by Will R Bird
At dark we were relieved by the Pats and I barely escaped being detailed as one of a party to carry the officer to the quarry line where the transport would get him and take him out for burial. We went to Neuville St. Vaast again and into caves there. It was weird to go down and down and suddenly enter a quiet that startled one. The place was musty and had a damp chill that was peculiarly depressing. Before morning we were called out, five of us, as a ration party, and I saw how easily a man might get a “blighty.” We passed an old ruin with a long wall extending beyond it and light flickered through a small opening, perpetually shifting and stirring in a noiseless flighty dance. One aperture overlooked no man’s land and the flickers were from the flares which rose and fell all night long. As we paused by the opening there was a sudden snapping of machine gun bullets overhead, but they were disregarded as the wall protected us. We filed by and the fifth man yelled in pain. A bullet had come through that brick-sized opening and entered his leg. We bandaged him and he went cheerfully “down the line.” At the place where we got our rations I saw Freddy, and spoke to him. He was as wan and unchanged as ever, and told me, in dull voice, that one of our draft, a man from my own county, had been killed that afternoon.
When we returned with the rations I slept several hours and then was wakened and told that I was to take my pack and go with three other men to Mount St. Eloi. There we would meet a sergeant who would take us to a bombing school. I hated the idea, but made no objection. I had had my fill of talks on explosives, and had listened to dreary descriptions of the hairbrush bomb, the “lemon,” the “cricket ball,” and all the rest and I especially despised the wooden handled ones with long cloth streamers, but it never pays a new man to argue with an oldtimer.
We met the sergeant and went down the hill and across the road to long huts and found ourselves with men from the other battalions of the brigade, and I discovered that instead of all those silly arrangements I hated that we were to be instructed only in shooting rifle grenades and throwing Mills bombs. I was pleased at once, and when I found the hours short and rations plentiful was very glad I had come.
The next day at noon as we lolled in our bunks there was a sudden shrill tearing sound, and a terrific explosion just outside. Pieces of shrapnel came through the side of the hut. We leaped to the floor and raced from the building and into the field. Wheeeee. A second one came, and there were cries of “stretcher bearer – stretcher bearer!” Four men were killed and several wounded by those shells.
To my delight I learned quickly the proper elevation for the rifle grenades and made a top score the first day I tried. Throwing Mills bombs was easy for me. I had played ball in Canada and soon got the knack of the overhand throw, consequently I was called in by the sergeant and told that I would be given top notch marks for my work. I thanked him, and thought no more of it. The battalion had come to the old huts at Mount St. Eloi and had it rather easy, as well as us.
When our six-day class was up I reported back to my platoon, and was astounded to find that I had been transferred to the battalion bombers. I, a new man, was to be among the grand selected ones, the specialty men. The others chaffed me and said I had pulled strings to get my shift, and I really disliked leaving them. Freddy was not a cheerful tonic, but the rest were splendid comrades. The weather had become even colder and we went into the front line again and once more relieved the Pats.
CHAPTER II
I Shoot a German
The bombers were kind to me, and I found myself paired with Sammy Sedgewick, a real gentleman. He was a very fine, clean-living fellow and we got on well together. He told me all that was necessary about my work, which was to be chiefly patrolling the trenches. It was possible that we might be called to bomb a post or assist with some offensive scheme, but on the whole there was no intimation of anything unusual. We had good dug-outs and plenty of rations, and our hours were much easier than in the company, where a man did six hours on and six hours off with monotonous regularity all the time we were in the line.
One came down from his post, chilled, half-dazed from lack of sleep, and pushed his way into the crowded underground to his chicken-wire bunk. There he could lay on his elbows and eat his rations, and consider himself lucky if there were any luke warm tea to drink. The warmth of the men thawed the earthy walls enough to cause them to ooze water. Rats were everywhere, great, podgy brutes with fiendish, ghoulishly-gleaming eyes. They came at night on the parapets and startled one so that he thrust at them with his bayonet, or crawled over him as he lay under his blanket in his bunk trying to “shiver himself warm.” The bombers had it much better than the company men.
We patrolled the crater line, visiting all the trench posts and in the stretches between paused now and then and sent grenades into the German front. Then we would hurry along and so escape any possible retaliation. Such a procedure naturally roused the ire of the men doing sentry, who could not leave their stations, and we were soon unpopular. Sammy and I agreed not to play such a game, and not to shoot grenades unless we were certain of a target. We got them twice. One sentry called out to us and pointed out dark blurs that were working about the German wire. We sent two grenades among them and a Lewis gun helped complete the job. Later in the night another sentry told me that he had seen two Germans working at something just opposite his post. It was very frosty and still and we could hear a thumping sound as if they were hammering posts. I set my rifle carefully and fired. The elevation was exactly correct and the red flash of explosion was over the very spot aimed at. The sound of the report had not died away before a long-drawn yell sounded. The voice seemed that of a mere boy and his agonized screaming could be heard all along the crater line. I had the sound in my ears all the next day.
