War Letters of a Public-School Boy Part 14

I get on excellently with the cavalry officers. They have a bright charm of their own and are absolutely fearless. Most of them are descendants of the old English and Scottish chivalry.

They are intensely Conservative in opinion, not over intellectual, but men with fine traditions and n.o.ble instincts.

They have a pa.s.sion for horses and all things equine.

_September 16th, 1915._

So you have had an experience of the Zepps. I am glad London bore it philosophically. I never imagined that it would be possible seriously to perturb the people of England by this species of frightfulness. As Dad puts it, "Curiosity quite mastered every sense of fear," but if the Zepps. are to continue paying visits to our suburb, you may have to evacuate 198 and dig yourselves in in the garden with communicating trenches leading from your dug-outs to Croxted Road and Herne Hill.

It is splendid how our fellows keep rolling up to fight, for, believe me, the war is no joke out here. Very few people who have been out think it's all a death-or-glory sort of business. On the contrary, it is a steady and persistent strain, a strain under which the strongest nerves are apt to give way after a time--I am talking, of course, of the trenches. When the cavalry go into action as cavalry, they are bound to suffer fearfully, being so exposed, but there's no doubt that they will do their job, and put a still greater number of the Boches out of action. This is a war in which there is nothing picturesque or romantic. It takes all the cheerfulness of the British Tommy to overmaster the grinding strain of trench warfare, though as man is by nature a fighter, he presently begins to throw off the trammels of civilisation and live _a la naturelle_. The British soldier has done marvels in this war. Nothing but his irrepressible spirits and lion-hearted courage would have held up this great host of Boches armed with new and strange implements of war and with every weapon known to science.

_September 18th, 1915._

In an interval of relaxation, our division gave a Horse Show to-day. To these cavalrymen, horses are as meat and drink, almost the one topic of their conversation, at once their delight and their business. A lot of notabilities from various places in France came up to see the Show. It was the most magnificent display of horseflesh I have ever seen. It was held in a large open field. The programme included compet.i.tions for officers' and troopers' horses (light and heavy), driving for the limbers of the regiment, work by machine-gun sections, races, jumping, turn-out of A.S.C. wagons, and what-not. A wonderful display was that of the officers' chargers, in which the long line of compet.i.tors rode, trotted and galloped past the General who was judging. Some of the men's horses were also very good, and really ran the officers' chargers close for merit. The first three prize-winners would be worth a clear 450 apiece. To describe the efficiency of the wagon-driving, the smartness of their turn-out, the quickness and neatness of all their manoeuvres, is beyond me.

There was no lance or sword play. The whole business had been arranged to see that everything was as efficient as possible, and to promote a spirit of healthy rivalry among the different regiments. It was an extraordinary spectacle, not fifteen miles from the firing-line, with the big guns booming in one's ears the whole time--very characteristic of the Englishman's love of sport and its value to the nation. This is one of the things that the Boches never can, or will be able to, understand. They cannot realise how these "mad English" can forget the War when in the middle of it, and when any minute their "sport" might be interrupted by a "Jack Johnson." I was with our Brigade Veterinary Officer, who, of course, is an equine expert. It was a treat to hear him telling off the points of the magnificent chargers pa.s.sing in front of us, pawing the ground and snorting, full of dash and fire. To me the whole affair had a profound interest. I have never enjoyed myself more, and really its psychological significance was immense.

On the morning of 25th September, 1915, the 1st and 4th Corps of the British Army delivered an attack on the enemy line between La Ba.s.see Ca.n.a.l on the north and a point opposite the village of Grenay on the south. There were subsidiary simultaneous attacks east of Ypres by the 5th Corps, and north of the La Ba.s.see Ca.n.a.l by the 3rd and the Indian Corps. Our main attack was made in co-operation with the French offensive on our right. The British Cavalry Corps was posted in the neighbourhood of St. Pol and Bailleul-les-Pernes, in readiness to co-operate with the French Cavalry in pus.h.i.+ng home any success which might be attained by the combined offensive.

_September 23rd, 1915._

I am about to leave on an official mission, the nature of which I cannot disclose to you for the time being. My kit has had to be sent away, and I am only equipped with things I can carry about me or in my saddle-wallets on the horses. Revolver, haversack, official books, map-case and respirator are slung about my body.

It is fine to be independent of trunks. Last night I bivouacked in a field, and one day I was quartered in a mining village which before the war must have been a busy place. It reminded me very much of the outskirts of Llanelly. I am feeling better in health and spirits than ever before.

