by Jon E. Lewis
There were a few hundreds of us at this camp at Marchiennes. It was a cheerless place…designed to break the best of hearts. We had to sleep on a stone floor. If a small quantity of straw could be got, and what is more important, kept, the coldness of this floor could be modified. Straw could only be kept by sitting on it; as soon as your back was turned, it was taken by your neighbouring bedmates, At night, if the air was very cold we lay and froze until, becoming numbed, we were forced to get up and walk about the yard for an hour or so to try and keep warm. It can be imagined how utterly miserable I felt. I had to squeeze between rows of other sleepers. It was always a tight fit. We were compelled to preserve the same position all through the night, unless, as I have already stated, we were forced to move for sheer lack of warmth. Then you were fortunate, indeed, if the bed place could be found upon returning.
Lice, also, began to appear and became a continual source of irritation. They remained from this time onwards my constant and faithful companions until my release. Water for washing purposes was unobtainable. We had no blankets.
Now and again, small parties were made up and sent away. They never came back. Some said they had gone to Germany. It was discovered a long time afterwards that they had been sent to work behind the German lines in the occupied areas of France and Belgium.
The wheels of time turned slowly but surely and the hour came at last when I found myself in an outgoing party. I hoped it was going to be my fortune to find better conditions. I expected to say good-bye to the cold, lice, and starvation, Marchiennes once left behind. During the following march it poured with rain and, my feet still being bad, I staggered along all day in the mud.
It was evening when we arrived at Douai. We were shut up here in a cold, very dark, dirty dungeon of a brick-kiln. As far as billets were concerned, we had gone from bad to worse. The food was a little better. We only had sauerkraut at odd times. The same amount of bread was given, but the monotony of the diet was relieved by a meal of horse-beans and sometimes a small piece of black sausage about an inch cube or a teaspoonful of turnip-saccharine jam. All these came under the heading of dinner. Breakfast, served to us between 4 and 5 in the morning, consisted of a drop of some liquid, invariably hot, and seriously called coffee by the guards. It was compounded of a roasted mixture of acorns, sugar-beet, and other vegetable substances.
We were made to work, and were sent out in large working parties. After breakfast, we set out before it was light, and seemed to walk miles through deserted and shell-smashed villages. Although these villages had the appearance of being deserted, they were actually alive with German infantrymen, who lived underground.
Our work consisted of remaking the railroad along which was once the main French line from Douai to Arras. Some days we ‘packed’ under the sleepers with heavy hammering tools or helped to straighten the lines with great iron crowbars. Other days, we laid down the rails ourselves and fixed them. Sometimes we had to carry on under fire from our own guns. It was heavy and heart-breaking work on the little food we were given. The tramp to the neighbourhood of our work was in itself a task. Work was begun as soon as we arrived and continued until about 2 or 3 in the afternoon. There was no fixed hour for ceasing work. We were forced to wait until relieved by a mixed party of German and Austrian labour parties.
When relieved we tramped home, it being generally dark when we arrived at our brick-kiln abode. Then we had our dinner. Dinner! Let those two syllables sink in. Dinner! All the whole day between 5 in the morning and 5 in the evening, we had nothing whatever to eat.
It was curious to tramp along the old French line, past the broken-down stations, with all their glittering grandeur of glass smashed to dust. We sometimes came across some old wayside sign still hanging, a forlorn and tragic indication of the civilization that was once. I often wondered how many pretty damsels in neat dresses, or dapper, bearded, well-groomed gentlemen had waited for the train on those refuse-covered, grass-grown platforms.
The attitude of my mind during those unusual days reviewed in the light of to-day excites my wonder. Forcing myself to smile, I never gave up hope. Some fellows lost heart from the first. Their spirits gradually sank, their bodies with them until to live became too great a burden. They just passed away.
From this time on to the Armistice is a bitter story of months of the agony of demoralizing starvation, of sickness, of ever-present death, of escapes and recaptures, of hard work, of the great retreat, of the stupefaction of sudden freedom – a bitter story with one or two bright moments.
Private Reginald Morris joined the Artists’ Rifles in June 1915, at the age of 19, but was recalled to the Civil Service, enlisting again in January 1916. In June 1916 he was in France with R.A. Ordnance Corps, having a hectic few months dodging explosions on bombed and shelled ammunition dumps. In April 1917 he was transferred to Infantry Training Corps, joining the 25th Northumberland Fusiliers in May 1917. He served at Ypres, Cambrai, and Scarpe Salient, and various points on the Arras front. In March 1918 he was captured opposite La Fontaine.
CAPTIVITY IN THE ARDENNES
Victor Denham
I shall never forget the morning of March 28th, 1918, when I watched our trenches and the familiar landmarks disappear under the intense bombardment of hundreds of minenwerfers – those earthquakes in miniature. I watched and waited in a state of mental numbness or apathy, and at last the bit reserved for me hit me in the head. When I took a further interest in matters I was a prisoner.
