The following stories also illustrate the perils attending missing troops and their endeavours to regain the British lines. The first, from a letter of a non-commissioned officer of Dragoons, tells of the adventures of himself and a companion who lost their regiment on the Belgian frontier:—
We struck, after a very sharp and dangerous engagement, a tiny village, where the priest was absolutely an angel, and gave us—the four who got there—food, shelter, and clothing, and hid a corporal and myself in an old belfry, and a couple of infantrymen, wounded at Mons, in a secret crypt. Since then much has happened. A veterinary officer and sergeant of Hussars, who had lost their way and could not speak a word of French, happened to hit the next village, and an old hawker managed to induce them by signs to follow him to our lair.
“What was he to do?” asked the officer. “Had the Uhlans gone west or east? Should they disguise and risk it, or face the certainty of being made prisoners if caught in uniform?” We settled it by a compromise, which has so far answered, for no Uhlans have appeared to molest us on the road, though we saw on the skyline about thirty trotting in the direction of ————. If they saw us through their field-glasses we should only appear to them as market gardeners or agricultural labourers, taking in a heavy load of potatoes, turnips, and garden produce, and suitably attired.
All our kit and arms had been sent on in advance in a donkey-cart, driven by an old woman, and in such a broken-down condition that even a keen-eyed Prussian would not have detected the false bottom we spent a day in making for the purpose of secreting Government property. The old curé roared with laughter at the ingenuity of the veterinary officer who designed the dodge and helped to make it.
The carrier’s wagon, in which we drove two horses, was now flanked by two pack horses with saddlebags on each horse (we had four altogether), stuffed with tomatoes and artichokes, on a French country saddle. I rode one and the officer rode the other. Peasants we met told us that all along the road ———— small parties of strangers had been passing whom they thought must be soldiers, but they were not dressed in uniform. So it seems clear that many of our men have been cut off from their units and are moving towards the coast.
Our first night after leaving ———— was at a village where there was a delicious running stream, and we bathed to our hearts’ content in a secluded bend away from the public gaze. The people were shy and seemed alarmed, so the officer showed them a letter from our dear old friend the priest, which served as an informal passport during our journey.
The Uhlans had been there and paid for some food, cleared the chairs away from the church and turned it into a stable, and although the people had shown them every civility the Germans threw manure into the holy water stoup, smashed the head of the blessed Virgin statue, and wilfully disfigured the shrine of St. Louis de France in whose honour a small chapel had been erected. There were no houses damaged, and it is a curious fact that in this particular instance the Uhlans had behaved as religious maniacs of a peculiarly disgusting type, breaking the glass of the church windows, tearing the lace altar frontal, breaking every candlestick upon the altar, and using the vestments of the priest for horse-rubbers.
The other account, like the first, communicated to the Daily Telegraph, is from Lieutenant F. V. Drake, of the 11th Hussars, and tells of his escape after the fighting at Mons. Speaking of the retiring movement, he says:—
After six days I was left with thirty-six men to hold the Germans back while the others got away; but we were surrounded by a brigade of German cavalry. First of all we tried to get across country, and were caught up in barbed wire, and they turned two machine guns on us. They killed a lot of horses, but not many men. We then fought our way on to the road which leads into the village of Honcourt. The village was held by the Germans, and barricaded. We were being shot at from behind and in front, and there was barbed wire on both sides of the road.
We charged the barricade. My horse was shot about 200 yards before I got to the barricade, and I was stunned a bit. When I got up again I found all the other fellows swarming on the barricade. I “joined in the hunt,” and eight others and I eventually got out of the village on foot into a wood, where I divided the men into twos, and told them the direction in which to go and left them, telling each pair to hide in different parts of the wood.
We spent two days and two nights in that wood, with the Germans absolutely round us: they were so near, in fact, that we could hear every word they said. Leaving the wood by night, we pushed on to where we heard the English were: at Cambrai; but when we got there we found they had left the day before. We then hid in a wine cellar, and the Germans came and burnt down the house above us. We, however, escaped through a ventilator. We crawled out through the kitchen garden and hid in some wheat sheaves for the rest of that day, and at night we moved south, where we heard firing going on.
We averaged every night about twenty-five kilometres. We always marched by compass, and always went absolutely plumb straight across country. Each day we hid in hen-houses, outbuildings, or wherever we could, and marched by night. We found the inhabitants extremely nice. Wherever possible they gave us food—if the Germans had not taken it all.
Later we secured a motor-car, and proceeded towards St. Pol, but when we had proceeded about half-way we found a German sentry outside a house. We raced past him, and he fired a shot or two, but missed us, and we got safely through the village. Boulogne was eventually reached without further adventure.
