In Great Spirits

by Archie Barwick

  The Major let us rest here for nearly half an hour. He recognised the beauty of the place, & gave us the full benefit of it. From here the road led down a pretty steep hill into the town itself, where the French or should I say the Flemish people were all out to see us march through their pretty little town.

  One thing is very noticeable in most parts of France & that is the lovely lace curtains that are in the majority of their windows — they do look nice & homelike. Oh she is a lovely country, the more I see of it the better I like it, for it forces the beauty of itself upon you. I can quite imagine why it is that the French are so patriotic a people & well they need to be, for they have surely one of the loveliest countries on earth for their birthplace.

  Well we finished up our march just on 2 o’clock, during which time we covered 16 miles in full marching order — pretty good going. As soon as we got our packs off the football was produced & we had a rare rough & tumble game for nearly 3 hours. Now what do you think of that. Yes, it is true & I was about the first one out. We played in a lovely paddock of green grass where if you fell you couldn’t hurt yourself. 2 of our officers came out & had a scramble with us.

  There are some magnificent walnut trees where we are billeted. Some of them must measure 60 feet across from one side to the other. They are loaded with nuts & the boys have been knocking them down all the afternoon.

  17th October. This morning we rose fairly late for all were very tired after our trying 3 days march, & I was stiff & sore all over, from the effects of the football after the heavy march. The morning was a beauty: sun shining brightly, birds singing, & ducks, fowls, cows & pigs all kicking up a noise outside. It reminded me of the old farming days. What a country of contrasts: the firing line & then the lovely country behind. Oh how I would like some of my people to see this country. I am sure they would love it as much as I do for it is so beautiful, & I believe every man is better in his heart for seeing & living in it.

  We got a lot of lollies this morning from the Comforts Fund.

  We are all filled with hope, for this afternoon Mr Yates told me that we would be moving on again in a few days. I asked him if we were going to Blighty but he only laughed & said he could not tell, but everyone seems to have it in their heads that we are going to England or Salonika.

  We are camped at present in an old barn & are sleeping on straw. It is bonzer & warm, quite a change to the cold & muddy trenches.

  The boys are in great spirits tonight & Len is one of the ringleaders in the rough & tumble that has been going on: “no man standing”, cockfighting & etc. This rough play has been taking place in a good lump of an empty bag well covered with plenty of straw. It is too thick for anyone to get hurt very much on it.

  Rain has set in tonight, but we can’t complain for we have had quite a stretch of fine weather. We all had cocoa for tea tonight & it was bonzer.

  18th October. This day 2 years ago we sailed out of Sydney Harbour on the old Afric, & of all those hundreds of fine men who left the Sunny South on that day there remains but a mere handful. It looks very much as if one of our chaps’ words will come true. He said when we left that we would be able to bring all the men who were leaving with the 1st Div back to Australia in a rowing boat. How we all laughed at the idea but unfortunately it is fast coming true. There are but 4 left now in my old original Coy H. I wonder what a fellow would have said if he were told when we left Mena that he would be one of the 4 lucky ones who were to be spared.

  19th October. Went for a fairly long route march this afternoon & they made the pace a cracker. After coming in off the march I issued out the clothing & etc I had requisitioned for a few days back. The trousers & tunics were what the boys call “Tommy Stuff” & you have no idea how we hate to have their clothing issued out to us. It is only natural that we should like our own distinctive uniform best, & all like to look like Australians. You should hear the boys performing & swearing. Some of them refuse to have anything at all to do with it; they prefer to wear their old Australian uniform, till it almost falls off their backs, rather than wear the English uniform & quite right.

  Tonight is the night for rumours. Each one that comes in has a different tale to tell. Some say we are going to the Somme, some Salonika, some Blighty. Others think Arras, which looks to me the most likely for I see by the papers that there have been very heavy bombardments down there lately & that’s a pretty healthy sign of coming battle in that quarter, but it don’t matter much I suppose for wherever we go there is bound to be plenty of strafing.

