1915: The Death of Innocence

by Lyn Macdonald

  Lord Kitchener had become increasingly awkward to deal with and it was tempting to take advantage of the re-shaping of the Cabinet to replace him as Secretary of State for War, but although Kitchener’s star was waning in political quarters, he was extremely popular with the rest of the country. To most people Kitchener was the war. It was his face that stared from every bill-board and gazed up from the pages of every magazine. Kitchener’s imperious finger had beckoned the nation to war and it was the first of Kitchener’s Armies that was on the point of leaving for the front to win it. To the public at large Kitchener himself seemed to personify stern British determination, and the desirable virtues of honour and duty had been the hall-mark of his distinguished career. Plans were already afoot to celebrate his birthday on 24 June with a mammoth recruiting campaign, and arm-bands stamped ‘Kitchener’s Birthday Recruit’ were being turned out in thousands ready for the occasion. Lord Kitchener was a national hero and a large segment of the female population of the United Kingdom was partial to heroes and would not be content until every eligible young man in the country was wearing heroic khaki.

  Much of the recruiting propaganda was aimed at stimulating women to encourage their men to enlist. There were posters depicting noble matrons – ‘Women Of Britain Say Go!’; white-haired old ladies at cottage doors drawing the attention of a reluctant son to troops marching on the road outside – ‘It’s Your Duty, Lad!’; young girls arm-in-arm with a soldier – ‘Is Your Best Boy In Khaki?’; and many women regarded it as a personal mission to accost every young man in civvies to shame him into joining up.

  Jeremy Bentham and his friend Bob Southin had been favoured by the attentions of one such lady on a train journey from Harwich to London, and somewhat to their astonishment for they had been in the war from the very beginning. It was true that they could be loosely described as wearing civilian clothes, but ‘loosely’ was an appropriate word for their suits fitted where they touched and, on that particular day, five days after their escape from the internment camp at Groningen in Holland, they were already coming apart at the seams. Bentham and Southin were two of the fifteen hundred men of the 1st Brigade of the Royal Naval division who had entered neutral Holland when they were cut off by the advancing German Army after the Battle of Antwerp the previous September, and they had been languishing in internment ever since.*

  Able Seaman J. S. Bentham, Benbow Bn., 1st Brig., Royal Naval Div.

  It was an elderly lady who got into our compartment and tackled us and did she feel small when Southin told her we were escaped prisoners of war! Of course we were very pleased with ourselves, but we must have looked like a couple of scarecrows. At the camp the Dutch officials opened and inspected all our large parcels but they didn’t bother about small ones, so I wrote to a friend of mine to send out a couple of suits folded up small, a bit at a time. I think his sister cut out the pieces and he sent them one at a time, a sleeve, a trouser leg or the front of a jacket, and thread and some buttons. It took us some months to collect all the pieces and then we had to sew them together, not very expertly.

  Groningen wasn’t like being in a prisoner of war camp in Germany. We weren’t short of food, though the diet was pretty dull, but tradesmen came to the camp with barrows selling cake and fruit and chocolate and cigarettes and we had plenty of money to buy things, because we were paid a certain amount by the Dutch authorities and I also got a monthly pay-cheque from the Dutch agents of Cocks-Biddulph, the bank I’d worked for in London. We also used to make photograph frames out of Dutch cigar boxes which we sent to Selfridges in London and in return they sent us out cigarettes and anything we needed, so we were quite well off, and the local people were very good to us. In fact the camp was open to civilian visitors every Sunday, and whole crowds of them used to come to see us just as though they were visiting the zoo and we really felt like caged animals. But I got quite attached to a Dutch girl who used to come and talk to me through the barbed wire and we got so friendly that she persuaded her father to write to the Commandant to ask if I could visit their house for a meal now and then. We got so friendly that one evening, just before I was due to go back to the camp, her elder brother asked me when I was going to give his sister a ring! Well that really scared me and it certainly speeded up our plans to get away.

  Of course, we’d been planning it for months, and the first thing we did was to change our religion. That meant that instead of attending church parade in the camp we were marched down every Sunday to the Walsche Kerk in the town, accompanied by a guard who waited outside during the service. There were about ten of us in the party and either the others had the same idea of getting away or perhaps they just wanted a change of scene and a breath of air. I’d also done my best to learn a bit of Dutch but there were a lot of words I didn’t know. However, the following Sunday we put on our civilian suits under our naval uniforms, and we were jolly glad of the baggy trousers for we could stuff our caps into our socks. Half-way along the road to the church I stopped to do up my bootlaces and then Southin and I dashed into a wood alongside the road, tore off our blouses and bell-bottoms, hid our seamens’ uniforms under some thick bushes and got back on the road further up as a couple of very disreputable civilians. We avoided the town and found the road for Assen which was about twenty miles away, and of course we were terrified we would be picked up on the road, but we got there late in the afternoon and went into a café and I ordered two beef steaks with potatoes. We were starving by then! But the man was suspicious and right away he asked us if we’d escaped from Groningen and he also told us that the police would give him fifty guilders’ reward if he reported us. So I said, ‘Well I’ll give you a hundred if you don’t,’ and I showed him the money. His manner immediately changed and he said we should be safer upstairs and showed us to a bedroom and said he would cook us a meal if we paid extra. We were a bit worried when he went out and locked the door from the outside, but he played fair and came up with two plates with gorgeous steaks and vegetables and two glasses of lager and he said that in the morning he would take us to the railway station and told me what tickets to ask for and made me repeat it in Dutch. He would walk in front of us next, he said, but we were on no account to try to speak to him. I told him that if he did this I would give him an extra fifty guilders.

