A War for King and Empire, page 26
‘Are you sure? I’m not going to be much help, corporal. I wouldn’t have made it this far without you.’
‘Yes, I know that. But we can’t very well leave him. Do your best, Atwood. We need to move. I don’t want to be out here at dawn, not with the Fritzs in a foul temper. They didn’t have a good night.’
With that I set to work and dragged the soldier’s body out of the ditch. Then I helped Atwood to his feet. After he assured me he could stand for a moment without help, I bent down and with difficulty lifted the body over one shoulder. Then I put my other arm around Atwood.
The firing had ceased and No-Man’s-Land was again cloaked in darkness.
We hadn’t gone more than a few steps when an officer with revolver in hand overtook us. It was Lieutenant Kent bringing up the rear of the attack party.
‘MacPhail, is that you?’ he said.
‘Yes, sir,’ I replied.
I stood there swaying on my feet, barely able to hold the body folded over my right shoulder. Atwood could hardly move his wounded leg and just out of the ditch he’d stumbled and almost brought us crashing to the ground. 600 yards to our lines seemed an impossibility.
Kent looked at me keenly. Then he motioned at the body. ‘He’s dead, I presume. Who is it?
‘Oh, yes he’s quite dead,’ I replied. ‘This, sir, is Lieutenant Drinkwater.’
‘Drinkwater!?’ Kent helped me lower him to the ground. After a moment studying his face he nodded. To my surprise he began rifling through Drinkwater’s pockets. ‘Take the insignia off, would you, MacPhail?’
Lieutenant Kent was a sharp one. He’d been out with the wire-cutters half the night, led the attack party in, and been in the midst of the action ever since. Still he had the wits to remember to remove any identifying marks.
‘I’m sorry, we’ll have to leave him,’ he said when we were done. ‘We’ve got too many wounded to carry as is. You look after Atwood. We’ll come back for the lieutenant tomorrow.’
‘Yes, sir,’ I said, and paused. ‘If I may, sir, why did we wait so long before going through the wire?’
Gruffly Kent responded. ‘There was an enemy working party up on the parapet. We were hoping they’d move off, but then… well, you know the rest.’
‘Yes, sir,’ I replied. Not for the first time in this war the plan proved no match for events. In any case we’d given Fritz a bloody nose for our trouble.
‘Here I’ll help. We’ll lay him back in the ditch. He should be safe there until we come back for him.’
CHAPTER 29
7th of February, 1916
No-Man’s-Land, southwest of Messines, Belgium
The tops of the willows swayed gently to-and-fro in the breeze, dark spindly forms silhouetted against the clear night sky. Up on the ridge towards Messines other shapes could be seen, the copse of a small wood, a line of wired fence posts that the Germans had placed so liberally everywhere on the slope, and at the peak of the ridge the crenellated outline of the shattered village itself. Lower down, the enemy trenches were lost to sight. I knew they lay straight ahead where darkness reigned, a few minutes distant by foot, less than a second by the round from a rifle or machine gun.
This afternoon the German howitzers and field guns had been at it again. They were quiet now and No-Man’s-Land had an almost pastoral serenity to it, if one ignored the steady pop and crackle of shooting off in the distance. The night after the raid Lieutenant Younger took a patrol to look for the bodies of those who had been killed, but returned empty handed; German working parties were out in force, covered by strong patrols. Tonight we were to try again.
Normally I would have accepted another summons for a night-time stroll in No-Man’s-Land with weary reluctance (there being no question of turning it down), but I was uncharacteristically eager. We were to recover the remains of our men. One of them in particular interested me a great deal. If we could locate Drinkwater’s body, the mystery of his disappearance might become clearer. I had developed an entire theory about it, and while I never much liked the lieutenant, he was a loyal soldier and a comrade, and it seemed only proper that the reasons for his death be known. I hadn’t yet told anyone of my suspicions, not even Dundas, but after tonight I hoped to know one way or the other. On top of which, Lieutenant Kent had approached me as I was preparing to inspect the platoon’s kit and feet – the latter never one of my favourite chores.
