Exits and Entrances

by Eva Moore

I look back on those years of the war as a rather confused series of emotions and pictures, when one worked, spoke at meetings, played in the evening, read the casualty lists, and always “wondered why”; when each day seemed to bring the news that some friend had made the supreme sacrifice, when each day brought the knowledge that the world was the poorer for the loss of many gallant gentlemen. Pictures that remain—tragic, humorous, and soul-stirring. The first detachment of men I saw leaving for the front! It was about a quarter to twelve; I had been playing at Kennington Theatre, and stood waiting for a ’bus at the end of Westminster Bridge. As I stood, I heard the sound of marching men, “the men who joined in ’14”. Out of the darkness they came, still in their civilian clothes, not marching with the precision of trained men, but walking as they would have done to their work. Not alone, for beside almost each man walked a woman, and often she carried his bundle, and he carried—perhaps for the last time—a baby. I wondered if King Charles, riding his horse in Trafalgar Square, had seen them pass and realised that in them was the same spirit as lived in the Englishmen who sent him to the scaffold—that England and the English people might be free? Nelson, watching from the top of his column, must have known that the spirit that lived in his men at Copenhagen, the Nile, and Trafalgar was still there, burning brightly; and His Grace of Cambridge, once Commander-in-Chief of the British Army, did he too watch the sons and grandsons of the men who fought in the Crimea, going out to face the same dangers, the same horrors, as the men he had known? So they passed, in silence, for at such times one cannot find words to cry “Good luck” or “God bless you”. Out of the darkness they came, and into the darkness again they went, in silence—“the men who joined up in ’14”.

And Southampton in the early days! One night men began to march past the Star Hotel at six in the evening, and at six the next morning men were still marching past, and all the time the sound of singing went with them, all night long—“Tipperary”. I wonder what “Tipperary” meant to them all; did it mean home, the trenches, or Berlin? Who knows! but they never seemed to tire of singing it.

In May, 1915, we went to Ireland, and in Dublin we heard of the loss of the “Lusitania”. No one believed it was true. It seemed impossible that England’s super-passenger ship could have been sunk almost in sight of land.

We reached Cork on the Sunday evening. Charles Frohman was one of the missing passengers. Early on the Monday, Harry and I went to Queenstown, to try and find his body. The sight we saw in the shed on the Cunard quay is beyond description. Lying on the concrete floor, their hands all tied with thick pieces of rope, lay nearly a hundred victims of war and German civilisation! Men, women, children, and little babies. I shall never forget the pathos of the dead children and babies! Dragged into the awful machinery of war, the Holy Innocents of the Twentieth Century, butchered by the order of a Modern Herod. In one corner lay a little girl, about nine years old; her face was covered with a cloth; the terrible pathos of her poor little legs, wearing rather bright blue stockings, the limp stillness of her! We found poor Mr. Frohman—the man who made theatrical destinies, launched great theatrical ventures, who had been sought after, made much of, and was loved by all those who knew him—lying there alone, although he was surrounded by silent men and women. We took him flowers, the only flowers in all that dreadful shed. They went with him to America, and later his sister told us they were buried with him. Outside in the streets and in the Cunard office were men and women, white-faced and dry-eyed: it was all too big for tears: tears were dried up by horror. Later in the week the streets from the station to quay had on each side of the road a wall of coffins.

I read in the papers accounts of the disaster, of the “wonderful peace which was on the faces of the dead”. That peace can only have existed in the minds of the writers—I know I did not see it. Horror, fear, amazement, and, I think, resentment at being hurled into eternity; but peace existed no more in the faces of the dead than it did in my heart. I came away from that shed and cursed the German nation. Yet even little children had done great things. Lady Allen, from Montreal, was on board with her two little girls. I was told by their sister, who was over doing Red Cross work, that they stood all three hand in hand, wearing life-belts, when a woman friend came up to them; she was without a belt. One of the little girls took off her belt, saying as she did so, “You take mine, because I have learnt to swim”. Lady Allen and the two children, holding hands, jumped into the sea; neither of the children was ever seen again alive.

I met an Australian soldier, in a tiny hotel (for every place was full to overflowing), who had been on board. He told me that in his boat there was a woman who sang steadily for hours to keep up the spirits of her companions; she was, he said, “perfectly wonderful”. After they had been on the water for five hours, they saw a man on a small raft; they had no oars, and neither had he. The Australian jumped overboard, swam to him, and towed the raft back to the boat. He did this with three ribs broken! The thing which he told me he regretted most was the loss of his concertina, which he had saved up for years to buy!

I do not mind admitting that I hated the sea trip back to England; apart from my own feelings, I felt that I was in a great measure responsible for the rest of our company. We left Dublin with all lights out, and went full steam ahead all the time. It was the quickest passage the boat had ever made. Immediately on going on board, I collected enough life-belts for every woman of the company to have one, piled them on the deck, and sat on them!

So the war dragged on, and one did what was possible. It is of no interest to record the visits to hospitals, the work, and so forth; everyone worked, and worked hard. My feeling was always, when some wounded man gave me thanks out of all proportion to what I had been able to do, that I should have liked to quote to him words from my husband’s play, Love and the Man: “I have done so little, and you have done so much”. Only the Tommy, being British, would have been very uncomfortable if I had said anything of the kind.

Then, at last, came that wonderful morning in November, when, riding on the top of a ’bus in Piccadilly, I heard the “maroons”, and saw all the pent-up emotion of the British people break loose. They had heard of disasters, lost hopes, the death of those they loved best in the world, almost in silence, but now—“it was over”, and a people thanked God that “England might be Merrie England once again”. I went on to my Committee meeting, a meeting for the organisation of a scheme to raise funds for St. Dunstan’s Blind Soldiers, and I remember, when it was ended, walking up the Haymarket with Forbes Robertson, and noticing the change that had come over everything. If we lost our heads a little that day, who can blame us? For four years we had, as it were, lived in dark cellars, and now, when we came out into the light, it blinded us—we were so unaccustomed to “being happy”.

That night Harry was playing at Wyndham’s Theatre in The Law Divine. He told me that the audience certainly only heard about half of the play, owing to the noise in the street outside.