Servants Of The Guns Part 2

Except for a narrow pa.s.sage-way and a small recess for the operators, the entire ground floor was blocked solid from earth to ceiling with sandbags; there is a distinct feeling of security to be derived from eight or ten feet thickness of clay-filled bags!

We climbed a wooden ladder and squeezed into the tiny room upstairs from which the fire of this particular battery is directed. A long low loophole carefully protected with sandbags and steel plates provided me with my first view of the front.

I was now some fifteen feet or so above ground level and could see the backs of all our lines of trenches, could see the smoke of burning fires and men walking casually up and down or engaged in digging, planking, revetting, and so on. Beyond was the front line--less distinct and with fewer signs of activity in it; beyond that again a strip of varying width, untrampled, green and utterly forsaken--No Man's Land. A few charred tree-trunks from which every branch and twig had been stripped by sh.e.l.l fire, stuck up at intervals. I could see the first German parapet quite plainly and (with gla.s.ses) other lines behind it, and numerous wriggling communication trenches.

So this was "the Front," that vague term that comes so glibly to the lips of the people at home. I looked at it intently for a long time and I found that one idea crowded all others from my mind.

"What madness," I thought, "this is which possesses the world! What _criminal_ waste, not only of lives and money, but of brains, ideas, ingenuity and time, all of which might have been devoted to construction instead of to destruction."

The Child noticed my absorption, read my thoughts perhaps, and translated them into his own phraseology thus:--"Dam' silly business, isn't it, when you come to think of it?"

The expression fitted. It _is_ a d.a.m.nably silly business, _but_, if we are to secure what the whole world longs for--a just and lasting peace--we have got to see this business through to the end, however silly, however wasteful it may seem. We have got to "stick it," as the soldier says, until the gathering forces are strong enough to break the barrier beyond all hope of repair; to break it and then to pour through to what will be the most overwhelming victory in the history of the world....

The major turned his head and spoke into a voice-tube beside him.

"Battery action," he said.

The operator on the ground floor repeated his words into a telephone. I pictured over again what I had seen in the morning; the detachments doubling to the places and the four guns instantly ready to answer the call.

It is altogether astonis.h.i.+ng, this siege warfare. An officer sits in a ruined house, strongly fortified, and not so many hundred yards from the enemy. From there with ease and certainty he controls the fire of his four guns. He knows his "zone" and every object in it as completely as he knows his own features in a looking-gla.s.s. Further, he is connected by telephone with the infantry which he supports, and through the medium of his own headquarters with various other batteries. Normally this "observation" work is done by a subaltern, who, nowadays, thank Heaven and the munitions factories, shoots as much, if not more, than he is shot at. But occasionally the enemy is stirred up and "retaliates." This word, in its present military sense, was unknown before the war. It means just this--

One side organises a bombardment. It carries out its programme, perhaps successfully, perhaps not. The other side, sometimes at once, sometimes afterwards, "retaliates" with its artillery on some locality known to be a tender spot: this is by way of punishment. A year, six months ago even, the aggression came almost entirely from the Germans, and our artillery from lack of ammunition could only retaliate mildly, almost timidly, for fear of drawing down still further vengeance on the heads of its unfortunate infantry. But that state of things has pa.s.sed for ever. The aggression now is all on our side--I speak, of course, of an ordinary day when there is no "show" on: moreover it is rigorous and sustained and wearing. If and when the Germans reply to our aggression, we re-retaliate, so to speak, with a bombardment that silences him. For instance, to quote from "Comic Cuts" (the official Intelligence Summary is thus named)--

"Yesterday the enemy fired thirty-five sh.e.l.ls into ----. We replied with 500."

That is all: but the whole situation on the Western front _now_ is summed up in that bald statement. In these days we have the last word _always_....

On this particular afternoon, however, we had a definite object in view.

The "heavies" by two hours' methodical work made what the Child calls "h.e.l.l's own mess" of a selected bit of parapet. Meanwhile a field battery industriously cut the wire in front of it and other field batteries caused "divarsions," as one says in Ireland, by little side-shows of their own. The enemy went to ground, no doubt in comparative safety, and sulked in silence. But as soon as dusk began to creep over the sodden lines, he woke up and started to retaliate. It had evidently occurred to him that we might be going to attack that hole in his parapet.

I watched what seemed like a glorified firework display for five or ten minutes, and somehow gathered the impression that I was merely a spectator. Then there came three sharp cracks outside the loophole--_just_ outside it seemed--followed by the peculiar but unmistakable whirr of travelling splinters.

"Safer downstairs," observed the major, and we descended quickly.

For the next quarter of an hour it really seemed as though the enemy had made up his mind to flatten out the "Waldorf." He had not, of course: he couldn't even see it. What he was really doing was putting a "barrage,"

or wall of fire, on the road just in front of us to hamper the advance of our supports in case we genuinely meant to attack on any scale. We waited patiently downstairs until it was over; rather like sheltering in a shop from a pa.s.sing shower.

