by Paul Almond
7:55 a.m. About 45 prisoners passed.
8:08 a.m. 35th Battery has telephone line going forward with Lieutenant.
8:40 a.m. L.O. 8th C.I.B. report Infantry have stopped at Red Line.
9:10 a.m. 35th Battery report that their Lieutenant has a phone at the head of Frinz Arnodf Graben trench. He reports situation good. Enemy shelling fairly heavy with 77mms.
10:40 a.m. All of our Infantry have reached final objective and are digging in. As far as can be told the battalions are in touch with each other.
April 10th: Action on Petit Vimy. Ammo dumps set on fire
April 13th: Heavy Snowstorm. Batteries did very little firing owing to our Infantry patrols being out.
War Diaries: 8th Brigade CFA
It all began with a chance remark. Lieutenant Overstreet had come over to watch us cleaning the gun, which it sorely needed after all the firing these last three weeks. Even though it was snowing, we were doing a full workout. “Well, boys, we did it. We took the Ridge. Everyone else tried, but we did it. Four days later and I still can’t get over it.”
“Single-handedly,” Edward remarked wryly.
“Well, not single-handedly. A thousand guns.”
Jim straightened from his task of removing the safety from the breech. “You don’t think maybe the Infantry had something to do with it?”
The boys were oiling or greasing all the moving gears and teeth. We had wrapped oily rags round our brush and punched it through the bore, pitch black from all the firing. Back and forth we pushed it until the rag came out clean — about thirty pull-throughs and twenty rags before the bore was nice and shiny again. Jim got busy disassembling and cleaning the breech. I enjoyed periods like this, when we got working together like normal human beings.
“Well, of course the Infantry did, but they sure as hell tried lots of times before.” Overstreet was fairly bursting with excitement. “The French and then the British. What do you think made the difference? The accuracy of our guns!” The heavy snowstorm had not dampened his enthusiasm. He was sailing, as the metaphor goes, on clouds.
“You don’t think the British or the French Artillery were accurate too?” asked Ed.
“Nowhere near as us,” said Harry.
“You honestly think that rig that they made us fire our gun through, whatever you call it —” I started to say. I was prepared to believe him, but I wanted to challenge it. And I liked the snowfall. Reminded me of home.
“The Boulangé electromechanical chronograph?” asked Harry. Trust him to know the correct name.
“I remember,” echoed Jim, gesticulating with his stick-like fingers. “We had to fire through two electrically charged wire screens, and somehow they could tell how far the shell would go.”
“That measures muzzle velocity,” explained Harry. “They never did that before.”
“No sir,” Overstreet said. “Vimy was the most accurate barrage ever. Having every gun’s actual muzzle velocity, not just estimated from a bunch of tables, meant we could fire a barrage so accurately that our infantry could really hug it. That paved their way up the Ridge. And Andy even insisted on correcting for weather conditions. He also brought in the chronograph, along with some other great ideas.”
“Oh so now Colonel McNaughton is Andy?” Red snorted.
“Well, he went to my old school: he was known as Andy then.”
“What school was that?” I asked.
“Bishop’s.”
“Oh, that’s where I was heading when they got me to enlist. My brother Jack went there.”
“No no, not Bishop’s University,” Overstreet said, “I’m talking about Bishop’s College School. After that, he took engineering at McGill. Studied under Rutherford, too.”
Now who was Rutherford, I wondered. Obviously someone important.
“Just a minute,” Jim said. “I have an elder brother in the Infantry. He got shot up three days ago in that assault. He’s going to be okay, but I don’t like anyone saying that the Artillery did more than the Infantry.”
“I agree,” echoed Ed. “One of my brothers was an officer in the assault, too. He got through it, thank God.”
“A lot of them got through it,” said Harry, “thanks to us. Thanks to the accuracy of our guns, don’t you understand?”
