First World War Folk Tales

by Taffy Thomas

  The two lucky survivors from Mons became the first of more than 200 Allied soldiers who were provided with a safe passage home thanks to Edith’s courage and tenacity. One by one, she would nurse them back to health and keep them out of the German prison camps, before engineering their escape.

  Edith told no one of her secret activities. She sewed all incriminating paperwork safely inside a cushion in her room and always held her nerve, even when the Germans suspected that she was up to something and carried out a search of the clinic. While Edith calmly showed the soldiers around, her latest charge – a Belgian collaborator – crept out of the back garden unseen.

  But Edith’s luck was running out, for on 31 July 1915, the German soldiers came back to search the clinic again and this time, when they left, they took Edith with them, her hands bound. Whether they had been tipped off, or whether they had seen Edith acting suspiciously, they did not say. All her captors did tell her was that she was not alone: two others involved in her scheme had also been taken prisoner and they, the captors lied, had confessed all. Poor Edith, who believed what she was being told, admitted defeat and admitted her part.

  It took just ten weeks for the Germans to bring Edith to trial and while pleas for her release came from as far away as America and Spain, the British Government remained silent, fearing their intervention would anger the Germans and do Edith more harm than good.

  All alone in the dock, Edith’s only defence for aiding the Allied soldiers was that had she not helped them, they would have been shot. To her German accusers, this was no defence at all, and Edith was sentenced to be executed the very next day.

  The last friendly person that Edith saw before she faced the firing squad came to her that night in the form of an English chaplain. Finding her calm, free of bitterness and resigned to her fate, the chaplain took communion with Edith then they quietly sang ‘Abide With Me’. Holding back the tears, Edith gave the chaplain a prayer book, asking that he honour her last wish that it be taken to her cousin back in Swardeston. Only after he left the room did the chaplain glance inside and see that Edith had dedicated the book to her one and only sweetheart, sending her darling Eddie her love.

  Edith Cavell and her two fellow conspirators were executed not long after dawn on 12 October 1915. There are those who say that the men in the firing squad could not bear to shoot such a kind and gentle soul, and fired wide. There are those who say that before the guns fired, Edith fainted and was put to death instead by a single pistol shot, fired by a German officer. Others say that one of the gunmen threw down his rifle in protest and was himself shot, alongside Edith, for his disobedience. There is, of course, also the possibility that nothing out of the ordinary happened at all. But whatever the details of Edith’s final moments, her body was hurriedly buried close to the firing range and her grave marked with a simple wooden cross.

  Edith’s life may have been cut short, but the effects of it lived on, as news of her death sent ripples of anger around the world. In trying to make an example of the brave nurse, the Germans had given their enemies all the ammunition they needed for a powerful propaganda campaign. In this shocking story, the Germans were the evil villains and Edith was the perfect patriotic heroine – a symbol of bravery and courage.

  So important was Edith’s legacy considered to be, that when the war was finally over, special arrangements were made to return her body to Britain where she could be laid to rest back in her beloved church in Swardeston. To mark her life, a memorial was held in her honour at Westminster Abbey, with Queen Alexandra and Princess Victoria in the congregation alongside nurses from all over the world. And in the true spirit of Edith’s sense of charity, the Cavell Nurses’ Trust was set up in her name, to provide rest homes for retired nurses.

  Edith never wanted fame and she never set out to become a martyr. But through her actions, her kindness, her bravery and her courage, she nonetheless became a true legend of the First World War.

  WHAT GOES AROUND COMES AROUND

  The bones of this story were given to us by Australian storyteller and Bush poet, Ken Prato. Ken – who spent forty-five years of his life working as a sheep-shearer all over Australia – shared the tale while visiting the English seaside town of Whitby to take part in a special event at the Whitby Folk Festival called Taffy’s Tunes and Tales. Ken is among the many hundreds of Australian tourists who have visited the French town of Villers-Bretonneux over the years, inspired by the story which here follows of a surprising and long-lasting friendship between two communities on opposite sides of the globe.

  Not far from the River Somme in Northern France is a small town called Villers-Bretonneux. Its size belies its significance, for in the spring of 1918, this was the site of the first head-to-head tank battle the world had ever seen.

  It was the final year of the Great War, and Germany was executing its last major offensive. As the German troops advanced towards Amiens, Villers-Bretonneux stood in their path. But this was no tiny ant about to be crushed easily underfoot. To win the town, the German forces had to push through British defences. In a clash of the Titans, the Germans pitted their three A7V tanks against three British Mk IV machines, and came out on top. By the end of the day on 24 April 1918, Villers-Bretonneux was occupied and around 3,500 dismayed residents were forced from their homes.

  But the people of Villers-Bretonneux were not to be exiled for long: the Australians were coming. After darkness fell that very same day, troops from the 4th and 5th Divisions of the Australian Imperial Forces – known as the AIF – launched a counter-attack.