One of the most graphic descriptions of the five days’ fighting at Mons is contained in a letter from a wounded Gordon Highlander. He relates that on Sunday, August 23, his regiment rose at 4 a.m., and marching out 1,100 strong took up ground on the extreme left flank of the British force and made good trenches, which apparently was the reason that they escaped with comparatively few casualties. “Later in the day a hellish tornado of shell swept over us, and with this introduction to war we received our baptism of fire. We were lining the Mons road, and immediately in our front and to our rear were woods. In the rear wood was stationed a battery of R.F.A.” The German artillery he spoke of as wonderful, and most of those do who have had experience of it. The first shot generally found them, as if the ranges had been carefully taken beforehand. But the British gunners were better, and they hammered and battered the Germans all the day long.
They were at least three to our one, and our artillery could not be in fifty places at once, so we just had to stick it. The German infantry are bad skirmishers and rotten shots, and they were simply mowed down in batches by our chaps. They came in companies of, I should say, 150 men in file five deep, and we simply rained bullets at them the live-long day. At about five p.m. the Germans in the left front of us retired, and we saw no more of them.
The Royal Irish Regiment had had an awful smashing earlier on, as also had the Middlesex, and our company were ordered to go along the road as reinforcements. The one and a half mile seemed a thousand. Stormed at all the way, we kept on, and no one was hit until we came to a white house which stood in a clearing. Immediately the officer passed the gap hell was let loose on us, but we got across safely, and I was the only one wounded, and that was with a ricochet shrapnel bullet in the right knee.
I knew nothing about it until an hour after, when I had it pointed out to me. I dug it out with a knife. We passed dead civilians, some women, and a little boy with his thigh shattered by a bullet. Poor wee fellow. He lay all the time on his face, and some man of the Irish was looking after him, and trying to make him comfortable. The devils shelled the hospital and killed the wounded, despite a huge Red Cross flag flying over it.
When we got to the Royal Irish Regiment’s trenches the scene was terrible. They were having dinner when the Germans opened on them, and their dead and wounded were lying all around. Beyond a go at some German cavalry, the day drew in, and darkness saw us on the retreat. The regiment lost one officer and one man dead, one officer and some men severely wounded.
We kept up this sort of game (fighting by day and retiring by night) until we got to Cambrai, on Tuesday night. I dare not mention that place and close my eyes. God, it was awful. Avalanche followed avalanche of fresh German troops, but the boys stuck to it, and we managed to retire to Ham without any molestation. Cambrai was the biggest battle fought. Out of all the glorious regiment of 1,100 men only five officers and 170 of the men answered the roll-call next day. Thank God, I was one of them.
Of course, there may be a number who got separated from the battalion through various causes, and some wounded who escaped. I hope so, because of the heavy hearts at home. I saw the South Lancs, and they were terribly cut up, only a remnant left of the regiment.
Operations of the French troops at this date are described by the Paris correspondent of the Daily Telegraph, who stated that:—
Incursions of the German cavalry forces had been made into the district of Valenciennes, Lille, and Douai, in the North of France, with the result that they got a bad reception and were cut up. The raid was carried out by three separate columns, one of which started in the direction of Lille, the second swept around Valenciennes, and the third advanced in the direction of Cambrai.
The first column crossed the frontier line and headed for Lille, but before it got to Lille it had a sharp encounter with the French. The column fell back, and finally moved on towards Douai. In its zigzag course it left a number of prisoners.
The second cavalry column, which was more important, crossed the French frontier on Monday evening, August 24. Faithful to their cruel practice, they compelled, under threat of instant shooting, a number of women and children to walk in front of them. Towards morning a battery of artillery, which had taken position and was concealed in a wood, opened fire on the enemy and caused great slaughter.
Eye-witnesses of the action relate that the column was entirely broken up. The few survivors who escaped fled, but were captured.
The British made a stout resistance in their position against Maubeuge, while the rest of the forces at Mons fell back. The pressure from the Germans increased in severity. Not only were their numbers vastly superior to ours, but they were said to comprise a body of their best men, animated with a determination to crush our lines. In those places where the strain was felt to be overpowering, especially on the left, some further support was given by our cavalry, who did splendid service in checking the enemy’s advance. When a battery of heavy German guns was playing havoc with our trenches, and the force of our artillery was beginning to lose effect, an order was given to the 9th Lancers to put the enemy’s guns out of action, and under a terrific storm of shell and shrapnel the order was carried out by a daring cavalry charge. The French were still retiring, and it was now evident that the position occupied by our troops was without sufficient advantage to enable them to make a further stand against the foe with any prospect of success. Dangerous as the operation was, Sir John French decided to retire, and to meet the Germans in what proved to be a most deadly conflict.
Sir John French continues the story of his retirement, and deals with the events of August 25, in the following section of his despatch:—