2/Lt John Gamble, 14th Durham Light Infantry
There are moments, sometimes hours, when right at the seat of the greatest of wars, close behind the firing line, near where there have been many thousands of lives lost in the fiercest fighting of the war, one can close one’s eyes and imagine all is peace again. At times when all the infernal engines and machines at the command of the armies are subdued for a few minutes, one may realise that all the frightfulness man can invent will never kill nature. Listen, now, to the birds singing over in those trees, which are rustling gently in the mild western breeze, as they have done for hundreds of years; and that little stream which has so often run with blood since the war commenced, still makes its merry music, as it bubbles over the little stones towards the canal waiting to receive it.
Close your eyes with me here, and listen to nature gently protesting that she still does, and always will, hold sway; that war will not continue for ever, and soon she will reassert herself in the stricken land, and with the aid of time, gradually cover up and remove all the appalling signs of the forces which have endeavoured to upheave her.
Such well-written prose could capture a moment, it could hint at greater, more substantial thoughts, but for the officer who wrote it there was also the reality of a war to be won. The diary would be put away, the letter closed, and the daily work of leading a company or battery resumed. With men constantly on the move, there was a continuous circulation of animals between units. Horses and mules were frequently traded, particularly among the artillery and service corps, keen to eject a horse that caused problems but which might settle down with another team. Theft, however, was a major cause of loss. This frequently exercised the minds of officers keen to recover a favourite horse from among dozens of others serving with another unit, all of which could look pretty much the same.
Capt. Graham Reid, 1st Field Squadron, RE
I saw Captain Alexander Arnold, who had been Riding Instructor at Chatham, several times. He came over to tea and did a bit of horse swapping with the squadron. We had some Australian RFA lines near ours and had to keep a very strict lookout on our own horses and saddlery. One night when two bombs fell near the line, several of our horses got loose, including one of Alexander’s chargers which, when we had rounded everything up, was missing. Keeping watch next day at the watering point, Alexander saw his own horse being ridden by a lanky Australian gunner, who was one of the large watering party. Alexander went up to this man and politely told him that he had his (Alexander’s) horse which had got loose the night before. The Australian replied, ‘Not a bit of it: I’ve had this horse ever since I came over, and that’s three years ago: Sammy, I call him.’ On Alexander pointing out that Sammy had ‘RE98’ branded on his forefeet the Australian looked down and then quite naively remarked, ‘So he has: I forgot that, sir. You’d better take him.’ He was not in the very least embarrassed.
Maj. Neil Fraser-Tytler, D Batt., 149th Brigade, RFA
I took a different route from the battery in order to lunch with the North Irish Horse, and also to pick up a horse hidden there for certain reasons during the last two days. The battery had quite a successful march, picking up a horse and two mules and having only one horse reclaimed, also a nice looking young setter joined them on the road, which will be useful for partridge shooting further north. Owing to all batteries grazing their horses in large herds in the open clover fields, a good many had changed hands, so every outgoing battery is carefully examined by those who are anxious to reclaim their horses.
Lt Richard Talbot Kelly, 52nd Brigade, RFA
We noticed while grazing our horses that numbers of other horses from units other than our own were also being grazed, and one particular bunch of horses used to be sent out in the charge of very few drivers, who then promptly went to sleep and took no further interest in the proceedings. Now there were amongst these horses one or two beautiful beasts in the pink of condition and we felt it would be nice to acquire them, so one day we arranged a little stampede and in the muddle that ensued quickly whisked away all five of these coveted ‘gees’. We rushed them back to our own wagon lines and set the farrier and his staff on to trimming them up with the clipping machine and to restamping the numbers on their hoofs.
Looking back on it now, it seems a thoroughly immoral act, but by this time the British Army had become expert scroungers, and scrounging a horse or two we felt was just as legitimate as scrounging RE material for a dugout. Two days later two officers came round and asked if we had found any stray horses. We said we had both lost and found some horses two days previously in the stampede, but if they liked they could come and look round our lines and see if they could recognise any of the horses they had lost. They walked round, but either the horses we had collected were not theirs or they failed to recognise their own beasts and they went away empty-handed.