I remembered that early in the mornings we had seen parties of German prisoners being brought back. Not warlike, for sure, them fellas, really beaten down, usually half a dozen or even more, guarded by only a couple of Infantrymen. I waved occasionally as they passed — well, why not? Poor buggers, they seemed just like us, only on the wrong side. Wish I could speak German, but no one on our gun knew how, though Jim claimed a smattering. But he hated them and wouldn’t even lift his eyes as they straggled past.
“Just because you stick up some screening to measure our muzzle velocity,” interrupted Jim again, “I agree no one’s done it before, but you mean to tell me —”
“Hold on,” Overstreet said, “That was just a small part of it. First of all, ‘Lieutenant-Colonel Andrew McNaughton’ brought a bunch of scientists turned soldiers here and they set up a flash-spotting unit.”
“A what?” I asked.
“Flash-spotters: they used transits like surveyors,” he gestured to illustrate, “so they could get good bearings on the flashes of enemy guns.”
“So geometry helped us find enemy guns?”
“Yes indeed. See, when you observe a particular gun flash —”
“A lot of guns, you can’t see the flash,” Harry objected.
“Well, I’m not talking about poor light conditions!” Overstreet hated being interrupted. He went on quickly, “One observer will see a flash and take a bearing. He reports it to his command post by phone, because that by itself is no use.”
“Why not?”
“You need at least two angles, right?” Harry asked.
“Right. Three is best,” the Lieutenant affirmed. “So the command post tells the others roughly where the flash should be visible. They all push a button on the next flash, and that actually makes lights go on in the command post. When all lights go up at the same time, the officer knows the posts are seeing the same flash. Then he plots it on a map, and where the lines meet is exactly where that gun is!”
“And you phone that back to HQ?” Red asked.
“No no, not HQ, that’s the whole point — they have this new counter-battery section that Andy set up. They do the calculating, and stick the enemy’s positions on a map.”
“And then we smash ’em?” I asked.
“Yep. They send the coordinates to the heavy guns, too.”
“Yeah, but you just wait for the next battle,” Jim said. “The Germans’ll catch on and he’ll move his guns every night.”
“Okay, if he figures out his batteries are being hit with amazing accuracy,” Overstreet went on, “but don’t forget those gun-pits, dug deep for sure, with sandbags and roofing, they’ll not be jumping for joy to move them.” We could see that. “So BAM! We keep hitting them, and wipe them out.”
“You’d wonder why the British never did that before,” Harry said. “Seems obvious.”
“So you think that a few surveying instruments allowed us to take the Ridge?” Edward was getting angry, working his steel wool at any corrosion and oiling the area afterwards. “No sir! It was our Infantry slogging through that mud, rolling up that hill...”
“Wait, Ed,” Dick protested, “don’t forget sound waves got measured, too. With delicate oscillographs and microphones...”
We all looked at each other “What oscillographs?” I asked.
“When a forward listening post hears an enemy gun, a button is pushed.” Dick was in his element explaining all this. “And then behind the lines, microphones are activated and they print the stuff out on graphs. The first proper sound ranging section in the whole Imperial army — all thanks to Andy.”
“I hear the British officers laughed him to scorn,” Harry said.
“Damn right they should
,” said Jim. “Think you can win a battle with a bunch of microphones?”
“Listen, Andy’s scientists can calculate a position within twenty-five yards of any gun. With our HE, that’s close enough. We were firing right on target.”
“So that’s how we shut down so many batteries?” I asked.
“Don’t you think those thousand guns blasting away made the difference?” threw in Jim. “We figured our one gun alone sent over fifty tons of shells.”
“We had lots of guns blasting away at the Somme, but it didn’t seem to help,” argued Harry. “Give up Jim, it was our accuracy that won the day.”
“And this time,” Dick’s patience was running out, “we silenced around eighty percent of the German guns facing us. The best estimate for the Somme was around a third — the reason why this time our infantry didn’t suffer nearly as much.”
That all made sense, for sure.
“Plus, our new 106 fuzes could cut those wire entanglements that often stop our Infantry.”
