These nurses came daily to re-dress my surgery scar, using a many-tailed bandage around my midriff; a bandage made of strips of overlapping cloth, loosely pinned over cotton wool. This allowed the liquids that bubbled up from around the operation scars to be mopped up. Meanwhile, should I require extra attention, a wooden spoon was brought and placed at the side of my bed, with which to bang on a chair.
Unsure whether I would ever get home, I one day asked a nurse to write to my mother, saying that although unable to write, I nevertheless wanted to thank her for everything she had done for me. My parents knew that I was in hospital, and had been told officially that I was poorly after a second operation. Yet it was important that I didn’t say goodbye as such and, only after it had been very carefully worded, was the letter sent.4
In the neighbouring bed to mine there was a young Belgian seriously ill with severe constipation. The doctors had operated and had left a bucket underneath his body to collect a slow stream of effluent, but the stench was overpowering. It was then that Sister Hoyle went out into the garden and returned with a huge bunch of lilac which she arranged in an earthenware pot and placed on the chair beside my bed. ‘Bury your nose in that,’ she whispered, and from that day she became an angel to me – she could do no wrong.5
My condition slowly began to improve and by the last week of June, I was considered fit enough to travel by ambulance train to the 14th Stationary Hospital at Boulogne. The hospital was made up of many uninspiring Nissen huts joined together, but the weather was fine and on warm days the orderlies would half-wheel, half-carry the patients’ beds out on to the cliffs so we could enjoy fresh air and sunshine. Three or four of us were allowed to relax and even eat our dinners out there, our beds backing onto the sea. While I was dozing one day, a charabanc full of nurses momentarily stopped on the road directly opposite us and as I looked my eyes fixed on one face. I looked again, she looked at me, and then I thrust my hand in the air and waved. It was Sister Hoyle. She acknowledged my wave, and within twenty minutes was scooting back along the cliffs to see how I was. The hospital at Namur was now closing and she was finally on her way home. We chatted for a short time, before she had to go, promising as she did so to tell the doctors my full case history so I would receive the very best attention. That one visit did me the power of good, and I have always been sad that we never met again.
With the worst over, it was now just a case of slow recuperation. I was to be confined to bed for some four tiresome months in all, propped upright so that my muscles wouldn’t tighten on the tubes that straggled from my stomach. To stop me sliding down the bed, a pillow called a Donkey was placed behind me, while strategically-positioned cotton wool cups under my heels and a water cushion under my backside helped avoid the worst that bedsores would bring. When finally allowed to sleep normally, I discovered that I could barely sleep on my side as it hurt so much.
The first few times that I was allowed out of bed were to sit still in a chair while my bed was remade. These few minutes were precious after six months lying on a matress and, although I struggled to get up, I had a taste for this renewed independence. I had a target in mind, for after months of bed pans, I wanted, more than anything, to go to a toilet on my own. As the toilets were at the far end of the hut, a few trial runs were needed before the day came when, labouring from bed rail to bed rail, I finally reached the objective. This one trip had, however, exhausted me and I had to call for an orderly to take me back to bed in a wheelchair.
Around the first anniversary of the Armistice, I finally got home to England and to the Royal Herbert Hospital in Woolwich. I had an aunt and uncle living locally, who came over and took me out, and as I got better I was able to go and see them. As a soldier, wearing the hospital blue uniform, I was entitled to free travel on Woolwich’s electric trams and was usually invited to sit pride of place next to the driver.
It was at The Royal Herbert that I learnt to walk again. Having been invalided for so long, my weight had tumbled to seven stone, and everything was flabby. I was really just skin and bones. At the same time, I was on a strict diet of mince and milk, week in and week out, so it took time to build up both my stamina and leg muscles. Through perseverance, I gradually taught myself to walk slowly round the ward with the nurse and her trolley, helping to hold a bucket as she changed the dirty swabs and put new dressings on wounds.
