Passchendaele

by Paul Ham

  After battle, the dead were given a short field service, if that were possible, though many bodies lay in the field for days or weeks before burial. The padres tended to use II Timothy IV.7–8: ‘I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day …’ Or the words of John XI.25–26: ‘I am the Resurrection and the Life, saith the Lord: he that believeth in Me, though he were dead yet shall he live: and whosever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die.’9

  Field services were held in former battle zones and attended by small groups of the deceased’s friends and his officer. The services catered for the major faiths, and were often moving. Nor were the exotic tribes of the Empire forgotten. The members of the New Zealand (Maori) Pioneer Battalion were buried according to the rites of the ‘tangi’ tribal service. A witness recorded the tangi of Lieutenant Colonel George King, the much-admired commander of 1 Canterbury Battalion, who had previously led the Maoris, perhaps the most feared soldiers on the Western Front. ‘I do not think,’ wrote the witness, ‘I will ever forget that service, a cloudless sky and an aeroplane scrap overhead, the shallow grave, the body sewn in a blanket and covered with the New Zealand flag, the surpliced Padre, the short impressive burial service and finishing up with the beautiful Maori lament for a fallen chief, “Piko nei te matenga” (“When our heads are bowed with woe’) sung by the Maoris present, and with its beautiful harmonies and perfect tune, it seemed to me the most feeling tribute they could offer.’10

  Dr Harvey Cushing witnessed the burial of Paul Revere Frothingham, great-great-grandson of Paul Revere, the American revolutionary. Revere’s body was laid to rest on a soggy Flanders field beside a little oak grove under an overcast autumnal evening. Chinese coolies in tin helmets served as the gravediggers, working in ditches half-full of water. As Revere had served with the British Army, in an ironic twist in the family story the lad’s body was:

  wrapped in an army blanket and covered by a weather-worn Union Jack carried on their soldiers by four slipping stretcher-bearers … Happily it was fairly dry at this end of the trench, and some green branches were thrown in for him to lie on. The Padre recited the usual service – the bugler gave the ‘Last Post’ – and we went about our duties. Plot 4, Row F.11

  Those were the lucky ones. At the end of Third Ypres, thousands of corpses lay in shallow graves or shell holes, on wires or in pieces. Crowds of the dead and wounded filled the pillboxes and trenches, and rows upon rows of stretcher-borne bodies – many alive, many dead or dying – accumulated at assembly points. The stench of decomposition hung on the chill wind that blew over the Salient, the harbinger of winter. December’s snowflakes cast a natural sheet over the hideous scenes on the ground.

  The burial details roamed Flanders fields for months after the end of Third Ypres, combing the Salient for soldiers’ remains, often finding only a limb, a hand, a head. Whole bodies were sewn into blankets. Body parts that seemed to form part of the same individual were placed in sandbags and buried as the complete human being. It was a gruesome jigsaw puzzle, and often the identity of the soldier was impossible to confirm.

  Lieutenant P. King of a regiment of East Lancashires led a burial party to inter the remains of hundreds of Scottish soldiers who were mown down during the attack on Frezenburg Ridge, on 20 September. ‘It was an appalling job,’ King later wrote. ‘[S]ome were so shattered that there was not much left. We did have occasions where you almost buried a man twice. In fact we must have done just that several times. There was one officer whose body we buried and then shortly after we found an arm with the same name on the back of a watch on the wrist …. If they had any identity discs, then we marked the grave – just put the remains in a sandbag, dug a small grave and buried him. Then I had to write it on a list and give the map reference location. Where the bodies were so broken up or decomposed that we couldn’t find an identity we just buried the man and put “Unknown British Soldier” on the list.’12

  The gravediggers were working in a wasteland:

  There was no sign of civilization. No cottages, no buildings, no trees. It was utter desolation. There was nothing at all except huge craters, half the size of a room. They were full of water and the corpses were floating in them. Some with no heads. Some with no legs. They were very hard to identify. We managed about four in every ten. There were Germans among them … 13