  Next morning after we’d had a good night’s sleep and some coffee, he was as good as his word. When we got to the station I asked for ‘Twee kartyes naar Rotterdam,’ which I had practised saying. I bought a paper and pretended to read it when we got on the train and Southin closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep. We should have changed at Utrecht but we stayed in the train because we saw some Dutch police on the platform and eventually we arrived, not in Rotterdam, but Amsterdam! Well, of course, our idea in going to Rotterdam was to try to get on a ship, so we hadn’t the faintest idea what to do next. We started walking round the town and after a while I spotted a shop with an English name. It was called ‘Bell’s Asbestos Company’ so in we went and I put on as casual an air as I could. When the man came forward to serve us I said, ‘Is Mr Bell in?’ He laughed and said the place was part of a chain of shops in Europe and there was no Mr Bell. So I then spilled the beans and explained who we were. He was very nice, and an Englishman, because Holland being a neutral country there were any number of English people living and working there, but he told us that if he were caught helping escapees he would be expelled from Holland. However, after he phoned the British Consul and the Consul said that on no account were we to go near his office and that he didn’t wish to know or hear anything about us, he decided to help us himself. Needless to say this was a huge relief.

  He didn’t like the look of our scruffy caps so he went out and bought us two straw hats and then took us to a café in a side street and bought us a meal. Then, the same way as we’d done in the morning, we followed him to the station where I bought tickets for Rotterdam and then followed him on to the platform where he stopped and watched from a discreet distance as we got on
the train. We reached Rotterdam without any other mishap but the next problem was to get into the docks because there were police at the entrance. So we hung about and then we saw a man with a huge load on a barrow pushing it towards the docks, so we whipped off our straw hats and bent down and helped him to push the barrow through the entrance. He was quite pleased about that and we were delighted. Nobody challenged us, and the police took no notice.

  Our friend in Amsterdam had found out that the SS Cromer was leaving that night and told us to make for it. We waited until no one was about, then ran up the gang-plank on to the ship and were met by the cook who was lounging about the deck. I greased his palm quite considerably, but I think he’d have helped us anyway. The cook was the only man on board and he hid us below until the Captain and the crew came back. Then our troubles were over! The Captain had us dressed in greasy overalls and told us to look busy when the police came round to inspect the boat before she sailed. When they came into the engine room the Captain came with them and he kept telling them to hurry up, because he didn’t want to miss the tide. What a night that was, for the cook had used the money I gave him and sent ashore for a lot of beer, and next morning we were up on deck feasting our eyes on dear old England as we approached Harwich.

  HMS Maidstone was the guard ship at the entrance to Harwich Harbour and our Captain signalled across and in no time a ship’s cutter came to fetch us over to the Maidstone and the Captain himself was waiting to meet us on the deck – two such scruffy individuals that it must have given the matelots quite a turn to see him shaking hands with us, because the Captain of a ship is nearly God to them. He took us to his cabin for a drink and gave us a fright by reminding us that, as from the time we had escaped, we were officially deserters. But he said, ‘Don’t worry about it, just contact your headquarters and report as soon as you can,’ and he gave us travel warrants for the train journey to London. It was the happiest journey of my life! We were in such high spirits that we simply couldn’t stop laughing – it was so marvellous to feel free and back in our own country again. Best of all was arriving at Liverpool Street. We could hardly believe that we were really back in dear old London!

  ‘Dear old London’ had changed considerably since Bentham had left it in August the previous year and the war had laid its mark on the streets. There were fewer young men about and most of those there were seemed to be in khaki. There were newspaper-sellers on every corner – far more, it seemed to Bentham, than ever before – for Londoners were avid for news, and recruiting posters met the eye wherever they turned. Flag-sellers were out in force collecting for war charities and the bill-boards advertising West End plays showed that theatreland too was working for the war. Basil Hallam (soon to enlist himself) was appearing in The Man Who Stayed at Home and Alsace was still enjoying a successful run. Along the Strand and Shaftesbury Avenue diligent ladies, bent on personal recruitment, haunted stage doors to accost young actors and any likely passers-by, and any civilian-clad young man who managed to escape their clutches still had to run the gauntlet of recruiting offices liberally sprinkled across the West End. There were half a dozen between the Strand and Hay market alone, each with an eagle-eyed recruiting sergeant pacing the pavement outside on the look-out for potential recruits. All of them were conspicuously decorated with flags and posters, but it was the recruiting office of the Royal Naval Division that drew the biggest crowds for they had thoughtfully filled a window with a display of shells and rifles and various interesting items salvaged from the battle-field plus a life-size wax figure in the uniform of the Royal Naval Division.

