The Death of Hope

by Andrew Wareham

  “No, General. We are bound for Ireland next month. Garrison there. Ourselves for the Curragh and the Twelfth for Cork.”

  “Ah, well. We cannot all serve where the glory is.”

  The Major did not seem much comforted by that reflection, though he did think they would eat better in Ireland.

  Wincanton gravitated to Richard’s side in the Mess later. He had been uncharacteristically quiet, Richard thought, hardly saying a word over dinner, unlike his normal braying self.

  “It’s not like real soldiering, is it, sir? I don’t think they know what it means to have stood in a trench. I am not to say I am the best of soldiers, sir. I do have some idea of what is what, though.”

  “You do, Wincanton. Your Mention is sufficient evidence of that. A pity there is no ribbon for a Mention. There should be something. It is a recognition of gallantry and should be displayed with pride.”

  Richard deliberately spoke just loud enough to be overheard. The word spread quickly that the staff lieutenant had an award for gallantry, caused an amount of irritation among the younger men who now suspected that he had remained silent in their company for looking down on them.

  The Major was heard to say that it made sense – an officer with Baker’s record would want fighting men about him.

  “Might be one of the ‘boy brigadiers’ – the gilded youth, and all that - but nobody can argue his prowess. Don’t know how old he is, mark you – could be a youthful forty, which is still young for the rank. Personally, I suspect he’s no more than thirty.”

  Wincanton was into his second brandy, more than sufficient to breach the bounds of discretion in his case, his head being weak for alcohol as well.

  “He is twenty-one, Major. Just. He looks older for having the years at sea before coming out to Flanders. That puts years on all of us.”

  “I might have thought that he would have needed more experience before reaching his rank.”

  “Experience of what, Major? He has been out since August ’14, almost unbroken. Nobody can have more experience than that. Not of the war we are fighting now.”

  The word ‘we’ did not go down well – it seemed to imply there were those who fought and lesser souls who did not. Wincanton was unaware he had caused offence, finished his brandy and thought he might be wise not to take a third. Richard noticed him wave a mess waiter away, was surprised by the evidence of maturity.

  “Don’t see much in the way of brandy in the Trenches, you know. No head for alcohol, these days – not like you chaps who can sit in a Mess every night!”

  Conversation was strained after that.

  The visiting pair retired early, pleading a long day of travelling and too many disturbed nights prior.

  Richard slept badly, the bed too comfortable, the room too warm.

  They breakfasted together, made their farewells and boarded the front vehicles of the waiting convoy.

  There were two staff cars and four lorries lined up. Paisley and Braithwaite’s batmen threw their half a dozen suitcases and their own kitbags aboard the first lorry, waited for the other three to fill up, wondering who else was coming with them.

  Major Danby enquired if the rest of their baggage was following behind.

  “I remember going down to Cape Town, sir, as a captain. I had eight trunks and the general must have had sixteen! Quite filled the hold, the sailors told me, all of us together!”

  Braithwaite had little patience early in the morning.

  “Did the same myself, in that war, Danby. This is a different kettle of fish! In the line, one requires a pair of working uniforms and nothing more. Behind, in the rear areas, one needs a little more but certainly no great mass of dress and undress and parade and ceremonial and ball dress as one did at peace. Those days are gone, major. We are a fighting army now, concerned more with killing the Hun than looking pretty! Good day to you now. Thank you for your hospitality.”

  The three vehicles drove off, leaving the remainder to return to their workshop.

  “Bloody trunks, Baker!”

  “Two separate armies, sir. Those of us who have been out and those who have not. Idling in Ireland! Complaining because there are no more than five courses for dinner! I would like to have seen Danby sitting down to lukewarm mutton stew as his whole dinner!”

  “Very much so, Baker! Glad we are to be at a distance. Had we remained in Aldershot we should inevitably have been invited to Guest Nights with them. No doubt we shall have to put up with that sort of thing in Arborfield – bound to be more formality than we have enjoyed in Flanders. Not to worry! You will need to learn the ropes for the post-war Army. I presume you will stay in?”

  “Probably, sir. Depends to an extent on Primrose. She may have plans for me. Provided they are not too outrageous – and I trust her good sense – I shall fall in with them. Be happy to, in fact. What of you, sir?”

  “I think my lady wants me out, Baker. We have an estate to care for and she has some substantial holdings of her own – shares and things. I think she has it in mind that we shall make a splash in the City and in the West End after the war. If that is what she wants – well and good! Like you, Baker, I am lucky in my lady.”

  There was a parade awaiting them as they reached Arborfield, a telephone call from Aldershot giving the timing.

  The Adjutant of the battalion greeted them, addressing General Braithwaite.

  “First Battalion, Northamptonshire Shoemakers, sir. A ‘pals’ battalion. Major Portman acting in command.”

  “Whose brigade?”

  “Brigadier Baker’s, sir. Six battalions, two brigades, in the barracks here, sir. The remaining brigade is in the old barracks at Reading, sir. Not too far distant.”

  “Good. Let’s have a look at them.”

