Tommy's Ark: Soldiers and Their Animals in the Great War. Richard Van Emden

by Richard van Emden

  Ahead, the leading troops were brought up by agricultural barbed wire strung across the line of advance, so that horses were beginning to be pulled up when I heard for the one and only time in the war a bugle sounding ‘troops right wheel’. I pulled my horse round, then with a crash down she went.

  I hit the ground at full tilt and with my sword still firmly attached by a lanyard to my hand, was lucky not to impale myself. Dazed, I struggled to my feet and can now recall only an odd assortment of fleeting thoughts and sights – a single image of chaos. A riderless horse came careering in my direction and, collecting myself, I raised my hand in the air and shouted ‘Halt!’ at the top of my voice. It was a 9th Lancers’ horse, a shoeing smith’s mount and wonderfully trained, for despite the pandemonium, it stopped on a sixpence.

  Running through the field to my right was a single-track railway, and mounting, I rode off in that direction.

  Cpl William Hardy, 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards

  We galloped right across the enemy’s firing line, absolutely galloping to death. The noise of the firing was deafening, being mingled with the death shouts and screams of men. Corporal Murphy, riding by my side, was shot through the chest and I had to take him out of the saddle and undress and tie him down to dress his wound. Men were shaking hands with each other, thankful they were still alive.

  Tracking all night. It was sickening to see the wounded horses that were trying to follow us, but the majority were shot.

  In this magnificent but desperate charge, the three regiments had been broken up by enemy fire, leaving small groups of surviving cavalrymen to make their own way from the carnage in the hope of finding their units later that day. The charge delayed the Germans, many of whom were terrified by the spectacle, and it was not until several hours later that the enemy pressed forward, during which time many of the British infantrymen had slipped away. One of those who saw the aftermath of the charge was a young private, John Lucy.

  Pte John Lucy, 2nd Royal Irish Rgt

  These mounted men were only six in number, and they led in other horses beside their own. On approaching them, I was surprised to learn that they had been in action, and were all wounded, slight wounds, bullets through arms and muscles, and that kind of thing. They were hussars. We were full of admiration for these heroes. They told us that some of their regiment had been killed, hence the led horses, and we looked on them and the riderless horses with increased respect. There is something poignant in a riderless horse coming out of battle. For the moment we thought them even greater beings than the cavalrymen. The mildness in their eyes and the grace of their bodies as they pawed the ground warmed us towards them. We patted their sleek necks.

  The retreat from Mons would cause the horses as well as the men an immense amount of suffering. For the civilians, the German advance was nothing short of catastrophic. As the British regiments retreated, the soldiers became caught up in a huge civilian exodus, people abandoning everything but what they could carry.

  Capt. Arthur Osburn, Medical Officer attd. 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards

  The refugees were driving their cattle, sheep, pigs, geese and poultry and bringing, in every kind and form of vehicle, all they possessed from their babies in arms to their grandfather clocks. Tired old women with their aprons full of ornaments and silver forks gesticulated and wept and fainted. There were men carrying mattresses and women dragging children. Cart-horses and bullocks, hay-carts, dog-carts, wagonettes and decrepit and reluctant motor cars were all jammed together in the most extraordinary confusion.

  2/Lt Arnold Gyde, 2nd South Staffordshire Rgt

  How miserable they were, these helpless, hopeless people, trailing sadly along the road, the majority with all they had saved from the wreckage of their homes tied in a sheet, and carried on their backs. Some were leading a cow, others riding a horse, a few were in oxen-driven wagons. They looked as if they had lost faith in everything, even in God. They had the air of people calmly trying to realise the magnitude of the calamity which had befallen them.

  Cpl William Watson, RE, 5th Div.

  We found the company encamped in a schoolhouse, our fat signal sergeant doing dominie at the desk. I made him a comfortable sleeping-place with straw, then went out on the road to watch the refugees pass. I don’t know what it was. It may have been the bright and clear evening glow, but – you will laugh – the refugees seemed to me absurdly beautiful. A dolorous, patriarchal procession of old men with white beards leading their asthmatic horses that drew huge country carts piled with clothes, furniture, food, and pets. Frightened cows with heavy swinging udders were being piloted by lithe middle-aged women. There was one girl demurely leading goats.

