Into the Jaws of Death

by Jack O'Brien

This was one thing the Germans never could understand, for, as a nation, they have no spirit at all; I have seen big men blubber like children over the slightest hurt. Working with civilians, we often had the satisfaction of a scrap. We dared not touch one of the military, no matter what they said or did, for it would mean instant death; but when the civilians were extra-brutal or insulting, as they often were, we got even if we did not happen to be too greatly out-numbered. The smallest Britisher that ever went into the mine could lick the biggest Hun in a fair fight. But that was just the trouble—the Germans know nothing about the first principles of fair play. At school, instead of being taught to defend themselves with their fists, they fight with sticks or anything they can lay their hands on, and once they get their opponent down, they kick him until he gives in. So when they ran up against English-speaking people and there was a scrap in sight, they were astounded to see the Englander lay down the shovel or whatever he happened to have in his hands. They would stand and stare with their weapon half raised as they saw their opponent laying aside his only means of defence. They did not know what to expect, and while they were in this uncertain condition the Englander got in his first blow. We became quite notorious for our methods of fighting, and when we would be put to work with any new men, their first question would be, "What did you do before joining the Army?" and we always said, "We were boxers." They would smile and say, "Ich nix boxer—nice Engländer, good Engländer"—this amused us immensely and their fear of us made them use us more decently.

After I had been in the mine about six months, Snipe and I planned out a scheme by which we hoped to escape doing any work for awhile. In going through the mine, we had come across many abandoned tunnels from which the coal had been taken—in many cases these tunnels were partially caved in and were considered unsafe, and for this reason they were avoided by the miners. The idea came to us this way;—one night when Snipe and I were coming off work, we passed these tunnels, and I said to Snipe, "Say, old boy, I'm fed up with this everlasting work for these brutal Huns; let's think up some scheme for getting out of it for awhile." Snipe said, "All right. But how can we get away from these blamed 'square-heads'?" Just then we noticed one of the tunnels, and I said, "Hully gee! Snipe, what's the matter with hiding in one of these tunnels? No one ever comes here." "Golly! I believe it would work," says Snipe, pounding me on the back. We were very much excited, and when we reached our bunkhouse we told some of the other boys. They asked to come in too, so six of us laid our plans. We went down on shift as usual and followed the other miners till we came to the tunnel in which we had planned to hide. When there was no one looking, we would dodge in, and when we were missed the miners thought we had gone to work in another part of the mine; each mine boss thought we were taken to work for some one else, so no one hunted us up; of course we were in constant danger of being buried alive, but we gladly took the risk for the sake of getting a rest.

We would lie round chatting and sleeping all day, and at night, blacken our faces and join the other miners on their way to the main shaft. We worked this game for eight weeks, not always staying in the same hole, but changing around whenever we saw a likely looking place. We had a splendid rest, and it put us in better condition for what was to follow. A funny thing happened after this had been going on a few weeks. One morning two of our boys, Barney and Raeside, did not come down in the same cage with us, and as we didn't dare wait, for fear of being set to work, we were out of sight before they arrived. So they hunted up a place for themselves, and the spot they chose was between the timbers and the roof of the main tunnel. It was a good place, and they would never have been discovered if they hadn't gone to sleep and snored. But they did, and a fire boss happened to be passing at the time, so he located their hiding-place. Of course he couldn't see who was there, but he tried to poke them out with his stick. They soon woke up, but Barney whispered, "To hell with him, Mac, we won't go," so they lay still. Finally the fire boss went for help, and as soon as he left the boys came out. But they had to come out one at a time. Barney got down first; and he beat it to locate another hole. When Raeside struck the tunnel, he saw a light not far away, and he thought it must be the returning boss, so off he went in the opposite direction. Barney had the light, and was looking for a place large enough to hold them, when he heard Raeside running. He at once jumped to the conclusion that Raeside had spotted a "square-head"—and he started off to his assistance—Raeside heard some one coming on the run, and he thought it must be the boss, so he went still faster. They chased each other like this for about a mile. Then Raeside gave out: and hiding his lamp, he hid in the first hole he came to. In a moment along came Barney, puffing and blowing like a whale, and as he passed Raeside saw who it was. Then the joke of it struck him, he called Barney back, and the two of them sat down in the tunnel and laughed till they were sore. The boss never found them, and I can imagine how angry he was when he went back with his reinforcements and found his prey gone. That night the boys told us the joke they had played on themselves.

