‘Yes,’ said Curzon. ‘I see what you mean, of course.’
‘It’s like this –’ said Hudson, going on to expand his original thesis.
There was excuse to be found for them, and for G.H.Q. too. Anyone could realize the terrifying effects of a bombardment, but no one who had not lurked in a dug-out through one, emerging alive at the end – shaken, frightened, exhausted, perhaps, but alive and still capable of pressing the double button of a machine-gun – could appreciate the possibility of survival.
Two-thirds of yesterday’s attack had failed, but there were considerable lengths of the German front line in British hands, where the Forty-fourth Corps and the Seventeenth and the Third had won footholds. From these points the pressure was to be maintained, bombardment and advance alternating. The Germans would go on losing men, and the advance would slowly progress. Something would give way in the end. The German strength would dwindle, their morale would break down under the ceaseless strain of the defensive, and, as a further possibility, the advance would in the end climb up to the top of the rolling crest ahead, and something would simply have to happen then.
Hudson’s estimate of the enemy’s losses was fantastic – he had selected the highest estimate put forward by the intelligence section, simply because anything less seemed fantastic to him. A month or two of losses on that scale would reduce the German Army to a wreck. There would be corresponding losses on the British side, but the British Army could bear them as long as the leaders kept their nerve – and that was the point which Hudson specially wanted to make with Curzon. Not all corps commanders could be trusted as Curzon could be, to push attacks home relentlessly, applying ceaseless pressure to divisional generals.
So that Curzon was to be maintained in charge of his present sector of the front. He would be supplied with new divisions as fast as they could be brought up to replace his exhausted ones, and he must see to it that the attacks were maintained with all the intensity the situation demanded. It was a high compliment which was being paid to Curzon (or at least both Hudson and Curzon saw it as one). He flushed with pleasure and with renewed hope; he had work to do, a plan to carry out, a goal in front of him, and he was one of the five lieutenant-generals who were charged with the execution of the offensive on which England was pinning her whole trust.
After Hudson’s departure Curzon called his staff together. He outlined the work before them, and he quoted the figures of the German losses which Hudson had given him. He looked round at them. Miller, dark, sombre, and reliable, nodded approval; the others, even if they did not approve, had learned by now to keep their faces expressionless in the face of schemes they could not oppose.
‘Our old Ninety-first Division is coming up into our sector,’ concluded Curzon. ‘We know what they can do. What do you suggest, Miller? Hadn’t they –’
In this fashion began the orgy of bloodshed which is now looked upon as the second phase of the Battle of the Somme, three agonizing months during which divisions, ‘fattened up’ in back areas on quiet sectors, were brought up into the line to dissipate in one wild day the strength built up during the previous months. They went into action ten thousand infantry strong; they won a few yards of shell-torn ground, a few trees of a shattered wood, or the cellars of a few houses, and they came out four thousand strong, to be filled up with recruits and made ready for the next ordeal. Kitchener’s Army found its grave on the Somme just as the old Regular Army had done at Ypres.
Curzon worked with grim determination during those three months. There was always pressure to be applied to someone – transport officers who said that a thing could not be done, major-generals who flinched from exposing their divisions to some fresh ordeal, artillery colonels who pleaded that their men were on the point of exhaustion. He did his duty with all his nerve and all his strength, as was his way, while the higher command looked on him with growing approval; he was a man after their own heart, who allowed no consideration to impede him in the execution of his orders.
Chapter Twenty-One
One morning there was a private letter (it was marked ‘Private’ on the envelope) for Curzon, and the sight of it gave Curzon an unpleasant sensation of disquietude. It was addressed to ‘General Herbert Curzon’, care of the regimental depot of the Twenty-second Lancers, and had been sent on to him via the War Office – and it was from Aunt Kate. He hesitated before he opened it; he did not want to open it; it was only by an effort of will that he forced himself to open it and read it.