Yet the memory of that morning and of the months in France that preceded it are not so vivid as the memories of my captivity.
After spending a few hours in a prisoners’ cage I was given a bag containing some biscuits, and a German soldier, no doubt pitying my bandaged head and my youthfulness, gave me his ration of ‘coffee.’ This action impressed me very favourably at the time, as we were conjecturing on the treatment we were going to receive.
Then we started to march. A Uhlan, complete with lance, rode at the head of the column and another at the rear. We marched without a single halt all through the afternoon, and reached our destination – Douai – about eleven o’clock. That march became a very tragic procession towards the end, and I have no doubt that it would have been more tragic if any of us had fallen out.
At Douai we spent a nightmare of a night. We were herded into a long, low building once used for storing coal. This place was already packed with English prisoners, and someone had lit two huge fires, one at each end. All through the night we stood there – it was only with difficulty that I could turn round – and the red glare of the fires, the pitch blackness of the shadows, and the groans, cursings and stench of perspiring humanity gave me a good impression of the ancient idea of Hell.
At last the door was unlocked and we stumbled into the blessed rain-laden air. We resembled coal-men. Although my head was throbbing painfully, I considered myself lucky, as all the wounded were sent to a large, clean building with wire beds. Here I made my first acquaintance with German black bread, and after drawing two wisps of straw from my portion I decided I did not want it. Later on I was not so particular.
After Douai, Denain, where we realized the full meaning of captivity. There were days of idleness divided by ‘meals’ of bad black bread and ‘soup’ made from dried mangel-wurzels. This horrible stuff was the cause of daily cases of dysentery.
We travelled from place to place until a party of us arrived at some saw mills near Tannay, in the Ardennes. We were arranged in groups according to our civil occupations. I was a clerk, but having heard good things about working on a farm I decided I was a farmer’s boy – only to find that my job was to load trucks with heavy planks of wood.
The country around was beautiful, the weather glorious, and if we had had sufficient food we might have been to some degree reconciled to our lot, but every day our plight appeared more hopeless: every day we became a little weaker. How we managed to work at all surprises me now. Our rations were a slice of black bread every evening
with sometimes a small herring, and soup at midday, consisting of horse beans and a few small cubes of meat. There was ‘coffee’ in the morning.
The sleeping quarters were of wood and so old that the beams and roofs were alive with wood lice and bugs, which dropped on our faces as we tried to sleep, and gave out a horrible smell when squashed. When we complained, our guards thought it a huge joke.
At last most of us slept out of doors. If only we could have stopped dreaming about food! Food! That was all we thought and talked about. We mentally prepared and partook of most elaborate banquets. I used to sleep with a fellow of my own age and we told each other of our favourite dishes. What feasts we spread as we lay together beneath the stars! Every evening with great will power I managed to save a portion of my bread ration for the morning, putting it inside the straw mattress on which I lay to make sure of it. Yet in the morning it was always gone. I thought that I must have eaten it during my sleep. It was only after some weeks that I learned that my bed-fellow had been caught in hospital taking other men’s rations. I had never suspected him.
A man who was a lay preacher held services, which I attended. The Germans laughed and mocked at us from the other side of the wire. Yet that man, though urging us to pray for strength to endure and play the game, was caught stealing his fellow prisoners’ food.
One man made a bowl of soup which he placed by an open window to cool. He turned his back for a few seconds and when he turned round again it was gone.
Hunger at last made me part with my wrist-watch – the only article of value I had besides my boots. It was a great moment of decision when I took it to the Italian cook. He gave me a small sack of dried crusts of bread, kept back from our rations, no doubt. I put one or two crusts in my pockets and smuggled the sack under my greatcoat into my sleeping box. But many pairs of eyes must have noticed my sudden stoutness. I left the place for about half-a-minute and when I returned not even the sack remained. And still those eyes looked at me, blandly and innocently.
It was a true saying in those days that ‘An Englishman was an Englishman’s worst friend.’ If a German was in charge of the food store we were sure of obtaining our fair ration, but a fellow prisoner in charge would soon grow fat at our expense. Still we were all mad for food, and madmen cannot be made responsible for their actions.
The most dreadful thing about captivity is the loss of that spirit of comradeship which on the other side of the line kept men decent in the most trying circumstances. I sensed this change in relation to one another soon after I was captured, and before very long it was every man for himself at any cost. No pity or kindness was to be found behind barbed wire enclosures, and the weakest went first. Hunger made hatred universal. For this reason I was glad I had become separated from those with whom I had been captured. Often I wondered how men of the same race could be such beasts to one another.
In charge of us was a huge bearded German sergeant-major whom we called ‘Bluebeard.’ He was a typical German bully, with a hatred for us that one only found in those who had never been to the Front. There was also a sergeant under him who was just the opposite, but this sergeant had lost an eye in the trenches.