  Each inhumation, whether the corpses were Allied or German, received a brief service. ‘[W]e didn’t just dump them into a hole,’ said King. ‘We committed each one properly to his grave. Said a little prayer out of a book issued to us. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” The men all stood around and took off their hats for a moment, standing to attention. “God rest his soul.” A dead soldier can’t hurt you. He’s a comrade. That’s how we looked at it. He was some poor mother’s son and that was the end of it.’14

  When the war was over, the soldiers’ remains, if they could be found, were exhumed from these temporary graves and relocated to dedicated Commonwealth war cemeteries.

  Two organisations, founded by the indefatigable Major General Fabian Ware, undertook the immense task of identifying and burying them: the Directorate of Grave Registration and Enquiries, part of the War Office, was charged with identifying and reburying remains; and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission with marking graves and building and maintaining burial sites. Between 1919 and 1921, Ware’s Exhumation Units fanned out across the Salient, to attempt to find, exhume and identify tens of thousands of soldiers’ bodies buried in makeshift holes, collapsed dugouts or shallow graves, on or near the battlefield, marked with a wooden cross. Shellfire had obliterated many of these temporary resting places, along with the corpses, making the soldier difficult or impossible to identify from what remained (DNA testing had not been discovered). Every body and body part had to be unearthed and, if possible, identified or matched with other body parts.

  For this immense task, Ware deployed 8559 men, divided into squads of 32, who worked in groups of four, each equipped with rubber gloves, two spades, a pair of pliers, stakes to mark the graves, tarpaulins to wrap the bodies, stretchers and disinfectant. Machine-gun-cleaning rods were commonly used to probe the earth, for signs of the dead.15 Dog tags, papers, wallets, any unit numbers or identifying marks on belts, spoons, watches or ground sheets were the most useful means of identifying the dead man and his unit. Identified remains were then transferred to a designated Commonwealth cemetery.

  By May 1920, the exhumation teams had recovered 130,000 bodies – many from earlier battles in the Salient, and many of them German.16 The German dead were buried in mass graves, with little attempt to identify them. An unknown number of bodies were found embedded in trench walls, where they’d been flung ‘to help build up the parapet’, Ed Lynch recalled. ‘It’s not good burial but it’s good warfare,’ he wrote. ‘We’re not undertakers.’17

  Telegrams were sent to the families, and then obituaries appeared, followed by local memorials and the inscription of an epitaph on the soldier’s tombstone. There was no question of repatriating the remains to their various countries – an enormously costly and difficult exercise. In any case, the very concentration of burial grounds in Flanders and north-east France has given the area its special quality as a place of remembrance. The diffusion of the soldiers’ bodies throughout the world would have ‘caused remembrance to fade a lot faster or even to disappear altogether’.18

  Once a soldier was confirmed dead or wounded, the telegrams were dispatched. The news arrived in the little official envelope every parent dreaded; for example:

  REGRET REPORTED SON PRIVATE _____________

  WOUNDED WILL PROMPTLY ADVISE IF

  ANYTHING FURTHER RECEIVED19

  Madam,

  It is my painful duty to inform you that no further news having been received relative to (No.) _____ (Rank) ________ (Name)____________ (Regiment)___________
______, who has been missing since _______, the Army Council has been regretfully constrained to conclude that he is dead and that his death took place on _________ (or since).