  The better part of eight hundred men in their ranks, mostly young, below the age of twenty, all fit and healthy, the medically unsuitable weeded out. They presented well, smartly uniformed, rifles clean and held properly. The sergeants were older men, most with ten or more years in, gleaned from the old professional Army.

  “Good looking battalion you have here, Portman. Are the others in the barracks the match of them?”

  “Pretty much, yes, sir. Two of them are smaller men, across from the Black Country – they come a bit stunted there. One of them is from Dorset – half the men six-footers.”

  “The Guards were always used to recruit there. Tall men in those parts for some reason. You have no colonel?”

  “Coming in this week, sir. Sick list after the Dardanelles.”

  “Knows his way around, then. What of your Mess? How many with experience of France?”

  “None of us, sir. Myself and one captain who saw the Boxers. That’s it. The bulk are no more experienced than the men. Same in all of the brigades, I am told, sir.”

  “Explains why they sent us across, Portman. A good parade. Thank you.”

  The formal exchange of salutes commenced and the general withdrew and the men marched off to put on working uniforms and return to the hard slog of drill and practice in the butts.

  Richard wanted to see his own people.

  “What is my brigade, do you know, Portman?”

  “Us and Princess Patricia’s Isle of Wight Rifles; Twelfth Wiltshires – Moonrakers, that is, sir.”

  “Princess Patricia’s…”

  “Yes, sir. Apparently, Her Highness has some connection with the Island, sir. They are Hampshires, I think. Their colonel has a slight lisp.”

  The three maintained straight faces.

  “How very unfortunate, Portman! We should not mock the afflicted!”

  “Of course not, sir.”

  General and Brigadier parted company, each led by a warrant officer to his set of offices and his personal quarters and then to meet his immediate juniors.

  The offices had been recently and quickly constructed, were little more than waterproof huts, each big enough for a dozen desks. The senior officers had their separate rooms, all furnished to the of
ficial pattern and with an anteroom for the staff.

  “Messing, sir. Brigadier is to dine in his own quarters for weekends and two days, rotating around his three Messes for luncheon and Dining In with each once a week. Your quarters are one of the houses over on the Reading road, sir, about a quarter of a mile distant.”

  The Dining in was a nuisance, demanding too much formality, useful for bringing him into contact with the officers of each battalion.

  “I shall pay fees to each Mess, of course.”

  The warrant officer made no comment – each brigadier had his own habits.

  “Are you in charge of my people, WO?”

  “No, sir. I am a Moonraker, sir. Reached retirement age in ’14, sir, and was asked to stay on and get the new battalions up and running. When you go across to France, I shall be sent to another new battalion, sir, or to assist with the training of the conscripts, who are to be sent out to existing battalions in France rather than be made into their own battalions. I was refused for active service because of age, sir.”

  “Wet, cold and muddy – it is no place for a man who has done his twenty years already.”

  “So they tell me, sir. I have survived the mud in West Africa and the cold in China, sir. Take more than that to put me down.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Freeman, sir.”

  “Speak to me just before we go out in May, Freeman, if you are still of the same mind. I will arrange something.”

  “Thank you, sir. Have you a warrant officer for your cadre, sir?”

  “Coming in from France tomorrow. One of my Bedfordshires.”

  “Very good, sir. I shall show him the ropes. Luncheon with the Dorsets today, sir. All of the Brigade’s field officers will be present.”

  “Very good. Pass the word, please, that I expect working dress to breakfast and luncheon, Monday to Friday.”

  “Habit has been to wear mess dress, sir, except when the battalion has been out on a route march. Once a week, that is.”

  “A full fifteen miles in five hours with sixty pound pack and rifle?”

  “Not quite, sir.”

  “Pass the whisper, if you would, Freeman. Let it not come as too great a surprise.”

  “The men will be able to handle it, sir.”

  Richard noticed the lack of reference to officers.

  “I suspect I must march along with the columns myself, Freeman.”

  The warrant officer permitted himself a quick smile.

  “That could offer a fine example, sir. Provided, of course, sir…”

  “That I managed a full fifteen miles and still looked chipper at the end?”

  Freeman left to pass the word that they had a soldier in command – a proper hard bastard, too!

  Richard took to the telephone, reached the butler at Lord Elkthorn’s London house.

  “Miss Patterson is out at the moment, sir. Shopping, one understands. She is due to attend an afternoon performance, a matinee of Joy-Land, in support of the Soldier’s Fund, sir. She is to dine here this evening. Might I suggest a call at seven o’clock, sir?”

  Richard agreed – one did not argue with butlers, he had learned that.

  Primrose was delighted, more with his presence in England than with the promotion.

  “I am here till May. Taking the Brigade across to Flanders then. I can take four weeks in late February or March and April. Would you wish us to wed then?”

  She would, at some length.

  “I can get to London on Saturday and Sunday. Can you put me up or must I use a hotel?”

  A hotel was wiser, she thought, removing them both from temptation.

  “It is only January now – I must not risk a six months child, Richard!”

  He agreed that would cause an upset in Society, was amused that she could discuss such an eventuality so calmly. He also noticed that she was looking forward to getting into a bed with him; he was in favour of that.

  “A date for our wedding, my love?”

