As I drew near the hospital I was obliged to pass by a German prison camp. I suppose my thoughts were wandering that night. At least the first thing I realized was seeing through the rain the bright blade of a bayonet thrust at my breast; then I heard the voice of the guard: “Quick! Are you friend?”
I stopped suddenly. I had not heard him challenge me the first time, which he surely must have done. I realized in an instant my position. “Yes,” I shouted, “friend.”
“It’s a good job you spoke, sir,” warned the guard, and then he said, quickly, “Pass, friend.”
Although I had realized my position, I had not felt the slightest alarm, but now as I walked along in the darkness a strange fear took possession of me, so that I shook almost violently. I have been challenged often by sentries since that night, but it has never been necessary to inquire more than once; nor have I ever been halted so suddenly by a pointed bayonet.
I found the out-going chaplain, Father Coté, packing his bed-roll, and as he packed he gave me all the advice necessary to an incoming chaplain. The following morning he went up the line, and immediately after lunch I left No. 2 C. I. B. D., where I had been most cordially treated by both officers and men, and came to No. 7 Canadian General Hospital.
Chapter XXVII
Hospitals and Trains
No. 7 Canadian General was only one of a group of hospitals situated along the highway that led from Etaples to Camiers. There were seven or eight large hospitals in all, though only two were Canadian, the others being British. Although I was quartered at No. 7, I had also to attend the other Canadian Hospital, No. 1. There were about 2,500 beds in No. 7, and about 2,000 in No. 1.
At one end of No. 1, there was a marquee chapel-tent and at the rear of No. 7 there was a low wooden chapel called “Church of Our Lady, Help of Christians,” but this was used mostly by the British Catholics.
The military hospital in France usually consisted of a number of long, low, detached one-story huts, built in rows, each row behind the other. Between the rows ran little lanes just wide enough to permit two ambulances to pass. There was a door in each end of every hut, so that it was very easy to go from one hut into the other. Each hut was a ward; in some hospitals they were numbered; in others they were lettered. Down each side of the aisle, running from door to door, was a row of beds—low iron beds covered with army blankets. In most of the hospitals there were no counterpanes, but there were always clean white sheets and pillow-cases. At one end of the ward were two small cubicles, one of which was the nurses’ office, the other a kind of pantry and emergency kitchen, though nearly all the cooking was done in the general kitchen, which was a special hut.
Into these large, quiet wards, far away from the roar of the heavy guns, the crackle of machine-guns and rifles, the wounded lads came, carried by train and ambulance.