In its next verdure, when this fiery mass
Of living valour, rolling on the foe
And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold and low.
Byron.
On Sunday, August 23, 1914, there was fought what will rank as one of the great Battles of the Ages. For on that Sunday the whole flower of the German Army, including the pick of their famous cavalry, was hurled against the British Army in the proportion of six to one!
I had hoped not to sully with the Kaiser’s now notorious address to his troops the pages of a book in which were to be recorded only gallant deeds. But alone it explains the strong preponderance of numbers at the Battle of Mons.
This is what the German Emperor evidently thought to be an inspiring and dignified message to his generals. I must tell you it was issued on August 19, that is, only four days before our first contact with the enemy:
“It is my Royal and Imperial command that you concentrate your energies, for the immediate present, upon one single purpose, and that is that you address all your skill and all the valour of my soldiers to exterminate first the treacherous English and walk over General French’s contemptible little army.”
How hard the Kaiser’s legions tried to obey his commands you will shortly see. Also how completely they failed, and that although, as I must again remind you, the great outstanding feature of the Battle of Mons was the overwhelming number of the enemy compared to our forces.
The simplest and most homely account often brings a fact more truly home to us than any fine language would do, and I doubt if we shall ever read a more vivid picture of the opening of this terrific fight than the following passage in a letter written by a young British soldier to his father, who is a gardener: “You complained last summer, Dad, of the swarm of wasps that destroyed your fruit. That will give you an idea of how the Germans came for us!”