A Frenchman was accompanying us, a Lieutenant Dallennes of the 26th Battalion Chasseurs à Pied, come to learn the tricks of night-time raiding. That was another reason Kent had asked me along, to help translate. The French lieutenant spoke some English, Kent barely a word of French, and I think he wanted to ensure things went smoothly. Out in No-Man’s-Land there was typically little talking and consequently little danger my questionable translation skills would land us in a fix.
We walked in file, following almost the exact route from two nights earlier. Approaching the gap in the first line of wire, Kent drew us to a halt. With a couple of men he crept off in the direction of the wire. It was understood that we were to cover them.
‘Il faut attendre ici, monsieur,’ I whispered to the French lieutenant. He drew his revolver and we sat on the ground to await the results of Kent’s investigation – no sense providing Fritz with a target.
Time has a tendency to pass very slowly in No-Man’s-Land and it was therefore a surprise when I saw the figures moving towards us. Alarmed I raised my rifle. My first thought was of a German patrol, the memory of how they’d blundered into us during the raid all too recent. My finger was on the trigger guard, only a hair twitch from the trigger should the need arise. Dallennes shot me an anxious glance and followed my example. He had a Modèle 1892 in hand, the standard French service revolver. Behind him the men were prepared.
I peered down the steel barrel of the Lee-Enfield, watching intently. Fortunately there weren’t many of them. Then I recognized the gait of the man in front. Though his features were obscured by the gloom there was no mistaking who it was.
Lieutenant Kent shook his head from side to side when he reached us.
‘Non, c’est impossible de continuer, monsieur,’ I informed the French lieutenant, by which I meant the first line of wire had been repaired and we’d gone as far as we could. I hoped he’d understand the mangle I made of his mother tongue.
He looked me in the eye and nodded solemnly. After the mangle the Germans had made of their country the French were remarkably good-natured about such matters.
‘Sir,’ I whispered to Kent, ‘May I go and look for Lieutenant Drinkwater?’
Kent nodded his assent, signalling with a finger that I should take a man along.
The route to the willows and the ditch was a short one. I found the spot where Atwood and I had sheltered with surprising ease, at least I thought I had. However, of the body there was no sign and that made me think I’d made a mistake. I sent the private off one way down the ditch and I went the other, a venture that proved as fruitless as the attack at Festubert, although thankfully less sanguinary. There was no mistake about it, Drinkwater’s body was gone. Here too the Germans had tidied house. Which was very unfortunate.
It was closing on 2.30 a.m. when I reached La Grande Munque Farm where the company was bedded down, a walk of close to two miles from our front lines. Only with difficulty did I eventually find a corner with a little hay where I could sleep – not a bunk, they were all taken. I don’t recall much after that. As a result I didn’t see Dundas until the next morning.
‘What’s all the hush-hush for, Mac?’ he asked, after I found him and furtively motioned that I needed to talk.
I didn’t respond but led him by his free arm – the other was cradling a mug of coffee – into the courtyard. There, standing in the mud amongst a handful of horses, an ammunition limber in sore need of a new wheel, and men moving back and forth between the farm buildings, I explained. I told him first about the exchange I’d witnessed between Drinkwater and Harry Hobson. Then I told him about having stumbled upon Drinkwater’s body on the way back from the raid. I told him all the details I hadn’t told anyone else.
‘The strangest part of it all was that I didn’t see any sign of a wound on Drinkwater. Admittedly it was dark, but I had a fair look when Lieutenant Kent and I were removing his identification. No bullet wounds, no stab wounds. He was lying all crumpled up, his head face down in the dirt.’
Dundas whistled, then drank from his mug. ‘I know what you’re thinking. You think Hobson killed him, don’t you?’
I nodded. ‘Why or how, I don’t know. But it’s the only explanation that makes any sense. Drinkwater couldn’t have just ended up in a ditch of his own accord.’
Dundas scratched at his chin. ‘You realize you’ve no proof,’ he said finally.
‘Of course I realize that. I was a lawyer, remember?’ I responded, a trifle irritably.
‘So what are you planning on doing about it?’
‘I don’t know, that’s why I wanted to talk to you.’