Even into 1920, men were still dying from their wounds. Yet, although I saw some terrible sights and found myself holding many a chap’s hand when the pain became unbearable, the sights themselves didn’t turn my stomach in the least. It was fascinating to see what the doctors were able to achieve, one surgeon, Major Swan, working wonders with two particular cases.
The first had lost part of his upper lip, to which new skin had been grafted, grown after surgeons managed to join the man’s arm to his stomach. The growth of skin in between was cut away from the stomach but not away from the arm, which for the following six weeks was strapped to the upper lip. The graft was successful, and by the time I was discharged, the man had at least a provisional lump of flesh which the surgeons could later shape.
The second had been hit by a large shard of shrapnel which shattered the femur in his thigh. So badly damaged was his leg that, after patching up, it was found to be three inches shorter than the other. An orderly told me that Major Swan was certain he could lengthen the leg to within half an inch of its original size, but that it would be a nasty operation. The patient was willing to go along with this, so during the operation Major Swan cut the bone at an angle, as two orderlies were instructed to pull the leg. Where the two bones still met, he screwed a metal plate into place to give it support while the bone knitted together, the man’s leg being kept in traction all the while. It took months to succeed, during which time I helped to dress the wounds and saw this metal plate in action. The leg would always be stiff, but so pleased was Major Swan with the result that the metal plate was later inscribed with details of the operation, mounted on a piece of mahogany and presented to the delighted patient.
After four months at the Royal Herbert, I asked to be discharged. It was March 1920, and I’d been nearly a year in various hospitals. While I was grateful for all that had been done, I was thoroughly tired of the whole experience. The doctors were reluctant to let me return to the Regiment, back once again at Tidworth, and insisted that if discharged, I must have a letter from the Squadron Sergeant Major stating that I would be put on twelve months’ light duty, and that under no circumstances would I go riding.
The letter arrived, and I was discharged from the Royal Herbert for a week at my parents’ cottage at Croxley Green. While I was there, my girl friend, Betty Shepard – a class mate of my elder sister’s – came to see me. I’d kept in contact with her since 1916, but though I had known her well beforehand, our relationship, which had been on paper until then, didn’t work out once we met, and we quickly split up.
It felt strange to return to Tidworth. The Regiment had been back into the swing of peace time soldiering for a full year, since its return from Germany, and there were many new, as well as old, faces. I returned to barrack life with B Squadron, but was quickly moved to one of the cubicle rooms next to the stairway, as I had been made an Orderly Sergeant and drill instructor to the regiment of recruits. The drill instructor’s job was unofficial. The RSM, ‘Liz’ Barrett, an old soldier and long-standing favourite in the Regiment, was meant to drill the three Squadrons, every Friday. However, he was suffering from bouts of laryngitis and needed someone to call out the commands as he gave them quietly behind. I didn’t mind, I was on light duties and had plenty of time on my hands. To fill the day, a young doctor recommended that I took up the art of Indian club swinging to build up my stomach muscles. Standing on an upturned beer box, I would windmill two clubs around, building up the weight gradually, until I could swing two rifles around for up to an hour a day.
One of the perks of being a member of the Corporals’ Mess was that the small swindle
s that went on within the Regiment usually filtered down to us first. One fiddle concerned a prized book of passes someone had pinched, enabling myself and two others almost unlimited possibilities to leave Tidworth Camp. The book contained anything up to a hundred passes, an assortment of white and pink slips, the former giving permission to leave the camp, the latter to use the trains for free. I had palled up with a girl, Clarice Plumb, who worked in a haberdashery store in Swindon, and so ‘allowed’ myself once weekly visits, setting off at 5pm to give myself plenty of time to cover the twenty-six-mile trip from Tidworth to town. Despite the train passes, I preferred to cycle to Swindon, for I didn’t want to court suspicion; by going across country, I knew I’d never meet a policeman, whereas on the train there would be one checking passes at Ludgershall station, one possibly at Andover, and another at Swindon. Each slip had to be signed by an officer and we practised forging signatures including Lieutenant Fetherstonhaugh’s, which proved too flourishing to duplicate faithfully, and Captain Misa’s, which was simple. Many years later, the back of a regimental reunion dinner menu gave me the opportunity to pen Misa’s signature for his informal inspection. ‘We got many passes on that one,’ I told him with a grin. His reply was humorous and unprintable.