  German flares lit up the skies, turning night into day and casting the Australian soldiers into deadly pools of light amid which they could be picked off, one by one, with machine-gun fire. But the brave soldiers from Down Under kept on coming, wave upon wave, and by morning the tide had turned and they were chasing an enemy ten times their own size back out of the town.

  Yet, being so heavily outnumbered meant that victory came at a high price. The AIF were left with 1,200 of their brothers’ bodies to bury, more than 10,000 miles away from home, in French soil.

  Having fought so hard to regain Villers-Bretonneux, the AIF soldiers were determined that no German would ever set foot in the town again. They stationed a garrison there, amid the war-ravaged buildings, and were welcomed by the locals who were overjoyed at being able to return to their homes – no matter how tattered and torn they were.

  As a demonstration of their gratitude, the people of Villers-Bretonneux changed the names of many places in their town. The main street became Rue de Melbourne, a restaurant was fondly renamed Le Kangourou, and one district was newly christened Robinvale, after the town in north-east Victoria from which one group of AIF soldiers came.

  Throughout the final months of the war, the AIF remained in Villers-Bretonneux, manning the garrison, and a strong bond of friendship was forged between the French inhabitants and their colonial saviours.

  Finally, at war’s end, the soldiers said their goodbyes and returned home to Australia, leaving their new French companions to rebuild both their town and their lives. Reunited with their families, the soldiers spoke with affection of the now devastated town that was Villers-Bretonneux and the friendships they had forged. As one by one their stories were shared, a feeling began to emerge … a determination not to forget but to continue to help their friends working so hard to restore their beloved town, thousands of miles away back in France.

  So it was that the people of Victoria decided to raise funds to help rebuild the town’s primary school. Schoolchildren all over the state joined in by holding penny-drives, and day by day, week by week, the funds grew until they had raised some £10,000. The sum was matched by the Victoria State Government, and the organisers proudly despatched to France enough money to rebuild the school.

  On 25 April 1927 (which, coincidentally, was also Anzac Day), and nine years to the day after the AIF had driven the German invaders out of Villers-Bretonneux, a brand new, two-storey school
building was inaugurated in the town. Overwhelmed by the generosity of their Australian friends, the local people named it L’Ecole Victoria, and above every blackboard they installed a sign conveying the message: ‘N’oublions jamais l’Australie’ or ‘Let us never forget Australia’.

  Then, on the front of the building, they put up a plaque with the inscription:

  This building is the gift of the schoolchildren of Victoria, Australia, to the children of Villers-Bretonneux as a proof of their love and good-will towards France. Twelve hundred Australian soldiers, the fathers and brothers of these children, gave their lives in the heroic recapture of this town from the invader on 24th April 1918, and are buried near this spot. May the memory of great sacrifices in a common cause keep France and Australia together for ever in bonds of friendship and mutual esteem.

  If someone ignorant of the story of Villers-Bretonneux passed by the windows of L’Ecole Victoria on the first day of any term-time week – even today – they might hear the children inside singing a surprising song … a song which might seem out of place in rural France. For they would probably hear the words of ‘Waltzing Matilda’, and they would be witnessing yet another way in which the people of the town remember the generosity of their wartime friends on the other side of the world.

  Thousands of Australians who do know the town’s history visit Villers-Bretonneux each year to relive the adventures of their forebears and to pay their respects to the dead, lying in one of the beautifully maintained cemeteries on the edge of the town. Most will also visit the Musee Franco-Australien – the museum which was installed in 1975 on the upper floors of the school to house memorabilia representing their country’s involvement on the Western Front throughout the First World War – among the artefacts being letters, flags, uniforms, photographs and even a kangaroo mascot.

  Our story could finish here. But there is a saying – appropriately with an Australian flavour – which claims that ‘kindness, like a boomerang, always returns’, and that saying invites one final chapter to the tale …

  In the summer of 2009, a series of devastating bushfires ravaged the state of Victoria and many homes and three schools were destroyed in the blaze. Here was an opportunity for the people of Villers-Bretonneux to repay the kindness shown to them some nine decades earlier. A sum of $21,000 was raised by the French community, and was sent to help fund the rebuilding program.

  Some months later, a group from the little French town – including the mayor and thirty citizens – travelled all the way to Australia to be part of the opening ceremony for the new primary school at Strathewen, in central Victoria. And in the courtyard they witnessed the erection of a special plaque, reminiscent of its French counterpart on a similar school 10,000 miles away, which read: ‘N’oublions jamais nos amis de Villers-Bretwonneux, France’ or ‘Never forget our friends in Villers-Bretonneux, France’.

  The date of 25 April officially became known as Anzac Day in 1916 – one year after the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landed at Gallipoli in 1915, and took part in their first military action of the Great War. It became a national day of remembrance in Australia in the 1920s and after 1927 it also became a public holiday.