  21st October. Well here I am sitting up in my bed which is in an old house. My platoon are occupying one of the top floors & we have straw & our blankets, & by the Holy Moses we want them for we have been, & are yet, nearly frozen to death.

  We left St Omer last night about 5.30, & in a few minutes after leaving both doors were shut tight for the sun had set, & the gentle breeze which was blowing cut like a knife. Soon all overcoats were out & the boys all lay closely together to keep the warmth in. During the night we passed through Calais, Boulogne & Etaples. At the latter place we heard the bugles sounding the “Last Post” as we went through. A lot of the boys thought we were off to Blighty once we got down in this part but I was not deceived for I guessed they were taking us the roundabout way, for what reason I don’t know but I suppose they have it all worked out.

  This was one of the coldest nights I ever experienced — it was on a par with my first night under the pyramids in Egypt. I nearly froze to death, my feet I could not feel, & try as we would we could not get warm. You should have heard the language, but all the swearing never stopped the frost or cold so we had just to grin & bear it. We are now beginning to get the cold weather — how we are going to stand it when the snow & hail come along I don’t know. I’m thinking it will put half of us out of the running. We shivered & our teeth chattered all night long.

  We arrived at Longprenz just as day was breaking. Here all got out of the trucks & fell in. I was that cold that I could hardly give my orders; my voice sounded like a drunken man’s, thick & unsteady. Soon we were on the move & our footsteps sounded like a rapid tattoo on the hard frost road. We all had our packs on over our overcoats & in this way we walked miles & miles before we got our feelings back again, & if we stopped for more than 10 minutes at a time we nearly froze. About 7 o’clock the sun rose, but even though the sun shone brilliantly there was no warmth in it. Oh how we all longed for the good old Australian sun. They said when we started out that we had 7 miles to walk but it turned out to be nearer 10, & I can tell you we were nearly done when at last we sighted our billets. We had to go down a fairly steep hill into it & a couple of the boys got nasty cracks from slipping on the glassy surface.

  Some of the country looked lovely as we came through, with its mantle of white lying all over & the sun shining on it all. That is of course if you cared to look on the beautiful as it appeared, but the majority had no time for anything like that, they only thought of the cold.

  23rd October. This morning turned out a little warmer than most of them, & a good job it was for we were moving at 6.45 & all was hustle & bustle to get things cleaned up & packs ready by that time. The sun was just rising as we marched out of Brucamps. They reckoned we had to march a mile to the place where we were going to catch the buses, but the military miles are notorious, & this mile turned out to be nearly 3. At last we struck them, all lined up along the road, there must have been hundreds. These buses shifted the whole Brigade at one stroke, something like 4 or 5000 men a distance of 30 miles.

  We passed hundreds of German prisoners working on the roads & railways. Some of them were fine-looking men but the majority were miserable-looking specimens who seemed only too pleased to be safe. I saw several of them driving traction & oil engines.

  We reached our destination about 5 miles from Albert about 2 o’clock. From here we had to pick up our packs to walk, & by Jove it was a snorter. We were bound for Fricourt 9 miles away & to me it seemed one of the hardest marches
as ever I have done. We had had no tucker since breakfast so you can guess how we felt, & we were a very straggling tired lot that eventually pulled up at some long low huts where we are spending the night, 75 men to a hut. We can hear the guns booming away & the horizon is lit up with the flash of the guns.

  24th October. We moved off this morning at 10 o’clock on an empty stomach for the rations did not turn up till after breakfast. The roads were in an awful state. Imagine if you can water, slush & mud over your ankles & in places to your knees, & us pushing our way through it, dodging motor cars, motor waggons, caterpillars, guns of all descriptions & size from the giant 16 inch down to the 18 pounders, & talk about horse transport, well there were thousands of them, carrying ammunition, hay, biscuits & bully, clothing, timber & etc, all going for their lives, & every now & then a lorry load of wounded would pass by us on their way to the hospitals, most of them looking rather pleased with themselves for they would stand a good chance of going to Blighty. It was one of the most wearisome marches as ever I have been on, for we were held up every few hundred yards by the heavy traffic.