DEAR BERTIE,
Just a line to wish you all success and to ask you if you will do a favour for your aunt, because I have not asked you ever for one before. Our Dick has got to go out to the Front again. He was wounded and came back to the hospital, but now he is better and he is going back next week. Bertie, he does not want to go. He does not say so, but I know. He has done his bit because he has been wounded and has got the Military Medal. I showed him something about you that I saw in the paper, and he said joking that he wished you would give him a job. He said he would rather clean out your stables than go over the top at Ginchy again. He said it as if he didn’t mean it, but I know. Bertie, would you do that for me. You have only got to ask for him. Corporal R. Cole, 4/29 London Regiment, Duke of Connaught’s Own. I swear that he won’t say he is your cousin to your friends. Because he is your cousin, Bertie. He is my only son and I want him to come back to me safe. Please, Bertie, do this for me because I am only an old woman now. He doesn’t know I am writing to you. It does not matter to you who cleans out your stables. Your Uncle Stanley and Gertie and Maud send their love. Maud has a fine big baby boy now. We call him Bertie and he is ever such a tartar. Please do that for me.
Your loving
AUNT KATE
Curzon sat and fingered the letter. Aunt Kate was quite right when she said it did not matter to him who cleaned out his stables. Curzon really had not troubled his mind with regard to the dispensing of patronage at his headquarters. He had no knowledge of how the grooms and clerks and servants there had been appointed to their soft jobs – nor would he trouble as long as they were efficient. A single telephone message would suffice to give him Corporal Richard Cole’s services – the 4/29 London was in Terry’s division and coming back to the line soon.
But Curzon had no intention of sending for him; he formed the resolution after only brief reflection. Cole had his duty to do like everyone else, and there was no reason why he should be selected rather than any other for a safe billet. Curzon had always frowned on favouritism – he reminded himself how he had sent back Horatio Winter-Willoughby to regimental duty. He was not going to deprive the fighting forces of the services of a valuable trained N.C.O. He tore the letter up slowly. He was glad that he had reached that decision, because otherwise a request by a Lieutenant-General for the services of a corporal would have been sure to excite comment, and Cole would be sure to talk about the relationship, and Greven would hear, and from Greven the news would reach the Duchess, and from the Duchess it would go on to Emily. He did not want Emily to know he had a Cockney cousin – to shake that thought from him he plunged back furiously into his work.
In fact he was able to forget all about his cousin again in the stress and strain of the last weeks of the Battle of the Somme, and the excitement of the first entry into action of the tanks, and the need to combat the growing paralysis caused by the October rains and the exhaustion of his units. Only was he reminded of the affair when yet another letter, addressed in the same way, was put into his hands. There was a telegraph form inside addressed to Shoesmith Road, Brixton – ‘Regret to inform you Corporal R. Cole killed in action Nov. 1st.’ There was only one word on the sheet of notepaper enclosing the telegraph form, and that was printed large – MURDERER.
His hands shook a little as he tore the papers into fragments, and his face lost a little of its healthy colour. He had never been called that before. It was a hideous and unjust accusation, and it made him furiously angry; he was angrier still – although
he did not know it – because he was subconsciously aware that there were plenty of people who would most unreasonably have agreed with Aunt Kate. He did not like to be thought a murderer even by fools with no knowledge of duty and honour.
The memory of the incident poisoned his thoughts for a long time afterwards. When he went on leave – his first leave for eleven months – he was almost moved to confide in Emily about it. He knew she would appreciate and approve of his motives, and he was in need of approval, but he put the insidious temptation aside. His common sense told him that a moment’s sympathy would not be worth the humiliation of confessing the deceit he had practised for two years; and yet it was his need of sympathy which made him put his arms round Emily and kiss her with an urgency which brought colour to her cheeks and expectancy into her eyes.