An article by a Liberal M.P. that appeared recently in the _Daily Chronicle_ annoyed me very much. Previously I had imagined the writer to be rather a sportsman and a game fighter; but his insulting references in this article to the "good fellows" in the trenches, who are "excellent in their time and place," etc., simply set my teeth on edge. I know full well that the type of thing that he calls "a voice from the trenches" is only an exploitation of sensational newspapers, as Tommy never by any chance in my experience of him talks of subjects like conscription. But the sheer cruelty of this M.P.'s patronising talk of the men who are dying by thousands to keep him and his kind safe at home absolutely surpa.s.ses everything. The suggestion that the man at the Front knows less of how to run wars than M.P.s who have, in all probability, never seen a drop of blood shed or a gun fired in anger in their lives, is, on the face of it, ludicrous. We have heard a lot about the Army not interfering in politics. Well and good; but let the politicians cease to meddle with military affairs, unless, of course, it is manifest that the most sacred civil rights of the people are being sacrificed to a caucus of officers, like those who tried to hold up the Home Rule Bill.

To-day a big detachment of German prisoners was brought into the village. They were well dressed and equipped, and in reasonably good spirits.

_October 3rd, 1915._

Life continues to use me well, though in the last week or two I have been all-ends up with work. I have usually managed to keep fairly dry, but the weather is awful, and despite mackintoshes and greatcoats galore, I have been absolutely soaked on more than one occasion, especially one night about four days back, when I had to sleep in the open on a heath in pouring rain, and with a bitter wind blowing. However, one thinks but little of that sort of thing when campaigning, and I have never been better in health.

I wish I could describe to you some of the scenes I witnessed during the past week, above all, on that never-to-be-forgotten day before the great attack was made. We found ourselves moving along the same road as the Guards--Grenadiers, Scots, and Welsh--who were going up to the attack (the Welsh Guards had never been in action before, having only recently been const.i.tuted, but I hear they did great things). Never had I seen such a sight as that evening before the attack. On one side of the road our cavalry, on the other the Guardsmen, all moving forward to the accompaniment of the sound of guns booming sullenly ahead. We halted for a time beside a detachment of Life Guards, among whom I recognised an old Alleynian named Kemp, whom I had not seen since last October. We had a few minutes' pleasant conversation before pa.s.sing on with our respective columns.

A day or two ago I was to have gone right up to the battlefield with supplies, but a sudden change in orders made it impossible.

However, a number of our lot were up there. They tell me it was a fearful scene--the ground littered with corpses, and all the debris of a battlefield scattered around. I was bitterly disappointed at not getting right up, but duty is duty, and I had orders to do other things. We all hope that the day of the great move forward has now begun to dawn, but there's no doubt it will be a devil of a job, as the Boches are fighting like h.e.l.l to regain the lost ground. All yesterday, last night and this morning the guns have been rumbling away with more than usual vigour.

One day last week I visited a soldiers' cemetery; it was chiefly used for men who have died of wounds at a casualty clearing station near by. A most mournful and yet most impressive spectacle it was. As I returned I saw long strings of ambulances coming down from the Front--a sight that spoke eloquently of the toll that this war is taking of our best. I note you say that the new Welsh Division will be going out presently, either to France or to the Dardanelles. I hope that they will prove worthy of the great name that the Welsh have made for themselves in this war.

Yesterday I chatted with a Welshman from Pontypridd, a Regular in the First South Wales Borderers. He had been out here right from the very start, had been twice wounded, and, except for one convalescent period of a fortnight, had had no leave at all.

Chris Fowkes, who was wounded some time back, was in the same company as this st.u.r.dy Welshman.[1]

[Footnote 1: Fowkes was a contemporary of Paul's at Dulwich.]

_October 6th, 1915._

The general impression here now is that the advance is proving a very tough proposition. The casualty list is of colossal dimensions. All the signs point to a long war.

A French interpreter is attached to each battalion of British infantry, or regiment of cavalry, with a liaison officer, or interpreter officer, attached to each brigade in addition.

Personally, I have never found any need for an interpreter's services. I am able to make almost any of my requirements comprehensible to the inhabitants, and I think I may describe myself as being really fluent in French by this time. It is perfectly amazing how few of our people can talk any other language than their own.

That was a piquant incident at the College as described by Hal. A little dash of unconventionality like that is wanted in Dulwich and in all Public Schools. They, like other national inst.i.tutions, are terribly p.r.o.ne to get into a groove. Though that groove be a good one, yet an occasional lift out of it can do no harm. But there's no doubt about it that, conservative though they may be, our Public Schools have done marvellously in this war. The system has proved its value ten thousand times over, and never so much as on these gory plains of Flanders and the hilly crags of Gallipoli. Of late the officer casualties have been fearful, and most of them these days seem to be killed, not wounded.