  Capt. Arthur Corbett-Smith, RFA

  No man in the world is more tender to helpless or dumb creatures than the British soldier or sailor; no man more cheerful. And no man in the Force but felt his heart wrung by the infinite pathos of the folk of Mons and round it. History will never record how many soldiers lost their lives that day in succouring the people who had put such trust in their presence.

  And how many won such a distinction as no king can bestow – the love and gratitude of little children? One man, at least, I knew (I never learned his name) who, at the tears of two tiny mites, clambered into the ruins of a burning outhouse, then being shelled, to fetch something they wanted, he could not understand what. He found a terror-stricken cat and brought it out safely. No, not pussy, something else as well. Back he went again, and after a little search discovered on the floor in a corner a wicker cage, in it a blackbird. Yes, that was it. And, oh, the joy of the girl mite at finding it still alive!

  ‘Well, you see, sir,’ he said afterwards, ‘I’ve got two kiddies the image of them. And it was no trouble, anyway.’

  Pte John Lucy, 2nd Royal Irish Rgt

  Our own cheerful platoon commander, he who was so keen on bayonet charges, now limps badly, and commandeers a heavy Belgian carthorse – a vile animal, a stink factory that gasses the whole platoon and adds to our misery. Another horse, an officer’s charger, is found by a corporal, who rides it all day and only late in the evening discovers that the saddlebags are stuffed with chocolate. There is a scramble for the chocolate, and the artillery come and claim the charger to take the menial place of a draught horse gone lame in a gun team.

  Many artillery horses fall out, lame and fatigued. The men outmarch the horses. Some horses have been shot, others stripped of harness and left alive, standing or limping, along the line of retreat.

  One of our signallers stops to repair a puncture and is left behind. He returns on his bicycle waving the busby of a German hussar who was closely following us up. He has shot the enemy cavalryman, but what about the horse? He has shot the horse too, in his excitement. He is damned for his stupidity by the officers.

  2/Lt Arnold Gyde, 2nd South Staffordshire Rgt

  Horses have been slaughtered by the score. They looked like toy horses, nursery things of wood. Their faces were so unreal, their expressions so glassy. They lay in such odd postures, with their hoofs sticking so stiffly in the air. It seemed as if they were toys, and were lying just as children had upset them. Even their dimensions seemed absurd. Their bodies had swollen to tremendous sizes, destroying the symmetry of life, confirming the illusion of unreality.

  The sight of these carcasses burning in the sun, with buzzing myriads of flies scintillating duskily over their unshod hides, excited a pity that was almost as deep as pity for slain human beings. After all, men came to the war with few illusions and a very complete knowledge of the price to be paid. They knew why they were there, what they were doing, and what they might expect. They could be buoyed up by victory, downcast by defeat. Above all, they had a Cause, something to fight for, and if Fate should so decree, something to die for. But these horses were different: they could neither know nor understand these things. Poor, dumb animals, a few weeks ago they had been drawing their carts, eating their oats, and grazing contentedly in their fields. And
then suddenly they were seized by masters they did not know, raced away to places foreign to them, made to draw loads too great for them, tended irregularly, or not at all, and when their strength failed, and they could no longer do their work, a bullet through the brain ended their misery. Their lot was almost worse than the soldiers’!

  It seemed an added indictment of war that these wretched animals should be flung into that vortex of slaughter. We pitied them intensely, the sight of them hurt and the smell of them nauseated us. Every memory is saturated with that odour. It was pungent, vigorous, demoralising. It filled the air, and one’s lungs shrank before it. Once, when a man drove his pick through the crisp, inflated side, a gas spurted out that was positively asphyxiating and intolerable.

