by Jon E. Lewis
Stumbling along in the inky darkness, the intensity of which was preserved by frequent explosions, I can hardly attempt to describe my thoughts and feelings. There came a time when two horses dashed madly past us towards the rear. They had been released from their load by a shell which had killed their driver and shattered their wagon. With a crash, one of them collapsed within a yard of us, showing horribly plainly that even horse-flesh cannot be disembowelled and live. We continued going forward.
Then the darkness was temporarily relieved. A dump of Verey lights had been exploded, and a firework display, enough to confuse the most carefully contrived artillery signals, shed a fantastic light upon this hell on earth. Darkness may be awful, but when duty tells you to go and be killed and, in the going, to walk past wounded men, right and left, in the eerie light of military fireworks, the horror of it becomes almost unbearable.
Just before we arrived in our jumping-off trench something happened which I can never forget. A young soldier of my own section was struck by a shell fragment square between the eyes. His cries haunt me now. ‘Mother of God! Mother of God!’ he shrieked time and time again. We left him behind where he lay, whimpering ‘Mother of God! Good God! I’m blind!’ It got in my ears. ‘Mother of God!’ I reiterated, scarcely knowing what I was saying. Then I realized the meaning of the words. In a flash of violent emotion I denied Her there and then. If She existed, why were we here? She didn’t exist. There was no such thing. My strength was in my three to one odds. It was all chance. Oh for a Blighty one. Even the fourth chance, death, was becoming less dreadful. It would take me out of it all, whatever else might happen. So, at last, we arrived in the front line.
Zero was 7.15 a.m. In a few minutes we should endure the supreme test. Furtive peeps over the parapet revealed nothing of the enemy trenches, for a mist lay over all. What if our artillery had failed to cut ‘his’ wire? Were his machine-gunners waiting to mow us down as we struggled to break a way through his entanglements? The monotonous hammering of these questions must have had different effects on different men.
In me, strangely enough, they induced feelings of utter weariness followed by spasms of fatalistic carelessness, which I could have wished to last the whole war through. But our emotions come and go like clouds in the sky, and my new-found peace of mind was short-lived.
Suddenly the noise of the guns eased off. For a second or two there was quiet. Then the fury of our barrage dropped like a wall of roaring sound before us. By some means the signal to advance was given and understood and we found ourselves walking forward into the mist, feeling utterly naked. Who can express the sensations of men brought up in trench warfare suddenly divested of every scrap of shelter?
Forward we stumbled into a mist that seemed to grow ever thicker. So great was the noise that the order to keep in touch with one another was passed only by means of shouting our hardest, and our voices sounded like flutes in a vast orchestra of fiends. All at once I became conscious of another sound. A noise like the crisp crackle of twigs and branches, burning in a bonfire just beyond my vision in the mist, made me think I must be approaching some burning building. I realized, when my neighbour on the right dropped with a bullet in the abdomen, that the noise was machine-gun and rifle-fire, and I felt the tiniest bit happier when I touched my entrenching tool which, contrary to regulations, was attached to the front of my equipment instead of the side.
Presently we came to the first enemy trench. How one’s thoughts race at such a time! But the surge of apprehension dropped, the steeled muscles relaxed and our hearts ceased their frantic overtime – at least, mine did – when we saw that our artillery had done its work well and truly. We had to pass this trench, but there was no need to jump over it for it was almost filled in-blown in. Maybe the ground over which we walked already buried the enemy we had hoped to slay.
After scrambling over what remained of this trench, I found myself with another signaller, cut off completely from the rest by the mist. We had come close together in our scrambling and remained together. We were alone in a mist which we began to suspect was not altogether made by Nature. Here was a fine mess. Fryer (that was my companion’s name) and myself cut off from our comrades, not knowing whither we were going nor how far we should go. What should we do? We did what irresponsible private soldiers could do – dropped into the nearest shell hole. Discussing our position over a Woodbine, shared by the simple and wasteful expedient of breaking it in two, we went to sleep!
