by Ludwig Renn
“Is there also a medical aid station over there, Herr Leutnant?” asked the medical NCO.
“That we’ll find out when we get there.—Esche, have you reported the situation with the kitchens to battalion?”
“Yes, Herr Leutnant. Battalion wants to leave the kitchens in Chailly and let them know by telephone where they should come.”
“Are those who are to receive bandages here?” called the medical NCO.
“Here, first squad, first platoon! I called.
“How many men are you?”
“Nine men, Sergeant!”
“Here, take the iron portions[b] for your platoon with you!” broke in Esche.
“I don’t have anything to carry them with.”
“You were all told to bring groundsheets with you!”
They pushed and yelled in confusion all around me.
I returned to the squad. The twilight crept into the corners of the trench. A rat scurried over the piles of garbage.
After an hour the company arrived from the rear and occupied our position. We moved out to the right. We shoved along in the trench one behind the other. At one place a red light blinked out from a dugout on the left. Then it was black with almost nothing to see but the trench walls against the sky.
Then we climbed out on the front of the trench. We crossed a beet field, slipping on the beets with the hobnails in our boots. Suddenly there was a stench. On the left were two dead oxen, which appeared to be oversize. Maybe they were very bloated.
There was a rifle shot from our right flank, quite close, which echoed for an inordinate amount of time.
We wheeled to the left and made a wide curve to the right. Suddenly I heard voices, but as if they were coming out of the ground. I looked sharply in that direction and made out something white and wide. We were swinging into a chalk quarry. People were walking here and there. Flashlights flashed on.
“Where should we put the digging tools?”
“Where is the medical aid dug out?”
“Be quiet! We are only two hundred meters from the French! Turn your flashlights off!” whispered someone.
Our platoon leader came up close to me. What does he want?
“You are to come to the lieutenant. He is up there.” He pointed toward the quarry rim.
I forced myself through the people. There was a booth built on the stone wall. Next to that ladders led to a narrow landing on which a number of officers were standing.
“Gefreiter Renn reporting, sir!” I said quietly. “Today you are my third runner. Go to the platoons! They should position themselves close to this wall!”
It had become quieter in the quarry.
As I came back to Fabian, there stood the major, our battalion commander, who quietly gave directions: “—And when the rifle platoons of the other three companies have taken the redoubt I will pull your company forward. A new firing line against the French will have to be immediately set up. That’s what these steel sheets in the quarry are for. Then the redoubt will have to be tied in to our trench system.”
He whispered all that in a hard tone of cool deliberation. I had never heard orders given like that before. But that was the correct way to do it.
There was nothing to see ahead of us but a slightly rising meadow.
“It is now time,” whispered the major.
A shiver overcame me.
To the left I heard the soft clanking of entrenching tools. They were moving forward.
From far to the rear: Wham! Howitzers firing. The barrage came slowly across the sky. Bam! Bam! Bam!
Bam! It came very closely over us and landed ahead of us.
The heavy shell arched down, wheee, growing louder. Wham! It landed.
From behind: dull reports. It boomed, whined, and zoomed wildly from different directions and landed irregularly ahead of us in the ground.
No more barrages. What’s coming now?
The last shells struck.
“A bad job by the artillery,” grumbled the major. They should be firing without pause further to the rear.
Ahead there was a rifle shot, two, three. Then it crackled and whined. I ducked. But the major stood unmoving. I stood up.
The bullets hissed around us. Very isolated shells came in. I stared into the darkness.
If the first attack failed would we be thrown in? From the front several people came running, “Help, medics!”
“What’s the situation up front?” asked the major coldly.
“Oh, they’re positioned there. The digging tools were clanking. There were a couple of shots from over there and they threw themselves down and began shooting again!”
The major moved his mouth as if he was chewing. It hissed and popped. “I have to have a couple of people to go forward!”
From ahead came more people.
“Medics!” Fabian called into the quarry. “Who will volunteer to go on a patrol?”
“Here!” came an excited call. It was Kaiser. He came running up the steps with another volunteer.
A fresh voice called from the left: “Medics!”
“Over here!” called some of the people from the quarry.
“Come forward with litters!” he called.
“Which company are you from?” asked the major. The man came up close and suddenly stood at attention. He was small and already older. “The fourth, Herr Major.”
“What’s the situation with them?”
“Heavy losses! We didn’t reach the objective!” There was the rattle of shots.
“Good, you can go!—Volunteers! You go forward in this direction! I want to know what the second company accomplished!”
They climbed out and ran into the darkness. I was very afraid for them.
“Herr Major!” someone called from the quarry. “The colonel wants a report whether the attack was successful.”
“Why always that question? I’ll report when the time comes!”
It had become somewhat lighter. But you still couldn’t see anything any better. The rattling of rifle fire stopped. I wondered that it didn’t bother me anymore.
Two men came running from the front and stood at attention above the major.
