Tuesday, November 3rd, Bailleul, 8.30 a.m.—Just going to load up; wish we'd gone to Ypres. Germans said to be advancing.
Wednesday, November 4th, Boulogne.—We had a lot of badly wounded Germans who had evidently been left many days; their condition was appalling; two died (one of tetanus), and one British. We have had a lot of the London Scottish, wounded in their first action.
Reinforcements, French guns, British cavalry, are being hurried up the line; they all look splendid.
Wednesday, November 11th.—Sometimes it seems as if we shall never get home, the future is so unwritten.
A frightful explosion like this Hell of a War, which flared up in a few days, will take so much longer to wipe up what can be wiped up. I think the British men who have seen the desolation and the atrocities in Belgium have all personally settled that it shan't happen in England, and that is why the headlines always read—
"THE BRITISH ARMY IMMOVABLE."
"WAVES OF GERMAN INFANTRY BROKEN."
"ALLIES THROW ENEMY BACK AT ALL POINTS."
"YPRES HELD FOR THREE WEEKS UNDER A RAIN OF SHELLS."
You can tell they feel like that from their entire lack of resentment about their own injuries. Their conversation to each other from the time they are landed on the train until they are taken off is never about their own wounds and feelings, but exclusively about the fighting they have just left. If one only had time to listen or take it down it would be something worth reading, because it is not letters home or newspaper stuff, but told to each other, with their own curious comments and phraseology, and no hint of a gallery or a Press. Incidentally one gets a few eye-openers into what happens to a group of men when a Jack Johnson lands a shell in the middle of them. Nearly every man on the train, especially the badly smashed-up ones, tells you how exceptionally lucky he was because he didn't get killed like his mate.
Boulogne, Thursday, November 12th, 8 p.m.—Have been here all day. Had a hot bath on the St Andrew. News from the Front handed down the line coincides with the 'Daily Mail.'
Friday, 13th.—Still here—fourth day of rest. No one knows why; nearly all the trains are here. The news today is glorious. They say that the Germans did get through into Ypres and were bayoneted out again.
Friday, November 13th, Boulogne.—We have been all day in Park Lane Siding among the trains, in pouring wet and slush. I amused myself with a pot of white paint and a forceps and wool for a brush, painting the numbers on both ends of the coaches inside, all down the train; you can't see the chalk marks at night.
This unprecedented four days' rest and nights in bed is doing us all a power of good; we have books and mending and various occupations.
Saturday, November 14th.—Glorious sunny day, but very cold. Still in Boulogne, but out of Park Lane Siding slum, and among the ships again. Some French sailors off the T.B.'s are drilling on one side of us.
Everything R.A.M.C. at the base is having a rest this week—ships, hospitals, and trains. Major S. said there was not so much doing at the Front—thank Heaven; and the line is still wanted for troops. We have just heard that there are several trains to go up before our turn comes, and that we are to wait about six miles off. Better than the siding anyhow. Meanwhile we can't go off, because we don't know when the train will move out.
The tobacco and the cigarettes from Harrod's have come in separate parcels, so the next will be the chocolate and hankies and cards, &c. It is a grand lot, and I am longing to get up to the Front and give them out.
Sunday, November 15th.—We got a move on in the middle of the night, and are now on our way up.
The cold of this train life is going to be rather a problem. Our quarters are not heated, but we have "made" (i.e., acquired, looted) a very small oil-stove which faintly warms the corridor, but you can imagine how no amount of coats or clothes keeps you warm in a railway carriage in winter. I'm going to make a foot muff out of a brown blanket, which will help. A smart walk out of doors would do it, but that you can't get off when the train is stationary for fear of its vanishing, and for obvious reasons when it is moving. I did walk round the train for an hour in the dark and slime in the siding yesterday evening, but it is not a cheering form of exercise.
Today it is pouring cats and dogs, awful for loading sick, and there will be many after this week for the trains.
Every one has of course cleared out of beautiful Ypres, but we are going to load up at Poperinghe, the town next before it, which is now Railhead. Lately the trains have not been so far.
