by Will R Bird
For a long time there was not a sound, and then we heard the Germans moving in the outskirts of Avion, a village just back of their front line. It was an hour later before they were in their front trench, and was getting light. The first thing I saw was a dead man to our right. He was stretched out on his back, and as we looked at him we heard the Germans getting into their trench. They jabbered among themselves as they examined their dead, and then, to our amazement, we heard a dozen voices calling for help. All the time we had waited there had not been a sound and yet those wounded Germans had been lying just back of their trench, wherever they could crawl.
I made small openings among the thickest weeds so that I could watch all sides. The signaller remained squatted at the bottom of the hole and did his talking in a low tone. Suddenly a head shot up in the trench just in front of me, a broad face with a very blunt nose. The German stared beyond my hiding place and then scrambled over the bags and through the wire. I slipped the safety off my revolver and told the signaller to be prepared to beat it. But the German had not seen us. He crawled out to the dead man, a 49th soldier, and took his boots and puttees, even his socks, and then went back.
It got lighter and soon we could see the Germans coming from Avion. A brick wall was over on our left and we saw that it concealed the entrance to a dugout. Many of their wounded had crawled out on the ground between their first and second trenches and in order to get them in, the stretcher bearers would be fully exposed. An officer came from the dugout and after many harsh words, which we could hear, he made an elderly-looking Hun tie a white flag to a pole and climb out of the trench. None of our fellows shot at him, and soon the stretcher bearers were following. They only had three stretchers and the rest were carried in in ground sheets, doubled like jack-knives, bumped along the rough ground so that they groaned piteously.
All that day we stayed there and watched the Germans. There were two officers in charge and we picked out the three different ways by which they came from Avion; saw where two more dugouts were placed; estimated the number of dead they carried away and the strength of the trench garrison. Then, at night, we stole back to our lines, and as we went found an old shallow trench, with a place in it that the Germans possibly used for a listening post.
The “new men” did not get on well with the “old men.” All the veterans seemed to resent our intrusion. They held aloof from us and would not talk with us at all, with the exception of McLeod and a chap called Farmer. It did not bother me in the least, but Jimmy was hot-headed and often relieved his mind within their hearing. The last afternoon we were in the line I went out in daylight to have a look at the shallow trench. Tommy and Mickey were together on post and let me use it as a sally port. The old sap was reached without much exposure and I went down it till I found an enlarged space with a trip wire around it. Undoubtedly the place had once been used, but weeds were growing in it. As I crouched there I saw a slight movement in the tall grass farther along the trench and then glimpsed a red-and-grey pillbox cap. In a second I had hidden back of the old post, and lay watching.
Very quietly a head was raised, and then the shoulders of a German officer. He was a young man with firm even features and a brown mustache. His eyes were blue and he had a very friendly look. After a moment’s watching he crawled along and came into the post, worming under the trip wire. I lay perfectly still and released the safety of my rifle. It only needed the pressure of my finger to kill the fellow, for his head was in line with the muzzle of my Lee-Enfield.
The German lay still a long time, listening, and I knew by the way he acted that he was alone. He had a Luger in his hand, but placed it on the ground as he removed some old wire from under his knees, and when he crawled on he forgot his pistol. He came on the length of himself before he remembered it, and then, as he turned to reach for it, I raised up so that he could see me.
I’ll never forget the look that was on his face. He was so surprised that he seemed paralyzed. A long minute passed, and then another. Neither of us moved. I had my finger crooked, ready, and he saw that I had. He whitened, turned red, paled again, his eyes watching mine, and then he smiled!
I had fully intended taking him prisoner, or shooting him, and yet, as he backed away, smiling at me, I did not do a thing. Back he went, foot by foot, watching me closely, and smiling. He passed the Luger and never looked at it. Back, back, he went, and I crawled forward. I did not know what I was going to do, I wanted to stop him, and yet that smile of his had me hypnotized. I kept on until I had picked up his pistol and he slipped back under the wire and to where I had first seen him. If he had picked up a bomb, or hurried, or done anything but what he did, the spell would have been broken, but he backed and smiled his way down the sap until he reached a bend, and there he stopped – and saluted me!
