CHAPTER THIRTEEN
We were by no means well acquainted with our new position, and one night shortly after our arrival, two of the men who had been sent out to reconnoitre, were captured by the enemy, who let them go, however, after stripping them to the skin.
When they returned they had big bayonet wounds in their hips, and were suffering greatly both from the wounds and exposure. You can imagine our feelings at such wanton cruelty.
Previous to this for some time I hadn’t been given any scouting duty and had been resting, but a few nights after this occurrence, shortly after dusk, I was sent to a listening post, which was situated to the right front of our open flank. The ground was very broken and the temperature was touching on the zero mark. Before starting out, we had just got our night issue of rum. A lance-corporal accompanied me, and after lots of manœuvring and stumbling through shell holes half filled with slush, we arrived at the place where I had to listen for movements of German artillery, transports, troops, etc.
We crawled to the edge of the bank, which overlooked a creek or canal. We knew the German lines were just across that short space. The lance-corporal said he would see that some one should be sent to relieve me in half an hour; then he departed. He had not gone more than a hundred paces, I should judge, when the German artillery let loose. It seemed as if a thousand hells had erupted. I was dumbfounded. I wiggled backward on my stomach, until I slid into a shell hole full of water and mud. I did not mind the cold; it helped to brace me—to realize fully the situation in which I was placed. The shell fire was lighting up the heavens; splinters, slugs, and bullets filled the air.
I began saying my prayers. (I thought this would be my last listening duty on earth.) I crouched as low as the slush in the hole would allow me. Even while in this position, bullets and shrapnel embedded themselves so near me that, had I lifted my head, I should have been plugged instantly.
The hellish bombardment seemed unceasing. I was cramped and numb. How long the firing lasted I do not know. At last, however, I became conscious that the clouds were clearing away and I discerned a pale moon. I tried to drag myself out of the freezing slush, but couldn’t. All the power in my body seemed gone. The shelling had ceased and there was a dead silence. I knew I was freezing to death. I once even tried to place the muzzle of my rifle under my chin and blow my head off, but I was unable to feel for the rifle. My hands had lost sense of touch. My lower limbs were insensible. I gave up all hopes of help or of ever leaving the shell hole—alive.
What seemed a long time after I had deemed myself lost I heard some one in the vicinity. I wasn’t able to lift my head. I tried to speak. I was as one dead, with the exception of my brain.
The next thing I knew something was being poured down my throat. Some one was attending to me but I was unconcerned. I wanted only to die. If I could but have spoken, I would have begged the men who were attending me to put me out of my agony. After a while, I recognized them as our men. They were rubbing and slapping my body for all they were worth. Now and again one of them put his water bottle to my mouth. At first I could not make out what he was trying to pour down my throat, but at last I recognized it as rum. I forced myself to drink it. Then they rubbed my abdomen and legs with some of it as briskly as they could. One of them exchanged his kilt for mine; then they both wrapped their greatcoats around me, and, between them, managed to carry me back to the trenches—to safety.
The jolting on the way back started my blood circulating. It is beyond me to explain exactly the feeling. My stomach began aching as if it contained boiling lead; then a feeling as if a million electrically charged wires had commenced to burn in the lower part of my abdomen and down to my lower limbs. I had the desire to shout out loud; whether or not I did, to this day I cannot tell. I must have gone completely insane with the pain for a while, for later I found myself struggling with a group of men, and they were urging me to keep quiet. They poured lots of rum into me, and I began to feel much better; in fact, more like myself, except that my legs and feet were like lumps of lead.
During this time—since my rescue from the shell hole—the Germans had made a charge and were repulsed. The Black Watch had taken a line of their trench and were holding it. Two men had been sent out to find what had happened to the lance-corporal and myself, as the company commander had been expecting our report. They found the lance-corporal, riddled with bullets, not far from where he had left me. When they came across me I had done an eight hours’ stretch of duty.
I stayed in the reserve trench until we went to billets, a couple of days after this. We were looking forward to spending Christmas in billets, but were disappointed.
We had hardly been “cushy” three days, when we were sent to hold a position on the left flank of an English battalion of what we believed to be the Sussex Regiment. It was just two days before Christmas when we took up this position.
It was much quieter here. Snow had fallen during the night, giving the ground a sort of peaceful appearance, except for a few dark patches where some “Jack Johnsons” or “Black Marias” had landed toward dawn. (It was Christmas Day.) Just after “stand down,” our mail was issued. It consisted mostly of parcels. Our part of the trench was very fortunate. Every man had at least two letters and as many parcels. I received three in the same handwriting and a two-pound box of chocolate almonds. Parcels containing socks, mittens, scarfs, etc., were pounced upon by all hands, as these articles were very much needed at this time. Next in importance came the cigarettes, of which we received a goodly supply.
I need hardly say that we all tasted one another’s luxuries—shortbread, chocolates, and currant cakes (which had to be eaten mostly with a spoon because of the rough handling they had had)—and we exchanged confidences about our letters whether they were from Miss Campbell, Mrs. Low, or Uncle Sandy.