The enemy sent over “darts” in reply but none fell near us. It was as cold as ever the next night. Everything had frozen and no working parties moved anywhere. The ground was like rock. We moved constantly while on our rounds, as it kept us warm, but the sentries huddled in their corners and grew stupid from the cold. Several of them went to sleep on duty. This would have been a serious matter in some places, but our officers and non-coms made allowance for a man’s condition. We were well managed. There had been no asinine drilling in muddy fields while we were out of the line, only necessary parades concerning equippage and pay and baths. Our rifles had to be kept clean, and our feet rubbed with whale oil to prevent frost bite, but there was no shining of brass and buttons. At one point we found a Lewis gun crew asleep, every man, and for a joke removed the gun, hid it, and wakened them by throwing bits of chalk. I do not think they went to sleep again when on post.
I saw one of our draft asleep, and wanted to wake him, but the officer making his rounds reached him first. He shook the fellow and then talked with him in a low voice, telling him the usual penalty for such neglect of duty. That man never forgot his lesson, or the kindness of the officer.
The cold continued, it being the coldest winter France had experienced in years. During those hours we wandered from post to post I thought of many things. Something in the eeriness of the line, great tumbled heaps of chalk, and rifts that were trenches, made one feel that danger was always near. Away on the Somme and up at the other end of the Ridge there was always shelling, and here and there machine guns chattered, but often our part of the sector would be quiet for an hour at a time. Only the stamping of feet, coughing, or the pounding of arms told where the sentries were, and overhead uncanny wailings crossed each other under the stars as the “big ones” went seeking cross roads and other back area targets.
I thought of Canada and its people, sleeping snugly in their beds, with only vague ideas of what war really meant, of the French folk in their cottages, many within range of the German guns, trusting that no sudden death would be their lot before morning, that some day the Allies must be victorious, shrugging their shoulders and meeting every fresh calamity with their laconic expression the soldiers termed “See la gare.”
I thought repeatedly of Stev
e, and now understood more clearly many of the letters he had written while in Belgium. Sometimes I stopped at Mickey’s post, or Melville’s or Charley’s and talked with them of the home town.
The war had changed men, changed them mightily. Down in dugouts where there was hardly room to breathe, men who had come from comfortable homes moved without complaints to their fellows. All grousing was reserved for the higher-ups, the “brass-hats” and the “big bugs” responsible for everything. The men were unselfish among themselves, instinctively helping each other, knowing each other, each with a balance and discipline of his own. We endured much. The dugout reeked with odours of stale perspiration and the sour, saline smell of clothing. There was not enough water to permit frequent washing, and whenever we could get warm the lice tormented us.
The vermin were everywhere. We could wash and change our shirts as often as we liked; within a few hours we were lousy again. Men squatted in their bunks beside candles and picked the seams of their clothing, sought the crawlers, always fought them, but never, while we were in those dugouts at Vimy, conquered them.
I talked with Tommy each night, and his vigorous comment was refreshing. He said that we were as uncivilized as in the beginning, that we were nocturnal beasts, hunting each other in packs, with the same mercies and feelings as wolves. He talked about his fellows and said that it was curious to note the influence the front had on different men. Everyone was puzzled about himself, wondering, and yet an open book to his comrades. I did not agree with such a view. Fear, he said, was at the back of every brain, and our talk was but to camouflage it.
One afternoon I had to go on an errand that led me up a trench called La Salle Avenue. Another man was going ahead of me and as we hurried along I heard a “phew-phew-phew” in the air. The man ahead looked over his shoulder and yelled. Crash! I was hurled against the trench wall, slammed against it, and for a moment knew nothing. A million bells rang in my ears. Lights danced and sparkled and I could not get my breath. Hands tugged at me and I got up to stare at a gaping, smoking crater not ten feet from where I had fallen. A big “rum jar” had fallen between the other man and myself, and though he was much further away than I, he was seemingly shell-shocked. He was taken back to a dugout and never again did front line work.
I was sick for an hour and my head ached and throbbed, but otherwise I was not affected. That night was very quiet. At times there was no shelling on the flanks, and there would be oppressive silence as the Very lights dropped silently and intermittently, their eerie glow tracing queer moving shadows across the desolate waste of chalk and dirty snow. A solitary rifle shot was startling, and the heavies overhead rumbled like express trains. I went down the trench and talked with Fernley, a very quiet, easy-going fellow. He had stood his rifle against the side of the trench and was pacing up and down and beating his chest with his arms in an effort get warm. We chatted awhile and then moved on.
I was not ten yards from him when – ping – a dart burst on the parapet several feet from where he was standing. I had turned as I heard the missile and to my surprise Fernley sank to the trench floor like a wet sack. I hurried to him and spoke to him, but he never answered. He was dead.
There was not a mark on him. A dart must strike almost beside one before doing great damage, and I was completely puzzled. I got the sergeant and he examined Fernley, and was mystified. We carried the dead man to the dressing station and they began to strip him. I went back to the trench and looked around, looked until I noticed the rifle still standing there, and – part of its bayonet was gone. The mystery was soon solved. The dart had exploded beside the bayonet and had blown three inches of the steel toward Fernley. His arms were extended as he beat himself and the piece pierced an armpit and entered his heart. Not a drop of blood had issued from the wound.