  At last we got on to the Bazentin Road which carried us nearly to Delville Wood, the place which cost so many men, & of all the sloppy dirty walks as ever I have been on well this one takes the bun. It was neither mud nor water but it was about the same thickness as cream, & as we went along we got covered with white mud from head to foot. Talk about a mess we were in, you would scarcely have known us, especially some of the boys who came gutsers & fell in the rotten stuff. Well we reached our destination at last, just back of Mametz Wood, which is still full of German & British dead. The ground round here is just a labyrinth of trenches everywhere you look. The Tommies had a pretty tough job to drive them out of here I’ll bet.

  You should see the joint where I am writing this in. 3 hours ago there was mud 8 inches deep where my bed is, but having no dugout I set to work & scraped the rotten mud off, drove some stakes in & stretched my waterproof over it. I then collected what bags I could find & put them down. There are hundreds of us sleeping in the same sort of joints, for they have some room only for a few hundred men of each Batt & they are crowded in little canvas lean-tos. We are in reserve here about 5 miles behind the firing line, & there are great guns all round us.

  Just opposite us the metalled road ends, & if ever I saw a bog in my life well it is here. All carts are double banked when they reach here, & you should see the struggling it takes to get through it. There is no water among this mud, just pure sticky clay 3 feet deep, & horses get stuck in it let alone waggons. Our boys were helping fallen-down horses up tonight. I saw one of our little machine gun carts which is drawn by 3 men stuck, & 2 horses & about 20 men had to drag it out. The traffic never ceases, there is one perpetual string of vehicles day & night.

  About 200 yards from us there are great watering troughs, & of an evening it is the sight of a lifetime to see the never-ending strings of horses & mules going to & from the water. They reckon there are 12,000 horses or mules in this valley & I believe it. I pity the poor horses for they are bogged nearly half their time & they are covered with mud from head to foot. In this rotten rainy weather they look very miserable & they have to work very hard, toiling & struggling all the day long dragging shells, water, tucker & etc for the needs of the thousands of men who are engaged in this gigantic battle.

  The guns never stop firing, & just at the rear of us there are some enormous guns & when they fire they fairly shake the hills. Trains are running everywhere up here; they are building the line as they advance.

  25th October. Oh what a night. We had never a wink of sleep & nearly froze to death & it rained like blue blazes, so when we crawled out this morning we were wet to the skin & aching all over. A more miserable-looking lot of men you never saw, for the rain beat in on us all the night & the roofs of our waterproofs leaked & our overcoats sucked up the cold moisture from the ground. It’s a wonder to me how on earth men stand it, for the conditions are awful at present & show no signs of bettering, for the rain is still pouring down & we are like blocks of ice. Some of the chaps are lucky, Len among them, for they have decent dugouts. I have about 18 in. square of dry place where I am writing this, my blanket is sopping wet, my overcoat ditto, my feet & hands are almost beyond feeling & I have to do a bit of manoeuvring to keep the water off this book. Oh I can tell you I am writing under difficulties.

  I have seen quite a number of the 53rd round here including a few of the old hands who joined it when the Batts were broken up at Tel-el-Kebir. Nearly the whole of the Australian Force is here & there is going to be something doing next time we hop over.

  Saw no less than 46 aeroplanes up.

  Although we are but 5½ miles from the firing line, the place at night time looks more like some big town with its thousands of lights & fires. It beats me as how the Germans don’t shell the place to pieces, for there is nothing to stop them from running a balloon up at night & they can see our lights & fires for miles.

  26th October. Still alive & kicking. Had a little better rest last night for it ceased raining about 6. Our chaps bombarded something terrific all night; it was one constant roar & rattle. Old Fritz poked a few over among us, & one 9.2 lobbed about 15 yards to the left of our little shanty, throwing dirt & mud all over us. It was wonderful no one was hurt for it did not lob more than 3 yards from where the 2nd Batt Bombers were sleeping with only waterproofs over their heads. Talk about narrow shaves.

