by Tim Atkinson
‘Atten-SHUN!’ Jack calls his section to order.
‘So where is Private Gilchrist?’ Ingham asks in a thin voice as he walks along inspecting the platoon.
‘He’s … not well, sir.’
‘The MO seen him, has he?’
‘Not yet, sir, no.’
‘You’ve sent for him though, naturally?’
‘No, sir.’
‘No? Oh dear! Oh dear, oh dear.’
‘He was … only just taken badly, sir.’
‘Ah!’ Ingham nods. ‘So what, precisely, is the nature of this … illness, then?’
‘I’ll bloody tell you what it is, sir!’ Ocker’s voice calls out across the parade ground. The colour drains from Ingham’s face and his mouth falls open.
‘He’s bloody gone an’ done it this time,’ Jack whispers from the corner of his mouth. Mac slowly shakes his head as Ocker – tunic open, braces hanging loose and boots undone – appears before them.
Ingham somehow manages a tense smile, showing his teeth like a monkey. ‘Ah, Gilchrist!’ He tries to sound as casual as possible. ‘Feeling better now, are we?’
‘All the better for seeing you, sir.’ Gilchrist raises his hand in quick salute. ‘Because, you see, it’s time we got one or two things sorted out, I reckon.’
‘Sorted out?’
‘Yeah, mate – sorted out. Now shut your clacker and listen up, Ingham ol’ fruit. As the boys here have just told you, I’m sick.’
‘Well, they said—’
‘I’m bloody sick, “sir” – sick to bloody death of the Army and sick to bloody death of … well, death, to be quite honest with you. We’re all flamin’ fed up with poncing around like soldiers all the time. In fact, we’re bloody fed up wi’ being soldiers, and that’s something I’ll come to in a minute. We’re not fighting any more, there’s not a war on, and even the flamin’ enemy has been sent home.’
‘Well, yes, but …’
‘All we do is fight the flamin’ mud. And we’re flamin’ fed up with it.’
By now the attention of men in several other units has been aroused, including Captain Harris. ‘Spot of bother, Ingham?’
‘No, no, not at all, Harris old chap.’ Ingham waves his stick. ‘Just letting the men get their grievances off their chest, y’know. Important for morale to let them have their say and for them to know their voices are being heard.’
‘Ah.’ Harris looks genuinely interested. ‘Capital idea. Very brave of you, mind. Not sure it’s in King’s Regulations but then, most of what we do isn’t in the book these days, what?’
‘Exactly.’ Ingham grits his teeth.
‘Yes. Don’t want any more mutinies in the British Army, do we?’
‘Good Lord, no!’ Ingham’s eyes widen.
‘Calloo Calais, eh?’ Harris sniggers.
The rest of the men watch in silence. Gardeners are skirting the perimeter of the parade ground, some studiously ignoring what is happening, others stopping to enjoy a moment’s entertainment. Beyond the huts, one of the big green Albion lorries is being cranked, the engine first spluttering then shaking as the heavy truck shudders into life.
‘So what is it that you men want?’ Lieutenant Ingham asks at last.
‘No parade,’ says one.
‘Better food,’ says another.
‘And we all want to go home,’ Ocker says at last. ‘We want out o’ the Army.’
‘Really? All of you?’
Jack looks down at the floor.
‘Well I’m warning you,’ Ingham says after a while. ‘There’s really very little I can do. I’ll pass on your grievances to the colonel, but until then you are subject to the King’s Regulations. You must do as instructed by the sergeant and you must obey orders.’ There is a murmur among the men. ‘Although,’ Ingham carries on, ‘some of you may be interested to know that a number of our fellows are now nearer to getting their wish granted than they might have realised.’
Jack looks up. Ingham unbuttons the breast pocket of his tunic and takes out a letter.
‘Yes, yes, I have it here.’ He opens up the folded piece of paper, smiling to himself. ‘We may not be finished here,’ he says. ‘And our work may not be over—’
‘We’re still finding bodies, sir,’ Jack says. ‘Only t’other day a farmer out at Langemark called us out because he’d found some poor Tommy lying in a ditch.’