  Trp. Benjamin Clouting, 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards

  We retreated south through village after village, mostly small grubby affairs, surrounded by coal mines and slag heaps, a feature of the region. It was hot, dry and dusty, and very quickly the horses began to look exhausted and dishevelled. Where we could, we rode along the road’s soft, unmetalled edges, for the oval stones were very hard on their legs, but our horses soon began to drop their heads and wouldn’t shake themselves like they normally did. Many were so tired they fell asleep standing up, their legs buckling, as they stumbled forward, taking the skin off their knees.

  To ease the horses’ burden, excess kit was dumped. Shirts, spare socks and other laundry were all thrown away along with our greatcoats. It helped, but the horses really needed a good rest and this was an impossibility. The best we could do for them was to halt, dismount and lead on, a short-lived order to walk that usually lasted for no more than a mile or so. As a result, the horses’ shoe nails wore down at a terrific rate, each lasting little more than a week or ten days, before the chink, chink sound of a loose shoe meant falling back to find the farrier. It was sad to see our horses, so coveted and closeted at home, go unkempt. Saddles, once removed after every ride, now remained on for several days and nights with only the girths being slackened. The horses became very sore, their backs raw from over-riding, although they tended to suffer less than the French horses, which were simply ridden into the ground. The French cavalry never walked anywhere, and when they finally halted to give their horses a breather, it was not unknown for part of the horse’s back to come away with the saddle. One horse went mad, banging its head against a wall, before it was finally put out of its misery. It was appalling to see. For our part, we did the best we could, bandaging our horses’ grazed knees with rags or bits of puttee, but the majority could consider themselves lucky if they got a rub down with a bit of straw, or a pat on the back to bring back the circulation.

  Lt Eric Anderson, 108th Batt., RFA

  We only lost two horses through exhaustion. They had been turned loose to look after themselves. All our old peacetime horses were looking really fit, though a little thin. The horses given us on mobilisation had not, as a rule, done so well, as we had not had time to harden them properly before going over to France and they had been plunged straight into the middle of real hard work. They had hardly had 1lb of oats issued to them but had done well on unthrashed oat straw. This was given them at every possible opportunity so they did not do so badly.

  Capt. Charles Norman, 9th (Queen’s Royal) Lancers

  When horses fell sick or were wounded, the men had to ride or lead them with the transport. When men were killed or wounded, their horses had to be led with the troop or with the sick horses. A troop after action was therefore always hampered by an excess or a shortage of horses. Very seldom indeed was it in the desired condition of having one man to one horse. This greatly reduced its efficiency. At regular intervals, sometimes on the eve of an important action, 30 or 40 men were withdrawn from the squadron to go away and bring up a draft of horses. When these fresh horses arrived, generally after 48 hours, many of them were fat and soft, and quite unfit for hard work. It was always better to keep a hard horse, though wounded and sore, if he were going on well and fit for work, than to take a soft one in his place, though he had a whole skin. Unfit horses with soft backs and girths were useless, and seldom lasted two days of hard work.

  Driver Charles Keller, RHA

  A horse cannot rest properly when it has to wear its harness all the time, travelling most of the twenty-four hours each day. Even at Le Château [26 August] where we were for more than a day we didn’t risk removing the harness. On the march, we would find ourselves dropping off to sleep as we travelled along and it was the same with the horses. When that happened we would dismount and walk along beside the teams to keep awake. Most nights we would walk more than we would ride. Whenever we stopped to give the teams a rest and some food we would sit in front and lean against their front legs to take a nap, then if the horse started to move it would wake us up.

  In the confusion of the retreat, both horses and men became ravenously hungry. The Army Service Corps did what it could, dumping food by the side of the road to be picked up by whoever happened to pass that way. When it was possible to stop, the infantry automatically posted men to watch out for the enemy. It gave some men and horses a few hours’ rest at most.

  L/Cpl Alfred Vivian, 4th Middlesex Rgt

  Early in the morning, just before dawn, a slight contretemps occurred which resulted in the loss of two perfectly innocent and gentle lives.

  One of the sentinels, peering into the gloom, suddenly espied figures stealthily moving in his direction. Failing to elicit a response to his challenges, he opened fire, the sound of his outburst creating the wildest excitement and apprehension in the camp.