Every Tommy, every Jock, learns to know and to love his trench mate as a brother. The men in the “ditches” feel as if they all belonged to the one mother, sharing each other’s confidences, both pleasant and sad. There is no selfishness—not even a thought of it—“over there.”
We were all sitting round the fire-steps of our trenches, thinking, ever thinking, and wondering how many of us would live to see the same sun rise on another Christmas Day. The sun was red. It appeared to be dripping-red—with blood, when a slight commotion started up along to the right. I grasped my rifle and at the same time looked round the little traverse. I saw a few chaps with their heads over the parapet—which seemed unwise and extremely dangerous. I thought we had been surprised by the Huns, and took a glance in the direction of their trenches, which looked as quiet as our own. But I could see thin lines of smoke rising up at irregular intervals from the fires they had built. Almost at the same instant my eye caught sight of a figure some six hundred yards to our right proceeding in the direction of the boches’ trenches; and, to crown all, he was a British Tommy!
I thought the man must have gone out of his mind, and when I looked at where he came from, it seemed as if the whole regiment was viewing the daring proceedings of this solitary individual “between the lines.” At that part the trenches were much nearer than at ours. They seemed there about two hundred yards apart, while ours were about five hundred yards distant from Fritz.
I saw the solitary Tommy walk right on to within a few yards of the German entanglements and pause a minute; then a boche’s head could be seen. At this, Tommy picked his way over the entanglements very cautiously.
My heart was in my mouth! I could scarcely keep from shouting when he reached the edge of the enemy parapet and—disappeared!
By this time our regiment was practically all on the fire-step, breathlessly watching and ready for what might happen after the disappearance of this “madcap.”
Five minutes more elapsed. Then a head bobbed up at the same spot we had been watching, and out of the trench came—the selfsame Tommy. He was carrying something in his hand. My eyes kept steady on him until he reached his own parapet, where he stood a moment flourishing this article; then, clasping it to him as if prizing it, he got down into the trench. While he had stood there for a moment, his fellow trench-mates threw out their arms to take his precious bundle from him, but as I say, he seemed to hold tightly on to it. When I looked back at the place he had just left, the Germans were waving their helmets, with heads above the parapet. It was Christmas all right! and we certainly got a Santa Claus surprise in watching these unusual proceedings.
They were getting bolder on both sides at this part of the line, and a few men began walking on their parapets, finally coming closer and then meeting men from the enemy trench. Then followed a football match with regimental shirts tied up. To see those Tommies charging with their shoulders and explaining the game to the Germans, who were not so well acquainted with it, was a Christmas festival in itself that will never be forgotten by those who witnessed it.
[We found out afterward that “Spud” Smith—who had just received a lovely “currant bun” from home and was overjoyed with it—was jumping round and making so much noise about it, that the fellows dared him to take it over to the Germans and wish them “A Merry Christmas.” He at once threw off his equipment and made toward them, where he received his Christmas present in the form of a bottle of “schnapps.” “Spud” Smith was the madcap of his regiment.]
A few minutes after midnight, we were brought back to war again by the Germans shelling us all along the line.
Everything was tolerably quiet, with the exception of an occasional shelling from either side, until New Year’s Eve, when an infernal row got up and on New Year’s Day we had about one hundred and thirty casualties. The shelling grew worse, and we discovered that the Saxons had been relieved by the Prussians. Twice they charged us in mass formation, and we were forced to retire to our second-line trenches. It was their idea and intention to break through our lines to get to Calais in time for the Kaiser’s birthday. This was the beginning of their big drive. Although we got a severe cutting up, we managed to hold all the ground we had, despite their mass formation, which is a stern and dreadful thing to face.
One morning, about the middle of January, the coal boxes, Jack Johnsons and Black Marias were just simply shaking the earth. The German airplanes had been very active these last few days, and it seemed they were giving their heavy artillery the proper range on our lines. The Jack Johnsons were landing to the right of our regiment and were gradually working their way up toward us. We could see them tearing up parts of the trenches—smashing up men, whose limbs were sent flying up through the air. The sight was really too frightful to recall.
Orders were given that the Black Watch should stand to its post and that no man was to retire. But as the heavy shells drew nearer, smashing everything up, they proved too much for the recruits who had joined us only within the last few days, and they made for the reserve trenches. By this time the Germans were beginning to make their advance in waves. Word was passed along that our regiment should retire to its reserve trenches, but it came too late for a few of us,—as we were already pumping it into the Germans. Those who had retired were firing over our heads at the advancing Huns, thus making it dangerous for us to withdraw.
Just as I had made up my mind that we must get back somehow, Sergeant Johnstone crept to my side and said; “Cassells, let’s stick it out. This might last only a few minutes more and then it’ll be all right again.”
“All right, Johnstone,” I said; and we shook hands.
Our own shells were bursting so close to our front that they were showering us with earth and stones.
I saw the nearest Germans about a couple of hundred yards away.
Then suddenly a dark curtain dropped before my eyes.