The signallers packed up their instruments and prepared to go home.

Personally I was inwardly none too happy about the prospect of sallying forth into the open; but these men appeared to have no qualms whatever.

They were used to it for one thing, and for another they had had a long day and wanted their tea. In such circ.u.mstances it takes much to deter the British soldier.

"Seems to be over: might as well 'op it, Bill," said one.

"Righto," answered the other. "Bloomin' muddy this way. What say to going down the road?"

_Tack-tack-tack-tack_ came from the direction of the road. Even war-worn signallers retain their common sense.

"'Ark at that there [adjectived] machine-gun, it's 'ardly worth it;"

they agreed and squelched off through the thick clay, grousing about the state of the country but perfectly indifferent to the deafening din around them.

Five minutes later we followed them and walked back, facing the flashes of our own guns, which were still firing steadily--just to make certain of having the last word with the Hun....

It was nearly nine o'clock when we at last clattered into the courtyard of our billet and slipped wearily off our horses. It had been a long day but an interesting one, for we had seen, at close quarters, a battery doing its normal job under the prevailing normal conditions. And very soon now our battery will be in that position, putting the last finis.h.i.+ng touches to its education and doing that same job, I hope efficiently. Then, and not till then, will it really be a Battery in Being.

"IN THE LINE"

We are beginning now to regard ourselves as old stagers. We have been in action for nearly three months and in that period our education, in all the essential things, has advanced at a most surprising pace. Our most cherished illusions--culled from the newspapers for the most part--have been dissipated and replaced by the realities of this life. How often, I wonder, have we read that this is a war of attrition, or of artillery, or of finance, or of petrol! It is none of these things--at least not from our limited perspective. It is rather, to us, a war of mud, of paper (so many reams of it that the battery clerk's head buzzes and he cannot sleep at night for thinking of the various "returns" that he must render to headquarters by 9 a.m. on the following day), of routine, and, above all, of marauding.

Wherefore we have adapted ourselves to circ.u.mstances. We have learnt that mud in itself is harmless and, since it is impossible to avoid, not worth noticing at any time; that unpunctuality in the submitting of any report or return demanded (however senseless) leads to far more unpleasantness from high quarters than any other sin one may commit; that routine is an irksome fetish of the Powers, but that it makes each day so like its predecessor that the weeks slip by and one forgets the date and almost the month. Lastly, we have learnt that the way to get things is to find them lying about; that while it is possible to indent for material, it is also possible to collect it if one takes the trouble. Timber, for instance, is required for building gun-pits, so are steel girders and brick rubble and brushwood. Well, do not the winds that shriek across this flat country blow down trees sometimes? Is there not a derelict railway station less than a mile away, and are not piles of rubble placed along the roadsides for mending purposes? It is pleasant, too, to have a real door to one's dug-out instead of a hanging corn sack: there is more than one partially ruined cottage near at hand.

We are beyond the borderland of civilisation here; We have left our scruples behind us, for we know that if we refrain from taking those rails, those doors and window frames, those stout oak beams, some one else will have them shortly.

Circ.u.mstances, too, have brought it home to us that this war is not so "stationary" as we imagined. The relative positions of the two opposing armies remain the same, weary month after weary month. But the positions of the units composing them do not. We, for example, soon after our arrival in the country were sent up to be attached for instruction to a battery which was in action. It was explained to us that we would eventually "take over" from that battery when its division went out to rest. We were at pains, therefore, to acquire all the knowledge we could in the time. The subalterns learnt the "zone" which they would have to watch and fire over--every yard of it. The sergeants mastered the particular system of angles, "registrations," etc., in use; the signallers knew the run of their wires and understood the working of the circuit; the gun detachments, as a result of many hours of patient sand-bag filling and building, had begun to regard the place as their future home which it was meet to make as strong and (afterwards only) as comfortable as possible. And I, as the battery commander, besides being fairly confident of being able to "carry on," had noted, with satisfaction, it being then midwinter, that there was a fireplace in what would be my room.

But did we "take over" this position? Not we! Three days before the relief was due to take place we were sent off to another battery about which we knew nothing whatever and took over from it in a hurry and a muddle. Which strange procedure may be accounted for in one of two ways--as having been done expressly with a view to training us in dealing with an unexpected situation or, more simply, as merely "Dam bad staff work." We will leave it at that.