But our good time ended abruptly one Saturday when a mine inspector, or "fire-stager" as he is called, came around on his tour of inspection, and he found us hiding in a hole about three hundred yards from the main road. We put out our pit lamps when we saw him passing, and he didn't let on having seen us, so we couldn't tell whether he had or not. He was too big a coward to tackle us alone, and we knew that if he had discovered us he would go for help. We didn't know whether to run or risk staying where we were, and while we were talking about it, we heard the tramping of a lot of feet in the tunnel leading to our hiding-place. It was too late to go now, we would have to face the music. There were six of us, and Snipe suggested that if no more than ten came we would stand and fight, but if there were more we had best make a running fight and escape to some other part of the mine. We decided to do this, and while we were waiting for them to come in we filled our pockets with stones.

But the foreman had no intention of bringing his men in—he lined them up, ten on a side, opposite the hole through which we must come out—they were armed with sticks, pieces of heavy rubber hose, and anything they could lay their hands on. After lining them up he made them hide their lamps under the jackets so that we wouldn't be able to see them when we came out. Then, when he got them fixed to his liking, he very bravely marched in where we were and said, "Alle Engländer?" We said, "Yes." He said, "You Schweinhunds!" At that one of our boys jumped and made a pass at him, crying, "You big square-headed German, I'll knock your head off, I wouldn't take that from your Kaiser Bill." The German backed up and avoided the blow, saying tauntingly, "Ah, nix, Engländer." Then he asked us why we were not working, and we said we had got tired and were taking a rest. He said "Komm' mit." We said, "Oh no." When he saw we had no intention of going he began to make promises. He said that if we would only go back to work he would not report us and we would not be punished in any way.

We did not believe him, and we trusted his promises about as long as it took him to make them; but, as Snipe said, we might as well take a chance on it, for we had to get out, and there was only one road to go. Of course he couldn't understand us, but we had picked up enough German to make out everything he said. Well, we pretended to believe him and we started out, walking in couples. When the first two reached the main road two lights flashed out, and the clubs commenced to whistle through the air. The boys shouted "duck!"—and, believe me, we did. We started down between those two lines of Germans, and seeing there were so many we thought it best just to make a run for it. In going through, three of our boys got knocked down, and the rest of us got some bad whacks over the head and back but we kept our feet. The last two Germans on the line got scared when they heard us coming and started to run. They were on the road just ahead of us, and we made a dash after them. They were a considerable distance from the main body when we overtook them, and I remember one of the boys saying, "We'll make these square-headed devils pay for what we've received"—and believe me, we did. Instead of going home to their supper that night, I'll bet they went to the doctor.

Well, when this scrap was all over and we got to the top of the shaft, the mine inspector that had caught us reported us to the military authorities, and their punishment was five hours "at attention." When we had put this in, they allowed us to go to our bunks. The next day was Sunday, and we were peacefully sleeping when a big German came in and called out our numbers. We asked him what he wanted, and he said we had to go on the Coke-o-roy. We certainly knew what this meant.

The coke ovens were attached to the mine, and most of the coal taken out was made into coke. Work on the ovens was so hard and so trying on account of the great heat, that they used this as a punishment for anything that was done wrong in the mines. This is what the German who could speak English told us. The morning we were put on, he lined us up and read this to us, "If you Engländers does not do your work right beneath the mine, we put you on coke ovens, and there, if you shall not work, you shall die." We all laughed at this, and he said, "You England Schweinhunds!" and went away.

But it was sure a punishment. The regular hours through the week was a twelve-hour shift, and each man was obliged to shovel thirty-two tons of coke, wheel it from ten to twenty yards along the platform, and dump it into railway cars. On Sunday the shift was twenty-four hours long, and each one had to handle sixty-four tons of coke. If you were not through when your time was up, you must keep at it till you did the required number of tons and then start back to work again with your shift.

It was on the twenty-four-hour shift that we started our work. We went on at 7 A.M. on Sunday, and we worked from that until 7 Monday morning. Almost as soon as I went on the ovens I met two of my old pals, Nickelson and Macdonald. They had been put here for attempting to escape from the mine, and had been at this job for a week before we arrived. We were mighty glad to see each other, for we all belonged to the same "school." But a "school" in a German prison camp does not mean the same as it does in America. We got the idea from the British Tommy, only he calls it "mucking it." It is made up of a bunch of boys who put all their parcels in together and go fifty-fifty on everything. Sharing with each other brought us a little closer together than we otherwise would have been.