Canada in Flanders, Volume I

by Baron Max Aitken Beaverbrook

Map—Line occupied by British in March 1915

Once a German Taube rose in the air and lunged towards the British lines. Then began a struggle for the mastery, which goes to the machine which can mount highest and fire down upon its enemy. The Taube ringed upwards. A couple of British aeroplanes circled after it. To and fro and round and round they went, until the end came. The British machines secured the upper air, and soon we saw that the Taube was done. Probably the pilot had been wounded. The machine drooped and swooped uneasily till, like a wounded bird, it streaked down headlong far in the distance.

I walked over to where a British aeroplane was about to start on a flight. The young officer of the Royal Flying Corps in charge was as cool as though he were taking a run in a motor-car at home. "As a matter of fact," he said, "I wanted change and rest. I had spent five months in the trenches, and was worn out and tired by the everlasting monotony and drudgery of it all. So I applied for a job in the Flying Corps. It soothes one's nerves to be up in the air for a bit after living down in the mud for so long."

I watched him soar up into the morning sky and saw numerous shrapnel bursts chasing him as he sailed about over the German lines. What a quiet, easy-going holiday was this, dodging about in the air, a clear mark for the enemy's guns! But, to tell the truth, the British flying men and machines are very rarely hit. Flying in war-time is not so perilous as it looks, though it needs much skill and a calm, collected spirit.

At length the din of the gunfire ceased, and we knew that the British troops were rushing from their trenches to deal with the Germans, whose nerve the guns had shaken. Astounded as they had been by our artillery fire, the Germans were still more amazed by the rapidity of the infantry attack. The British soldiers and the Indians swept in upon them instantly till large numbers threw down their weapons, scrambled out of their trenches, and knelt, hands up, in token of surrender.

The fight swept on far beyond the German trenches, through the village, and beyond that again. The big guns occasionally joined in, and the chatter of the machine-guns rose and broke off. Now the motor ambulances began to come back—up that road down which the finger pointed to Neuve Chapelle. They lurched past us as we stood by the signpost in an intermittent stream, bearing the wounded men from the fight.

Presently the cheerful sight of German prisoners alternated with the saddening procession of ambulances. Large squads of prisoners went by, many hatless and with dirt-smeared faces, their uniforms looking as though dipped in mustard, the effect of the bursting of the British lyddite shells among them in their trenches. The dejection of defeat was on their faces.

Some of them were halted and were questioned by the General. One man turned out to be a Frankfort banker, whose chief concern later was what would become of his money, which he said had been taken charge of by some of his captors. He was also anxious to know where he would be imprisoned, and seemed relieved, if not delighted, when he heard that it would be in England.