I had not gone far when I met four of our men carrying on a stretcher the dead body of the Battery Staff Sergeant Artificer. He had dropped asleep on one of the guns and, as the tractor moved on, he had fallen forward, head downwards, beneath the gun wheel, which had passed over him, along the whole length of his body, crushing him to death. They said he died before they could get him out. He was a good man and a very skilled worker, full of pluck and spirit. The last thing he had done for me was to get everything ready for rendering the guns unserviceable in case we should have to abandon them. There was no chance of decent burial for him here, but I had his body placed upon an empty trench cart, which was being towed by a lorry of another Battery, and put two of our men in charge of it. They buried him the next day or the day after in a cemetery near Portogruaro.
About 7 a.m., as I was still making my way back through the traffic towards our guns, it was reported that enemy cavalry patrols had been seen to the north of the road, and that shots had been exchanged. For a moment there was some panic and confusion, but a scheme of defence was quickly organised. No one had supposed that they could yet be so near. I found Bixio rallying some Infantrymen, with eloquent words and great gestures, and an Italian Infantry Major, calm and smiling, was putting out a screen of machine gunners and riflemen across the road itself and along a hedge five hundred yards to the north of it. All was in readiness for putting our guns completely out of action. There would be nothing else to do, if the enemy appeared, for we had no gun ammunition, and it was impossible to get on, until the whole traffic block in front of us had been shifted forward. But I told Bixio that I should do nothing to the guns, unless there was some evidence that the enemy was really approaching with a superiority of force over our own.
The enemy, however, did not at that time reappear and the best bit of hustling traffic management that I had yet witnessed during the retreat, now took place. The northern road was at last clear at Latisana, and the authorities turned their attention to us. A breakdown gang appeared and a number of new tractors and lorries with refills of petrol. Civilian carts whose drivers remained, were ordered to drive on, those which had been abandoned were overturned to one side into the ditches, and dead horses and wreckage due to bombing or the brief moments of panic were likewise thrust off the road. Relays of fresh drivers took over all the lorries and tractors which would still go. The rest went into the ditch on top of the dead horses and derelict carts. The heavier loads which single tractors had been pulling were split up between two or more. In a surprisingly short time the whole mass began to move.
Here I parted from Medola, who had been a very good friend to us. Our three guns got a new tractor to themselves and I got up beside the driver. And so at last we entered Latisana. Our new driver was immensely enthusiastic, but very excited. He told me that he had had two brothers killed in the war and had applied, when the retreat began, to be transferred from Mechanical Transport to the Infantry. That morning, he said, he had heard General Pettiti, who was our Army Corps Commander, give the order that all the British Batteries must first be got across the river and only then the Italian. I said that I saw no good reason for this preference, but that anyhow he was driving the last three British guns. This pleased him tremendously. By now I was wrapped up in a new and dry Italian blanket, which I had taken from an abandoned cart by the roadside.
Our tractor, less enthusiastic than its driver, broke down continually. It was rumoured that the bridge had been blown up already, and there were wild screams of despair from a crowd of women, who came running past us. At last we turned the last corner and came in sight of the Tagliamento. The bridge was still intact. Italian Generals were rushing to and fro, gesticulating, giving orders. General Pettiti sent a special orderly to ask me if mine were the last British guns. I told him yes. Our tractor broke down three times on the bridge itself. But at last we were over. One of our party had an Italian flag and waved it and cried "Viva l'Italia!" Not long after, the bridge went up, with an explosion that could be heard for miles around.
CHAPTER XXIII
FROM THE TAGLIAMENTO TO TREVISO
I heard later that the Major and his party had reached Latisana the previous day. Winterton had joined them near Muzzano. They had marched for forty-eight hours practically without food and with only some three hours' rest in stray halts. They had been magnificent, but they were utterly done, and the Major, who had been most done of all, told me afterwards that it had made him cry to watch them hobbling along,—some of them men too old or of too low a medical category to have passed for the Infantry,—and to hear them singing,
"What's the use of worrying?
It never was worth while.
So pack up your sorrows in your old kit bag,
And smile, smile, smile!"
The spirit of the men in the retreat from Mons was not finer than the spirit of those men of ours.