‘Quite,’ says Ingham. ‘And given the numbers of men still missing, what would you expect?’
‘Most of the men who are missing won’t be in any fit state for us to bury, sir,’ says Ocker.
‘… or for anyone to find,’ adds Mac.
‘The Directorate of Graves Registration and Enquiries is satisfied that we are doing what we can. They appreciate that the work we do—’
‘We, sir?’
‘They appreciate that the work is dirty, difficult and sometimes dangerous. And you’ll be pleased to know that from now on the task of maintaining the cemeteries is to be transferred to the Imperial War Graves Commission. Major-General Ware – fine chap – and his men will be taking over the running of all the battlefield and concentration cemeteries from now on.’
‘And good luck to ’em,’ somebody is saying.
‘Indeed, indeed,’ Ingham nods. ‘All of which means there is in point of fact very little left for us to do now the concentrations are largely over and the battlefields have all been searched.’
‘But there’s thousands on ’em still out there, sir – unaccounted for.’
‘Yes, well. Be that as it may, that element of our work is drawing to a close. Dammit, I thought you’d all be pleased.’
‘Pleased, sir?’
‘Yes. Isn’t that one of the things you’ve just been grumbling about to me? There’s no satisfying some people …’
‘No doubt most of t’lads would be more relieved if you telled ’em they was going home soon, sir.’
‘Most, Lance-Corporal Patterson? Not including yourself in that number then?’
‘I think what Jack is trying to say,’ Mac interrupts, ‘is that “pleased” is not quite the most suitable word for the end of the work that we’ve been doing, sir.’
‘I don’t see why not. We’ve done a fine job, a damn fine job.’
‘Some of us,’ someone mutters.
‘I see!’ Ingham turns to face the speaker. ‘No, I see.’ He nods. ‘I understand perfectly, and I sympathise – really I do.’ The sudden change of tack takes the men by surprise. No one speaks. And Ingham slowly takes another letter from his tunic pocket, glances down for a moment, then looks back at the men. ‘You think I’m not in sympathy with the serious and solemn nature of what we do here, don’t you?’ he says. ‘You men think that because I’m back here filling in Army forms rather than out there getting my boots dirty, you think I don’t understand. You think me unfeeling. You regard me as cold-hearted. And yet’ – he jabs his finger at the letter – ‘it may interest you to know that it is to me that requests occasionally come from the living, from the bereaved, from the families of the men we’re burying.’
Jack and Ocker both glance at each other. Mac slowly shakes his head. Only Fuller stands alert, waiting on Ingham’s every word.
‘You know’ – Ingham screws up his eyes – ‘there are those who feel it very keenly that these poor fellows can’t go back to their homes, their families, their loved ones.’ He looks carefully at each of the men. The nearby truck has driven off, the remaining sections of the platoon have been dismissed. The gardeners are all at work.
‘What if you, not they, had fallen? Would your families prefer a grave that they could visit?’ Ingham walks along the line. ‘Would your loved ones be helped by having a headstone in a place of their own choosing, where they were able to lay flowers, and to stand and grieve?’
‘Fine words, sir,’ says Fuller, before a surreptitious kick from Ocker shuts him up. Jack studies the horizon with renewed interest.
‘I will read you a letter,’
Ingham says. ‘It comes from the relative of one of the soldiers we happen to be burying today. This elderly gentleman lives in Canada. As he says, he has little hope of ever visiting his son’s grave. He writes:
I beg you, please, to do what you can for a father. My boy is gone for ever. My only son now lies in a country I know nothing about nor will ever visit. I long for a grave where my wife and I may stand and weep. I need to be close again to my son, even if cold earth should separate us. Please, I beg of you, as King Priam begged for the body of Hector – please, do what you can.
‘What do you think to that, then, eh?’
For a long time, there is no sound. A train hisses steam. The engine of another wagon fades to a distant hum as another party of Commission gardeners sets off for a day’s planting, tidying, landscaping. Birds sing; skylarks rise from behind the spreading acres of rough, wooden grave markers down the road at Lijssenthoek, the sound of their song headed straight for heaven. In the far distance, gunfire: a hunter shooting rabbits.
