeen wounded.
On the night of May 7th the P. P’s had a muster of 635 men. This was
a good deal less than half of the original total in the battalion,
including recruits who had come out to fill the gaps caused by death,
wounds and sickness. Bear in mind that before this war a force was
supposed to prepare for retreat with a loss of ten per cent. and get
under way to the rear with the loss of fifteen per cent., and that with
the loss of thirty per cent. it was supposed to have borne all that can
be expected of the best trained soldiers.
The Germans were quiet that night--suggestively quiet. At 4.30 the
prelude began; by 5.30 the German gunners had fairly warmed to their
work. They were using every kind of shell they had in the locker. Every
signal wire the P. P’s possessed had been cut. The brigade commander
could not know what was happening to them and they could not know his
wishes--except that it may be taken for granted that the orders of any
British brigade commander are always to “stick it.”
The shell-fire was as thick at the P. P.’s backs as in front of them.
They were fenced in by shell-fire. And they were infantry taking what
the guns gave in order to put them out of business so that the way
would be clear for the German infantry to charge. In theory they ought
to have been buried and mangled beyond the power of resistance by what
is called “the artillery preparation for the infantry in attack.”
Every man of the P. P’s knew what was coming. There was relief in their
hearts when they saw the Germans break from their trenches and start
down the slope of the hill in front. Now they could take it out of the
German infantry in payment for what the German guns were doing to them.
This was their only thought. Being good shots, with the instinct of the
man who is used to shooting at game, the P. P’s “shoot to kill” and
at individual targets. The light green of the German uniform is more
visible on the deep green background of spring grass and foliage than
against the tints of autumn.
At two or three or four hundred yards no one of the marksmen of the
P. P’s, and there were several said to be able to “shoot the eye off
an ant,” could miss the target. As for Corporal Christy, the old bear
hunter of the Northwest, he leaned out over the parapet when a charge
began because he could shoot better in that position. They kept on
knocking down Germans; they didn’t know that men around them were
being hit; they hardly knew that they were being shelled except when
a burst shook their aim or filled their eyes with dust. In that case
they wiped the dust out of their eyes and went on. The first that many
of them realised that the German attack was broken was when they saw
green blots in front of the standing figures--which were now going in
the other direction. Then the thing was to keep as many of these as
possible from getting back over the hill. After that they could dress
the wounded and make the dying a little more comfortable. For there
was no getting the wounded to the rear. They had to remain there in
the trench perhaps to be wounded again, spectators of their comrades’
valour without the preoccupation of action.
In the official war journal where a battalion keeps its records--that
precious historical document which will be safeguarded in fireproof
vaults one of these days--you may read in cold official language what
happened in one section of the British line on the 8th of May. Thus:
“7 A. M. Fire trench on right blown in at several points.... 9
A. M. Lieutenants Martin and Triggs were hit and came out of left
communicating trench with number of wounded.... Captain Still and
Lieut. de Bay hit also.... 9.30 A. M. All machine guns were buried
(by high explosive shells) but two were dug out and mounted again. A
shell killed every man in one section.... 10.30 A.M. Lieut. Edwards
was killed.... Lieutenant Crawford, who was most gallant, was severely
wounded.... Captain Adamson, who had been handing out ammunition, was
hit in the shoulder, but continued to work with only one arm useful....
Sergeant-Major Frazer, who was also handing out ammunition to support
trenches, was killed instantly by a bullet in the head.”
At 10.30 only four officers remained fit for action. All were
lieutenants. The ranking one of these was Niven, in command after Gault
was wounded at 7 A. M. We have all met the Niven type anywhere from
the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic Circle, the high-strung, wiry type,
who moves about too fast to carry any loose flesh and accumulates none
because he does move about so fast. A little man Niven, a rancher, a
horseman, with a good education and a knowledge of men. He rather fits
the old saying about licking his weight in wild cats--wild cats being
nearer his size than lions or tigers.
Eight months before he had not known any more about war than thousands
of other Canadians of his type, except that soldiers carried rifles
over their shoulders and kept step. But he had “Fanny” Farquhar of the
British army for his teacher; and he studied the book of war in the
midst of shells and bullets--which means that the lessons stick in
the same way as the lesson the small boy receives when he touches the
red-hot end of a poker to see how it feels.
Writing in the midst of ruined trenches rocked by the concussion
of shells, every message he sent that day, every report he made by
orderly after the wires were down was written out very explicitly--
which Farquhar had taught him was the army way. The record is there of
his coolness when the lid was blown off of hell. For all you can tell
by the firm chirography he might have been sending a note to a ranch
foreman.
After his communications were cut, he was not certain how much support
he had on his flanks. It looked for a time as if he had none. After
the first charge was repulsed he made contact with the King’s Royal
Rifle Corps on his right. He knew from the nature of the first German
charge that the second would be worse than the first. The Germans
had advanced some machine guns; they would be able to place their
increased artillery fire more accurately. Again green figures started
down that hill and again they were put back. Then Niven was able to
establish contact with the Shropshire Light Infantry, another regiment
on his left. So he knew that right and left he was supported--and by
seasoned British regulars. This was very, very comforting--especially
so when German machine gun fire was not only coming from the front but
in enfilade--which is so trying to a soldier’s steadiness. In other
words, the P. P’s were shooting at Germans in front while bullets were
whipping crosswise of their trenches and of the regulars on their
flanks, too. Some of the German infantrymen who had not been hit or had
not fallen back had dug themselves cover and were firing at a closer
range.