We occupied this new position, which, by the way, was a good one with a quite comfortable billet close at hand, for just three weeks. At the end of this time we had thoroughly settled down: we had done a great deal of constructive work--strengthening gun-pits, improving dug-outs, fixing voice-tubes for the pa.s.sing of orders from the telephone-hut to the guns; we had laid out an extra wire to the O.P. and relabelled all our circuit: we had cleaned up the wagon-line, rebricked the worst parts of the horse-standings and laid down brushwood so that the vehicles were clear of the all-pervading mud. We had arranged a bathroom for the men as well as a recreation room: we had built an oven (nothing acquires merit more simply in the eyes of the Powers than a well-devised oven--"Your horse-management is a scandal, Captain ----!" "Yes, sir: but have you seen our oven?" Wrath easily deflected and the Great One departs to make a flattering report). We had visualised at least twenty various "stunts" that would make things safer, or more comfortable or more showy. We had reached a moment, in fact, when we were secretly rubbing our hands and saying "the place is not only habitable but _good_: and we are about to enjoy the fruits of our labours thereon."

Which was a foolish att.i.tude to adopt and one which, now that we are a more experienced (and therefore a more cynical) unit, would not be conceivable.

This time they moved the whole division, telling us (or the infantry rather) that the order should be regarded as a compliment in that the division had done so well that it was to be entrusted with a more difficult--which is a euphemism for a more dangerous--portion of the line.

Resignedly we packed up everything that we possessed, "handed over" to the incoming battery, and, after failing to persuade the mess cat to accompany us, trekked off in a howling gale to the new place. This latter was not without merits, but had the great disadvantage that the only house available for a mess was nearly a quarter of a mile from the gun position.

The gun-pits, with the exception of one which had been partially reconstructed on sound principles, were bad. They had been built in the summer when every one was saying, "No use wasting material--we won't be here next winter." But here we are all the same, regarding rather gloomily the defects which it will take weeks of hard work to remedy.

I overheard one gunner expressing his opinion thus to a friend of his--

"Well now, Dai,[6] I don't know what battery was here before us now just, but they weren't great workers, see! Our pit couldn't keep the rain out last night--what'll it do if a sh.e.l.l comes along?"

[6] David.

So I indented on the Royal Engineers (who own vast storehouses called in the vernacular "Dumps") for rails and bricks and cement and sandbags, and I sent marauding parties out at night to collect anything that might be useful.

The men with a good-will which was beyond all praise, seeing that this was their third position within the month, started the arduous task of dismantling the old pits and dug-outs and building them anew--guessing by this time that in all probability they would be moved on elsewhere before their labours were finished. For that is one very definite aspect of this war....

Our mess is a cottage which we share with a French family. Monsieur works in a mine close by, the numerous children play in the yard or are sent on errands, Madame in her spare moments does our was.h.i.+ng for us. In the evening they all a.s.semble in the kitchen and try to teach French to our servants. It amazes me to watch the sangfroid with which they go about their daily occupations regardless of the never-ceasing sound of guns and sh.e.l.ls, regardless of the fact that the German line, as the crow flies, is less than two miles away. At 8 p.m. to the moment, whilst we are at dinner, they troop through into their own room to bed, each with a charming "Bon soir, messieurs." And on each occasion they make me personally feel that we are rather brutal to be occupying two-thirds of their house and spending our days making the most appalling havoc of their country. But I console myself by remembering that these people once had Uhlans in the neighbourhood and are therefore prepared to disregard minor nuisances such as ourselves.

Seven to seven-thirty p.m. is generally rather a busy time. Official correspondence, usually marked "secret" and nearly always "urgent," is apt to arrive, and it is at this time that the intricate report on the day's shooting has to be made out and despatched to Group Headquarters.

I am in the midst of this, working against time, with an orderly waiting in the kitchen, when the door is flung open and the Child enters with a cheery "Good evening, Master."

The Child calls me Master sometimes because I am always threatening to send his parents a half-term report on his progress and general conduct, or to put him back into Eton collars! He has now just returned from forty-eight hours' duty at the O.P. and presents an appearance such that his own mother would hardly recognise him. He wears a cap of a particularly floppy kind which he refers to as "my gorblimy hat," an imperfectly cured goatskin coat of varied hues which smells abominably, fur gauntlets, brown breeches, and indiarubber thigh boots. Round his person are slung field gla.s.ses, a prismatic compa.s.s, an empty haversack, and a gas helmet. Moreover, he is caked with mud from head to foot and flushed with his two-mile walk against the cold wind. For this is still March, and we have had frost and snow and thaw alternately this last week.

"Anything happen after I left?" I ask. I had been up at the O.P. in the morning, and we'd "done a little shoot" together.

"Nothing much. The Hun got a bit busy with rifle grenades about lunch time and started to put some small 'minnies'[7] into our second line. So I retaliated on three different targets, which stopped him p.d.q. Later on he put a few pip-squeaks round our O.P. and one four-two into the church. That's about all, 'cept that I had to dodge a blasted machine-gun when I was leaving at dusk--one of those 250-rounds-a-minute stunts, you know--and I had to nip across that open bit, in between his bursts of fire. The trenches are in h.e.l.l's own mess after this thaw--I went down to the front line with an infantry officer to look at a sniper's post he's located; we might get the 'hows'[8] on to it. Any letters for me?"