  An official letter followed, offering the families the ‘deep sympathy of the King, Queen, and Government in the sad loss that you and the Army have sustained’.20 A death notice then appeared in the local papers, often in the name of the late soldier’s children. Private Matthew Austin was one of 50 men in his unit killed on 12 October 1917; his two-year-old son Hugh’s name appeared beside the notice: ‘In loving memory of my dear daddy … who was killed at Passchendaele … The dearest spot on earth to me is where my dear daddy lies.’21

  The late soldier’s officers or friends usually followed up with a personal letter to the parents, enumerating their son’s qualities and the gallant manner of his death. Many performed the rite so often that it became a reluctant chore, a benumbed duty. Norman Collins often had to write 60 letters at a time, about men he barely knew.22 The officers tended to embellish their letters with lavish testaments to the personal qualities, soldierly courage or popularity of the deceased. Thus the phrases ‘he died a soldier’s death’, ‘he was loved by all’, ‘he was a fine soldier’, ‘I cannot speak too highly of him’ proliferated. These sentiments may have been true and heartfelt, but if the dead man had been unpopular or a bad soldier or a coward, the officers lied out of sympathy for the families. ‘We always tried to write a nice letter to the mother or father because we felt for them,’ Collins recalled.23

  There is no doubting the sincerity of Lieutenant F. Taylor’s letter to the family of Corporal John (‘Jack’) Ison, killed by shell-fire at the front line on 10 October 1917. ‘When I lost him I lost a friend and one of my best corporals,’ Ison’s sergeant major, P. Kinchington, wrote to the dead soldier’s father on 26 November 1917.24 ‘We went through Gallipoli, Egypt, France, Pozieres [sic], Belgium, the Somme, & again at Ypres together. I can honestly assure you that I miss Jack as much as my own brother … I know it is an awful thing to part with one’s sons … You have no idea of the troop’s sufferings … It really is a mercy from God to take us. I assure you at times I have asked God to take me from this life.’25 The battalion’s chaplain also wrote to Ison’s parents, telling them of the ‘splendid soldier’ and ‘fine man’ their son had been: ‘I can, I believe, give you the complete assurance that your son did not suffer any pain in his passing; he passed instantly to his rest & to the close keeping of God.’26

  Four of Harold Leslie (‘Les’) Larsen’s close friends wrote to console his mother after the stretcher-bearer’s death, blown up while carrying out the wounded on 4 October, a week after he was awarded the Military Medal. ‘[W]hat a fine son,’ began their deep-felt tribute to the 22-year-old baker’s son from Queensland. ‘He was ever ready to give assistance to those in danger or difficulty often at the risk of his own life … Never was a lad more popular amongst his comrades, his bright smiling face and splendid disposition inspired us all, in fact he was a general favourite in the unit.’27 Many letters attested to the fact: before his death, Les Larsen had spent seven days in succession bearing the wounded to safety ‘under heavy shell fire, through shell holes and knee deep mud’.28

  Deeply moved, Mrs Larsen tried to express herself to one of her surviving sons:

  I want to write to you tonight and yet I don’t know how … Our dear Les has gone; never shall I see him. We cannot realise it yet … this dreadfulness that has come upon us. Killed in action the cable said; so he got his wish. He once said, ‘If I have to go, Mother, I hope I am killed outright and not have to linger in agony.’ … The thing I have dreaded has come to pass; but the awfulness of it, oh dear, when will the misery end?29

  Quoting from the letters she had received from her son’s fellow soldiers, Mrs Larsen wondered what ‘Battlefield’ his ‘poor body is resting in …’ In an earlier letter, Les had tried to console her in advance of his possible death: if it came, Mother, he wrote, it would be ‘a happy relief’ from the war. But she could not reconcile herself to his peace.30 On 18 May 1918, she received a parcel containing Les’s personal effects – identity disc, coins, letters, wallet, badge.31

  Many soldiers sought to console the dead man’s family by invoking the greater good of his sacrifice. After the death of her beloved brother Allan, Sister Elsie Grant, a young Australian nurse, received a letter from his sergeant:

  It is with regret I take up my pen to write these few lines telling you that your brother A.H. Grant was killed in action on 12.10.17; but Sister is it not a great consolation to know that he died a grand and noble death fighting for his God, King, Country and dear ones … he was so jolly; full of sport; & good-natured that he was soon known and loved by all of the boys, in fact his platoon used to just idolise him.