“Yes, but our Infantry took the Ridge,” snapped Edward, still annoyed. “Maybe we helped, maybe we didn’t, but they’re the ones who slogged up that hill, through the driving sleet —”
“Edward’s right. Think of all the planning they got beforehand.” I could see Jim was getting convinced. “I heard General Byng made all units practise on fields with marked positions using different coloured ribbons and flags. They trained and trained.”
“Aye, that they did,” added Edward. “And you know what else my brother told me? In the British Army, only officers got maps so Other Ranks often got lost. But Byng ordered tons of maps so that every soldier knew exactly what he was doing and where he was headed. Never happened before, my brother told me. He thinks Byng is a genius — flying in the face of the High Command, he got it done, with his commanders of course. And the result? We took the Ridge.”
“Well, it just feels good to me,” I said, “being in a major assault that we won.”
“Amen to that,” said Dick Overstreet, as he saw Edward re-assembling the breech. “Well, boys, looks like you got your gun back in shape.”
“Shouldn’t we be rolling up ahead?” Jim asked. “Now that we’ve taken the Ridge.”
Overstreet nodded. “Headquarters would like that. But the ground is just impassable.”
“Doesn’t bother me being stuck here,” Red commented. “No nicer dugout; that chalk makes good walls. Once we get the water pumped out.”
Dick left and I checked the gun. Yes, good shape for the next barrage. Well, time for a well-deserved rest, even if only for half an hour. I led the way, and we trooped off to our hole in the ground. Home sweet home!
Chapter Nineteen
Hill 70
July 25th, 1917. 10 p.m. Brigade headquarters and batteries withdrew from fighting positions [at Petit Vimy] and proceeded to Wagon Lines near Berthonval Farm and the next day on to Noeuz les Mines [facing Hill 70].
Aug 8th: We are expecting operations to come off any day. We do a little night firing, principally with the 35th Battery. At night the enemy shells our roads and approaches to our positions.
Aug 10th: A few more shells than usual falling near our batteries. A goodly lot of gas shells sprinkled in tonight, giving us quite a test. Every precaution taken by all concerned.
War Diaries: 10th Brigade CFA
Dawn was just breaking and I found myself already awake, even though being back at the Wagon Lines I could sleep as long as I wanted. I heard a commotion in the distance. What was it? Screaming and shouting? Men in pain? From what? I swung out of my cot. Another Coverer, Corporal Phil Hayes who’d become a friend, was fast asleep, mouth open, lean cheekbones smooth like an Indian’s, tuft of jet black hair protruding over his greatcoat.
I tugged on my boots, wound my puttees, put on my tunic and belt and crawled out. In the light rain, I listened again. That noise, like men in pain, came from the direction of the gun line. I headed over to the roadway. Would they need help? Had there been some special heavy bombardment? The batteries had been ordered not to do much firing, and I thought that Heinie had not found our positions. So what could it be?
I waited anxiously as the noise approached. We had been fighting for weeks around Petit Vimy when our orders had come to move. After Vimy Ridge in May, my 35th Battery had been switched from the 8th to the 10th Brigade. We had marched out in a loop westward around the big mining town of Lens (which the British were poised to attack) and on to the north to face Hill 70.
The Canadian Corps had been ordered to attack Lens — as the Germans obviously anticipated. But our new Corps commander, General Currie, had decided instead to try for Hill 70 (about two hundred feet high) overlooking the town, a harder obstacle to conquer, but one that could give the element of surprise. Once we took Hill 70, the enemy would counter attack again and again, and that would allow us to wage a battle of attrition from above, wearing Fritz down, so that Lens could more easily be taken by the British later.
The sorry procession grew louder and then hove into sight: some men draped over empty ammunition limbers, three Drivers leading their horses and others pushing the stretcher carts with large wheels to traverse such dreadfully pitted ground. As I ran across, one lad was screaming, “Shoot me, shoot me, please, I can’t stand it.”
Where the hell was the Brigade MO? We hurried the soldier to the Aid Post and helped others from the limbers: some blinded. I guided another to the empty cots. The Drivers were jumpy, having listened to the moaning and crying all the way from the firing line, a mile or two.
