In the Russian Ranks Part 8

There was a great deal of bayonet work during this campaign. It is a favourite weapon of the Russians; and proportionately disliked by the Germans. The bayonet of the Russian soldier is never unfixed, except for cleaning purposes. He marches with it, eats, works and sleeps with it always ready for instant action. The German soldier is not so particular; and I saw more dirty weapons amongst our prisoners than I ever thought existed in any army in the world. Wounds from German bayonets are peculiarly fatal, as the backs of them are serrated to enable them to be used as cutting implements. For this reason the soldier often has great difficulty in withdrawing his weapon after stabbing a victim: and we found that in some cases, where the point of the bayonet was forced through the body and embedded in the backbone, it had been unfixed and left sticking in the wound.

As we approached the Prussian frontier the German resistance became sterner, and they made more frequent attempts to rally. As I have said, their retreat never a.s.sumed the character of a rout--very far from it.

Only straggling or isolated parties ever fell into disorder. Their retirement was steady and orderly as far as their military movements were concerned; but in the towns and villages they behaved like beasts.

We had plenty of evidence that nearly all their junior officers, and thousands of their men, never lost an opportunity of getting drunk. The Kaiser was said to be a teetotaler: the Crown Prince was often as drunk as a lord--a German lord; and it is said that when in this condition he beat his wife so badly that she left the palace, and took refuge in the house of a n.o.bleman. The story was told on excellent authority; otherwise I should not run the risk of being thought a gossip-monger by repeating it. I have, myself, seen the man in the company of courtesans; and, apparently, under the influence of drink.

Though the Germans made attempts to beat back our pursuit, and to some extent checked it, they could not altogether stop it; and I think the gradual slackening of our endeavours to beat them quite out of Poland was the outcome of the men's exhaustion.

The country was in a terrible state. The Germans had no time or opportunity to bury many of their dead, and the whole district, for hundreds of miles, was strewn with the bodies of men and horses, sometimes half covered by water, often floating in it. Though the weather was changing, and becoming colder, especially at night-time, portions of the days were hot, close, or muggy. Consequently the corpses soon began to decay, and the whole land stank revoltingly; and the men kept their pipes constantly alight to counteract the offensiveness.

Owing to the state of the ground it was scarcely possible to bury many of these bodies, and they were left to rot away where they lay, or floated. Our own dead were conveyed to the cemeteries and burying-grounds; but the people would not tolerate the desecrating Germans in "G.o.d's acre." Amongst the enemy's dead were some Austrians, showing that the troops of their nation had been engaged in this region.

On the afternoon of the 26th we came to a standstill near the River Warta. The headquarters of the 40th were at a small village the name of which I never clearly heard. Very few people were left in it; but others arrived when they heard that it was in our hands. All those who had most to fear from the enemy (that is, all those who possessed a rouble's worth of property) had been in hiding in the woods, where some of them had been living in underground burrows wherever they could find a spot dry enough to construct them in.

Of the 40th not 800 effectives remained; and as the regiment had commenced the war with a strength of 4,000 men, it will be seen how terribly it had suffered. I heard the band of the regiment for the first time in our bivouac on the 26th. It consisted of twenty-seven musicians: three months previously there had been eighty of them. They had been under fire many times, collecting and a.s.sisting the wounded, the chief work of the bandsmen during fighting. The Russian bands of music, like the Prussian, are much stronger than ours, and are formed on German lines, as far as numbers and instruments are concerned. I cannot give much praise to their style of playing.

[Ill.u.s.tration: RUSSIAN OFFICERS NOTING MOVES OF THE ENEMY]

On the 27th and 28th the enemy appeared to be ma.s.sing on our front, and the regiment was ordered to fall back towards Lodz. We were halted again on the 29th, and joined by the Preobujensky regiment, at nearly full strength, and the Troizki rifle battalion. With them came a battery of eight field guns, which had been got through the marshes in our rear.

It would seem that our regiment, and a body of Cossacks, had been pushed too far to the front, and had to be drawn back. As far as I could understand the position, the Russian troops formed a crescent with the horns at, or near, Radom and Lowicz. Beyond these points the lines continued for hundreds of versts, right and left, but were, more or less, thrown back. It was very difficult to learn the exact position, because the enemy so frequently regained the ground he had lost only a few hours previously. The Russians showed great bravery and considerable dash; but they did not carry things before them quite so rapidly or decisively as they sometimes claimed to have done. In the fighting described in these October days, the Germans got very much the worst of it. I am not sure that it would be safe to say much more than this.