After the stress and turmoil and overwork of active service it seemed like Paradise to be back in the quiet West Country, to ride a horse through the deep Somerset lanes with Emily beside him and not a soldier in sight. The freakishness of Fate had placed him in a position wherein he was compelled to work with his brain and his nerves. He had been gifted with a temperament ideal for a soldier in the presence of the enemy, knowing no fear and careless of danger, and yet his duty now consisted in never encountering danger, in forcing responsibility on others, in desk work and paper work and telephone work which drained his vitality and sapped his health.
Emily was worried about him. Despite the healthy red-brown of his cheeks (nothing whatever would attenuate that) she fretted over the lines in his forehead and the increasing whiteness of his hair, even though she tried to look upon these changes in him as her sacrifice for King and Country. There was anxiety in her eyes when she looked at him while they were in the train returning to London – the Duke had expressed a wish to have a long talk with Curzon before he went back to France, and, as he could not leave his official duties, Curzon was spending a day and night of his leave in London although Emily had met him at Folkestone and carried him straight off to her beloved Somerset.
The Duke was worried about the progress and conduct of the war. While talking with Curzon he seemed incapable of coming out with a downright statement or question or accusation. He listened to Curzon’s bluff phrases, and said ‘H’m’, and stroked his chin, but an instant later he harked back again, seeking reassurance. Curzon found it difficult to understand his drift. Curzon was quite ready to admit that the offensive on the Somme had been quenched in the mud without decisive results, but he was insistent that it had done much towards bringing victory within reach. The German Army was shattered, bled white; and if it had not rained so continuously in October, just when the offensive had reached Sailly-Saillisel and Bouchavesnes on the crest of the ridge, the decisive victory might have taken place then and there.
‘H’m,’ said the Duke, and after a pause he harked back once more to the aspect of the question which was specially worrying to him. ‘The casualties are heavy.’
The Duke felt that was a very mild way of putting it, considering the terrible length of the daily lists – Englishmen were dying far faster than in the Great Plague.
‘Yes,’ said Curzon. ‘But they’re nothing to what the German casualties are like. Intelligence says –’
The conclusions that the General Staff Intelligence drew from the material collected by their agents and routine workers were naturally as optimistic as they could be. The material was in general correct, but necessarily vague. Exact figures could not be expected, and the data accumulated only permitted of guesses. Pessimists would have guessed much lower. Equally naturally Curzon and his fellows approved of the conclusions reached by Intelligence. If this plan of attrition failed, there was no plan left to them, only the unthinkable alternative of stagnation in the trenches. With just that unmilitary confession of helplessness before them they would need a great deal of convincing that their only plan was unsuccessful.
‘You’re sure about this?’ asked the Duke. He wanted to be convinced, too. The task of finding someone to win the war was a heavy one for the Cabinet.
‘Quite sure,’ said Curzon, and he went on to say that as soon as fine weather permitted a resumption of the offensive a breakdown of the German defence could be looked for quite early. Tanks? Yes, he imagined that tanks might be a useful tactical accessory; they had not yet fought on his front at all, so that he could not speak from experience. It would take a great number of tanks, all the same, to kill the number of Germans necessary for victory. Only infantry, of course, can really win battles – the Duke was so eager to learn that Curzon could restate this axiom of military science without impatience. Keep the infantry up to strength, build up new divisions if possible, keep the ammunition dumps full, and victory must come inevitably.
‘I’m glad,’ said the Duke, ‘that I’ve had this chance of talking to you. We’ve been a bit – despondent, lately, here in London.’
‘There’s nothing to be despondent about,’ said Curzon. A despondent soldier means a bad soldier; Curzon would be as ashamed of being despondent as of being afraid – he would see little difference between the two conditions, in fact.