  Yesterday evening everyone was issued with their steel helmets & gas bags for we are supposed to be ready to move off at an hour’s notice for the firing line.

  The weather looks as if it has taken up at last. The blue sky can be seen & the sun is shining. Once the ground hardens there will be something doing for the country simply swarms with troops. The 5th Div have had their charge cancelled twice now through the weather.

  300 Germans gave themselves up last night. They were starving & had had no food for 3 days — they can’t get through our shell fire, it is too severe.

  About 200 tons of coal have gone past here towards the firing line today. The railways are very busy getting munitions & etc to the guns & men.

  I notice we are using a lot of old Fritz’s little wicker baskets to pack our shells to the guns in. They go by mule pack, each mule carrying 8 × 18 lb shells. It is the only way they have a chance of getting it to some of the guns during the wet weather — even then the mules have a struggle to get through the vile sticky stuff.

  Len handed Capt McKenzie the money we have on hand today, to keep until after the scrap is over. If neither of us live to claim it he is going to send it home.

  27th October. The whole Coy was out on fatigue last night. We had to march for 2 miles through sticky clay in which you sank to your boot tops at every step, & if you did not have good laces in them you would leave them to rot in the clay. The whole country for miles around is just one great quagmire of glue-pot clay.

  Arrived at our destination, which was a great dump on the railway line where everything is unloaded for the Army’s need. Here is to be seen a narrow gauge German line & dozens of ruined trucks which our artillery have destroyed. How on earth the Germans don’t shell this dump gets me, for at night time it resembles a busy town with its hundreds of bright lights, trains whistling, motors too-tooing, men shouting, the creaking of the heavily laden transports & the rumble of the slow & ponderous caterpillar as it hauls some gun along the crowded road or pulls a motor out of the bog. They are splendid, are these great caterpillars. They will go almost anywhere & very rarely get bogged.

  When we pulled up we found we had to wait from 6 to 9 before the trucks containing the sleepers which we were to unload would arrive, so the boys started singing, one Coy against the other, & in this way we passed the time away, but we had a terrible job to keep ourselves from freezing, for it was frightfully cold & the wind cut like a knife.

  We got to work about 9. Each Coy had 2 trucks to unload, & the sleepers had to be carried 6
00 yards up a rotten mucky road, 2 men to a sleeper. It took us till 1 o’clock to move these sleepers — this was real bullocking work, but officers & all took a hand in it.

  When we finished we came home by the railway line which has just been newly built & I got a lovely buster — slipped on one of the slippery sleepers & down I come fair & square. I got a nasty bruise or two out of it, but of course I did not say anything, oh no. We reached our miserable home about 2 o’clock & the cooks had hot tea waiting & an issue of rum, & we badly needed a hot drink for we were nearly all dead beat for we had had a strenuous night.

  Woke up this morning chilled to the bone & shivering like a leaf. One of the coldest & raw winds imaginable was blowing straight in on us, & I for one did not give a hang what happened I felt that miserable. It is nearly impossible for us Australians to keep warm in this weather & we sleep with all our clothes on; in fact we dress to go to bed & then we nearly perish. I don’t think we have much of a chance of standing the winter here & I have no wish to sample it. All the boys look very miserable & drawn up, & all we talk about is the good old sunny days of Australia, the finest place in the world. Oh how we all look forward to our returning to her, never more to roam I’ll bet.

  Old Fritz dropped 10 big shells just about where we are billeted last night & 9 of them were duds. The soft ground is responsible for this I reckon. One of them knocked a dugout in but luckily no one was hurt.

  Through all this bad weather the charges have been put off, & they may not take place now till next spring. Yesterday morning the Germans attempted to take a position off us. They got halfway across & then they got stuck in the mud, & the boys killed every one of them, so that ought to be a lesson to us.

  Tonight I get my third promotion. I am a Sergeant tonight, pretty rapid you know.