Their losses were heavy, and their retreat beyond a doubt; but it is ridiculous to talk of routs, as some newspapers seem to have done. I did not see these accounts until after my return to England; and I have not read very many of them. I am afraid a good deal of error was fallen into by a too ready acceptance of first accounts.

I would also note that owing to the immense extension of the fronts of the two armies, a victory in one place was often quite independent of operations going on at a distance on either flank, and often led to a dangerous advance, exposing the wings of the victorious force: and I am surprised that neither side seems to have, on any occasion, taken advantage of these too rapid advances and pursuits.

CHAPTER XI

THE RETREAT OF THE GERMANS FROM THE VISTULA

As is usual after severe fighting, a lull supervened; and we remained quiet in camp for some days. "Camp," I say. It was almost the first time since I had been with the Russian Army that I had slept in a tent; but the time was coming when men could no longer spend night after night bivouacked in the open air. Already the weather was becoming chilly, and often very cold after sunset. There was less rain; but it still fell long and steadily at intervals, and sometimes for a whole day without a break.

About 1,900 recruits joined our regiment; and many other units had their terrible losses made good; indeed, I heard that between 600,000 and 700,000 reservists and others joined the armies on the German and Austrian frontiers; and yet they were not brought up to their full establishments; a telling revelation of the fearful losses that had been sustained; although according to Prussian accounts, they had taken nearly a quarter of a million of prisoners from us. I am satisfied that they captured a good many: as we also had done.

November came upon us in a typical way--damp and foggy, so that it was impossible to see the face of the country. As surprises are peculiarly liable to be attempted in such weather, we were much hara.s.sed by outpost work; at least five times the usual number of men being engaged on this duty. Fortunately we had a large body of Cossacks; and these rascals are never surprised; and no kind of experience comes amiss to them, so long as they have a chance of plunder and rapine. That is the truth, and it may as well be told. During the November fogs they caught a good many German patrols, who were attempting to play the game of hide-and-seek; and very few prisoners were made. Many of the Russian troops were becoming fierce-tempered; and none more so than the Cossacks. One of these men displayed a bag full of watches and rings which he had taken from slain Prussian officers. He was reported to have slain more than fifty of the enemy with his own sword and lance; and he was notorious for spearing wounded men as he rode over the battlefield, such crimes, and plundering, not being punished as they are in most armies--the German excepted, where murder and theft are rewarded with iron crosses, and commendation from commanding officers. But these Cossacks are very useful fellows; they fairly frightened our enemies; and in this way probably saved us from a good deal of trouble and loss: and they certainly always hampered the movements of the foe much more than regular cavalry could have done. Probably they sometimes saved us from disaster.

For it leaked out that, in our recent advance to the Warta, we actually had a large force of Germans on our rear: and it is more than likely that the Cossacks had the princ.i.p.al share in driving them back from several impending attacks, of which we knew nothing at the time; and which would probably have ended in our making the acquaintances.h.i.+p of a Prussian prison; or a still narrower place of confinement.

The rain ceased for a time, and both sides continued to entrench themselves, the Germans in front of us being not more than a mile distant, with their advanced posts much closer. They had contrived to get up heavy guns; and there was a good deal of artillery shooting every day, which blew in trenches, destroyed wire-entanglements, and did lots of other damage, but did not kill many men. Sometimes an enormous sh.e.l.l blew a poor fellow to pieces, sometimes wiped out half-a-dozen at once; but I do not think we lost more than a score a day all along the line.

The freaks played by sh.e.l.ls were sometimes extraordinary. One went just over the head of an officer, killed a boy who was standing behind him, went over the head of another man, and then sprang high into the air before exploding. It is as impossible to give a probable explanation of such strange action, as it is to say why a fragment of sh.e.l.l bursting fifty yards away should kill three men, while one exploding right in the midst of a group of twenty gunners should leave them all unscathed. It is the law of chance--if chance has laws.

I should also mention (though I did not learn the circ.u.mstances until some time afterwards) that the Germans had fortified several villages and towns on the left bank of the Vistula, with first, second and third lines of defence; and that the Russians, unable to take these in their general advance, had masked them, and left them on their rear. The garrisons could not have been strong enough to take advantage of this circ.u.mstance; but it does not seem to be so dangerous to leave fortresses behind in these latter days of the strange development of war, as it formerly was.