Driver Charles Keller, RHA
We moved a long way back and built some stables and thatched the walls and roof with straw. It was quite warm for the horses but it couldn’t have been very well built because the first high wind that sprung up blew it away. We were able to hang on to most of the horses but some did break loose. Those that got away we couldn’t do anything about before daylight and it took several days to round up all of them. Some of them were more than thirty miles away. Some were found hidden in farmers’ stables and they didn’t want to give them up. Others refused to allow us to check their barns and we had to get the local police. We had a few horses that were balky [perverse] and troublesome and, although we saw them, we didn’t bother to pick them up as they were more than a nuisance when we used them to take up ammunition. They would no doubt soon lose their balkiness when the farmer hooked them to a plough. The farmer would see that the balky one earned his oats. They weren’t as kind to their animals as were the British soldiers.
French farmers were realistic about the purpose of an animal on a farm. There was no room for sentiment when the living was hard, made harder still by a war which stripped the countryside of most young agricultural workers. Most soldiers out on rest were, if so minded, happy to watch the work, although antagonisms between farmers and soldiers were as frequent as they were perennial.
Pte Hugh Quigley, 12th Royal Scots
There is a curious self-containedness in the life of a French peasant. Even the farm stock fraternise in a strange way. Yesterday the good wife (who waddles along as if cut through at the waist, bust and hips wobbling in different directions) brought in a cartful of dried bean-stuff. It seemed to be a delicacy, for first a brown cow slipped up and tore off a mouthful, then a calf, then an old grey mare and foal, until the cart was completely surrounded and the old wife lost to view. Quite a fine picture! Cows, horses, a loquacious sow, an infinity of white hens, ducks, and, bringing up the rear, a troop of half-grown turkeys.
Pte Arthur Alexander, 1/14th London Rgt (London Scottish)
Nearby was a small farm where we could buy fresh milk. Sometimes we would have to wait while the woman milked the cows before we could be served, so it was then quite warm and unquestionably fresh. Whilst waiting to be served, I was surprised to see how close the cattle were to the inmates of the farmhouse. One had only to open the living-room door, which room, by the way, had in it a great old four-poster bed, and you walked into the cow-stall and saw the cows bedded down. This was much too close to my way of thinking but they thought nothing of it and were evidently accustomed to eating and sleeping in close proximity to their cattle. I am afraid it would horrify most English folk.
Rifleman Aubrey Smith, 1/5th London Rgt (London Rifle Brigade)
I had a wordy argument today with a man who tried to hit my horse because he imagined he was being forced into the mud beside the road. I also had trouble with a fat old wench who swore at me. One of her fowls flew through the mud, spraying my face with slosh; as I was in a bad temper I gave vent to my wrath by chasing the offending chicken up the road. The owner happened to see the chase and ran after me, jabbering away ninet
een to the dozen and shaking her fist, which led to retorts in equally strong language conveying, however, nothing to her unreceptive mind . . .
We were in a typical Flanders area where the billets were farms – miles from any shops or canteens and surrounded by an almost impassable flooded waste. This was the place where we joined the remainder of the transport, the section sharing a barn with about two dozen fowls. From the noise they kicked up it would appear that they were the original and lawful owners and their protests became so loud in the early morning that nearly everyone hurled mugs, boots and other missiles at the rowdy roosters. The civilian owners of the farm, as one might expect in these parts, were surly and resentful. As if we were out here for a beanfeast, deliberately choosing to live with their livestock and sleep on their smelly straw! As if we were occupying their filthy barn for the love of the thing! We were no happier than they – we, who were far from our homes and would shortly be enduring hell at Ypres. The least these mercenary old peasants could do was to be grateful to the British for keeping the Germans from their doors.