When he was gone I hurried back. I was bewildered at myself, called myself names, and yet I did not say a thing to Tommy or show him the Luger. All that night I thought of that German and alternately was sorry or thankful that I had let him go. I said nothing to Cave about it, or to anyone, and we were relieved by the 58th Battalion.
We went back to the line on the 2nd of July and found the front trench in Avion. The scouts were established in a cellar and as we looked about in the morning we spotted a lovely bunch of roses just in front of the German wire. Some of the platoon were in splendid dugouts, places with carpets on wooden floors, real beds, and clocks and stoves and mirrors, furnishings looted from French homes. Sedgewick and some of the others watched a house that was well over toward the German lines, and talked about using it as an observation post.
We had no orders, however, and when it was dark I got out of the trench and crawled through several gardens until I reached the roses. It was a longer crawl than I had expected and when I reached them a voice startled me so that I almost jumped and ran. Three Germans were just inside their wire and apparently they were considering a venture into no man’s land. I lay within ten feet of them and saw them point and gesture, their huge helmets silhouetted against the distant glimmer of a flare. They talked there at least ten minutes before they got down and I could get my roses.
When I reached our dugout again, a royal row was in progress. The “oldtimers,” after a long and careful reconnaissance, had reached the house they wished to use. In it, they had listened a time, and then had been badly scared by having Jimmy’s voice, a few feet away, ask them if they thought it was all right. He was seated by a window watching the Hun lines, and had gone there as soon as it was dark. Sedgewick and his mate claimed that the Germans must have heard Jimmy, there had been considerable machine-gun fire soon afterward, and he derided them for taking so long to get to a place. McLeod made both parties keep quiet, but there was hostility in the air. And Jimmy and I wore roses.
An hour after, the Germans began pitching “Minnies” into our lines. Our cellar opened on to a street through which one could walk in safety from machine bullets and as I went on a message to a company headquarters I saw the red trail of a “Minnie” in the sky. I stopped and looked. Two men were coming along the street behind me. I watched the big shell and decided that it would go back of the house, so dodged in front of it then changed. My last decision was correct. The Minnie dropped in front of the building, falling on the cobbles, and there was a tremendous explosion. Stones and bricks flew everywhere, crashing among the ruins. I ran around to where the two men had been, for I had seen them standing as if undecided. They were both lying on the street, two officers of the Princess Pats. One, Major Molson, was dead, the other a captain, had his leg blown off. I ran for help and we got him on a stretcher after binding the stump, and, strangely, he never lost consciousness and actually seemed calmer than those helping him.
Next day Cave sent Wilson and I over to the right in front of a company headquarters to where an old ruin extended into no man’s land. He told us to get into it, if possible, and observe. We found the place rather exposed but reached it and found we could get to the upstairs part withou
t showing ourselves. It was a badly shattered ruin but enough room remained to give us hiding. Beside where we lay was an opening large enough to allow a man to step outside. We were not there five minutes until we knew we had the finest observation post in that sector. In that time we had counted over forty Germans in view. We watched a carrying party going across a field, sheltered by an embankment, and a party of twenty were working busily, building what we supposed was a “Minnie” emplacement. They were mixing concrete and carrying timbers, a big non-com directing the whole. By using our glasses carefully we could see even his expression, and the screwed-up look on the face of a fat fellow who was trying to light a clay pipe.
I wriggled out through the grass again and reported our find and within the hour had an artillery officer up in the house with us. He had brought a phone with him. Wilson and I were tingling with excitement, but I had apprehensions as to what might happen. The workers were busy as ants around their construction when the first shell dropped among them. It was the nicest aiming I ever saw. The officer had had his battery fire a first shell far over into a field, then a second to the right, a third a little nearer, and had then made his calculations, and he scored a direct hit. When the smoke cleared four men were lying inert where they had worked and two wounded ones were just crawling from view. No others were in sight. The officer had that one gun remain registered, and then began sniping at other targets. He sent the carrying party, then on its second trip, diving into a dugout entrance we had not noticed, and he made two more kills, one a chance hit on a lone messenger, blowing the fellow into the air, the other on a party of three that had emerged from the embankment and were staring our way.