Having little to do we amused ourselves, and one another, by repeating, and studying, the various rumours and bits of news we heard. Russian newspapers, of course, and a good many German ones, reached our trenches; and a few French publications; but I never saw an English paper of any kind. Those we obtained were generally ill.u.s.trated; but the pictures, as far as they related to the Russian seat of war, were mere inventions; and I am afraid the same remark must be made with regard to the news; though some of the papers had a fairly good notion of the general progress of events. It was when they came to details that their novelists got to work.

The unimpeachable items of news that were of most interest to us were that the Grand Duke Nicolas was directing the operations against Przemysl, and that the fall of that important place was imminent. It seems, however, that the celebrated fortress proved a tougher nut to crack than it was generally thought it would be. Personally, I am of opinion that the Russians went the wrong way to work in invading Austria; and Silesia, not Galicia, should have been their first objective. I need not enter into details, or reasons, here, because I am at variance with most critics on the conduct of the whole war. There are people who would think it presumptuous on my part to presume to think differently from the conductors of the Russian, French and English forces: but I do think differently from them: and whatever the ultimate issues of this gigantic war, the most t.i.tanic the world has seen, I do not hesitate to say that not one of the contending parties has produced a really great General--a Napoleon, or a Moltke. At the moment of writing this paragraph the war has lasted nine months; and during that time it has simply been a game of see-saw, a swaying backwards and forwards, without one decisive, or even very important, action on any side. The war might easily have been ended by this time: if it is allowed to degenerate into a war of trenches it will end when the Germans have spent all their money, and not sooner.

On the 5th November we suddenly received orders to occupy again the line of the Warta. We advanced by forced marches, finding that the Germans had abandoned their trenches during the night; and they were reported by our Cossacks to be drawing off in the direction of Kutno, evidently with the intention of falling back on Thorn, distant about four marches.

The next day we learned that there had been sharp fighting on the Prussian frontier near the often-mentioned town of Kalisz; and that the Russian troops had entered German territory. They were also said to have invaded Prussia in the north, at Virballen; not far from which place I had seen some heavy fighting, as narrated in a previous chapter.

What I subsequently saw and heard led me to entertain some uncertainty as to the extent and actuality of these important claims. I do not know, but I think it is probable, that these actions were little more than Cossack raids. Villages and railway-stations were burnt, and the lines destroyed in places. The results were not permanent, and it seems likely that the Germans gave ground for the time, because they thought it necessary to withdraw at least three corps to put against their French and British opponents.

There must be considerable monotony in describing such a war as this I am treating of. To a great extent land-fighting, like naval encounters, has lost its picturesqueness, and has become little more than a disgusting slaughter. A good deal of the action is similar to the fighting of rats in a ditch. Trench warfare is horrible, with its villainous grenades and bombs, which are quite different from these devices in former days, and are no better than tools in the hands of a butcher. It is useless to argue that a bomb is a bomb, and that it cannot matter whether a man is blown to pieces by one of the ancient, or one of the modern, type. It does matter a good deal--to the survivors, at any rate. The effect of modern sh.e.l.l-fire is h.e.l.lish, its destructiveness is so great, its effects on its victims so awful, compared with anything of the kind that was formerly in vogue. Where one man died formerly from artillery fire, 500 go down now; and nearly all of them are mutilated most horribly.

The advance of the Russians seems to have shown the Germans that they made a mistake in withdrawing troops from their Eastern frontiers. They came rus.h.i.+ng back to Poland from somewhere, either France and Belgium, or the interior of Germany. On the 8th November they were still in great force to the north of the Warta; and our cavalry reported that they were receiving strong reinforcements via Bromberg and Thorn. Afterwards I found that this information was correct in most of its details; but it must be remembered that I laboured in great disadvantage and difficulties, especially in obtaining information from places far distant from the spot where I happened to be at any given time. I frequently applied for permission to go on scouting parties, or to join the Cossacks in their raids; but this was not often given to me, or very willingly conceded on the few occasions when I was successful in obtaining it. I cannot tell why. The very few newspaper correspondents I met with did not seem to have much more liberty of action than I had: and when they learned that I was not a correspondent they gave me but scant aid, if any at all.