An hour later I was nudged into wakefulness by Fryer. It was considerably quieter, but bullets were still zipping past. The mist had cleared a little and visibility was extended to about 400 or 500 yards. Together we raised our heads, cautiously, above the shell hole, and saw not a soul. Suddenly, from Fryer, ‘Down! Keep down!’ and he suited the action to the word, pulling me with him.
‘What the hell are you playing at?’ I asked. ‘Keep down a bit,’ he said; then, a moment or two later, ‘Look behind.’ Carefully I raised my head again and looked. Behind us, in a part of the trench we had crossed that had escaped the general smashing in of high explosives, was a German. A brave man, braver than either Fryer or I, was standing in that bit of trench. With a rifle to his shoulder he was firing steadily in the direction of our old front line, and by his side, keeping under what little cover there was, was another, busily loading a second rifle. I raised my own to shoot the first active German enemy I had seen, but Fryer pulled me back. ‘Don’t be a bloody fool,’ he said. ‘Don’t you see we’re surrounded?’ I won’t worry you with the argument I had with Fryer – nor with myself – about what was our duty. Enough that discretion won and, astonishing though it may seem, we lay down and went to sleep again.
We awoke a second time and fell to discussing plans to get back to our lines. If the worst came to the worst we considered how we might manage to be safely taken prisoners. Once more we carefully peeped over the lip of our shell hole, but the heroes of an hour ago were no longer there. Our inaction was getting on my nerves. I decided to look about me to see what had been happening, but Fryer wouldn’t come. He, poor devil, had started to crack up.
Gingerly I climbed out of our friendly shelter. The attack was at that stage when one might walk about almost with impunity. There were too many targets, I suppose, for one more to attract much attention. Besides, everyone was busy, either finding out where he was or digging himself in. Signal flares were going up half a mile away on our right front and I already began to imagine myself being court-martialled for shirking. What a contrast to my feelings of a short time before when we were ‘surrounded.’
It was with real thankfulness that I found the captain of our company. He was sheltering in a shell hole just as Fryer and I had done. I grew positively superior when he insisted on telling me how his servant had saved his life. In tones as shaken as Fryer’s, he described how a tin plate which his servant had put in his haversack had deflected a bullet which otherwise would most certainly have killed him. I fancied I knew where one Military Medal would go. Then he remembered his men. ‘Go back,’ he said to me, ‘and tell the C.O. that we are absolutely lost; too much damned mist and smoke; and ask for orders. Is there anyone with you? Fryer? Take him with you.’
We went back, Fryer and I, reported to the adjutant of one of the battalions of our brigade who was acting brigadier, all his superiors having been killed or wounded, and received instructions to remain in the trench. Messages had already gone out, we were told, ordering a general withdrawal to our starting-point. The attack had failed. Pray God we should not have it to do all over again.
I am sorry I cannot finish this short account of a ‘push’ with some stirring deed of valour. Fritz soon became aware of our intention to abandon the attack and it was not long before his artillery was blowing our trench to pieces.
Fryer was killed at my side. I cannot describe the ‘incident.’ I saw about as much red as was left in the poor chap’s face when he settled in a crouching posture – dead. From that time until we we
re relieved I waited every second for a similar end. I was buried, and got out. I trembled violently for ten solid minutes with shell-shock, but recovered and had to hang on. When the relief did come it was due more to sheer fatigue than self-control that we refrained from running out of the trenches.
Our whole brigade had suffered very heavy losses. We were taken behind the lines for a rest, addressed by our G.O.C., told how, through lack of information, we had valiantly attacked a force three times our number and, after being brought up to strength, we were sent in to do it again.
Private Fred Ball enlisted in the Liverpool ‘Pals’ in January 1915; crossed to France on November 7th, 1915; served in France continuously during the remainder of the War. Was wounded once – very slightly – near Arras in August or September 1918. After the Armistice went into Germany with the Army of Occupation, leaving there to be demobilized at the end of March 1919. He neither sought nor received promotion.