Two Germans showed their heads near the emplacement, and both had binoculars. We knew that they were getting suspicious and the officer kept his guns from shooting. Then came bold steps up the stairs behind us, a quick voice. Izzy, an impetuous officer of “A” Company, wanted to know what luck we were having, and before we could stop him he had stepped full-length into the opening beside us and stood calmly surveying the German lines. One scoop gathered our glasses and tunics which we had lain on the floor. Wilson and I made it a dead heat until we reached the company houses and the artillery officer was not far behind. He never bothered with his phone. Izzy stared at us, then started down, no doubt bewildered by our conduct. Crash! A shell went through the top of the ruin, blasting out the entire corner where we had been and covering Izzy with a deluge of debris. It was a miracle that he was not killed. We saw him come into the open and dash blindly toward the company headquarters, and we kept on, far along the side of an old railway track until we were back to our cellar. The Hun smashed that ruin to powdered brick and he kept right on and levelled all the houses where the company officers were, they remaining in the cellars, unable to get away. We heard that Izzy received the colonel’s compliments. The battalion was relieved and we went back to Chateau de la Haie.
No sooner were we in billets than I went to see the boys in the company, and was astounded to learn that Ira had got into trouble. During the heavy shelling of “D” company’s trench at Avion he and others had been ordered to dugouts. They had stayed there for some time when a shell blew in part of the entrance and showered chalky earth on Ira who had been halfway up the stairs. Probably he was shocked by concussion. At any rate, so Tommy told me, he had been shaky for some time, brooding on the fate of Herman, who had been his friend, and thinking of Freddy’s prophecy. When, later, an officer came and ordered them back to their posts Ira would not go. He told the officer that he could not do so, and he was crimed. They sent him to join the road-making gang for twenty-one days.
There was a queer old chap in the company, one of the last draft, a short, bow-legged fellow, Bunty. He had made himself a bivvy under the parados – because it was easier digging –and so constructed it that he had to sit in it like a Hindoo. He was a heavy sleeper, and very scared of shells. Tommy found him asleep there one morning, sitting cross-legged, and took a dud shell to the place. He made a cleft in the parapet directly in front, then scooped out the earth between Bunty’s knees, without waking him. He pushed the dud into the hole, and then threw a Mills bomb into the grass just back of Bunty’s parados. The explosion, of course, wakened the little man, but there was no outcry, not a sound. Tommy hiding around the traverse, was obliged to go to see what happened. Bunty was there, rigid, sweat streaming down his face, unable to move or speak. Fright had almost paralyzed him. Tommy removed the shell and never let Bunty know it was all a joke. Melville also had got into trouble. A German airman had the habit of coming each morning, just as it was light, and flying very low above our trench, shooting at the men. On the third morning Melville was ready for him. He had two rifles beside him and he pumped lead like a machine gun, causing the airman to swerve from his route. The boys all claimed that Melville hit him, at any rate the flyer never returned, but an officer who had seen the shooting had Melville on the carpet. The orders were that no man must even look up while an enemy airman was overhead, and never shoot at them.
During our stay at Chateau de la Haie the private war between the “old” and “new” scouts waged merrily, though I had little to do with it. At every opportunity Tommy and I went to other units, visiting them, and I talked with all the interesting strangers I met, making notes of all unusual stories that I heard. One evening we went to the old crater line at Vimy and I looked over from Vernon post to where the German front had been. It seemed incredible that we could have remained so close to the enemy, for one could almost have thrown a bomb from one post to the other. Then we went and looked down over the plain. The moon had risen, casting its spell over all the hillside, blotting out harsh lines, tinging all with an eerie sort of beauty that held us, unspeaking, a long, long time. I thought of some rare moments there, quiets at midnight when we talked of home and things near the heart, fugitive minutes, never to be forgotten. As we went back Tommy pointed out French graves near Souchez, with “Mort Pour la patrie,” on the crosses, others with but an inverted bottle holding all the particulars, and told me that he and another had found a dreadful spot, a little area of unburied dead, mostly Sengalese, rotting, rat-picked bones, with fezzes, faded red sashes, and brass-studded belts among the skeletons.