The Germans had located the points in the P. P’s’ trench occupied by
the machine guns. At least, they could put these hornets’ nests out
of business, if not all the individual riflemen. So they concentrated
high explosive shells on them. That did the trick; it buried them. But
a buried machine gun may be dug out and fired again. It may be dug out
two or three times and keep on firing as long as it will work and there
is any one to man it.
While the machine guns were being exhumed every man in one sector of
the trench was killed. Then the left half of the right fire trench
got three or four shells one after another bang into it. There was no
trench left: only macerated earth and mangled men. Those emerging alive
were told to fall back to the communicating trench. Next the right end
of the left fire trench was blown in. When the survivors fell back to
the communication trench that was also blown in their face.
“Oh, but we were having a merry party,” as Lieutenant Vandenberg said.
Niven and his lieutenants were moving here and there to the point of
each new explosion to ascertain the amount of the damage and to decide
what was to be done as the result. One soldier described Niven’s eyes
as sparks emitted from two holes in his dust-caked face.
Papineau tells how a tree outside the trench was cut in two by a shell
and its trunk laid across the breach of the trench caused by another
shell; and lying over the trunk limp and lifeless where he had fallen
was a man killed by still another shell.
“I remember how he looked because I had to step around him and over the
trunk,” said Papineau.
Unless you did have to step around a dead or wounded man there was no
time to observe his appearance; for by noon there were as many dead and
wounded in the P. P’s’ trench as there were men fit for action.
Those unhurt did not have to be steadied by their superiors. Knocked
down by a concussion they sprang up with the promptness of disgust of
one thrown off a horse or tripped by a wire. When told to move from one
part of the trench to another where there was desperate need, a word
was sufficient direction. They understood what was wanted of them,
these veterans. They went. They seized every lull to drop the rifle
for the spade and repair the breaches. When they were not shooting
they were digging. The officers had only to keep reminding them not to
expose themselves in the breaches. For in the thick of it--and the
thicker the more so--they must try to keep some dirt between all of
their bodies except the head and arm which must be up in order to fire.
At 1.30 a cheer rose from that trench. It was for a platoon of the
King’s Royal Rifles which had come as reinforcement. Oh, but that band
of Tommies did look good to the P. P’s! And the little prize package
that the very reliable Mr. Atkins had with him--the machine gun! You
can always count on Mr. Atkins to remain “among those present” to the
last on such occasions.
Now Niven got word by messenger to go to the nearest point where the
telephone was working and tell the brigade commander the complete
details of the situation. The brigade commander asked him if he could
stick, and he said “Yes, sir!” which is what Col. “Fanny” Farquhar
would have said. That trip was hardly what could be called peaceful.
The orderly whom Niven had with him both going and coming was hit by
high explosive shells. Niven is so small--it is very difficult to hit
him. He is about up to Major Gault’s shoulder.
He had been worrying about his supply of rifle cartridges. There were
not enough to take care of another German infantry charge which was
surely coming. After repelling two charges, think of failing to repel
the third for want of ammunition! Think of Corporal Christy, the
bear-hunter, with the Germans thick in front of him and no bullets for
his rifle! But appeared again Mr. Thomas Atkins--another platoon of
him with twenty boxes of cartridges which were rather a risky burden to
bring through the shell fire. The relief as these were distributed was
that of having something at your throat which threatens to strangle you
removed.
Making another tour of his trenches about four in the afternoon, Niven
found that there was a gap of fifty yards between his left and the
right of the adjoining regiment. Fifty yards is the inch on the end
of a man’s nose in trench warfare on such an occasion. He was able to
place eight men in that gap. At least, they could keep a lookout and
tell him what was going on.
It was not cheering news either to learn a little later that the
regiments on his left had withdrawn to trenches about three hundred
yards to the rear--a long distance in trench warfare. But the P. P’s
had no time for retirement. They could have gone only in the panic of
men who think of nothing in their demoralisation except to flee from
the danger in front without thinking that there may be more danger to
the rear. They were held where they were under what cover they had by
the renewed blasts of shells--putting the machine guns out of action
again--which suddenly ceased; for the Germans were coming on again.
Now was the supreme effort. It was as a nightmare in which only the
objective of effort is recalled and all else is a vague struggle of
all the strength one can exert against smothering odds. No use to ask
these men what they thought. What do you think when you are climbing up
a rope whose strands are breaking over the edge of a precipice? You
climb--that is all.
The P. P’s shot at Germans. After a night without sleep, after a
day among their dead and wounded, after the torrents of shell-fire,
after breathing smoke, dust and gas, these veterans were in a state
of exaltation entirely unconscious of dangers of their surroundings,
mindless of what came next, automatically shooting to kill as they were
trained to do, even as a man pulls with every ounce of strength he has
in him in a close finish of a boat race.