Ypres: other than a brief excursion into the town in October 1914, the Germans had been held back on the edge of a tight salient that contracted and expanded according to which side had been on the offensive. The town itself had slowly succumbed to enemy fire, the beautiful Cloth Hall was a smouldering wreck as was the cathedral, while the town’s ramparts were shell-pitted and sandbagged. Yet in the moat there was still life.
Capt. James Dunn, RAMC attd. 2nd Royal Welsh Fusiliers
Ypres is a ghost: the grubby little town will have to be rebuilt, every house, from its foundations. The ramparts are scarred, but stand. Only the moat is unchanged. On its calm surface there floated, so stilly as to make scarcely a ripple, two swans preening themselves languidly in the brilliant, oppressive sun of a fine day.
A month later the swans were still there, but their circumstances had worsened.
Cpl G.W. Durham, 3rd Div., Cyclist Coy
One wretched pair of swans, the last of a big flock, still has a nest in the moat. Someone tried to get the eggs one day, but suddenly realising that he was being shot at by our sentries, he wisely desisted, as they had made pets of the birds and would have shot him as calmly as a rat. Both the birds are crippled.
The cuckoo sings on the rampart, so do the blackbirds and thrushes. The birds take no notice of war at all and will sing over a battery while it is firing.
Capt. James Dunn, RAMC attd. 2nd Royal Welsh Fusiliers
The cob, a great beauty, appears to have been wounded; one of the digits of his left wing looks as if it had been broken and had set badly. These birds have become legendary. Their appearance at the Menin Gate foretells a peaceful day, their disappearance, no one knows whither, portends a bombardment.
Chaplain Thomas Tiplady, Army Chaplains’ Dept
For three years the storm centre of the British battle front has been at Ypres. Every day and night it had been the standing target of thousands of guns. Yet, amid all the havoc and thunder of the artillery, the graceful white form of a swan had been seen gliding over the water of the moat. It never lacked food, and was always welcome to a share of Tommy’s rations. [Then] a shell burst near the swan, and it was mortally wounded.
Somehow the swan seemed a mystical being, and invulnerable. It was a relic of the days of peace, and a sign of the survival of purity and grace amid the horrors and cruelties of war. It spoke of the sacred things that yet remain – the beautiful things of the soul upon which war can lay no defiling finger. Now it had gone from the water and Ypres seems more charred than ever, and the war more terrible.
On the last day of July 1917, the British offensive at Ypres began in earnest. The battle lasted over three months and the general morass in which it was fought came to symbolise in the public consciousness the misery of that conflict.
Lt Col. Cecil Lyne, 119th Brigade, RFA
Had I a descriptive pen I could picture to you the squalor and wretchedness of it all and through it the wonder of the men who carry on. Figure to yourself a desolate wilderness of water filled with shell craters, and crater after crater whose lips form narrow peninsulas along which one can at best pick but a slow and precarious way. Here a shattered tree trunk, there a wrecked ‘pillbox’, sole remaining evidence that this was once a human and inhabited land. Dante would never have condemned lost souls to wander in so terrible a purgatory. Here a shattered wagon, there a gun mired to the muzzle in mud which grips like glue; even the birds and rats have forsaken so unnatural a spot. Mile after mile of the same unending dreariness; landmarks are gone, whole villages where hardly a pile of bricks amongst the mud marks the site. You see it at its best under a leaden sky with a chill drizzle falling, each hour an eternity, each dragging step a nightmare. How weirdly it recalls some half-formed horror of childish nightmare, one would flee, but whither? – one would cry aloud but there comes no blessed awakening. Surely the God of Battles has deserted a spot where only devils can reign.
