Told by The Reverend G. Vernon Smith, Resident
Chaplain to the Bishop of London, Deputy
Priest in Ordinary to the King
This is an account of how a Bishop of the Church of England visited the troops at the front. He went to France as the guest of Sir John French, Field Marshall of the British Army, to spend Holy Week and Easter with the troops. The chaplain who relates these experiences was one of the guests. He said before he left London, the Bishop received most cordial letters of God-speed from the Bishops of Canterbury and York. The Bishop's first evening in France was spent at the Soldiers' Institute at Boulogne, and this building was packed with soldiers at a concert. He then started in a motor car for the headquarters of the British Army, where he was received by the Field Marshall with all the members of the staff. A complete record of his journeys has been published by Longmans, Green and Company, with whose permission the following chapter is here presented.
[4] I—HOLY COMMUNION AT THE FRONT
It was in —— that the Bishop for the first time came close to the actual front and within range of the German guns. The cars were at the door of the house where the Bishop was billeted, in a quiet little side-street, at 6:45 in the morning, for an early start had been arranged.
We drove through the narrow streets to one of the large Hospitals in the town, where he celebrated the Holy Communion at seven o'clock for those of the officers and patients who wished to attend. After this service the other patients came in for morning prayers, at which the Bishop said a few words to them. It was invariably the case, when the Bishop visited a hospital, that there were many patients who wished to have a word with him. There were always, also, some men to whom, for some special reason, the Medical Officer or Chaplain wished to take him, and not infrequently in the Officers' Hospitals there were men whom he knew personally.
It was, therefore, a hard task to keep up to time in saying "Good-bye" at a hospital, and Mr. Macpherson, whom the Bishop soon called his "nigger-driver," and who was responsible for seeing that the time-table was strictly kept—a task of considerable difficulty—had generally to remind the Bishop at a suitable moment that his car was waiting at the door.
In a few minutes we had arrived at the Jute Factory again, where thirty men were ready and waiting to be confirmed in the little Chapel which has been carefully partitioned off in one corner of the building.
It had been arranged that on this day the Bishop should visit some of the London Regiments that have recently gone to the front. Naturally he always looked forward with special eagerness to an opportunity of meeting, in these fresh surroundings, London men, to so many of whom he has spoken and preached in his diocese. Fortunately he was able in the course of the week to visit nearly all these regiments, although some of the men who were in the trenches could not, of course, be present at his services. To us, coming out from London, it was a great source of satisfaction and pride to hear of the high esteem in which these Territorial regiments are held by the leaders of our Army.
It was not a very long time, as the motors slipped along the quiet country roads, before we began to hear the distant sound of guns, and as long as we were within a short distance of the firing-line there was seldom an hour in which guns could not be distinctly heard.