“We didn’t meet up with the second company, Herr Major!” reported Kaiser, completely out of breath.
“Come on down here! It’s senseless to expose yourselves unnecessarily to the fire!”
They climbed unaided onto the landing. Then Kaiser stood at attention again. “The first company took fire first. Lieutenant Albert is said to be dead.”
Someone came from the right. “Report from the second company: the company walked into the fire of the fourth and has pulled back to their starting point.”
“The company is to wait there for further orders!—The attack has failed!” He turned bitterly to Fabian.
“If the brigade commander wishes another attack, let him take another battalion!—If all our people were like these war volunteers, then we would now be sitting in the redoubt!”
We climbed down into the quarry. Wounded were brought in on litters. They were bandaging in the wood stall. A doctor and a medical NCO came outside with a lantern. They shined it on one man, who had inkwell-size wounds through his legs.
“Aren’t those shrapnel wounds?” asked Fabian. “I have not heard any artillery firing.”
“No, that is from a dum dum round.”
“Are the French really shooting with that?”
“You see it. It’s bestiality!” said the doctor and went reluctantly on. The man with the leg wounds was already dead.
Lying on the ground were spades, bloody jackets, shreds of shirts, bread pouches, rifles.
The shooting had stopped. We moved back to our position. Kaiser stayed close to me, but didn’t utter a word.
The dawn came slowly. Kaiser looked pale and dirty. However, his eyes were oddly bright.
VII
The company had fallen in on the road to Chailly.
“Attention!” commanded the compan
y sergeant.
Fabian came and positioned himself in front. He had a paper in his hand.
“In the name of his majesty, the Kaiser, the commanding general has awarded the Iron Cross second class to the following: Vice Sergeant Heller, Corporals Renn, Ziesche, Marx, Seidel.—I heartily congratulate you!—At ease!”
He came to me, opened a small, blue packet, and pulled the black and white ribbon with the cross on it through the second button hole. “You will have to fasten it with a needle.—Are you happy?” He shook my hand.
I was embarrassed because everyone was looking at me.
I wore the cross the whole day long. The sun shone on the muddy street. Everyone I met appeared to look at me. I couldn’t get over the feeling of going red.
I didn’t dare to openly examine the cross closer. Therefore, in the afternoon I went outside of the area. I liked the silver edge very much. I would have liked to have a mirror there.
That night I packed up the cross so it wouldn’t become dull and only left the ribbon in my button hole.
VIII
I strolled as a corporal on trench duty between the hard frozen chalk walls. At his position, an alarm sentry stamped with his coat collar turned up. A little further on someone in front of a dugout was swinging a mess kit, which had holes punched in it through which glowing charcoal shone. Then he went inside and hung the heater on the ceiling. Inside they were eating breakfast.
I curved into the latrine entrance. Ziesche was sitting bent over the rail and was reading the newspaper.
“Hey,” he said. “We’re building a tower.” He pointed in the ditch. “You have to help too. But you have to aim good so that it falls in the right place and freezes on top. The second squad already has a higher tower than us. We don’t intend to do a shabby job!”
I went back into the main passage and then into the next trench forward toward the most forward position. It was newly finished and therefore still looked fairly neat. There were only a few guards there.
A piece of paper lay on the ground. I picked it up and threw it out of the trench.
Seidel was standing on a platform, his rifle beside him, and looked attentively at the armrest board ahead of him. He had a stalk of straw in his right hand with which he now and then touched something that must be on the board. I approached him slowly.
“Just what are you doing there?”
He started. Then he laughed. “Come on up!”
His watch lay next to him.
“I caught a fat louse and want to see how far he can move in ten minutes. But the wretch won’t walk in a straight line. I have to keep bringing him back in the right direction.”
At the next fork in the trench someone was busy setting up a sign that read,
RIGHT BOUNDARY R 2b
Sssch–wham! A shell.
I climbed onto a platform. To the left floated a brown cloud. It must have landed by our second platoon.
I went to the rear to the main position. The medical NCO came running with two stretcher bearers behind him.
“What’s the matter?”
“Someone in the second platoon is wounded.”
I looked after them. How quickly they were on the scene.
Our colonel came along the trench, behind him the battalion commander, lieutenant Fabian, and the battalion adjutant.
I reported to him. “As corporal of trench duty, first platoon, third company!”
“Do you not have a signaling whistle?”
I pulled it out of my coat pocket.
“Those on duty should carry the whistle openly hanging around the neck!” said the colonel to Fabian.
He put his hand to his cap. “By your order, Herr Oberst!”
“I’m missing the trench signs in your area!” said the colonel. “For example, where does this way lead?”
“To the first platoon latrine, colonel!”
“Have you got chlorine powder there for disinfecting?”
Fabian looked at me questioningly.
I nodded with my eyelids.
“Yes, Herr Oberst,” said Fabian and smiled secretly at something.
