The British soldier

by E. J. Hardy

We are so accustomed, however, to read of officers saying, when mortally wounded, to their men, "Do your duty, my lads, and never mind me," that their self-forgetfulness almost ceases to surprise.

One officer was hit, and his men were for putting on his first field dressing. "No," said he, "I am past that, but for God's sake don't let the Germans break the line."

There was a British gunner whose wonderful marksmanship was the talk of his battery. One shell blew up a railway station, the second fell plumb into a German victualling train, and the third lopped off the team of an advancing battery. Finally the German gunners hit him in the legs. Even then he would not leave the field. "Carry me to the gun and let me have one more shot," he implored. His comrades did so, and without a groan he took his last aim.

A similar instance of self-sacrifice for the sake of duty was related in The Evening News by Private R.G. Tipper, of the 3rd Battalion Grenadier Guards. "There was a man in the trenches who had not got a clean sheet; he was always getting into trouble for one thing or another. He got hit in the left arm. He crawled back to the nearest field ambulance, and had his wound dressed. We advised him to go to the rear, but he refused, and with difficulty made his way back to the firing line. There, despite his wounded arm, he steadily went on firing at the enemy. Some time passed, and he was shot in the right arm. Again he made the difficult and painful journey to the field hospital, and again, with both his arms injured, he stubbornly insisted on crawling back to the trench. By-and-by he collapsed, shot clean through the body. Several comrades ran to him and raised him. 'You must get back now,' they told him. 'No,' he said with a white face, 'let me be. The blighters have done me this time.' His rifle still rested where he had been firing, supported in its loophole. 'Hoist me up before you go,' he muttered, 'I'll give them another round, so help me! Prop me up, quick.' They knew they could do nothing. They propped him up beside his rifle and went to the other wounded men. With fumbling hands the dying man pointed his rifle, and let drive two more rounds at the enemy. Then he slipped down dead."

The fighting around Ypres involved a great amount of very risky observation work. In many instances artillery subalterns took up dangerous positions well in advance of the front line of infantry, and, telephone in hand, gave the range to the gunners with perfect calmness. A young lieutenant posted himself in a tower a few hundred yards from the German trenches. He telephoned his orders regularly for half an hour. Then he said, without any trace of excitement, to the operator on the other side, "I hear the Germans coming up the stairs. I have my revolver. Don't believe anything more you hear." With these words he dropped the receiver; and he has not been heard of since.

When there is the excitement and stimulus of a "gallery" it is comparatively easy to be brave; but think of the heroism of such lonely work as that which was done by Lieutenant F.H.N. Davidson, R.F.A. Early in the day our gunners had found it impossible to locate certain German guns which were fast rendering our trenches untenable. The country was so flat that there was no possible point of vantage from which the gunners could observe except the steeple of the church in Lourges. But the Germans knew that as well as we did, so the church was being vigorously shelled, and already no less than twelve lyddite shells had been pitched into it. It was the duty of Lieutenant Davidson to "observe," so he calmly went to the church, climbed the already tottering tower, and, seated on the top, proceeded to telephone his information to the battery. In consequence German battery after battery was silenced, the infantry, which at one time was in danger of extermination, was saved, and the position, in spite of an attack in overwhelming force by the enemy, was successfully held. The church was rendered a scrap heap, but still Davidson sat on the remnants of his tower. For seven solid hours expecting death every moment, he calmly scanned the country, and telephoned his reports. At dark his task was done, and he came down to rejoin the battery. As he left the ruins a fall of timber in one of the burning houses lit up everything with a sudden glare, there was the crack of a rifle—the German trenches were only a few hundred yards away—and a bullet passed through the back of his neck and out through his mouth. But, without hurrying his pace, he walked to his battery, gave them his final information, and then said, "I think I'd better go and find the field ambulance, for the beggars have drilled a hole in me that needs plugging." And he walked half a mile to the nearest "collecting point."

A man who was struck with four bullets in his thighs remarked, "What luck to have got all four; that means three comrades more to fight the Germans."

A private of the 1st Warwicks was hit with a shrapnel bullet at the battle of Mons. He said, "Good luck to the old regiment," and rolled over on his back dead. What esprit de corps! What forgetfulness of self!

The gunner who wrote the following had the freedom from self which enables us to sympathise: "I had comparatively little pain, though it seemed that my arm had been blown away. I could not verify this, because I was so numb it was impossible to move. What did hurt was the sight of pal after pal around me either killed outright at one go, or 'snuffing it' in agony quite near."