Part 19

Everything in that country was mud, thick clay mud, black and greasy, and the country flat and hideous. And it rained perpetually and was getting beastly cold. Altogether it was a nightmare of a place, even without the fighting thrown in, and we prayed to be delivered from it, and go and fight somewhere else.

Our prayers were destined to be answered, for on this morning we were ordered, in spite of the desultory fighting going on, to hand over to Macbean's Brigade and go north. This only meant the Brigade Staff, two companies Bedfords, and about 300 Cheshires and 300 Dorsets who had been in reserve to the 14th Brigade; but they were not in a very happy condition, for they had hardly any officers left and had been extremely uncomfortable for the last week, being hauled out of their barns on most nights and made to sleep in the wet open as supports in case of attack.

Our orders were, together with the 15th R.F.A. Brigade, to move north and concentrate near Strazeele and Pradelles, where we were to go into rest for five or six days.

I knew those rests.

So after handing over to Macbean at 10.30 A.M., and talking to General Anderson (commanding the Indian Division) and the Maharajah of Bikanir, we made devoutly thankful tracks in the direction of Locon and Merville.

We were but a small part of the 15th Brigade after all who left the environs of Festubert on that morning--only Headquarters, a very weak battalion of Cheshires--not more than 300 all told--and two companies of Bedfords. The remains of the Dorsets had been ordered to join us about Strazeele, and the whole of the Norfolks and half the Bedfords were left in the trenches to give a bit of moral and physical support to the Indians. I did not at all like being parted from them, but there was no help for it. The West Ridings (Duke of Wellington's) were attached to me from the 13th Brigade, but that did not make up for the absence of one and a half of my own beloved battalions.

Nevertheless it was with a feeling of extreme thankfulness that we left the horrible mud-plain of Festubert and Givenchy, with its cold wet climate and its swampy surroundings and its dismal memories, for both Dorsets and Cheshires had suffered terribly in the fighting here. And the pleasantest feeling was to hear the noise of the bursting shells grow less and ever less as we worked north-westwards, and to realise that for the present, at all events, we need not worry about Jack Johnsons or Black Marias and all their numerous smaller brethren, nor to keep our attention on the tense strain for bad news from the firing trenches, but that we could, for several days to come, sleep quietly, not fully dressed and on our beds or straw with one eye on the wake all night, but in our blessed beds and in our still more beloved pyjamas.

We trotted on ahead over the cold, wet, muddy, level roads of those parts, with a welcome break for luncheon at a real live estaminet, till we got to Merville, and then we slowed down.

Merville is a nice prosperous little town, with canals and parks and a distinctly good modern statue of a French soldier in the middle--by whom, and of whom, I have forgotten. It was, oddly enough, almost like an extra-European bit of civilisation, for the streets were swarming with Indians and Africans of both armies--tall, solemn, handsome Sikhs and Rajputs in khaki; Spahis, Algerians, and Moors in every variety of kit--red jackets, cummerbunds, and baggy breeches, bright blue jackets, white breeches, blue breeches, khaki breeches, dark blue vareuses, white burnouses, Arab corded turbans, baggy crimson trousers, &c., &c., even to Senegalese as black as night, and Berbers from Mauritania and the Atlas. I tried to talk to some of the latter, but it was not a success, for they did not understand my Arabic, and I did not understand their Shlukh.

And so on via Strazeele--where Saunders and his Dorsets had already arrived--contentedly to Pradelles, in which neighbourhood we billeted, and were met by a staff officer, Cameron of the 5th Divisional Staff, who gave us the welcome news that we were to rest and recuperate for at least a week--really and truly this time.

We put up at a nice, bright, ugly little chateau belonging to an elderly lady who was most civil and told us stories of what the Germans had done when they passed through a week or two ago on their retreat eastwards. Amongst other abominations, they had, on arrival, demanded of the old cure the key of the church tower, on which they wished to put a Maxim. The old man, not having the key, had hobbled off to get it from the garde champetre, who happened to be in possession of it for the time being. He could not, however, find him, and the officer in command, being in a diabolical temper, put the poor old priest up against a wall and shot him dead on the spot. This was recounted by the cure's sister, and there was not a shadow of doubt on the matter, for it was confirmed by all.

Oct. 31st.

Next day was a clear bright Sunday, and before we had come down to breakfast, looking forward to a nice lazy day, we were ordered to send the Dorsets away in motor-buses to Wulverghem (opposite Messines), where heavy fighting was going on. So much for our promised week's rest! And before 11 o'clock we had received another urgent telegram telling us to fall in at once and march eastwards through Bailleul.

I was deputed to command the whole of the remaining troops of the Division on this march, and by a complicated series of moves from their billets we got them strung out on the road, and pushed on by 12.30. The troops were mostly artillery, engineers, and train, and the only other infantry that joined me were the West Kent, now under their own C.O., Martyn.

Other troops were also on the move through Bailleul, and we had a weary time of it getting through. It was dark before we had filed through the big market-square with its old brick church tower and Town Hall; and even then, though billets had been arranged for in the country beyond for the rest of the troops, we had the devil's own job before our own headquarters could find a resting-place. We wanted to put up at Dranoutre village, but the village was full of the 3rd Cavalry Brigade, and we should have been in front of our own lot; so after a depressing wait in a tiny pothouse near Dranoutre, whilst St Andre and Weatherby and Moulton-Barrett scoured the country, we eventually settled down in a little farmhouse at Hille, a few hundred yards inside the Belgian border. Not so bad, but tiny, and crowded with not only the proprietor and his numerous family, but with a number of refugees from further east. My own bedroom was about 6 feet square and full of stinking old clothes, but I was lucky to get one at all.