We were in supports again, and then back to the front trench, and this time I was excited. I was to do a reconnaisance with one of the non-coms. We crawled out under our wire and moved by inches, worming between Durand and Duffield Craters. After each yard or so we listened for a time and it was an hour before we were in position to look at the enemy wire and judge its strength. When we got back to the trench the bombers told me that a raid was to be made from both our craters and from the Patricia posts. The next day the Stokes mortars pounded the German line.
The raid was on the 13th of February, and zero was at 9.15 a.m. Six bombers were taken to Patricia and there we were given sixty grenades and told to shoot them all in two minutes, beginning at 9.13. It was ticklish work. In our hurry it would be easy to make a mistake and cause a premature burst, but no accident occurred and we got our barrage away on time. Then we went down to a tunnel entrance and awaited the raiders’ return. Buglers were stationed in the crater posts to blow the recall. One officer and five men were wounded, the officer severely, and two prisoners were taken.
That night we were relieved by the “Van Doos.” I offered to guide their bombers in to our particular dugout and was given the task. It was the first I had seen of the 22nd since they were in Amherst, and my impressions were rather mixed. They lagged in the trench, talking loudly, making much noise, and one man even played a mouth organ. We hurried as fast as we could, getting out before the company, and shortly after the Germans gave our friends a house-warming in the shape of a “Minnie” bombardment. We heard afterward that there were many casualties before morning.
The next day we marched and marched and marched, going through several towns, of which I only noticed Houdain, and on to Divion. After the long session in the crater line, with little exercise, it was a hard grind. My legs grew woodenly stiff, my back was numbed and aching, and my shoulders were raw where the straps chafed. We staggered into billets and I was sent back to the company and told that the “battalion bombers” were no more. A re-organization was to take place, each platoon to have its own bombers and machine gunners, and I was not sorry. I wanted to be with the old crowd again.
When I woke in the morning I could barely move myself. The boys brought me my breakfast and I lay in my blankets until noon. Then the medical sergeant, a prince of a fellow, came and examined me, and asked about my experience with the “rum jar.” He said that I had undoubtedly suffered from concussion, and that I had better remain in billets for the day. The next morning I went on the sick parade and the medical officer, after a brief examination, gave me a paper and told me to report to a medical hut in Bruay. I went at once, for I was missing an inspection, a review by General Nivelle.
I was at the hut in Bruay for two hours before the orderly there took my paper. A dozen of us sat in a chilly room and waited for our turn. The man next to me had sore feet and I judged from my paper that my heart was to be examined. After waiting until one o’clock, four hours, a doctor came and snatched my paper and the one from the man with bad feet, then he yanked me into the room. Four officers were there. They ordered me to remove my boots. I started to protest and explain, and was told to keep quiet. They looked my feet over and told me to dress them again, then pushed me out by another door. I don’t know what happened to the man who needed my examination.
The medical sergeant told me to report again to the doctor, but he was a gruff man who had little use for the “other ranks” and I felt that I could carry on. At once I was notified for guard. We were marched to an old brick barn and reached our quarters overhead by a shaky ladder on the outside of the building. It was terribly cold and the barn had a hundred vents for the wind. We lay on bare boards and tried to keep warm but it was impossible. The sergeant went out and after a long time returned with a jug of rum. Earle was on the guard with me and neither of us, as a rule, took our ration, but we did that night. We were trembling with cold and the sergeant gave each of us a cigarette tin of the liquor. I felt as if I could not swallow it and after a time things seemed to move, but I was warmed. It came my turn to go down and stand sentry by the ladder but I found it a very difficult task to reach the ground. Once there I clung to the ladder and watched the estamine
t nearby go wheeling around. Earle had as difficult a time when he came down, but when we were relieved each of us went to sleep and slept warm until morning.
Christensen, the Dane, got in wrong with the non coms on Sunday. He was told to prepare for church parade and would not do so, saying that he had no religion, that he was an infidel. They crimed him for it and ever afterward he was given sharp treatment. I was in a billet with Billy, the complainer, Earle, Laurie, Flynn, a quaint Irishman who had false teeth, and Theriault and Roy, two of the New Brunswick draft. We were in a house and slept fairly warm, but one night a rat stole Flynn’s teeth from where he had lain them by his head and went down between the walls with them. Flynn roused everyone, but never recovered his grinders. Theriault and Roy were comical chaps and we got on well together.
The sergeant-major called me to his billet one night and asked me if I cared to be promoted or not. Up to that hour I had been fairly content with my lot, but somehow – though I knew he meant it well – his words brought back all my old bitterness against the army. I refused to consider such a proposition, and he was far more courteous than I had expected. He told me that our draft was the finest bunch of men to join the battalion, though the 92nd had been considered an extra class, and that he wished to get some good N.C.O.’s from among us. I said nothing, but I knew that some of our men were of the very finest type, as well educated as any of the officers.
