No. 0000, Pte. N. N.,
B Co.,
1st —— Highlanders.
Dear Sir,—I was sorry to hear that you had been one of the unlucky ones, along with myself, to be put aside and away from the regiment. I hope that you will pull through all right. I am getting on, but it is my legs that are all the hinder. It was a very bad place I was wounded in the stoumick. Now, dear sir, I hope that you won't think me forward in asking you for a favour. If you would let me have the advance of 2s. so that I could get some tobacco, as I have lost everything.
N. N.
This man recovered, and was exchanged many months afterwards.
Another young Irishman, who was a great favourite, had been badly wounded in the foot. It was found necessary to take the foot off, and after the operation, when Mlle. Waxin went to console him, she found him lying with his face to the wall, silently weeping.
"I was going to scold him for being such a baby," she said to me afterwards, "but when the English-speaking sister explained to me the reason of the tears, I felt like crying myself."
"It is not the pain, sister, that troubles me," he said to them, "but you see with a wooden leg I can never go back again to the old regiment."
On 9th Oct. we had a very strict inspection of the hospital, and a great number of the remaining British wounded were put down on the list of "transportables." The French nurses always sent off the British wounded dressed in French uniform, as it was a fact notorious at Cambrai that the Germans robbed British wounded of their uniform. In many cases German soldiers took greatcoats away from wounded men and gave a five-mark piece in exchange. The ill-treatment which was specially shown to British soldiers on the journey to Germany was the principal reason why the French, whenever they could get a chance, disguised our wounded soldiers in French uniforms. The fact that, in the early days of the war, British prisoners were invariably treated worse than the French cannot be denied, and will be amply proved from the evidence of returned prisoners, and from other sources of information at present unavailable. It is the truth that nearly all British soldiers taken prisoners and sent to Germany during the first months of the war were made the object of special contempt, neglect, or cruelty. Such conduct undoubtedly constitutes a departure "from laws of humanity, and from the dictates of the public conscience," which are supposed to govern the conduct of civilised nations.[1] To ill-treat or insult a wounded and helpless enemy is the most despicable offence a soldier can commit. Men who do these things dishonour the name of soldier.
The meaning of war without chivalry was first brought home to the inhabitants of Cambrai when they saw the way the victorious Germans treated the unfortunate wounded who had been brought into the town from the neighbouring battlefields. During the first week of September hundreds of wounded, French and English, were sent to Germany packed in cattle trucks, with no medical attendance, no food, no water. It was only natural that in our hospital both nurses and patients should dread the days when German officials came round searching for cases that could be considered "transportable." The inspections which took place on the 9th and 11th of October were carried out with great severity. My companion Wilkinson was taken away, and many were put down on the list who were quite unfit to travel.