IX
The winter slipped by. I made a couple of patrols and brought back pieces of the French barbed wire as booty. A couple of times there were fire fights. I managed the library. In the meantime I felt empty and got drunk often.
Ziesche and Seidel played cards. I could have participated, but had no understanding of how anyone could take the game seriously. Therefore no one wanted to play with me, which in the long run didn’t bother me.
Kaiser distanced himself more and more from the others. He suffered under the futility of trench warfare. I understood well how he had enthusiastically come into the field. And I understood how it was an excruciating effort for him to retain his enthusiasm when he had to carry train rails with his weak arms for building dugouts. For months now he had to stand watch in posts where he couldn’t even see the French trenches. But I couldn’t help him. If I ever had enthusiasm for the war, as when we had crossed the Maas, it had quickly faded and I had longed for other feelings.
One day we were inoculated against typhus. We had a liquid injected under the skin. The medics told us that toward evening we would get a fever. I became very sick. During the night I was driven by all sorts of weird imaginings that I couldn’t see clearly.
I woke up. The straw rustled. Someone moaned.
“Ludwig,” said Seidel, “I am so thirsty.” I stood up. The spot where I had received the shot yesterday was somewhat sore. Otherwise I felt pretty well.
Seidel lay and appeared tortured around the eyes and so old. I felt his forehead. It was hot. He was very afraid. I could see it in his eyes, which continually followed me.
On this day it was like a hospital in our company. But by the next morning everybody was suddenly all right. The sun was shining outside. Flowers bloomed. Seidel told me, laughing, that he had thought he was dying.
One afternoon I was sitting with the window open in my book room. Outside I heard a couple of words that I didn’t understand, but of a tone to catch my attention.
I saw Kahle, an older married man in our company, in an attitude of begging before the preacher, who took off with a shovel in his hand. What has happened?
Kahle came slinking slowly toward the door. He knocked.
“Come in!”
He came bent over through the door—he was very tall and thin—and came over to me with a smile and held me around the neck. I pushed his arm back: “Would you like to have a book?”
“No,” he smiled at me lovingly, “you!” In addition he pushed his stomach forward.
“Either find yourself a book or get out!”
His bowed knees trembled.
“Get out and decide outside what you want!”
He remained standing, undecided.
I took up my book list as if I had to write something down.
He went bowed to the door. He remained there and looked at me longingly.
I thumbed through pages. He came over again.
“Is there something you still want?”
“You—.” He smiled dejectedly.
“Go!” I said sternly.
He slunk outside. I could hear that he remained standing in front of the door. Then he slowly went away.
The door was flung open and Seidel came in. “Ludwig, have you already heard that Kahle made a homosexual attack on the company sergeant?”
“When? And how do you mean attacked?”
“Early today. The sergeant was at a table writing. Suddenly someone grabbed him from behind and wanted to kiss him.”
“And what did the sergeant do?”
“Well, you know how he is: he sprang up and laughed.—He reported to Fabian that they should take him away, I believe in a hospital for the mentally ill.”
I looked out the window and saw the preacher coming timidly out of the garden as if the enemy was still there.
X
At the beginning of June ou
r battalion was pulled out of the front and we marched some thirty kilometers to the rear to the staging area to get straight again. We had all become accustomed to walking bent over from the continual bending in the low dugouts and in the trenches where a beam lay across here and telephone wires hung there.
The unaccustomed marching in the heat with full packs was very stressful for us. Between living at night, and in dark and damp dugouts, we were exhausted.
We came to a village that had a steep, wide street climbing up from a green valley. At the upper end lay crossways a large, gray house, the castle.
Our platoon came to a wide, low house on the right which had a couple of steps leading up to the door. Inside, an old man with carefully parted white hair met us and invited us with a motion of the hand to come to the rear in the yard, which was paved with wide stones. To the left by the wall stood a bench with a table and chairs. He motioned toward it and led us further into a roomy horse stable with iron hay racks and cribs and posts between the stalls. To the right there was a feed room. That’s where we were to sleep.
“If Kahle were here,” said Seidel, “then he would have to be placed in there so that he couldn’t attack us during the night.”
We ate that evening at the table. In the rear part of the yard was a garden with weeping willows, shrubs, and flowers and a large arbor.
We learned that the old man was the father of the castle owner and that he had raced horses in his younger years. From the street the house looked like the farm houses.
During the coming days we exercised and participated in combat exercises. I felt healthy. The lieutenant laughed when he came to duty early in the morning. Also the platoon and squad leaders were cheerful and the cheerfulness spread through the whole company. During this time we exercised robustly and everyone was totally involved in the combat exercises. Probably because Fabian tried out different battle plans and then discussed the advantages and disadvantages of a particular battle process with everyone.
One warm, clear evening I went walking with Seidel. In the lower village we met vice sergeant Lauenstein and two NCOs. We went along with them by a small, fenced-in garden. The sun went down. Then the willows and poplars became transparent.