  Since Jeremy Bentham’s uniform was still lying hidden beneath bushes far away in Holland he was anxious to obtain a replacement.He presented himself at the depot at Blackfriars in the role of returned hero and not only persuaded the storekeeper to fit him out with new clothes but, feeling that he richly deserved promotion, also induced him to hand over a Leading Seaman’s badge; This at least would prevent him from doing sentry duty when he reported to the Royal Naval Division at its base in the Crystal Palace. Suitably arrayed he made his way to Sydenham to report for duty, was welcomed with open arms and awarded fourteen days’ leave. It was some compensation for the anticlimax of his home-coming.

  Able Seaman J. S. Bentham.

  I went home expecting a hero’s welcome, but when I arrived at the house I couldn’t make anyone hear, so I went next door and the neighbours told me that my father and stepmother were away on holiday in Newquay. So I had to set off to my married sister’s in Wembley and she was suitably pleased to see me so unexpectedly. My father cut short his holiday and came home but he was far from glad to see me and instead of a welcome I was told I was an exceedingly silly boy. There I was, he said, safe in Holland for the duration and now due to my stupidity I would have to go back into the war. I told him that was the whole point of escaping. However he soon came round and I rather think he was quite proud of my exploits because that night he took me down to the local pub and spent the evening telling his friends all about my adventures. That was another good night, because everyone wanted to treat me.

  But my real moment of glory came at the first pay parade after I’d returned to the Crystal Palace. On pay parade your name was called, you took a step forward smartly and advanced to the table with your cap extended to receive your pay. Of course the average sailor had only a week or two’s pay to draw, but when it came to me there was quite a bit as I had only been paid one guilder every ten days and I had eight months’ pay owing. Well! My cap was covered with golden sovereigns and you could hear the gasp from all the rookies as I marched back, for they didn’t know me from Adam, or where I had come from. I had more than twenty golden sovereigns in my cap. Did I feel rich! Of course I didn’t say anything about my self-appointed promotion, but no one questioned it, and I was never ordered to take the Leading Seaman’s badge off. Best of all, I was told that my application for a commission had been granted and I started training right away. I was cock of the walk and no mistake!

  I knew I was a lucky man because I soon found out about the terrible casualties my Division had suffered in Gallipoli, and I knew full well that if our Brigade hadn’t been interned after Antwerp, I might easily have been one of them.

  The five weeks that began on 22 April with the German attack at Ypres accounted for the highest casualties since the start of the war and the full cost of the landings at Gallipoli was only beginning to be known. Every day fresh casualty lists told the tale of the push at Aubers Ridge and Festubert. Nothing had been gained and all there was to show were the long, long lists of soldiers killed, missing or wounded that filled so many columns of the daily newspapers, and the shower of official telegrams that were dreaded by every family with a boy at the front. Even the sight of a telegraph boy cycling down a street could strike terror into a nervous heart.

  When a telegram arrived for Jock Macleod’s family his mother was at the local VAD hospital where she worked three afternoons a week.

  Miss Betty Macleod.

  Friday May 21st. Both parents were out when the wire came, Mother at the hospital and Daddy playing bowls in the Trinity Fellows’ Garden, so Mollie and I set off on our bicycles to find them. Of course they both had fits. They saw us coming waving a telegram – poor Mother turned as white as a sheet and couldn’t stop shaking for ages, and Daddy got a shock too, though after the nasty turn she’d had herself Mother warned us to call out as soon as he saw us to say it was good news. The telegram was from Jock to say that he had leave and was arriving in Cambridge by the 6.15. The whole family tootled up to the station to meet Jock. He looked tired and pale but quite fat, and he was very cheerful. Went out with him and Daddy after supper to see the war telegrams at the library in a sort of triumphal progress down the middle of the street – so many people stopped us and wanted to speak to Jock.

  When we got home we settled down to make swabs for the hospital while we all chatted to Jock. What we gleaned was this. On May 19th Sir John French inspected th
ree Battalions of his Brigade and congratulated them. He said they had been subjected to the most intense shell-fire ever known in the history of war. He would not have blamed them, nor been at all surprised, if he had found them on the other side of Ypres and if it had not been for them saving Ypres Italy would not have come into the war. Ypres was to be added to the names on their regimental colours. Jock says there are only seven officers left in his Battalion and he is second in seniority now. He told a tale about one of the men who said, when he was bayoneting a German, This is for the Lusitania’ – prod – ‘And there’s another for me’ – prod. Laughed and talked until very late.

  Saturday May 22nd. Jock slept on till eleven o’clock and then had breakfast in his dressing-gown. Meanwhile we went out to buy him sweets and fruit. He ate nearly the whole lot before dinner! In the afternoon we took him up to tennis and tea at the club and Mother came to watch, but Jock got weary soon so we all went home. A few more tales came out. One sergeant sang ‘Here we are. Here we are, Here we are again’ all through a bayonet charge and he has been recommended for the VC. Glorious day. Supper in the garden.