  The sergeant included a few items in the parcel – the young man’s wallet (containing £5), a letter and a mirror – that Grant had asked him, on the night before he died, to send to his sister should he not survive ‘the Stunt’ that killed him.32 Elsie had last seen her brother in August, when he visited her after the shelling of the Australian casualty clearing station in the village where she worked. ‘God must’ve sent him as a comfort,’ she had told a friend at the time.33

  Often the aggrieved widow, mother or father, sought further information on their husband or son, usually by writing to the padre. Many also wrote if they had not heard from their loved one, to inquire whether their sons were alive. Their letters make some of the saddest reading of the war:

  Dear Sir,

  I have received … the sad news of the death of my dear son. It came as a great blow to us all. He was a good and devoted boy …. We are glad to know that his death was instantaneous …

  Dear Sir

  I am writing to thank you for letting me know about my dear husband’s death. It came as a great blow to me but I am more than pleased to think you witnessed his death and berrial [sic] as I can rest quite comfortable that heisput [sic] comfortable away.

  To the Padre …

  … He was our only surviving son and it is, therefore a bitter grief. We would be so grateful for any little news of him …

  Sir,

  Would you kindly tell me what you know about my poor Boy … is he alive or dead, it is 8 weeks now since I heard a word …

  Dear Sir,

  I hope you wont [sic] mind me writing to you again … your kind letter of sympathy is of a great help to us poor mothers. I can’t realise yet that I shall not see my dear boy again on earth but I do miss his bright cheery letters, they were such a help to me. It does seem so hard that we should lose them like that when you have brought them up so many years with no husband to help you but I musnt [sic] repine. God knows best and I pray that my dear boy and I shall meet again in a better land. Should you know of any boy who is lonely and gets no letters from home if I could write him sometimes I should still feel that I had someone out there I could help in that way … 34

  These are samples of thousands of letters sent to Reverend Victor Tanner and the other padres. Tanner plainly did not relish the task of replying to so much correspondence. The families’ ‘pathetic letters’, he wrote, with exasperation, revealed their ‘complete ignorance of the conditions of modern warfare’, questions such as: Was my husband’s death instantaneous? Did my boy suffer? What were his last words? Could you send me the ring he was wearing?35 Tanner had a standard card printed to respond to the deluge, to which he would sometimes append a personal note.

  One of the hardest post-mortem rites the family had yet to bear was the arrival of their son’s parcel or trunk containing his personal effects – usually just his clothes, razor, pay book, a little money and watch. Often, they amounted to a few cards and photos and his last will and testament. Corporal John Ison’s effects included a cigarette case and a watch in the back of which he kept a lock of hair.36

  Months passed before Australian, Canadian and New Zealand families received the parcel, of which the army would p
re-warn them: ‘transmission to your address, one package containing the effects of the late [soldier’s name and unit] received ex Transport [ship’s name], as per inventory attached …’ The families were asked to ‘kindly let us know whether [the parcel] come [sic] safely to hand by signing and returning the attached printed receipt’.37

  Fearing a white feather in the post, Horace (‘Horrie’) Rex had enlisted a month short of his twentieth birthday. He had a robust military pedigree to live up to: his great-grandfather, John Mernagh, fought the British in the 1798 Irish Rebellion and migrated to New South Wales rather than face trial for murder if captured. His uncle, Brigadier General Dr Patrick Farrell, had served with the American Army in Mexico and in the Boxer War in China, and had commanded the first company of US troops to land in the Philippines on 30 June 1898. During the Great War, General Farrell held a senior command in the US medical corps.38

  In May 1917, Rex arrived in Flanders with an Australian machine-gun company. The average life expectancy of an officer of machine gunners was about three weeks. Horrie lasted a bit longer: fragments of a ‘whizz bang’ struck him on 7 October, at the entrance of his dugout. He was buried a few yards from where he was hit, but his temporary grave, marked by a little cross, did not survive the war. His remains were never found and he is now listed as missing on the Menin Gate.