So Bulgaria seems determined to come in against us. If this means that Roumania and Greece join us, I don't see why the Germans should be so keen on enlisting the Bulgars on their side. Funny, isn't it, how all Europe is falling into the whirlpool of war?

Every one of the little States finds that the war is a chance for it to get something out of someone else--hence its decision to join in. I hope our Government won't go sending big forces out to Albania or Salonika, or such places, unless and until they are sure it would be to England's benefit. For the life of me, I can't see why we should carry these footling little nations on our shoulders. All they do is to turn on you as soon as your back is turned, as _vide_ the Bulgars themselves. The end of it all is that everyone is sc.r.a.pping against someone else for some selfish aim, and the main object and high ideals for which we entered the war are wholly forgotten.

I cannot describe to you the muddy conditions out here. Mud lies inches thick on the roads, and is kept damp and slimy by the continual pa.s.sage of limbers, horses, guns, wagons and lorries--the final result being a veritable swamp. The other day a man of the 19th Hussars was watering two horses when he got himself and the two animals hopelessly bogged beside the pond in a swamp which he mistook for dry ground. Eventually we tugged him and the two horses out with ropes. They were all soaked with slime and mud from head to foot. As for the infantrymen, when they come out of the trenches, they are caked in mud all over. In these parts mud is the great feature of the war.

_October 11th, 1915._

I continue to be very busy. You must understand that it is my job to supplement the ordinary supplies that come up on the Supply Column from the railway with supplies obtained locally. These latter are frequently as essential as the former. Especially is this the case with cavalry, who are naturally apt, when moving, to get separated from their supplies, owing to the rapidity of their progress. Then comes the Requisitioning Officer's real task. That is not to say that this is the only case in which he has to work. On the contrary, the work is absolutely continuous.

The men always want all sorts of things that the Supply Column does not provide, and it is up to me to get those things, and what is more, in most cases, to transport them also. I am in charge of a number of wagons, limbers, etc., to carry out this latter job, and I am responsible for the care and transport of the ordinary supplies for our Brigade Headquarters after they leave the Supply Column. I have also to do the following jobs: (1) Distribute pay to the large number of A.S.C. men attached to Headquarters; (2) when we are in billets, to see to the billeting arrangements for the brigade, and adjust the relations between the troops and whatever inhabitants there may be.

You must not imagine that there are no inhabitants in these districts. On the contrary, it is my experience that people cling to their homes and lead their ordinary lives right up into the fire zone. Our authorities take the greatest care not to offend the inhabitants. Let me give you an ill.u.s.tration. Recently we were at a small village, now quite blown to atoms, and considered a hot spot even out here, and which really has no inhabitants.

Well, on the occasion of entrenching operations our chaps found it necessary to take some doors from ruined houses. They wanted the timber for planks for trench supports and dug-outs. Though all the inhabitants had fled or been killed long before, and the village was little better than a dust-heap, yet a solemn and portentous court of inquiry was held on those doors: were we justified in taking them, and should payment be made for them to the old inhabitants or their representatives? Eventually it was decided that, as the doors were taken to help to make trenches, they might be considered as destroyed by a _fait de guerre_, which, I believe, corresponds to an "act of G.o.d" in the civil courts, and payment ought not therefore to be made for the doors.

It was, however, pointed out that if the said doors had been used to make a road, not a trench, they would not be _faits de guerre_, and in such case payment would have had to be made to the Mayor of the destroyed commune!

"Business as usual" is the motto they try to live up to throughout these parts, and every effort is made to persuade people that the war is only a sort of accident. Money remains money, and there are people selling and buying right up to places where many lives are lost every day. The position is really almost that described in a _Bystander_ cartoon, depicting a peasant standing above a line of our trenches amid a h.e.l.l of shot and bursting shrapnel, and saying, "Messieurs, I am desolated to trouble you, but I must request you to fight in my other field, as I plough this one to-day." By the way, _The Bystander_ has succeeded, as no other paper save perhaps _Punch_ has done, in catching the atmosphere that exists out here.

I a.s.sure you that just behind the firing-line people are minting money out of our occupation. Not only do they get paid regularly if British troops are billeted on them, but they can name their own prices for milk, beer, eggs, etc., and all those other things that Tommy is anxious for, and for which he can afford to pay. He is, I think, paid three times as much as either the French or the Boche soldiers. True, I have met some pitiful cases of refugeeism, but to a very large number of people in Northern France the war is nothing but somewhat of a nuisance. Of course, where they do feel it is in their own terrible casualty lists. I have known family after family in the little villages who have lost one or two sons. In many communes one finds that the Mayor has been killed while serving at the front, and a deputy acts in his stead. The Mayor of the place where we are now stationed has three sons fighting, one at Verdun. I had an agreeable chat a few days back with the local schoolmaster, who was home on short leave from the trenches.