One of these I knew, Frederick, who looked at me and shook his head. A grizzled older soldier about forty, he had been a farmer. “I never seen anything like it,” he said. “Gas attack.”
So, that was what had happened! I knew the dirty Boche had used gas in Ypres a couple of years ago. These attacks had become more and more frequent, and in fact we ourselves used gas now, too. But I hadn’t seen the horrifying consequences up close.
The Medical Sergeant took charge immediately and told us he’d sent for ambulances. The plank road was often subject to shelling, being easily seen by aircraft and balloons, so our Wagon Lines had been situated a couple of hundred yards away.
Before long, the Brigade Medical Officer arrived and went right to work. I wasn’t used to hearing screams. Back at the firing line, apart from when we had misfires or deaths from high explosives, we weren’t subjected to that continual mutilation suffered by the Infantry every time they went into, or repulsed, an attack.
I felt helpless. I didn’t know what to do. The blinded fellow I’d helped bore his pain stoically but now he started to mumble. “We didn’t know it was a gas attack. Our orders were to keep firing and keep firing we did. Somebody smelled garlic but we never thought much about it, so we kept going. It was dark, so you didn’t see gas clouds or anything. But then, one fellow started to sneeze and cough, and the cry went up: “Gas gas gas!” By then, the damage was done. I got out my gas mask and kept loading, but I’d taken out my eye pieces — you know they steam up, and you can’t set a damn fuze or anything. So on I went handing up the shells, but my eyes started to hurt something terrible.”
Oh my Lord, I thought, this poor guy did his duty and now he’s blind.
“Corporal,” the MO cried, “over here, please.”
I left the blinded Gunner as another soldier came round to dole out tots of rum, our only painkiller at the moment. I went over to the MO who was working on the lad crying out in pain. “I’ve got to cut his clothes off. Hold his legs, please, he keeps kicking.”
He was horribly burned on his face and over the rest of his skin. The MO was trying to remove clothing stuck to his flesh. “Mustard gas,” he murmured. “Terrible stuff.”
The kid kept screaming and crying and then, mercifully, passed out. I released his legs.
Some twenty minutes later, another soldier ran in from the direction of the plank road. “We’ve got two ambulances — take everyone over.”
I stood for a moment, dazed. So that was it for those two. No hope?
The next soldier had burns on his face and throat and was gasping horribly. “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe.” He kept choking and vomiting. I gestured towards him but the MO shook his head. Leave him, too.
So I went to the blinded fellow, got him up, and led another by the hand. With the dawn lifting, we stumbled a good way across to the plank road. What a journey! How brave was my companion! In the end, we got everyone safely into the ambulances for the bumpy drive back to the Main Dressing Station, four miles at least. But good care there, I presumed, before they’d be sent on to the Base Hospital.
With a couple of others I walked back to the Wagon Lines where that poor burned fellow was screaming again. Wouldn’t it be kinder to put him out of his misery, as he begged?
I said as much to the MO and he nodded. “But it’s not allowed. We can only make him comfortable till he goes. He and the other chap. I don’t know how they let themselves get so burned.”
Well, I knew. Doing their duty.
Phil Hayes came over. “I was talking to a couple of them, sir. You see, it was so hot out there, they’d taken their shirts off. When the shout came: gas! They put on their masks but not their shirts until too late.”
The MO nodded. “That’s what’s so beastly about this new mustard gas. You can’t see it. Then it kills your nerve cells so you don’t feel what’s happening until too late. Imagine what their lungs look like! No wonder they vomit up their burned insides.”
Oh my God! What on earth had we humans devised? I couldn’t believe my ears.
***
Later the bugler announced lunch, and Phil and me lined up. I saw a new face coming past to eat, so I motioned to Phil and we followed; I like being neighbourly and it’s always good to make new fellows welcome. Short and squat, with a square black moustache, his name turned out to be Charles, Sergeant Peter Charles.