  “I shall discuss all with my esteemed parents, Richard. We can come to an exact conclusion on Saturday.”

  Three months passed rapidly, chasing his colonels, discovering two of them to be experienced in the new ways of war, one to be hopelessly out of contact with reality.

  Colonels Moncur and Barnard-Hope had seen how modern war was fought, Moncur having just recovered from wounds taken at the Dardanelles. Barnard-Hope had been sent back from Flanders to give the benefit of his sixteen months of experience. Appleby had spent the war in garrison in Liverpool, recruiting Lancashire mill-hands and eating dinners with the local gentry; he was distinctly plump.

  “Parade ground is the place for the men, sir! Learning to counter-march and form their files to left and right, column to line to square – that’s the way to do it!”

  “We don’t have parades in the trenches, Appleby. No room for them.”

  “Ah, yes, sir! Perfectly correct! The thing is, parades and drill teach the men obedience! That’s what they need!”

  Appleby’s every sentence came as a half shout, normally emphasised by a fist slapping into the palm of his other hand.

  “I rather like to encourage initiative among the men, Appleby. I like them to think for themselves.”

  “Think, sir? Rankers don’t think! Only our sort of chaps who can think! If they could think, they wouldn’t be rankers! Stands to reason! I mean to say, sir, where would we be if the louts in the streets thought for themselves? Be the end of the world as we know it! No, sir. Drill, drill and more drill – that’s what they need!”

  “I am afraid it is not what they are going to get, Appleby. One hour a day on the drill square. Two hours morning and afternoon in the butts, three days a week. Tuesday and Thursday and Saturday, a full fifteen mile route march, with pack and rifle. Other than that, I will have every man taught the basics of dressing a wound – putting on a tourniquet and such. That is what they need. Officers to accompany the men at all times, of course. Subalterns should learn the rifle; they will carry one frequently. As soon as it can be arranged, the men will learn to use the Mills Bomb. Every platoon will have a Lewis and every man should be taught the basics of loading and firing and clearing a jam.”

  “What about on the march, sir?”

  “No horses to hand in France, Appleby. Officers must be able to keep up with the men.”

  The other two smiled quietly, Moncur catching Richard’s eye for permission to speak.

  “My men always marched the better for seeing me at head, Appleby.”

  Barnard-Hope agreed.

  “They won’t fall out if you don’t, Appleby. Leading from the front – something the Brigadier knows all about and we must copy.”

  Appleby was not at all sure that he could march for as much as fifteen miles. He was rapidly persuaded that he had no choice.

  There was a sigh of relief when Richard went off on leave. Then the officers read the orders for continued route marches he had left behind and discovered that Moncur, acting in his place, had every intention of enforcing them.

  “Four more weeks unbroken, Moncur! I am almost tempted not to turn up at his wedding to show how displeased I am!”

  Moncur was not certain that the Brigadier would either notice or care. He did strongly suggest that the officers of the three battalions would regard such an action as disloyal.

  “It would hardly be possible to retain your place after that, Appleby. Effectively, the end of your military career, you know. You would probably end up in command of a stores depot somewhere, there to moulder away till the end of the war and be found surplus to requirements thereafter.”

  Appleby was not certain that was so terrible a fate. He was substantive in his rank, would have the full pension to supplement his private income, might be quite comfortable. If, on the other hand, he remained, he would be part of the victory that was sure to come, might manage to pick up a decoration as well, could be even better set up after the war as a Chief Constable or Chairman of th
e Hospital Board in his county, picking up a modest salary and huge expenses.

  “Only joking, Moncur! Could never do something so damned disloyal, you know!”

  Moncur hoped not. His own feet were sore but that was no excuse for moaning.

  “Still, Appleby, be a damned good feast tomorrow. Rubbing shoulders with all the nobs. I know my wife is much looking forward to the day.”

  Appleby was unwed, wondered if Moncur was taking a dig at him.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Working up a new flotilla was hard labour for all involved. Seven destroyers and a light cruiser had to learn the new commander’s ways and change their own habits, often reluctantly.

  The Navy demanded that the commanding officer was king – his word was law. Simon began to discover the reality and to remember that not all kings had been able to exercise the power that was in theory theirs. His knowledge of history was limited, Dartmouth teaching only the naval version which tended to start and end with Nelson, but he had a slight recollection of any number of mediaeval kings losing their heads in battles with their own people. He could not be toppled from his throne, unless the flotilla showed inefficient – should that ever be the case, Tyrwhitt would see him gone within the day. He could, however, find himself forced to compromise, to allow his captains more freedom than he wished to do things in their own favourite fashion.

  He had been appointed young and relatively inexperienced, which his captains knew. He was convinced this meant he brought a fresh point of view to their work; they seemed to believe it meant he was in need of guidance. Three days in and he was debating which of them was to be awarded the noble order of the boot as a warning to the other six.

  Simon found himself with seven captains beneath him, six lieutenants-in-command, the seventh a recently made lieutenant commander, second in command overall and in charge of his half-flotilla. Five of the six were new made, in their first command; just one of the lieutenants had three months of experience commanding a destroyer in the Dover Patrol, had been transferred across to Harwich to provide a stiffening for the flotilla.