Monday, November 16th, Boulogne, 9 a.m.—We loaded up at Bailleul 344. The Clearing Hospitals were very full, and some came off a convoy. One of mine died. One, wounded above the knee, was four days in the open before being picked up; he had six bullets in his leg, two in each arm, and crawled about till found; one of the arm wounds he got doing this. I went to bed at 4. The news was all good, taken as a whole, but the men say they were "a bit short-handed!!" One said gloomily, "This isn't War, it's Murder; you go there to your doom." Heard the sad news of Lord Roberts.
We are all the better for our week's rest.
Tuesday, November 17th, 3 a.m.—When we got our load down to Boulogne yesterday morning all the hospitals were full, and the weather was too rough for the ships to come in and clear them, so we were ordered on to Havre, a very long journey. A German died before we got to Abbeville, where we put off two more very bad ones; and at Amiens we put off four more, who wouldn't have reached Havre. About midnight something broke on the train, and we were hung up for hours, and haven't yet got to Rouen, so we shall have them on the train all tomorrow too, and have all the dressings to do for the third time. One of the night orderlies has been run in for being asleep on duty. He climbed into a top bunk (where a Frenchman was taken off at Amiens), and deliberately covered up and went to sleep. He was in charge of 28 patients. Another was left behind at Boulogne, absent without leave, thinking we should unload, and the train went off for Havre. He'll be run in too. Shows how you can't leave the train. Just got to St Just. That looks as if we were going to empty at Versailles instead of Havre. Lovely starlight night, but very cold. Everybody feels pleased and honoured that Lord Roberts managed to die with us on Active Service at Headquarters, and who would choose a better ending to such a life?
7 a.m.—After all, we must be crawling round to Rouen for Havre; passed Beauvais. Lovely sunrise over winter woods and frosted country. Our load is a heavy and anxious one—344; we shall be glad to land them safely somewhere. The amputations, fractures, and lung cases stand these long journeys very badly.
* * *
V.
On No.— Ambulance Train (3)
BRITISH AND INDIANS
November 18, 1914, to December 17, 1914
"Because of you we will be glad and gay,
Remembering you we will be brave and strong,
And hail the advent of each dangerous day,
And meet the Great Adventure with a song."
—From a poem on "J.G."
* * *
On No.— Ambulance Train (3).
BRITISH AND INDIANS.
November 18, 1914, to December 17, 1914.
The Boulogne siding—St Omer—Indian soldiers—His Majesty King George—Lancashire men on the War—Hazebrouck—Bailleul—French engine-drivers—Sheepskin coats—A village in N.E. France—Headquarters.
Wednesday, November 18th, 2 p.m.—At last reached beautiful Rouen, through St Just, Beauvais, and up to Sergueux, and down to Rouen. From Sergueux through Rouen to Havre is supposed to be the most beautiful train journey in France, which is saying a good deal. Put off some more bad cases here; a boy sergeant, aged 24, may save his eye and general blood-poisoning if he gets irrigated quickly. You can watch them going wrong, with two days and two nights on the train, and it seems such hard luck. And then if you don't write Urgent or Immediate on their bandages in blue pencil, they get overlooked in the rush into hospital when they are landed. So funny to be going back to old Havre, that hot torrid nig
htmare of Waiting-for-Orders in August. But, thank Heaven, we don't stop there, but back to the guns again.
5 p.m.—We are getting on for Havre at last. This long journey from Belgium down to Havre has been a strange mixture. Glorious country with the flame and blue haze of late autumn on hills, towns, and valleys, bare beech-woods with hot red carpets. Glorious British Army lying broken in the train—sleep (or the chance of it) three hours one night and four the next, with all the hours between (except meals) hard work putting the British Army together again; haven't taken off my puttees since Sunday. Seems funny, 400 people (of whom four are women and about sixty are sound) all whirling through France by special train. Why? Because of the Swelled Head of the All-Highest.
We had a boy with no wound, suffering from shock from shell bursts. When he came round, if you asked him his name he would look fixedly at you and say "Yes." If you asked him something else, with a great effort he said "Mother."
8 p.m.—Got to Havre.