At roll-call one evening I overslept myself, and after half-an-hour’s search this sergeant discovered me – a very small portion of humanity curled up in my box blissfully unaware of the uproar in the camp over my disappearance. I was greeted by my fellow prisoners with howls and curses for making them wait so long. Out of the corner of my eye I could see ‘Bluebeard’ getting his big stick ready for me, but the sergeant had seen him as well and putting himself between me and ‘Bluebeard’ he pushed me into the back rank of the crowd. I was placed in a cell as punishment and was anticipating a pleasant night’s sleep – for the cell was the only clean place in the camp – when about ten o’clock old ‘One-eye’ came along to release me with a fatherly pat on the head.
There was another unpleasant person at this place; a white-haired, blue-eyed German in charge of our working party. With my head still plastered he gave me the job of loading coal with a huge shovel. I could only manage a quarter of a shovelful at a time, but mistaking my weakness for laziness, he caught hold of me by the throat and nearly choked me. He learnt my name, and whenever I heard him say with a grin, ‘Come here, Mr. Victor Denham,’ I knew I was ‘for it.’
By now our numbers had rapidly decreased. Illness and mutilation in the machine shops took toll each day. It is still a mystery to me how a weak, insignificant boy as I was came through it when fine, strong men went to pieces and disappeared every week.
At last we became too weak to work in the mills any longer, so were drafted off in small numbers to various villages and given the work of hoeing mangel-wurzels – which seemed to be the staple food at the time. We were not trusted with the potato fields.
About this time I became something of a fatalist and considered that every change I made was for the best, so I volunteered for different working parties and was always moving about. At one place the French inhabitants were quite friendly to us, and at one cottage which we used to pass every day the occupants, with the acquiescence of our guards, allowed us to raid their potato store. What a feast we had that night! But the authority in charge heard of it and the inhabitants were warned that drastic punishment would follow the giving of food to the English prisoners. The villagers resorted to putting potatoes and apples along the roads we had to travel. No one could punish us for finding a potato or apple.
Another move. More mangel-wurzels needed hoeing. Our party numbered about a dozen. And what a party we were! So prematurely aged and weak that our hoes were a necessary aid to getting to work.
At this village a Scotsman was our cook – as we knew to our cost. He soon got fat on what he kept back from our rations and very soon collected hundreds of marks by selling as supper food he had kept back from our dinner. But he was paid in his own coin, for one day all his marks were missing. His suspicions immediately fell on us and, appealing to our guards – all decent fellows – he made us strip, and then searched our clothes. But he never found his money. The German sergeant who watched the proceedings was much amused; we found out that it was he who had taken the money.
With his plausible tongue, this Scotsman won the sympathy of the French woman who lived next door (we were lodged in a house), and she gave him some good dinners which he carried past our very noses with such unctuous remarks as ‘God bless her!’ How I hated him!
I was becoming very weak now and it was evident that the guards noticed it, for they would enter our room every night with the remains of their suppers and, after searching round, would discover me in my corner and put what they had brought in my basin.
A German infantry regiment passed us one day. They seemed very dispirited. In front of the column was a scarecrow of a horse. We were told that it was the regiment’s meat ration. And so it turned out to be. The inhabitants of the village also had their share and, thanks to them, we were given the head and a few ribs.
The sight of an officer passing along the road by which we were working would act on our guards magically. We would be peacefully working when they would suddenly seize us round the throats and shake us like dogs, calling us all kinds of names. This was the kind of treatment the officers delighted to see us subjected to. When they had gone normal relations were resumed by our guards.
It was whilst in this part that I commenced to suffer from a form of dropsy. I would be working in the fields and would suddenly discover that my legs seemed rooted to the ground. I then found that they had swollen to twice their normal size.
One day a German commandant visited us and asked if we had any complaints! We were surprised into silence. Any complaints! One of us ventured to say that we should like to write home, and after a few days we were each given a field card to satisfy us. These cards never reached home.
Home! I tried not to think of it. I did not even know if it still existed. It might have been bombed out of existence for all I knew. Th
ings were bad enough as they were, but to think of home and all it meant made one feel absolutely hopeless.
One day, as I was hoeing, one of the guards came over to me and gently led me away, I did not worry about what was going to happen to me as I was getting past caring for anything, but I was rather surprised when he made me lie down in the shadow of a hedge and told me I was to work no more. All that day I rested in the warm sun and compared the country with the English country and thought how happy I could have been if only I were strong again and not hungry. The next day I could not get up in the morning. I did not want to eat. I only wanted to be let alone, and I had my wish. During the day it seemed as if I had been completely forgotten.
The next day was my birthday. What a birthday! I well remember praying that I might die. Utterly hopeless I had no desire to live. My very body seemed a burden to me.
I did not undress at night, but lay in a kind of stupor, not caring for anything or anybody. But I overheard the others discussing me. A little ginger-haired man whom I disliked for no other reason than that he had a head-wound alive with lice remarked: –
‘He won’t last much longer. He doesn’t wash. He doesn’t undress. He doesn’t do anything. He just lays there. I know what that means.’