It is curious that only _The Bystander_ and _Punch_ should have succeeded in catching the atmosphere of "Somewhere in France."

Many of the war correspondents, brilliantly though they write, have missed it altogether. John Buchan is not so bad, when he writes soberly, but he will let his imagination run away with him. Talking of writers, what a delightful thing was that article of Zangwill's in the _Daily Chronicle_ on "The Perils of Walking in War-time"! Its brilliant satire, firm grasp of facts, lively humour and racy style quite took my fancy.

I have had some interesting chats with some of the old soldiers in our division about Mons, the Marne and the Aisne, and all "those brave days of old." One chap, now acting as a clerk at Headquarters, wears the ribbons of the D.C.M. and French Medaille Militaire for swimming a river (on the retreat from Mons) amid a tempest of shot and sh.e.l.l, and giving warning to a party of our people on the other side who were in the greatest danger of being surrounded--and quite oblivious of the fact--by the Boches who had forced the pa.s.sage of a bridge some way off. This brave fellow led his menaced comrades to another bridge, and so enabled them all to get clear.

The Supply Officer of one of our brigades is F. P. Knox, a Dulwich man, who captained the old school at cricket back in 1895 or so and I believe led Oxford to victory after that. His brother you may know--N. A. Knox, the famous fast bowler.

I was horrified to see in a recent casualty list among the killed the name of Second Lieutenant H. O. Beer. I remember him as a rather clever, quiet, inoffensive, distinctly popular fellow in Doulton's House. He left at the end of July, 1914, without getting any colours, but after doing quite well in all games. He won a Junior Scholars.h.i.+p, but failed to get a Senior. He was made a School Prefect in September, 1913, and you will see him in the very middle of the back row of the photo of the Prefects that we have--a markedly good-looking fellow, with light hair brushed across his forehead. What a wealth of tragedy and yet also of honour is expressed in the last line of his obituary notice in _The Times_--"He fell leading his platoon, aged twenty years."

Only yesterday, as it were, we were at school together--I remember handing him off with great vigour on the football field--and now! It was just the same with poor Reynolds[2] and Bray.[3] But I mustn't go on in this strain.

[Footnote 2: James Reynolds, head of the Modern Side for two years. The first Dulwich boy to take the London B.A. degree while still at school. Born, 1893. Killed in action in Belgium, May 2nd, 1915, while serving with the London Rifle Brigade.]

[Footnote 3: Frederick W. Bray, only son of Mr. W. Bray, West Norwood. One of the keenest members of the O.A.F.C. Quitting his engineering studies, he joined the 1st Surrey Rifles at the outbreak of war. Born, August 26th, 1895. Killed, May 25th, 1915.]

_October 15th, 1915._

The Balkan business is a startling knockout for those enthusiasts who see in the development of small States salvation for the world! If people would only accept the fact that this is a material world they would not be surprised at the situation.

Myself, I consider that our diplomacy has failed, probably because it did not offer tempting enough bribes to Bulgaria and Greece. No matter; what is the fate of a few tuppenny-ha'penny Balkan States, who have never done a thing worth doing, beside that of the British Empire! Why should we always play the philanthropic idiot towards all these wretched little nations? As if any of them--or anyone else, for that matter, in international politics--knows the meaning of the word grat.i.tude! However righteous our policy may have been, it doesn't seem to have worked in South-East Europe, and the Boches appear to have got home first there. I don't think it is so much a triumph for their diplomacy as a judgment on the blundering stupidity of ours. But when all's said and done, the alliance or hostility of a few Bulgars, Greeks or Roumanians doesn't count for so much, anyhow.

"Come the three corners of the world in arms, and we shall shock them. Naught shall make us rue, if England to herself do rest but true."

Have you seen the obituary notices of Captain Osmond Williams,[4]

of the Welsh Guards? His funeral took place not half a mile from the spot where we were at the time. The 19th Hussars was once his old regiment, and as he was simply idolised by the men, crowds of them went to the burial. He had a most romantic career--a career that might have stepped out of the pages of Scott or Dumas.

[Footnote 4: Son of Sir Osmond Williams, Bart., formerly M.P.

for Montgomerys.h.i.+re. Served in the South African War, and in his day was regarded as the most brilliant cavalry subaltern in the British Army. A severe accident in the hunting-field compelled him to leave the Army. When war broke out in 1914 he offered his services to the War Office, but was rejected because physically unfit. He then enlisted as a private soldier, and by repeated acts of gallantry in the field won his captaincy.]