As an Orderly Sergeant, it was my duty to take the roll call at 6.15am, thereby ensuring our swindle went undetected. After I spent the evening with Clarice, I would sleep at the YMCA in Swindon, being woken at 4am, in time for a cup of tea and a bun before I cycled into barracks. Everything was timed to a tee, so I was surprised when, one morning, he woke me an hour early. ‘Just wait until you look outside, there’s two inches of snow.’ This threw a great spanner in the works. Fearing I would give the game away, I dressed quickly and ran downstairs, and grabbing my bike set off as fast as I could. I was forced to remove the bike’s mudguards as they clogged up in the snow, but my luck was in, and when I came across a stretch where a milk lorry with twin tyres had driven, I was able to ride in the tracks and make good time to Ludgershall. I had to half-cycle, half-run, but I got into barracks just as reveille sounded. I chucked my bike in the corner and immediately started shouting, ‘Come on, show a leg’. I had a Corporal, nicknamed Bandy Nylon, who would take the roll call, but as I hadn’t made any arrangements, I would have been in trouble.
Not long after returning to the Regiment I was very fortunate to have General Pitman pin the Mons medal on my chest after a Sunday Church parade. I and one other trooper had not received our medals, and following a special ceremony outside Mooltan Barracks, we were given the privilege of standing on a dais with the General and taking the salute of the Regiment as it marched past. I was very proud, as one might imagine, and was congratulated on my smartness.
Only three months after rejoining the Regiment I decided to put in my papers and leave. The Regiment was going to India and I didn’t really want to go, and though I’d never regretted joining the army, five years of war had been a basin-full and I wanted the freedom I’d never had since a boy. Many things had changed within the Regiment, and now so many of the old faces had gone, I felt even more of a loner. I felt, too, that I’d learnt the drill to a high standard with pre-war men, superior to those who were now joining up, and that made me bitter against those who seemed slack or less able. This was how I felt and I wasn’t well respected because of it. To those who had joined up after the war, I was a faceless, stern drill instructor; it quickly brought me to the conclusion that all in all I’d truthfully had enough.
Opposite:
Ben’s final discharge from the army after serving seven years with the Colours and five on the Army Reserve. It is interesting to note the false date of birth. To be accepted into the army, Ben had to conceal his age: he was in fact born in 1897 not 1895.
Out in civilian life, my father was very poorly. Although he was bravely struggling on as a landscape gardener to make ends meet, he nevertheless desperately needed help. With leave owing, I was able to depart from the Regiment a month early, handing in my bandolier and sword, then the rest of my kit to stores, in exchange for which I received a new suit. I left Tidworth, and to all intents and purposes that appeared to be the end of my army service. I didn’t then, nor have I ever, regretted going to the war. I was aware that as a cavalryman and as an orderly, I had had a cushier time than some others, but nevertheless I had served throughout the war, and had been wounded twice. I had also been slightly gassed, with the effect that I suffered serious nose bleeds during dry weather for the next fifty years, and I have never regained the ability to smell gas (a potentially serious drawback in the kitchen). I did not suffer from any psychological problems after the war, or even from nightmares. I did have the habit of ducking if there was a sudden loud noise, but that was only a distant reflex to diving for the ground when shrapnel burst overhead, and in time even this tendency to flinch diminished. I left the Regiment with many memories, with the opportunity to attend regimental reunions, and £29–6s war gratuity to set me up for life!
It was late June when I eventually teamed up with my father. But he was more ill than I had realised and within a month he was dead from a mixed infection of the lungs. In eight years, so much had changed: Charlie Brand’s death, Sid’s death, and a year later the death of my grandmother who had raised him. Old friends from childhood had gone: Harold Clark and Janie Weaver’s brother, George. He had joined the Sussex Yeomanry and died of dysentery shortly after being evacuated from Gallipoli in January 1916, just one of several boys from Beddingham, Firle and Glynde killed in the war, with whom I had gone to school.