DELVILLE WOOD
Capt. S. J. Worsley, D.S.O., M.C.
Delville Wood is a name, even now, full of sadness and the suppressed agony of thousands who had to make its acquaintance. Probably nearly as many men remained in it as came out of it whole, and no one fortunate to escape from this hell can think of it without recalling hours of suffering and the names of many good comrades now no more.
Towards the end of September 1916 there seemed to be a lull in the Battle of the Somme. The glory of the first great achievements had somewhat faded with the realization of their cost and the doubtful value of their gains. One supposed that the High Command knew what they were doing, though even that is doubtful now. Most of us hoped that the lull meant a discontinuance of the battle, which seemed a hopeless hammering at a resourceful enemy in one of his strongest sectors. It was, however, not for us to argue why the strong rather than the weak positions were always to be attacked.
Anyhow our battalion, which had previously been in the line in front of Guillemont, moved into Delville Wood to take over the line on the eastern edge of the wood. The journey, as usual, began soon enough to bring us into the danger zone about dusk and was a nightmare. We were led by guides who had hardly been able to leave the front line and were hopeless, while landmarks had long ago been blown out of existence. Every semblance of a trench seemed full of dead-sodden, squelchy, swollen bodies. Fortunately the blackening faces were invisible except when Verey lights lit up the indescribable scene. Not a tree stood whole in that wood.
The weary tramp in single file went on for about three hours. Men carried heavy loads of equipment, bombs, rifle ammunition, Lewis guns, petrol tins of water, gas helmets, and so on. How they cursed as they one after the other collided with some obstacle or fell flat on a dead body. ‘Pass it along when you’re all up,’ ‘Mind the wire,’ ‘Mind the hole on the left’ – interspersed with humorous though trite remarks as to the first five years being the worst.
Eventually, after much searching, but without serious mishap, we found our sector. Two companies of the battalion were in front and two in support some distance back. Battalion Headquarters lay behind the wood. C’ Company, in which I had charge of a platoon, was on the right flank in a shallow, incomplete depression shown on the map as Edge Trench, its name indicating its position skirting the wood.
By this time it was just after midnight and all was fairly quiet. As far as we knew there was no particular cause for alarm. The officers and senior N.C.O.s had got the hang of things and knew roughly the position of the other troops in the neighbourhood and of the enemy, who seemed quite a good distance away immediately in front, though away to the right he was considerably closer to the line.
I was at the time twenty-one years of age, my company commander twenty-two, but we had both had a good deal of experience – sufficient to realize that in case of anything like a bombardment a position on the edge of a very well known wood would be no fun. Hence we decided to push forward. Each platoon would send a strong section some fifty to one hundred yards ahead to dig itself in. If we were left in peace a night or two, our men, nearly all miners, would join up the posts and make a continuous and less clearly defined front line. So the detached posts went out.
The wished-for peace was not for us, unfortunately. At 2 a.m., the officers met the company commander in the one and only dug-out to discuss ‘work done and work proposed’ for the daily return, and to look at some preliminary orders for a rather big advance three days ahead. After that I was temporarily off duty, but I had no sooner settled myself in the dug-out for what I considered a well-earned ‘shut-eye’ till stand-to before dawn, when pandemonium broke out. It was soon apparent that something very unpleasant was about to happen, so we stood to arms, groused a good deal, and waited. The waiting was always the hardest part of it all. The hours till 6 a.m. seemed terribly long, but our casualties had not been more than fifteen all told. The worst of it was that the wounded and even the runners, stout fellows though they were, could not get away or reach Headquarters with our tale of woe.