It seemed curious being amongst inhabitants many of whom understood no French, but only talked Wallon or Flemish. I found my reminiscences of the South African Taal came in quite usefully; but the best communicators were the Lowland Scots, who, thanks to their own strange dialect, managed to make themselves quite decently understood by the natives.

Here we stayed for a few days--to be accurate, until the morning of the 5th November. My own "outfit" consisted of the West Kent, Cheshires, and two companies Bedfords, and the West Ridings were subsequently added. At one period I was given the K.O.S.B.'s as well, who were in Neuve Eglise; but they were taken away from me on the same day, and so were the West Kent. There was, in fact, a glorious jumble, battalions and batteries being added and taken away as the circumstances demanded. Even the two companies Bedfords were spirited away for forty-eight hours, leaving me with the decimated Cheshires as the only representatives of the 15th Brigade, but with two battalions of the 13th and one of the 14th superadded, as well as an R.E. company (17th). Meanwhile the 5th Divisional Staff was stranded and almost troopless, for all the other battalions of the Division were scattered among other divisions--some even under the command of the Cavalry Division; and guns were pushed up, almost piecemeal, as they were wanted, to help in the attempt to retake Messines, out of which our cavalry had been driven some days before. French troops were also there, in lumps. One morning the country would be brilliant with the white horses, sky-blue tunics and red trousers, of the Chasseurs d'Afrique, and the roads impassable with French infantry and transport moving towards Ypres; and by the next evening nothing but khaki-clad British were seen, besides patches of Belgian infantry, largely stragglers and mostly unarmed.

Meanwhile rumours of desperate fighting up north came through--the critical time when the 7th Division stuck heroically to their crippled trenches and withstood the ponderous attacks of the German masses; but it was difficult to make out what was occurring, for one only gathered bits of news here and there and could not piece them together as a whole, for the links were missing.

On the 4th November we received orders that Sir Horace would inspect us on the following morning, and we made preparations to turn out as clean as we could in the ever-prevailing mud. But in the evening more important work was at hand, for we were notified to be ready to march on the following morning to Ypres. So the inspection fell through.

The idea was that we--that is, two companies Bedfords (450 men), Cheshires (550), and West Ridings (700)--were to combine as the 15th Brigade with M'Cracken's 7th Brigade (Wiltshires, Gordons, Irish Rifles, and another battalion), and go to relieve the 7th Division, which had, we heard, been getting some terrific knocks. With us were to go the two R.E. companies, the 17th and 59th, belonging to the 5th Division.

Nov. 5th.

We marched at 7.20 A.M. via Locre and Dickebusch, on the main Bailleul-Ypres road, passing through many French troops on the way. Not far on the other side of Dickebusch we heard that the road was being shelled by the enemy; so M'Cracken ordered the whole force to park in the fields some distance down a road to the west, whilst he went on to Ypres for instructions.

We had our midday meal whilst we waited there, but it was not pleasant for the men, for the fields were dripping wet and very muddy; they had, therefore, to sit on their kits, whilst the transport had to remain on the road, the fields being so deep.

McCracken came back at 3.30 P.M. with instructions, and we moved on, myself being in charge of the movement. We managed to get to Ypres all right along the main road, as the shells were rather diminishing and not reaching so far, and we pushed through the town, entering it by a bridge over the nearly dry canal. Why the Germans had not shot this bridge to pieces before I cannot imagine, as it was well within their range. There were numerous big shell-holes in the open space near the railway station; one or two houses were smouldering; there were heaps of bricks and stones from damaged houses in the streets, and the extreme roof corner of the Cloth Hall had been knocked off, but otherwise the town was fairly normal-looking, except, of course, that hardly any civilians were visible.

At the other end of the town I came across General Haig, and rode ahead with him down the Menin road as far as the village of Hooge, where the Headquarters of the 1st Division were, under General Landon. (He had succeeded General Lomax, who had been badly wounded by a shell exploding at his headquarters, and subsequently died, 15th April.) Here we had a cup of tea in a dirty little estaminet crowded with Staff officers whilst awaiting the arrival of the Brigade.

No part of this Menin road was, in fact, "healthy," and at night it was generally subject to a searching fire by German shells. The wonder, indeed, was that more casualties did not occur here, for after dark the road was packed with transport and ration and ambulance parties moving slowly and silently back and forth. But the hostile shelling was not accurate, and for one "crumper" that burst in or over the road twenty exploded in the fields alongside.

Only a day or two before, a couple of heavy shells had burst just outside General Haig's Headquarters at the entrance to Ypres. Luckily the General himself had just left, but poor "Conky" Marker of the Coldstream had been fatally wounded, and several other officers, signallers, and clerks had been killed.

My Brigade arrived in the dark by the time that I had received further instructions in detail, and was parked off the road (south side) half a mile further on, whilst Weatherby went on to make arrangements for their taking up the line, taking representatives of the battalions with him. I met General Capper (commanding 7th Division) at his dug-out in the wood close by, and he told me that his Division had been reduced to barely 3000 men and a very few officers, after an appalling amount of severe fighting.