Now my father’s death left me unexpectedly at a loose end, and with high unemployment, I wasn’t hopeful of finding work. My brother, who was employed at The Sun Engraving Company in Watford, managed to get me temporary work at the printing works, stacking waste paper in 100-lb bundles, before bailing, then binding them up ready for sale. The nationwide recession was biting, and it wasn’t long before the company began cutting staff, and I was told that being the last in, I could expect to be the first out. It was hardly an ideal job, and was something of a come-down from life in the army. I began to toy with the idea of emigrating, having heard that the Hudson’s Bay Company in North America were taking on people, but mother begged me not to go: ‘You’ve been away ever since you left school, I never see anything of you.’ So instead, I began to look at the police force, and was told that if my papers were accepted, I would be kept on at the paper firm until I was called for training.
Industrial unrest was rife at this time, and in April 1921 two thirds of the very powerful Triple Alliance (of the miners, rail-waymen and transport workers) had gone on strike. The miners had begun the industrial action and the railwaymen had followed in support. The mines were privately owned at this time, but so seriously did the Government take this action, that it mobilised Navy stokers to look after the pits and pumps to stop them flooding. These sailors complained that they were being intimidated by the strikers, so the Government mobilised a number of soldiers to look after the sailors. I happened to be one who received papers to rejoin the Regiment.
A travel warrant was sent, with orders to proceed to the Dragoons’ new depot at Dunbar. But I was in need of a break and in no particular hurry, so I set about a sightseeing tour of Scotland. I’d never seen Scotland before and by ‘mistakenly’ getting on the wrong trains, visits to Perth, Inverness and overnight stays at hotels in the depths of the Scottish Highlands, were made possible. Declining attempts by train guards to charge excess fares on some of my more outrageous detours, I merely explained that if platform guards were unable to direct me to the right coaches, that was hardly my fault. I was three days late into Dunbar and my absence commented on, but nothing more.
Having just arrived, I took a look around the camp when suddenly I heard ‘Cronkie, Cronkie!’ I turned and to my surprise saw Cumber running down the road, before flinging his arms round me in an embrace. There was so much to talk about that we spent the rest of the afternoon and evening just remi
niscing, and swapping stories. His face was still scarred from his fall on the railway, but otherwise he was fine. It was the first time I’d seen him since that day at Audregnies, and when I was moved on a few days later, it was sadly the last.
I was temporarily made an Orderly Sergeant again. However, I declined to revert to being a drill instructor as I was training to be a singer and, toying with turning professional, I didn’t want to damage my voice. Most troopers were kicking their heels around, until some of us were sent down to Tidworth from where a draft had just been sent to the mines in South Wales. An attack of the flu hit the camp, and I came down with a bad attack of quinsy, which laid me up in hospital. Apart from that, the next couple of months were spent whiling away time at Tidworth with a number of sailors who, having also been called up, were found to be excess to requirements.
In June I was finally discharged from the army, joining the City of London Police Force in November 1921. Shortly afterwards, an indirect approach was made by Sir Tom Bridges as to whether I wished to go as his servant to Australia, where he had been made its new Governor. It was a great honour, but I now had a new career, and I declined.
I remained on the army reserve for a further six years, until I had completed the statutory twelve years in the forces, when I was released from all military obligations in August 1927. I had finally reached the end of the line.
NOTES
1. This was Number 50 Casualty Clearing Station and was stationed in Huy from December 22nd 1918 onwards in what was an Ecole Normale, a teacher training college. The hospital remained at Huy until it was closed down on June 7th 1919, the remaining patients being transferred to the 48 CCS at Namur. The buildings at Huy still exist, in almost identical condition to that of 1919, just off the Rue Grégoire Bodart, near the river.
Teenage Tommy Page 23