It may have been this conversation between the Duke and Curzon which turned the scale of history. Perhaps because of it the Cabinet allowed the Expeditionary Force to spend that winter preparing once more for an offensive on the present lines, and were only confirmed in their decision by the bloody failure of the great French attack launched by Nivelle with his new unlimited ideas. Curzon was at Attas when Nivelle failed, waiting to engage in his eternal task of sending divisions through the Moloch-fires of assaults on the German lines. So serious was the news that a general assembly of British generals was called to discuss it – Curzon was there, and half a dozen other Corps commanders, and Hudson and his chief, and Wayland-Leigh from the Sixth Army with Norton. When Curzon climbed out of his car with Miller behind him and saw the array of cars already arrived, and the different pennons drooping over the radiators, he guessed that something serious was in the wind. Wayland-Leigh’s car stopped immediately after his, and Curzon waited to greet his old commander before going in. The Buffalo was lame with sciatica, and he took Curzon’s arm as they went up the steps.
‘Christ knows,’ said Wayland-Leigh, hobbling along, ‘what this new how d’ye do’s about. Ouch! I bet the French have got ’emselves into trouble again.’
Wayland-Leigh’s shrewd guess was correct. When everyone was seated on the gilt chairs in the big dining-room of the château an officer on the General Staff at G.H.Q. rose to address the meeting. It was Hammond, very tall, very thin, with no chin and a lisp, but with a reputation which belied his appearance.
‘Gentlemen,’ said Hammond. ‘The news I have to tell you is such that we have not dared to allow it to reach you by the ordinary channels. It must not be written about, or telephoned about, or even spoken about outside this room.’
He paused and looked round him as he said this, and one general looked at another all round the room, before Hammond went on.
‘The French Army has mutinied.’
That made everyone stir in their seats. Half a dozen generals cleared their throats nervously. There were alarmists among them who had sometimes thought of mutiny.
‘As you all know, gentlemen, the great French offensive on the Chemin-des-Dames has failed with very heavy losses, just as you all predicted. General Nivelle promised a great deal more than he could perform.’
Wayland-Leigh and Norton grinned at the mention of Nivelle’s name, and others followed their example. Nivelle, with his gift of the gab and his vaulting ambitions, was an object of amusement to the British staff. They smiled when he was spoken about, like a music-hall audience when a comedian refers to Wigan or to kippers. But Hammond was deadly serious.
‘The point is,’ he went on, ‘eight French divisions have refused to obey orders. It is not as serious as it might be, gentlemen. There has been no Socialist movement.’ The word ‘Bolshevik’ had not yet crept into the English l
anguage, or Hammond would have used it. ‘There are no political feelings at all in these divisions. They only objected to what they call unnecessary waste of life. It is a case of –’
‘Cold feet,’ interjected Wayland-Leigh, and got a laugh.
‘Objection to a continuance of the offensive,’ said Hammond. ‘Nivelle has resigned and Pétain has taken his place. He is rounding up the mutineers with loyal troops. I don’t know what measures Pétain will take – I suppose we all know what we should recommend to him. But the fact remains, gentlemen, that for this summer the duty of maintaining pressure upon the enemy will fall on us alone. We must attack, and attack again, and go on attacking. Otherwise the enemy will undoubtedly take the opportunity of falling on our gallant allies.’
There was a sneer in Hammond’s tone at these last two words – for some time there had been a tendency in the British Army to say those words with just that same intonation; for a year no English staff officer had spoken of les braves Belges and meant it.
‘So, gentlemen, the battle at present in progress at Arras will continue. The Second Army will deliver the attack at Messines which they have had ready for some time, while plans will be perfected for a transference of pressure to the northern face of the Ypres salient and a drive to clear the Belgian coast. In this fashion, gentlemen –’
Hammond turned to the big map on the wall behind him, and introduced his hearers to the Third Battle of Ypres. It was not the Third Battle of Ypres as the long-suffering infantry were to know it. Polygon Wood and Paschendaele were mentioned, but only in passing. The concentrated efforts of the British Army for a whole summer would carry them far beyond these early objectives. Hammond indicated the vital railway junctions far to the rear which must eventually fall to them; and he lingered for a moment over the relief it would afford the Navy in the struggle against submarines if the whole Belgian coast should be cleared.
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