I did not come much in contact with the commanding officers of my division, and was unfortunate in the fact that many of those that I became most friendly with were speedily killed, or wounded and sent back. At this time an officer named Martel was in temporary command of the division, Major-General Alexis Sporowsky having been taken prisoner, and his immediate successor killed. General Martel was one of the best officers I served under, and he willingly gave me permission to join a cavalry reconnaissance in force which was made by four dragoon and hussar regiments, and six sotnias of Cossacks.

We proceeded in the direction of Choczi, and met the enemy about sixteen versts west of that town, which is situated on the frontier line. They consisted of two regiments of cuira.s.siers (without their cuira.s.ses) and two of Uhlans. None of these regiments were of the same numerical strength as ours. I put the German force at 1,800 men, and six light guns. The Russians had 3,000, but no guns: and soon after we came into action we discovered that the enemy was covering a battalion of jagers (riflemen): so really they were much the stronger party.

The Cossacks spread themselves out like a fan, a movement which is as old as the force itself, and was used with great effect against the troops of Napoleon Buonaparte in 1812. They then rushed in on the jagers, and, though suffering severely, occupied the attention of those men, while we tackled the dragoons and the guns. The latter did not do so very much execution, but the cuira.s.siers, big, heavy men, broke through our dragoons, who are cla.s.sed as light cavalry. The Germans, however, are not good swordsmen, as I have previously stated, and while they were in some disorder, occasioned by the shock of their first charge, our hussars got amongst them and sabred them right and left in fine style. I can say that the edge of the sword was mostly used, not the point: while the Germans did use the point most, a mistake in cavalry actions, as it often leads to the trooper breaking his weapon, or losing it through being unable to withdraw it after stabbing an enemy; besides, a "point" is easily parried, and is intended to be mostly used against men lying on the ground, or against infantry.

The Uhlans remained in support of the guns, another mistake of theirs: for before they could come to the rescue of the cuira.s.siers our dragoons had rallied, and met them in a charge that badly routed them. They fled right off the field, leaving behind about 200 of their number in killed, wounded and prisoners. The Cossacks were equally successful. They nearly annihilated the jagers, and the six guns fell into our hands. The cuira.s.siers, too, were nearly all destroyed: for on account of their weight they could not escape from our light hors.e.m.e.n; the Cossacks, in particular, showing them no mercy. Man for man the German cavalry are inferior to the Russian troopers, chiefly because they are bad swordsmen, and are lacking of that enterprise and dash which are essential to the making of good troopers.

The guns could not be taken with us, and we were afraid to send them to the rear lest they should be recaptured: so they were destroyed by smas.h.i.+ng the breech-blocks and exploding charges of gun-cotton in the muzzles. The caissons, also, were blown up.

The remnant of the enemy were pursued until our horses were too much exhausted to follow them further, which was not until we had crossed the German border. Those of the jagers who were not destroyed surrendered as prisoners; but most of them afterwards escaped.

Altogether this was a brilliant affair. It cost the enemy more than 1,000 men; with a loss on our side of between 300 and 400. We lost 150 horses, but we captured 400 of those of the enemy, without counting the artillery draught teams. We rode some distance into Germany, giving the people a cruel lesson in war in retaliation of the wickedness of their own fiendish troops. I was sorry for them: but really I do not see how the sin of warfare is to be stamped out, unless we make it so dreadful that the people of a land will no longer tolerate it--the policy, I believe, of one of their own hard-hearted statesmen: and I imagine the people of East Prussia will not be anxious to see the Cossacks again.

They came upon the miserable people fresh from sights they ought never to have seen, and fierce with an anger that ought not to have been provoked. Those that sow the wind reap the whirlwind.

On the 9th and 10th we were in contact with a weak force of the enemy's infantry, supported by two or three batteries and some remnants of cavalry regiments. The batteries had been a good deal knocked about, and had not their full complement of guns, unless two batteries were split up into three, for the purpose of deceiving us. As they did not fire we guessed they had no ammunition left. Skirmis.h.i.+ng went on, but was productive of no material results. Some prisoners who fell into our hands were without boots, and had been marching with bare feet: the uniforms of others were very ragged. But on the 11th we were opposed by fresh troops, well clothed, and evidently well fed; and it became clear that reinforcements were arriving with food and supplies. Such a force of artillery opened fire on us that we were compelled to fall back rather hastily, and we took advantage of the smoke of some burning houses to cover our retreat. As we pa.s.sed near these houses some civilians shot at us with fowling-pieces from the windows of a large building, and blinded a Cossack. His comrades dismounted, stormed the house, and hanged the men to telegraph-posts. There was a painful scene when their women interfered to prevent the execution; and one man fought desperately for his life; while the screaming of children added to the horror of the surroundings. Only the men were punished: it was one of the dreadful, but necessary, acts of war. No troops in the world would tolerate to be fired on under such circ.u.mstances. The Cossack died a lingering death.