Wednesday, 18th November, 6 p.m.—Sotteville, near Rouen. This afternoon's up-journey between Havre and Rouen has been a stripe of pure bliss with no war about it at all. A brilliant dazzling day (which our Island couldn't do if it tried in November), rugs, coat, and cushion on your bed, and the most heavenly view unrolling itself before you without lifting your head to see it, ending up with the lights of Rouen twinkling in the smoke of the factory chimneys under a flaring red sunset.
We are to stop here for repairs to the train—chauffage, electric light, water supply, and gas all to be done. Then we shall be a very smart train. The electric light and the heating will be the greatest help—a chapel and a bathroom I should like added!
At Havre last night the train ran into the Gare Maritime (where we left in the Asturias for St Nazaire early in September), which is immediately under the great place that No.— G.H. bagged for their Hospital in August. I ran up and saw it all. It is absolutely first class. There were our people off the train in lovely beds, in huge wards, with six rows of beds—clean sheets, electric light, hot food, and all the M.O.'s, Sisters, and Nursing Orderlies, in white overalls, hard at work on them—orderlies removing their boots and clothing (where we hadn't done it, we leave as much on as we can now because of the cold). Sisters washing them and settling them in, and with the M.O. doing their dressings, all as busy as bees, only stopping to say to us, "Aren't they brave?" They said we'd brought them an awfully bad lot, and we said we shed all the worst on the way. They don't realise that by the time they get to the base these men are beyond complaining; each stage is a little less infernal to them than the one they've left; and instead of complaining, they tell you how lovely it is! It made one realise the grimness of our stage in it—the emergencies, the makeshifts, and the little four can do for nearly 400 in a train—with their greatest output. We each had 80 lying-down cases this journey.
We got to bed about 11 and didn't wake till nearly 9, to the sound of the No.— G.H. bugle, Come to the Cook-house door, boys.
Thursday, November 19th.—Spent the day in a wilderness of railway lines at Sotteville—sharp frost; walk up and down the lines all morning; horizon bounded by fog. This afternoon raw, wet, snowing, slush outside. If it is so deadly cold on this unheated train, what do they do in the trenches with practically the same equipment they came out with in August? Can't last like that. Makes you feel a pig to have a big coat, and hot meals, and dry feet. I've made a fine foot muff with a brown blanket; it is twelve thicknesses sewn together; have still got only summer underclothing. My winter things have been sent on from Havre, but the parcel has not yet reached me; hope the foot muff will ward off chilblains. Got a 'Daily Mail' of yesterday. We heard of the smash-up of the Prussian Guard from the people who did it, and had some of the P.G. on our train. Ypres is said to be full of German wounded who will very likely come to us.
Friday, November 20th, 10 a.m., Boulogne.—Deep snow.
Boulogne, Saturday, November 21st.—In the siding all yesterday and today. Train to be cut down from 650 tons to 450, so we are reconstructing and putting off waggons. It will reduce our number of patients, but we shall be able to do more for a smaller number, and the train will travel better and not waste time blocking up the stations and being left in sidings in consequence. The cold this week has been absolutely awful. The last train brought almost entirely cases of rheumatism. Their only hope at the Front must be hot meals, and I expect the A.S.C. sees that they get them somehow.
A troop train of a very rough type of Glasgow men, reinforcing the Highlanders, was alongside of us early yesterday morning; each truck had a roaring fire of coke in a pail. They were in roaring spirits; it was icy cold.
My winter things arrived from Havre yesterday, so I am better equipped against the cold. Also, this morning an engine gave us an hour or two's chauffage just at getting-up time, which was a help.
Sunday, November 22nd.—Left B. early this morning and got to Merville about midday. Loaded up and got back to B. in the night. Many wounded Germans and a good lot of our sick, knocked over by the cold. I don't know how any of them stick it. Five bombs were dropped the day before where we were today, and an old man was killed. Things are being badly given away by spies, even of other nationalities. Some men were sleeping in a cellar at Ypres to avoid the bombardment, with some refugees. In the night they missed two of them. They were found on the roof signalling to the Germans with flash-lights. In the morning they paid the penalty.