‘Do nothing,’ he said. He didn’t even pause to think about it. He just said it.
‘Nothing!?’
‘Yes, nothing. You can’t go around accusing one of the battalion of killing a mate, particularly an officer. Not without proof and you have absolutely none. Thanks to you Hobson’s a sergeant, so there’s a considerable chance you’d end up on charges yourself. Undermining authority or some such thing. You know the rules better than I do.’
‘Yeah,’ I said glumly. He was absolutely right. In the absence of an open and shut case there was every possibility they would throw the book at me and Hobson would emerge scot-free. That was where the army differed from civilian life. One’s superiors were on a pedestal and no one from the field-marshal on down took kindly to subordinates kicking at the supports underneath. With good reason, I suppose. That was the reason why the army was an army and not a mob.
‘Mac, I know you want to do what’s right. But there’s nothing that says Hobson had anything to do with this. Sure, you saw an argument. So what? And Hobson was along when Drinkwater disappeared. So were ten others. Plus several hundred Fritzs in the immediate vicinity. You’ve been out there yourself more than once; strange things happen in No-Man’s-Land. All I’m saying is I wouldn’t be so quick to jump to conclusions. More than likely it’s all a terrible coincidence. Hell, you told me yourself on more than a few occasions that you’d like to throttle Drinkwater.’
I smiled weakly. ‘I was joking.’
Dundas drank some more coffee. ‘Well. To put it in perspective…. how a little thing might be misconstrued.’
I’d been so certain, the scenario so clear and vivid in my head. Facing Dundas’s scepticism a dense smokescreen moved across. I wasn’t so sure anymore.
‘Let’s go, Mac,’ he said after a bit, noticing my quietness. ‘I’ve got a sick parade to look after.’
13th of March, 1916
I awoke to brilliant sunshine, a freak of nature in the succession of bitterly cold, wet and gloomy days that constituted winter in Belgian Flanders. Stepping out from the covered bay in the appropriately-named Winter Trench, where I’d spent the hours from dawn till well past noon, I could see that the snow was melting once more. A week ago it was all but gone and then on Wednesday (today being a Monday I was fairly sure), it had come drifting down in thick heavy flakes that filled the air, turning the visibility to nothing, and grown men into little boys for a few precious hours. The mood was even better after the announcement that the night time working parties were cancelled. Folds of white still blanketed the parapets, the fields and the fence posts, and coated the Messines Ridge, and the war and the sun were vying to sweep them away.
There were many who were happy about this. The snow for all its charms made an excursion into No-Man’s-Land all the more harrowing; the Germans had sighted their rifles and machine guns on some of the little trails we made, now highly visible. Furthermore, even at night, the form of a man in khaki was in vivid contrast to the land about and I’d been on edge when it was my turn to head out to man a listening post. I’d seldom moved quicker.
The listening post went well, apart from the biting cold, and I was returning to trench 134-135 where the platoon was relieving another. It was a state of affairs I was anything but happy with. Admittedly the north end of 134, abutting 135, was a lot drier than the southern sector where the Douve flowed through, but it was one of the spots where the enemy lines were nearest ours. Nor did it help that directly opposite was the local citadel of La Petite Douve Farm. Later tonight large salvoes of rifle grenades were expected to arrive. One wearied of German punctuality.
Hobson had taken the sector further north, and slightly further away, assigning this one to me. ‘Your own damn fault,’ snapped Dundas when I mentioned it to him. At intervals he still remonstrated me for turning down the sergeant’s stripe – a point of view I was increasingly inclined to share as the weeks passed and Sergeant Hobson found new and creative ways to remind me of our respective positions.
‘Oh, you’re just sore because you’re going to be up to your knees in water all night, Roy,’ I responded. Which was probably accurate. Dundas had drawn the section beside the river. He snorted.
‘Be thankful for the pioneers,’ I called after him. ‘They’re good at pumping.’ The small group from the 1st Pioneer Battalion, who I was to tutor in the intricacies of the trenches this night, glanced at me apprehensively.