We drew out of range of the infantry with slight loss; some of our men, who had their horses killed, running by the side of their comrades, and occasionally, in moments of great danger, riding behind them; but most of these men were ultimately taken prisoners. Two squadrons of the enemy's hussars had the temerity to charge our rear-guard. The Cossacks made sad work of them; especially as they thought they could not be burdened with prisoners during their retreat. Some three or four of these hussars and their horses were knocked over by a sh.e.l.l from one of their own guns--I presume accidentally.

When we had got out of range of gun and rifle we retired more slowly, meeting hundreds of people fleeing towards the interior of the country, evidently in fear of a general invasion by the Russians. They were driving all sorts of conveyances, from motors to dog-carts: the latter kind of vehicle, illegal in England, being very common in Russia and Germany; and, I think, in all Continental countries. These people were carrying what goods they thought they could save; but some of them got overhauled by the Cossacks, and would have done better to have remained at home, where, generally, they were not much interfered with.

Before we got back to the Warta we were joined by some more Cossacks, and other cavalry, who had been reconnoitring in the direction of Poweedtz and Piotrikow: and I may here say generally that I obtained pretty clear information that the Russians nowhere penetrated German territory more than from ten to twenty, or at most twenty-five, versts.

Sorry I am that I cannot make a better report. I saw clearly enough that a revulsion, if not a reverse, was impending. Where the enemy's troops came from I cannot always certainly tell; but come they did. Probably a strong contingent was sent from Belgium and North-West France; and still more probably the bulk of the reinforcements were newly embodied troops.

It must be remembered that nearly every man in Germany is a well-trained soldier; therefore it is easy to raise new armies from the civilian element.

Unfortunately, at this interesting moment I was put out of action for a month. On the morning of the 16th November I was struck in the back by a piece of sh.e.l.l fired at our position on the Warta, and was sent into hospital at Warsaw. I was much vexed at the accident; but as I could not stand, a temporary absence from the front was inevitable.

At the time I was incapacitated the Germans had at least partially reoccupied the country west of the Warta, though not, perhaps, in force.

We were not there in any great numbers ourselves, and kept a position further to the north than formerly. Both sides were again entrenching themselves.

My life in the hospital was a very monotonous one, as I could not maintain a conversation with anybody. About 300 badly wounded men lay in a building which seemed to have been a school, or public inst.i.tution.

There were only three or four doctors and about twenty attendants to look after this lot, and the nurses seemed to be nuns. They were most kind and attentive, but too few in number, as nearly all the cases were those of desperately injured men, an average of nine or ten dying every day. Their beds were immediately occupied by fresh arrivals, probably brought from temporary resting-places. The sights and sounds were of the most depressing description, especially when relatives or friends were present to receive the last sighs of expiring men.

My servant Chouraski was not with me when I was struck down, and possibly did not know what had become of me, or whether I was killed or taken prisoner. I was not taken back to my billet, eight versts from the spot where I was hurt, but was sent on at once to Warsaw in an ambulance. I never saw Chouraski again, or heard what had become of him: indeed, I met very few old friends when I returned to the front.

Semi-starvation, and a strenuous life in the open air, are good preparations for hard knocks. No bones being broken, nor other serious hurts incurred, my wounds healed rapidly; and in three weeks I could get up and lend a hand to less fortunate comrades. By this time I could speak a few words of Russian, sufficient to make my wants known; and the medical men spoke French. The nuns, however, did not seem to be so well educated as their cla.s.s usually is in other countries.

However, I could make it understood that I wished to be discharged at the earliest possible moment, and in spite of the persuasions of the doctors, I left on the 18th December, having obtained a permit from the commandant to return to the front. I was still rather weak, and was disappointed in my endeavours to obtain a horse; but had very little money left. In the first instance I went, with twenty other recovered wounded, belonging to a dozen different corps, to Lovicz, there to await orders.

CHAPTER XII