  THE PHOTO OF THE GIRL I LEFT BEHIND ME

  In the period leading up to the Great War, during it and indeed following it, the main forms of entertainment in England were the music halls and variety theatres. Famous artists used their voices for the war effort. Miss Florrie Forde amused audiences with ‘It’s A Long Way to Tipperary’, and ‘Take Me Back to Dear Old Blighty’. These were common entertainments for common people, though humour was a touch coarse, and unfettered by any of the sensibilities we have come to know in the twenty-first century with regards to issues of feminism and racism. This was probably not because folk were rude or insensitive, but rather because they were preoccupied with more immediate issues of mortality and survival.

  The text of the song that follows, originally from the comic singer Billy Merson (and which Taffy Thomas has heard sung on several occasions by Essex folk singer Simon Ritchie), has to be considered in the context of the 1900s, where it elicited hearty chuckles and belly laughs from both men and women, together enjoying a bit of escape from the death and destruction of Flanders Fields. If you find yourself chuckling likewise, just enjoy those few moments of freedom and guilty pleasure.

  The Photo of the Girl I Left Behind Me

  When first I made me mind up that a soldier I would be,

  The girl that I was courting she came round and said to me

  ‘I’ve had me photo taken, Bill, and if we are to part

  Promise me you’ll always wear the photo next your heart.’

  She hung the locket round my neck and her ruby lips I kissed

  Borrowed the fare to Aldershot and off I went to enlist.

  Chorus:

  With the photo of the girl I left behind me

  I went and joined the army full of glee

  Then someone came up to remind me

  The doctor wanted to examine me.

  When the doctor found the locket next my heart he said to me

  ‘Whose photograph is this sir that I find?

  Is this the captain’s bulldog?’ I said, ‘No, sir, if you please, sir

  It’s the photo of the girl I left behind.’

  I never shall forget the first day that I went under fire

  I’d been looking at the photo of the girl that I admire

  I thought her lovely face would encourage me to go

  And fight like Englishmen should do when going to face the foe.

  The Captain said, ‘We’re cornered, boys, so fight like mad you must.’

  I kissed the photograph and then you couldn’t see me for dust.

  Chorus:

  With the photo of the girl I left behind me

  I rushed into the thickest of the fray

  When the Captain said, ‘We’re out of ammunition

  I’m afraid it’s going to be a losing day.’

  I said, ‘Don’t worry over ammunition, if you please

  I have something far more terrible you will find

  I will rush amongst the enemy and I’ll frighten them to death

  With the photo of the girl I left behind.

  With the photo of the girl I left behind me

  I went to practise shooting one Summer day

  When we found a gust of wind had been unkind and

  Blown the blooming target right away.

  The Captain said, ‘The target’s gone whatever shall we do?’

  I shouted just to cheer him, ‘Never mind

  If you haven’t got a target and you want something to shoot at

  Here’s the photo of the girl I left behind.’

  Song lyrics written and composed by

  Billy Merson (1881–1947)

  Billy Merson’s song is actually a cheeky version of the following, traditional folk song dating back to the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, known simply as ‘The Girl I Left Behind Me’. The sad words of this traditional song were particularly relevant to the men who went off to the Great War, who would sing it about their loved ones back home.

  The Girl I Left Behind Me

  The hours sad I left a maid

  A lingering farewell taking

  Whose sighs and tears my steps delayed

  I thought her heart was breaking.

  In hurried words her name I blest

  I breathed the vows that bind me

  And to my heart in anguish pressed

  The girl I left behind me.

  Then to the East we bore away

  To win a name in story

  And there where dawns the sun of day

  There dawned our sun of glory.

  The place in my sight

  When in the host assigned me

  I shared the glory of that fight

  Sweet girl I left behind me.

  Though many a name our banner bore

  Of former deed
s of daring

  But they were of the day of yore

  In which we had no sharing.

  But now our laurels freshly won

  With the old one shall entwine me

  Singing worthy of our size each son

  Sweet girl I left behind me.

  The hope of final victory

  Within my bosom burning

  Is mingling with sweet thoughts of thee

  And of my fond returning.

  But should I n’eer return again

  Still with thy love I’ll bind me

  Dishonors breath shall never stain

  The name I leave behind me.

  UNDERGROUND MUTTON

  An old soldier from the Devonshire Regiment, Wrey Tucker, lived in the small Devon village of South Zeal near Okehampton until his death in 2012. A caretaker at the local primary school, Wrey told the story that follows to Taffy Thomas over several games of cribbage. It’s amazing how expensive collecting a new tale can be at a penny a point! Wrey told this as a Second World War story, although conversations indicated it was a First World War story that he had recycled.

  The soldiers of the Devonshire Regiment had completed their training on Dartmoor prior to their posting to France, and they had one more training week at the barracks at Catterick Camp in North Yorkshire to endure.

  After a long journey, the Devon men settled into their Nissen huts at the barracks, and went down to the mess for a meal. The food was disgusting. The Dartmoor and Exmoor boys all agreed that they had to do something about it.