  The discovery of the corpses of two cows testified to the watchfulness of our guard, and we relaxed our excited vigilance with expressions of relief.

  When daylight enabled us to look round, I sought a view of these unfortunate victims of circumstance, and was forced to rub my eyes and pinch myself at the peculiar sight they presented. It appeared that the bullets of that sentry had possessed the uncanny and unusual power of flaying the beasts and removing the greater part of the flesh thus exposed. I rightly guessed, after reflection, that some of the starving men had felt too hungry to allow such a unique gift of food to go begging.

  Daylight found me absolutely raging with hunger, and I eagerly watched for signs that would reveal to me the identity of the ‘butchers’, in the hope of being able to secure a titbit to allay the pangs of emptiness that assailed me, but all in vain, and I surmised that they must have devoured the meat raw and warm as they hacked it away from the carcasses.

  A large farmhouse lay a short distance in front of us, and on the pretext of obtaining drinking water I sought permission to take a party to it, which was granted. To our great disappointment, it was found deserted, and the most minute search failed to reveal anything in the nature of food. This almost broke our hearts, and we returned miserably to our unit.

  To the exhausted infantry, it might have looked a much better bet to have been a cavalryman or limber driver, sitting as they were on horses or wagons rather than toiling all day on foot. Yet infantrymen only had themselves to worry about; those with horses had an onerous responsibility to their animals, a fact not always appreciated by the infantry.

  Lt Eric Anderson, 108th Batt., RFA

  We had the greatest difficulty getting water. One battery was billeted at each farmhouse, the only places where water was to be had from wells and they [the infantry] were rather naturally afraid the water supply might run short. The sight of a couple of hundred thirsty horses used to produce all sorts of tales about staff orders having been given that no horses were to be watered there. As the staff never troubled to find us water, we generally disregarded such efforts till some irate one in authority could be found to drive us away. By this time, with any luck, we had watered quite a lot of horses, then we’d try elsewhere and finish up before getting pushed off again. No infantryman can understand why horses want to drink, apparently. It is the great grouse we had against them at the beginnin
g.

  Capt. Charles Norman, 9th (Queen’s Royal) Lancers

  One and a half or two hours were required to get the horses finished for the night. Watering a squadron was a long business if only one pump was available and no troughs. Sometimes a squadron had to water half a mile from billets at a pond. Barns had to be emptied of cattle, carts and farm rubbish before horses could be got under cover.

  In the morning, watering, feeding, packing saddles and saddling up occupied another hour and a half. This had to be completed before daylight. Thus from time actually spent in billets, three hours at least must be deducted to find the actual amount of rest obtained. Thus if a force reach billets at 10 p.m. and received orders to be ready for move at 5 a.m., the period of actual rest was only four hours. The amount of rest obtained was of course very much less than this.

  Trp. Benjamin Clouting, 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards

  Clean water was of great importance to a regiment on the move, and whenever possible, water bottles were kept topped up. On one occasion, the squadron turned into a stream, and the horses, tired and thirsty, went to drink, but we were told to ‘Ride on’, so on we went. The water was less than a foot deep, clear and inviting, and it seemed such a waste. Several troopers did try to get water into their enamelled bottles, removing the cork and slinging them over into the stream as they rode. But most bottles were already too light, and despite tipping and dipping them in the water, most failed to collect much before reaching the other side.

  2/Lt Arnold Gyde, 2nd South Staffordshire Rgt

  During a few minutes’ halt, a cow near the road stood gazing, with that apathetic interest peculiar to cows, at the thirsty men. It was not for nothing, as the French say, that one of the reservists had been a farm hand. He went up to the cow, unfastening his empty water bottle as he went, and calmly leant down and began to milk the neglected animal until his bottle was full. It was not in itself a funny proceeding, but there was something about the calmness of both the cow and the man, and something about the queerness of the occasion, that appealed to the sense of humour of the dourest old Puritan of them all. They laughed, they roared, they shouted, in a way that reminded the men of the last ‘soccer’ season. The noise must have mystified the pursuing Uhlans not a little.