All horses and mules were carefully examined and checked, with the result that Divisional, Corps and Army Orders became full of notices as to animals "found." Spare animals are excellent things on active service, but awkward at official inspections.
Motor-lorry trips were organized to different places, of which Lille was by far the most popular; and once a week a full load of cheery people would drive off from Warlus at 8 a.m. in the morning for several hours' journey through a land covered with frozen snow. The weather was like at our first initiation into active service—bitterly cold with heavy snow and hard frost, but generally a bright sun, though a biting wind.
On January 19th, like a bolt from the blue, Lieutenant-Colonel Macdonald, D.S.O., Manchester Regiment, arrived to take over command. Needless to say, no one had heard any tidings of his impending arrival, but a few days later Colonel Stapledon was ordered off to the 2nd Manchesters, and Colonel Macdonald assumed command. We were sorry to lose Colonel Stapledon. He had been with us but a short while, but he was universally popular, as, indeed, his successor became in a very short time.
During the month of January 7 officers and 148 men were demobilized, and our ration strength was down to 20 officers and 382 men, enabling two company cook-houses to be closed.
The month of February saw even further reduction, as, in addition to demobilization, 1 officer and 96 men were sent on February 26th up to the Army of Occupation. This rapid disintegration of the battalion brought most activities to a standstill. The railway piquets which we had had to maintain at Arras to keep order and stop looting were recalled; education died for want of instructors; football teams, concert parties faded in their time away. The battalion was rapidly approaching its cadre strength, and its days as a unit were numbered.
There is one event that occurred during this month that cannot be passed over in silence. On February 14th, the second anniversary of the departure of the battalion to France, our old Commanding Officer, Colonel Fletcher, died from pneumonia following upon a sudden attack of influenza. It is difficult for one who knew him so intimately, and worked in such close touch with him for so many months, to write of him with becoming restraint. As a Commanding Officer many found him hard and exacting, but he was even more exacting and hard on himself. His whole mind and his whole energy were devoted to his battalion to a degree that only those who saw most of him could ever realize. Wonderfully strong himself, he impressed others with his own strength; lofty in ideals, he led others to a higher plane. Nothing that was mean or selfish, that was not strictly true and honest, would he tolerate for a moment; and never was a man more outspoken in his condemnation of anything that was not right in the highest sense. By his devotion to his battalion he worked himself beyond the measure of human endurance, and there can be no doubt that his death was due to the havoc wrought on his frame by the endless work, physical and mental, which he accomplished for his battalion even after the gassing at Armentières, the severe physical effects of which he refused to recognize. Colonel Fletcher represented the highest type of British gentleman, and it was with thoughts of pride as well as sorrow that we learnt that in his last hours his mind ran unceasingly on the comfort and safety of "his boys."
The last days of the battalion require but a brief telling. More drafts left for the Army of Occupation; more officers and men went off to complete the tour of rest camps, "delousing camps," demobilization camps, and finally dispersal camps en route for civilian life. From Christmas onwards the melancholy break-up of our old battalion, of which we had been such proud and happy members, had been proceeding apace. Friendships that had seemed the normal part of our existence were now rudely rent asunder. Men whom we had grown to admire and love vanished one by one, perhaps never to be seen again. The memories of the past grew daily more distant and more unreal as the prospect of civilian life came steadily nearer.
On March 18th the fragments of the battalion, now one company strong, moved to the Brigade Concentration Camp at Maroeuil; and here the gradually diminishing force remained till May 11th, ever expecting to move, only to be disappointed again.
At last, after one or two false alarms, the party, having handed over all its animals, proceeded at 9.5 p.m. on May 11th, with all its transport vehicles, by train for the Base.
At 10.45 p.m. the engine did its best still further to delay matters by leaving the train on a downward slope and coming back to meet it when the train had gathered a good speed. Several vehicles of ours were destroyed, and several men of other cadres injured. A bridge party, consisting of the Commanding Officer, Adjutant, Quartermaster, and Lieutenant Wilson, seated on plush chairs in a cattle truck, was indeed slightly disarranged, but beyond the destruction of the whisky bottle only slight injuries were inflicted.