Think what it means, weeks of it, weeks which are eternities, when the days are terrible but the nights beyond belief. Through it all the horror of continual shellfire, rain and mud. Gas is one of the most potent components of this particular inferno. Nights are absolutely without rest, and gas at night is the crowning limit of horrors. The battery that occupied the position before we came was practically wiped out by it, and had to be relieved at short notice, and the battery that relieved them lost 37 men on the way in. You can imagine how bucked I was when they handed me out these spicey bits of gossip on the way up. I daren’t risk more than three men per gun up here at the same time and only two officers besides myself; at the moment they are rather sorry for themselves after last night’s gas stunt, and doing unhelpful things to their eyes with various drops and washes. I’ve got a throat like raw beef and a voice like a crow.
Pte Hugh Quigley, 12th Royal Scots
The landscape has no salient features of its own; everything blasted to mud – railway embankments, woods, roads confused in shell-holes and mine craters. Trees are only skeletons, and masses of obscene ruins mark farms or houses. You look in vain for a wood where such is marked on the map. The only way at night is to bend down close to the ground and gaze at the skyline for black shadows of pillboxes; by those shadows you find your way. Or, to remember a road once shown, the oddest details must be noted – a solitary length of rail or wire, a dud shell, three stakes together, a fragmentary hedge, a deserted waterlogged trench, dead men lying at various angles, and the position of pillboxes in relation to the track followed. The most exciting time I spent was in hunting B Company Headquarters across this monotony of mud and water. I think I must have visited the whole Division before finding it, artillery as well as infantry.
Long gone were the wandering farm animals of 1915 and 1916, gone were the weasels and stoats parting the long grass, gone were the feral dogs and cats; insects survived, but they went unnoticed. If, as Lieutenant Colonel Lyne suggested, even the rats had ‘forsaken’ the land, then it was indeed desolate. Only the fearful creatures forced up to the line to work were regularly seen: horses and mules.
Pte Thomas Hope, 1/5th King’s Liverpool Rgt
We become conscious of a sound totally different to that of shrieking bursting shells. We listen more intently and can pick it out quite easily from the general babel of noise. It has a rhythm about it which at first I cannot place, then suddenly it dawns on me: it is the thudding of hoofs.
‘What the hell’s that, Jock?’ shouts Webster. ‘Do you hear it?’
‘It’s the horses, Webby. Look, there’s two of them.’
Rearing and plunging, the terror-stricken beasts come out of the hell of shells and smoke. With necks outstretched they gallop on, making straight for the trench and the barbed wire in front of it.
‘The wire, Webby, they’ll be on it in a minute.’ . . .
We wave our arms and shout, but our voices can’t be heard above the noise of shelling, and there is a tanging of wi
re as the half-crazed animals gallop into the tangle of cruel barbs. They rear and kick and plunge deeper into its depths, making every movement a torture to them, and very soon they are a mass of lacerations right up past the flanks. One viciously snaps at its tormentors only to toss up its head with a cry almost human, its mouth dripping with blood.
Hopelessly we try and get at them, but have become so entangled ourselves that at each movement the wire tears our flesh, yet the piteous cries urge us forward, until we get to within four yards of them, but can get no further. We are close enough to see the mess they are in. Both are bleeding freely from dozens of ragged tears, while one has a huge slice out of its hindquarters.
‘What the hell do we do now, Jock?’ Webster inquires. ‘We’ll never get them clear of this lot, they’re too well anchored.’
‘We’ll have to try, we can’t shoot them without an officer.’
‘Officer be damned, Jock. I’m going back for my “Bondook” [rifle].’
As Webster struggles back to the trench for his rifle I speak gently to the two animals and try to stop their frantic struggles, but they are beyond control of human voice. Foam appears at their mouths, while steam rises from the blood that trickles from dozens of places on their torn bodies.
At last Webster is laboriously working his way back.
‘Try and quieten them, Jock,’ he urges. ‘Get hold of that one’s head and give me a chance.’
‘I can’t, damn you,’ I reply irritably, as my foot becomes entangled and I trip over sideways on to the ragged wire.
Tommy's Ark: Soldiers and Their Animals in the Great War. Richard Van Emden Page 23
