The men swore that they would behave, and the girls were not at all displeased at the new arrangement. They played for two or three hours, and the men kept their pledge. When the game ended they left with quite a different feeling towards me. It was a feeling of respect and even love, instead of their former one of hostility.
The Battalion remained in the reserve billets for several days. There developed, as a result of that game, a new attitude on the part of many soldiers toward us women. Companies of them would come over and join the Battalion in sports or singing and various entertainments.
The expected order for a transfer did not come promptly. Meanwhile, the time arrived to relieve the Corps in the trenches. I decided that we had had enough rest, and upon our arrival at the fighting line I put my Battalion on a regular war footing. I sent out scouting parties, established observation posts, and swept No Man’s Land with my machine guns and rifles. The Germans were very much agitated. Our own soldiers became excited too, but because of the friendly relations we had established in the rear, they contented themselves with sending delegates and committees to argue the matter with me.
“We have freedom now, you say,” I argued. “You insist that you do not want to fight. Very well. I will not ask you to fight the Germans. But you have no right to ask me to act against my convictions. We came here not to fraternize but to fight, to kill and get killed. I claim my freedom to get killed if I want to. Then let me fight the Germans at my sector. Let the Germans fight only against the Battalion. We will leave you alone, and you leave us alone.”
The soldiers admitted that this was no more than fair and consented to such an arrangement. When they asked me why I was so anxious to kill Germans I told them that I wanted to avenge my husband who was slain early in the war. For this invention I had only a slight foundation—a rumour that had reached me of the death in battle of Afanasi Botchkarev. Of course, it was an absurd excuse. But I had used it before and I used it afterwards on a number of occasions, and it finally became widely known and believed.
It was exhilarating to be able to do some real fighting again. It is true, we were a mere handful, scarcely two hundred women. But we raised quite a storm. Our machine guns rattled and No Man’s Land was turned from a promenade for agitators and drunkards into a real No Man’s Land. The news spread rapidly along the front of the activity of the Women’s Battalion, and I believe that for hundreds of miles our little sector was the only fighting part of the line. I was naturally very proud of this distinction.
For several days this state of affairs continued. Finally the Germans became so annoyed that they ordered their artillery to bombard my position. There had not been any artillery fire at our sector for some time, and the opening of the big guns caused tremendous excitement. Many of the men were caught in the bombardment and were killed or wounded. The Battalion’s casualties were four dead and fifteen wounded.
The whole Corps was roused to a high state of agitation, and a stormy meeting took place immediately. The men demanded my instant execution.
“She wants war,” they cried, “and we want peace. Kill her and make an end of it!”
But the members of the committee and my friends insisted that I acted in accordance with an agreement. “She only engages her own Battalion in fighting,” my defenders argued, “and leaves us alone. It is not her fault that the German artillery could not find the range quickly and killed some of our comrades.”