We moved to Berthonaval Wood and there we went for scout instruction to a small glade that seemed remote from war. Dashes of blue cornflower, scarlet poppies, and yellow mustard added a vivid touch to the sun-drenched grass. All around was a background of glossy sheen, a wall of still green trees. Then the expected happened. The “umptyumps” and the “oldtimers” clashed. Jimmy gained victory, though not much damage was done, and the next day all save Brown and Wilson were sent back to their companies. Headquarters did not want the turbulent bluenoses about. They disturbed the tranquility, disrupted the even tenor of head-quarter ways. Brown would never be troublesome. He was a quiet, inoffensive plodder, and would be a good billet orderly. Wilson was impulsive but had the making of as good a scout as any there.
We went back to Lozingham and were billeted in a barn. A new officer took command of fourteen platoon, Mcintrye, one of the “originals” who had been a sergeant. He was a rough and ready Scot, and a splendid soldier; we all liked him. We had an ideal vacation in that village. The weather was wonderful, glorious summer, dazzling sun and very hot, but cool and starlight at night. There was an aerodrome at Auchel, just above us, and at all hours the planes were roaring overhead. I chummed with Melville. He had never for a moment believed any of Freddy’s predictions, but scoffed at them, and he was a good man in the line. Beside us were Mickey and Jerry and Tommy, of the old gang, and Eddie was in another billet. Hughes, a 73rd man, was our corporal, and I found him a splendid fellow, a little too easy to maintain discipline, but “white” to the core. Christensen was stretcher bearer in another platoon and I got acquainted with our man Stewart, the kind-voiced fellow who told me about Laurie. Laurie, however, had recovered. We had had a letter from him. He was still in hospita
l and would never come back to the trenches. Sam, the miner, looked more sour than ever, and the surly cook would not speak, but I loved being with the company.
Mcintyre started at once to re-build the platoon. He got three of the poor men transferred to other work, and looked after us like children. He came to see our rations, our meals, our quarters, and made us drill and act smartly on parade. Every man was solidly for him. In my section were four of our draft, Barron, an athlete; Sambro, a dark-faced lad who had not missed a scrap since joining; Hale, husky; and Hayward, whom I fished out of the water hole at Vimy. The others were Luggar, a late arrival, Johnson, an English lad, and Orr, a lanky fellow, an “original,” who had been, until then, on a job in London. He was a sort of comic singer, and “Old Bill” took a great delight in imitating him, while we all called him “oldtimer.”
Jennings, a big man from the 73rd, was in the platoon, and did not like the French. The boys were better singers than any of the various canteen choirs I heard and the two ladies next door were very appreciative, bringing us offerings of coffee whenever a special selection was rendered. Melville always said that they were bribes for us to stop singing and Jennings backed him. He did not want to see them at all. Orders were issued that we were to have “physical jerks” before breakfast. It was an idiotic arrangement, but persisted for a short time. The bugler roused us and we were to don shorts and hurry to the training field where for half an hour we were supposed to go through snappy workouts. No one would move quickly. We wanted our tea and bacon and the goo that made Scotland famous before we could feel like jumping or running. The first morning Mcintyre raced in the lead away down the field lane, calling us to follow him. We did, but at a distance, and he turned and loosed his tongue, calling us cripples and babies and all kinds of soft pets. Melville gently reminded him that we were not officers, that we had not come from ten months of good living in England, and that even now we had not four-course meals awaiting us, and batmen to serve us, when we went back from our work out.