Corporal Dover had to give up firing his machine gun at last. Wounded,
he had dug it out of the earth after an explosion and set it up again.
The explosion that destroyed the gun finally crushed his leg and arm.
He crawled out of the _débris_ towards the support trench which had
become the fire trench, only to be killed by a bullet.
The Germans got possession of a section of the P. P’s’ trench where, it
is believed, no Canadians were left. But the German effort died there.
It could get no farther. This was as near to Ypres as the Germans were
to go in this direction. When the day’s work was done and there in
sight of the field scattered with German dead, the P. P’s counted their
numbers. Of the 635 men who had begun the fight at daybreak one hundred
and fifty men and four officers, Niven, Papineau, Clark and Vandenberg,
remained fit for duty.
Papineau is a young lawyer of Montreal, who had already won the
Military Cross for bombing Germans out of a sap at St. Eloi. Vandenberg
is a Dutchman--but mostly he is Vandenberg. To him the call of youth
is the call to arms. He knows the roads of Europe and the roads of
Chihuahua. He was at home fighting with Villa at Zacatecas and at home
fighting with the P. P’s in front of Ypres.
Darkness found all the survivors among the P. P’s in the support
and communication trenches. The fire trench had become an untenable
dust-heap. They crept out only to bring in any wounded unable to help
themselves; and wounded and rescuers were more than once hit in the
process. It was too dangerous to attempt to bury the dead, who were in
the fire trench. Most of them had already been buried by shells. For
them and for the dead in the support trenches interred by their living
comrades Niven recited such portions as he could recall of the Church
of England service for the dead--recited them with a tight throat.
Then the P. P’s, unbeaten, marched out, leaving the position to their
relief, a battalion of the King’s Royal Rifle Corps.
Eighteen hundred strong they had come out to France; and after they
had repulsed German charges in the midst of shells that mauled their
trenches at Hooge on that indescribable day of May 8th, one hundred
and fifty were able to bear arms and little Lieutenant Niven, polo
player and horseman, who had entered as a private, was in command.
Corporal Christy, bear-hunter of the Northwest, who could “shoot the
eyes off an ant,” by some miracle had escaped without a scratch. All
the praise that the P. P’s, millionaire or labourer, scapegrace or
respectable pillar of society, ask is that they were worthy of fighting
side by side with Mr. Thomas Atkins, regular. At best one poor little
finite mind only observes through a rift in the black smoke and yellow
smoke of high explosives and the clouds of dust and military secrecy
something of what has happened in a small section of that long line
from Switzerland to the North Sea many times; and this is given here.
Leaning against the wall in a corner of the dining-room of the French
château were the P. P’s’ colours. Major Niven took off the wrapper in
order that I might see the flag with the initials of the battalion
which Princess Patricia embroidered with her own hands. There’s room,
one repeats, for a little sentiment and a little emotion, too, between
Halifax and Vancouver.
“Of course we could not take our colours into action,” said Niven.
“They would have been torn into tatters or buried in a shell crater.
But we’ve always kept them up at battalion headquarters. I believe
we are the only battalion that has. We promised the Princess that we
would.”
In her honour an old custom has been renewed in France: knights are
fighting in the name of a fair lady.
XXVI
FINDING THE BRITISH FLEET
The Briton’s island instinct--Secrecy surrounding the fleet--The
magic message--The journey--A night drive along the bleak coast
of Scotland--Boy scouts as sentries--An obdurate guard--The
navy yard--The Admiral’s “quarter deck”--The largest contract
in all England--Great dry docks--Patriots in workmen’s clothes.
The Briton’s national self-consciousness is surrounded by salt water.
His island instinct is only another word for sea instinct. Ebb and
flow of war on the Continent, play of party politics at home, optimism
and pessimism wrestling in the press--in the back of his head he was
thinking of the navy.
During the first year of the war all other curtains of military secrecy
were parted at intervals; but the world of British naval operations
seemed hermetically sealed. One could only imagine what the Grand Fleet
was like. He had despaired of ever seeing it in the life, when good
fortune slipped a message across the Channel to the British front,
which became the magic carpet of transition from the burrowing army in
its trenches to the solid decks of battleships; which changed the war
correspondent’s modern steed, the automobile, trailing dust over French
roads, to destroyers trailing foam in choppy seas off English coasts.
But not all the journeying was on destroyers. One must travel by car
also if he would know something of the intricate, busy world of the
Admiralty’s work, which makes coastguards a part of its personnel.
There was more than ships to see; more than one place to go in that
wonderful week.
The transition is less sudden if we begin with the career of an open
car along the coast of Scotland in the night. Dusk had fallen on the
purple cloud-lands of heather dotted with the white spots of grazing
sheep in the Scotch highlands under changing skies, with headlands
stretching out into the misty reaches of the North Sea, forbidding
in the chill air after the warmth of France and suggestive of the
uninviting theatre where, in approaching winter, patrols and trawlers
and mine-sweepers carried on their work to within range of the guns of
Heligoland. A people who lived in such a chill land, in sight of such
a chill sea, and who spoke of their “bonnie Scotland forever,” were
worthy to be masters of that sea.