Mac eventually breaks the spell. ‘And did he,’ the Scot begins, ‘did the laddie’s father write to you personally, did he?’
Ingham looks down at the letter. ‘Ah, no. This was passed to me by … well, by one of the locals, shall we say.’
‘We all know who that’ll be, then,’ Jack whispers.
‘Oh aye, aye,’ Mac nods, then pauses, looks at Ingham squarely in the eye. ‘And why you, sir?’
‘Why me?’ Ingham stuffs the letter back into his tunic pocket. ‘I, er … I don’t know. I assume … I mean, I believe de Wu—’ He stops suddenly.
‘Told you,’ Jack whispers.
‘Well, as I said, Monsieur de – the name is immaterial,’ Ingham carries on. ‘This gentleman—’
Jack coughs. ‘Sorry, sir!’
‘This person approached me as a representative of His Majesty’s forces, having received communication from the father of one of our Dominion troops grieving for the loss of his only son.’
‘Knows him, does he?’ Mac asks. ‘Does de W … this “local person” … know the grieving father?’
‘Well how the devil should I know?’
‘Well, sir, don’t you think it’s a wee bit … I don’t know—’
‘What are you trying to say, Private MacIntyre?’
‘It’s a little bit suspicious. I reckon that’s what Mac’s getting at,’ says Jack. ‘Some bloke in Canada contacts Fats – I mean, this gentleman o’ yours, out of the blue and starts asking a lot o’ stuff about his son—’
‘His only son.’
‘Who’s this Priam bloke anyway? That’s what I want to know,’ says Fuller.
‘It’s not that we aren’t sympathetic, sir,’ Jack goes on. ‘We know all about the sacrifices, the pain o’ loved ones back home—’
‘And I don’t?’
‘I’m not saying that, sir. I’m just—’
‘Well, I can see this isn’t going to get us anywhere.’
‘Certainly not going to get this poor fella back to Canada,’ says Fuller. ‘Or answer my question for that matter.’ Silence.
‘You weren’t, by any chance, thinking that I was asking you to assist in the illegal repatriation of this body, were you, men?’
‘Course not, sir. Whatever gave you that idea?’
‘After all, that would be disobeying Army orders, wouldn’t it?’
‘Quite.’
‘Because we all know – don’t we? – that both French and British armies have strict standing orders forbidding the repatriation of bodies.’
‘During the conflict, sir.’
‘Aye, in 1915’
‘The Frenchies are taken their fellas home now though.’
‘But not the British.’
‘No.’
‘Too right,’ says Ocker. ‘I mean – can you imagine what would have happened if the folks back home caught sight of this lot?’
‘I don’t think that is the rationale for their decision.’
‘Maybe not,’ Mac says. ‘But I wonder how long the war would’ve gone on if the docks had been stacked up wi’ our dead.’
‘Can you just imagine the effect on morale that would have,’ says Ocker. ‘Passing crate loads o’ corpses as you disembark from the troopship.’
‘Almost as bad as marching to battle past mass graves, freshly dug,’ says Jack.
‘Yes, yes,’ says Ingham. ‘I appreciate all that, men. Nevertheless—’
‘Nevertheless, sir?’
‘Nevertheless I merely thought that it would interest you to know some of the complexities as well as the emotional sensitivities of the situation we find ourselves in.’ Ingham turns, without a word, then stops. ‘Interesting, too, to note that they are the same concerns the ancients had for their dead. Even Achilles eventually relented. He surrendered the body of Hector.’ He looks back briefly, nods at Fuller, then walks away.
‘Reckon your luck’s in there, mate.’ Ocker digs an elbow hard in Fuller’s ribs. ‘But if Ingham’s Achilles, then who’s—’
‘Patroclus?’
‘Company – DISMISS!’
Blake is waiting for them when the men finally get to the canteen a few minutes later. ‘I knew the question of whether men should be returned would raise its ugly head again,’ he says, as they explain what kept them.
‘It’s natural enough, I suppose,’ Mac says, passing his mess-tin to the orderly. ‘You know – people asking why, if the living can return home, why the dead can’t be sent back to where they came from.’
‘Well, they could’ve sent me back a darn sight quicker,’ Ocker says as his mug is filled with tea.