Just about six o’clock the Germans came on. They never approached closer than 150 yards from our trench and they made an excellent target for Lewis guns and lost heavily. By 8.30 a.m. I heard that the company commander was out of action, though not seriously wounded. Then came the even more serious news that my fellow subaltern had been killed on the right, where the enemy had forced an entrance. The battalion on the right had also been forced to abandon their line. This left me very much alone, with between but fifty and sixty men who could use a rifle. Some of these were wounded, but any escape from the trench was out of the question.
By 9 a.m. there was comparative peace, except in our minds when we grasped the seriousness of the situation. It seemed that the left had also broken and that our two depleted companies were in the blue. The left company had fared better than we. On our right the Germans and we shared a trench – only a narrow barrier separating us from them. Moreover, this barrier was on the wrong side of Company Headquarters, which, with our greatcoats, food, and orders, was lost to us. The only thing to do was to strengthen the barrier as best we could and lie low. There would probably be dirty work at that barrier later on.
Conditions in the wood were now worse than ever. Most of us felt sick and ill even when unwounded. Food and water were very short and we had not the faintest idea when any more would be obtainable. By the end of the next day several, including myself, had dysentery, and that in a ghastly battered trench with no prospect of medical attention. After all, we stood and lay on putrefying bodies and the wonder was that the disease did not finish off what the shells of the enemy had started.
The day was, in fact, uneventful; but as evening drew on we again prepared for the fray. It was not to be supposed that the success of the enemy would not be pushed home, and, as far as we could tell, only two weak companies stood between them and the possession of Delville Wood. Sure enough, the attack began at dusk and again it lasted for three hours. This time it was no frontal attack across the open but a determined push down the shared trench and behind in the shelter of the stumps of trees. It is difficult, and even a week later it was difficult, to recall those three hours. It is only on Armistice Day that I can live them again; but I don’t want to tell anyone about it. There was hand-to-hand fighting with knives, bombs, and bayonets; cursing and brutality on both, sides such as men, can be responsible for when it is a question of ‘your life or mine’; mud and filthy stench; dysentery and unattended wounds; shortage of food and water and ammunition.
The fighting ceased and a curiously fitful peace settled over the scene. In some ways fighting was preferable – one’s mind was distracted. Inactivity in such surroundings was harder than risking one’s life. For an hour or two that night I lay on a board in a bay of the trench and slept. But an hour before dawn we were at it again, getting ready for the expected onslaught at daybreak. Why this did not come I have never been able to make out. There was no reason at all why the wood should not have been recaptured completely, especially as, on l
ooking through our supplies, we could not muster more than 500 rounds of rifle-ammunition and thirty bombs.
By this time I was getting beyond effective command, but my senior sergeant was still very much alive and as aggressive as ever. His suggestion was that we should take a big risk as no attack appeared to be developing and have a shot at regaining Company Headquarters. I am afraid that the object of the projected operation was food rather than secret orders. Four others volunteered to see what could be done, and before dawn was far advanced we peeped carefully over the barrier half-expecting something unpleasant. One German was asleep on a fire-step five or six yards from us, and there was not a sign of activity. In these circumstances we agreed to risk it. I, being armed with a revolver, was to act as a sort of advanced guard while the others were to trail behind with bombs and bayonets to deal with any opposition. The essential factor for success was quietness – no bomb throwing or shooting except as a last resource. Nothing but a bayonet was in fact necessary, much to our amazement. Some half-dozen weary and comatose Germans were quietly and expeditiously removed from the active list, and Company Headquarters was gained in safety.
Yet there were no reprisals. Apparently no German officer or N.C.O. came round, and to our joy we were able unmolested to move the best part of our barrier to a point 50 yards beyond the Headquarters dug-out. We found all the officers’ kit, food, and orders intact, but neatly packed up as though for removal. The mystery of this non-interference is unexplained and I can only surmise that a few tired troops had got left behind, although the main forces of the enemy had for some reason or other been withdrawn. All that day not a shot was fired, though our nerves had gone almost to pieces and we were sure we should be amply repaid for our early morning escapade.