The British soldier

by E. J. Hardy

A few British soldiers held at bay a large number of Germans who were trying to rush a bridge. A Sergeant of the Royal Engineers perceived that if they did this our men would be cut off. He destroyed the bridge with dynamite, the British troops were saved, but a shell took off the Sergeant's head.

With the modesty of a real hero Lance-Corporal Jarvis, R.E., said to a newspaper reporter: "Yes, I am proud to have gained the Cross, but all the fellows at the front deserve it." Jarvis got the Victoria Cross for gallantry shown at Genappes on August 23rd in working for one and a half hours under heavy fire, in full view of the enemy, and in successfully firing charges for the demolition of a bridge. "The work on the bridge was done under fire from three sides. Near the bridge I found Captain Theodore Wright, V.C., wounded in the head. I wished to bandage him, but he said, 'Go back to the bridge; it must be done'—and so I went. The British infantry were posted behind barricades, and I had to make quite a detour to get round where I had to start operations."

"Good-bye, you fellows." Thirty gunners of a British field battery had just been killed and wounded. Thirty others had been ordered to take their places. Knowing they were going to their death, this was the last greeting to their comrades in the reserve line. Two minutes afterwards every man had been put out of action, and another thirty went to the front, with the same farewell greeting, smoking cigarettes as they went to almost certain death.

A pathetic picture was presented when a British Red Cross shelter was being shelled, and the less wounded men carried the more wounded to a place of comparative safety.

Some almost mad things were done by men in the trenches, in the intervals of coolly playing games.

A man stole forth on a dark night to carry off a German maxim. He wriggled on his stomach to within a few yards of his object. He surprised the guard of five Prussians, slew them, and returned in triumph to his trench with the maxim slung like a sheep across his shoulders. Rendered brazen by his success he sallied forth again to collect the ammunition and belt which he had left behind on his first journey.

One day the Gloucesters were lying under shell fire, and a shell dropped right in the middle of a party having some food. It did not explode at once, so one of the men dropped his biscuit, got up and threw the shell out of the trenches.

A sergeant of the Royal Horse Artillery who had come back from the war for a rest, was asked if there were many men getting the Victoria Cross. He replied: "Of course there are, but every fellow who has fought has in some way or other earned it. Why, our little trumpeter, had he been saving a wounded man under the same conditions as he collared a chicken for his comrades' dinner, would have certainly obtained the coveted Cross. We were being shelled and fired on fiercely when a chicken suddenly ran into a very inferno of fire. 'There goes our dinner!' cried the trumpeter, and without another word he chased the bird for at least five minutes, never worrying a little bit about the shells and bullets. Finally he came back with a bullet in his leg, but as proud as the Kaiser himself, with the chicken in his arms."

Compare with this the following, written by Sergeant George Freshwater, of the Highland Light Infantry: "The other day one of our fellows shot a pig that came wandering towards our trench. The difficulty was, however, to get him. The pig lay about 30 yards from us, and was right in the line of the German fire. Some of the Germans also shot at him, but it was our chaps who killed him. We drew lots who would go out and fetch the 'bacon' in. The chap who was stuck for the job went out at once, though some of us wanted him to wait until it got dark, but he wouldn't. He got the pig in safely, though he got two shots through his sleeve and one through his cap. The pig got six shots in him. We skinned and roasted the pig in the trench that night, and had a real good breakfast off him the next morning."

A man crept up to a German trench and took away from a sleeping warrior a helmet, knapsack, a pair of patent-leather boots (evidently looted), and forty-five rounds of ammunition.