‘Cheer up fellas. You should be plenty dry tonight,’ I reassured them. ‘You’ll want to prepare for when the pineapples start to fall from the sky, though.’
I might have mentioned that they should be thankful we didn’t have any such plans ourselves. The last time we'd been showing off, we fired 42 rifle grenades and got almost exactly the same number by return messenger. It was the sort of tit-for-tat that kept both sides on their toes.
That I knew the exact number was because we had instructions to count them – theirs and ours – although for what purpose was beyond me. I imagine it made for titillating reading for some under-employed soul at army headquarters. When the bombardments began I usually found I was too busy running one way or the other to count much of anything, so the statistical accuracy was questionable.
The only statistic that mattered to me this night was that my section of twelve, and the pioneers, survived. As objectives go it wouldn’t go down in the annals of military history, but then few days in the trenches would. I had the men well spread out, each of the pioneers instructed and paired with a reliable man. The NCO I’d relieved told me that midnight was when we should expect fireworks.
I was standing at the look hole when I first heard them. A succession of soft pops due east.
‘Heads up!’ I yelled. Men went scurrying.
Like arrows of old, a flight appeared in mid-air for an instant before descending toward the trench, straddling it in a flurry of small bangs. One landed several feet behind and exploded with the sound of a large firecracker. Had I not been up on the fire step I would have had a leg full of metal shards.
They were rifle grenades. Deeper thuds followed and I knew without even seeing them that they were large aerial torpedoes, fired from a trench mortar. As with the rifle grenades they appeared similar to a medieval mace, a length of rod sticking from a metal ball, but considerably larger. Unlike a mace the punch came from the explosive within, not the steel. If one landed beside you the chances were quite high you were heading west. A second or two later three large bangs went off near 135. Our artillery began shooting in response.
Too late I noticed another salvo of rifle grenades. They rained down in a cluster in the sector where I stood, a half dozen of them, exploding around us.
To my right there was a clatter, as of a stone falling on the plank we were standing on. I wrenched my head round and saw it lying there, halfway between Partridge and me. A wave of cold sweat rushed over, the thought that this time I was truly done for flashing through my head. However it didn’t explode. It just lay there. A steel rod attached to a small steel pineapple. Innocuous.
‘A dud,’ said Partridge weakly.
I exhaled. ‘Thank God for duds,’ I breathed.
Then from the traverse to the north came a man running. It was Harry Hobson and he was going full tilt. Of his rifle there was no sign, and my first impression was that he was in panic.
When he was close enough that I could see his face my second impression confirmed it. Hobson’s eyes stared ahead, unseeing, a look which I’d seen before in men who’d lost their senses amidst the crash of a bombardment. I could guess what had happened; one or more of the aerial torpedoes had landed close to him. ‘Whoa,’ I called out and stepped down from the fire-step, extending an arm in warning. He brushed past it and me. I swivelled and grabbed for his arm, was towed along for a couple of feet, and finally was able to steer him with a rough push into the wall of sandbags.
He was breathing heavily. ‘Calm down,’ I said firmly, ‘Get a hold of yourself, Hobson.’ I kept a tight grasp on his arm until I felt the tension ease away, then released it. ‘It’s a lucky thing an officer didn’t see you. This is not the behaviour expected of an NCO. What will the men think, you running away like a chicken with your head cut off?’ A corporal dressing down a sergeant was not foreseen in the army regulations. There were, however, several paragraphs in those same regulations which would have been of far greater concern if I hadn’t stopped him – I was quite certain the penalty for cowardice was death. It didn’t end well for NCOs fleeing their posts and their men. And I was angry with him, too; he was letting down his men, not to mention the rest of us. As his breathing slowed and the fog in his head cleared, he became as docile as a lamb. He knew the penalties for cowardice.
‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbled. ‘I… I just sort of lost my mind. Those torpedoes went off and…’
At the last sentence I looked skyward, conscious the barrage was finished. It had ended as suddenly as it began.
Then I noticed Partridge up on the fire-step. He had turned and was observing us. I barked at him: ‘Damn it all, Partridge. You’re supposed to be standing watch. Do you see anything in front?’