The frost has not broken, and it is still bitterly cold.
Tuesday, November 24th.—Was up all Sunday night; unloaded early at Boulogne. Had a bath on a ship and went to bed. Stayed in siding all day.
Wednesday, November 25th.—Left B. about 9.30.
Last night at dinner our charming debonair French garçon was very drunk, and spilt the soup all over me! There was a great scene in French. The fat fatherly corporal (who has a face and expression exactly like the Florentine people in Ghirlandaio's Nativities, and who has the manners of a French aristocrat on his way to the guillotine) tried to control him, but it ended in a sort of fight, and poor Charles got the sack in the end, and has been sent back to Paris to join his regiment. He was awfully good to us Sisters—used to make us coffee in the night, and fill our hot bottles and give us hot bricks for our feet at meals.
Just going on now to a place we've not been to before, called Chocques.
The French have today given us an engine with the Red Cross on it and an extra man to attend to the chauffage, so we have been quite warm and lovely. We ply him at the stations with cigarettes and chocolate, and he now falls over himself in his anxiety to please us.
The officers of the two Divisions which are having a rest have got 100 hours' leave in turns. We all now spend hours mapping out how much we could get at home in 100 hours from Boulogne.
Wednesday, November 25th.—Arrived at 11 p.m. last night at a God-forsaken little place about eight miles from the firing line. Found a very depressed major taking a most gloomy view of life and the war, in charge of Indians. Pitch-dark night, and they were a mile away from the station, so we went to bed at 12 and loaded up at 7.30 this morning, all Indians, mostly badly wounded. They are such pathetic babies, just as inarticulate to us and crying as if it was a crêche. I've done a great trade in Hindustani, picked up at a desperate pace from a Hindu officer today! If you write it down you can soon learn it, and I've got all the necessary medical jargon now; you read it off, and then spout it without looking at your note-book. The awkward part is when they answer something you haven't got!
The Germans are using sort of steam-ploughs for cutting trenches.
The frost has broken, thank goodness. The Hindu officer said the cold was more than they bargained for, but they were "very, very glad to fight for England." He thought the Germans were putting up a very good show. There have been a great many particularly ghastly wounds from hand-grenades in the trenches. We have made a very good journey down, and expect to unload this evening, as we are just getting into Bo
ulogne at 6.30 p.m.
Thursday, November 26th.—We did a record yesterday. Loaded up with the Indians—full load—bad cases—quite a heavy day; back to B. and unloaded by 9 p.m., and off again at 11.30 p.m. No waiting in the siding this time. Three hospital ships were waiting this side to cross by daylight. They can't cross now by night because of enemy torpedoes. So all the hospitals were full again, and trains were taking their loads on to Rouen and Havre. We should have had to if they hadn't been Indians.
We loaded up today at Bailleul, where we have been before—headquarters of 3rd and 4th Divisions. We had some time to wait there before loading up, so went into the town and saw the Cathedral—beautiful old tower, hideously restored inside, but very big and well kept. The town was very interesting. Sentries up the streets every hundred yards or so; the usual square packed with transport, and the usual jostle of Tommies and staff officers and motor-cars and lorries. We saw General French go through.
The Surgeon-General had been there yesterday, and five Sisters are to be sent up to each of the two clearing hospitals there. They should have an exciting time. A bomb was dropped straight on to the hospital two days ago—killed one wounded man, blew both hands off one orderly, and wounded another. The airman was caught, and said he was very sorry he dropped it on the hospital; he meant it for Headquarters. We have a lot of cases of frost-bite on the train. One is as bad as in Scott's Expedition; may have to have his foot amputated. I'd never seen it before. They are nearly all slight medical cases; very few wounded, which makes a very light load from the point of view of work, but we shall have them on the train all night. One of us is doing all the train half the night, and another all the train the other half. The other two go to bed all night. I am one of these, as I have got a bit of a throat and have been sent to bed early. We've never had a light enough load for one to do the whole train before. The men say things are very quiet at the Front just now. Is it the weather or the Russian advance?
Diary of a Nursing Sister Page 7