‘Of course, this is a unique situation,’ Blake says, as they move off to find a space on one of the tables.
‘You don’t say!’
‘What I mean’ – Blake hacks a knob of butter with his knife – ‘is that it’s the first time that the country has, I don’t know, taken responsibility like this, on a nationwide scale, for burial and remembrance.’
‘He’s right,’ Mac nods. ‘The treatment of the Boer War fallen was a national scandal.’
‘And in the Crimea,’ Blake adds, ‘and Waterloo. For most of our glorious history the dead were simply piled up in mass graves.’
‘So we should all be grateful, is that what you’re sayin’?’
‘No—’
‘—for letting ’em kill us and then giving us a state bleedin’ funeral for nothing?’
‘I’m only saying,’ Blake shakes his head, ‘that it’s what these men deserve. They gave their lives. It’s the least a grateful nation ought to do.’
‘Aye, but Ingham’s got a point, hasn’t he? Why shouldn’t a grateful nation show its respects for them back home?’
‘They are already raising funds for memorials and monuments,’ Blake says. ‘There isn’t a town or a village in Britain that won’t be doing something.’
‘Except for burying.’ Jack carries on chewing.
‘Och, man – but can you imagine it?’ Mac puts down his fork. ‘They don’t want this lot under their noses—’
‘Or under their feet.’
‘Do you think so?’ Blake takes another bite of toast. ‘Do you think that’s the only reason?’
‘Mac’s right. Can you imagine what it’d be like back home if they saw for themselves the size of these cemeteries?’
‘Mm,’ Blake nods. ‘I take your point, Jack, but—’
‘They don’t want to know, back in Blighty. They want it all neat and tidy—’
‘And they want it over here,’ adds Mac.
‘Aye, so that they can all get on wi’ their lives and pretend the whole thing never happened.’
‘Well, I’m not quite sure where this little chat is going,’ Ocker says. ‘But it ain’t helping my stomach. Are you not eating that bacon?’
‘Here.’ Blake passes his mess-tin across the table. ‘You have it.’
The men finish the rest of their breakfast in silence, till Jack
says: ‘Come on,’ and drains the last of his tea. ‘This isn’t digging any graves, is it?’
‘Or burying any bodies.’
‘Yeah, look sharp – time to shift some more o’ this soil.’ Ocker picks up his mess-tin and takes it to the washstand. A short time later the men cross the road and walk the short distance down to Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery.
‘Right,’ Jack says when they arrive. ‘This looks like our job. Twenty-four graves to dig, Plot Thirty-one.’
The men dig without a word until they call a halt just before eleven.
‘Come on, lads,’ says Jack, climbing out of the grave. ‘Time for a break. We don’t have to dig ’em all in a day.’
‘Got the whole summer for this sort o’ thing, ain’t we, Jacko?’
Jack doesn’t answer. He starts walking, then running up the hill. ‘Last one to t’caff buys the tea.’
‘You’re on,’ says Ocker, sprinting between the rows of crosses.
‘That’s not fair,’ shouts Fuller. ‘He’s got a head start.’
‘Then you’d better get a move on laddie,’ Mac shouts as he jogs past.
A small whitewashed hut by the entrance to the cemetery is just another example of the little local amenities now opening across the Salient for the comfort of the growing stream of visitors. And the men see no reason not to take advantage. Fuller – bringing up the rear – orders the teas and the men drink sitting on the wooden bench against the outside wall of the hut, enjoying the warmth of the early summer sun.
‘Ocker?’
‘Yeah, mate?’
‘Why do you always stand like that?’ Fuller squints, as if narrowing his eyes might make sense of what he’s looking at.
‘Stand like what, mate? On me feet?’
‘Nah – slanted.’ Fuller leans his body over, demonstrating. ‘Leaning like you was holding up the walls or something.’
‘Kind o’ habit, I suppose,’ says Ocker, closing his eyes and turning his face to the sun.
‘Habit?’
‘Yeah, mate. Habit born o’ being shelled from above and shot at by rifle and machine-gun fire from below.’
‘Habit born o’ madness, I reckon,’ Jack laughs.
