With French in France and Flanders

The Battle of the Aisne

 

The victory on the banks of the Maine brought no rest to the British Expeditionary Force. The enemy was in full retreat, and, if possible, they must be kept on the run, so, doggedly, we followed at their heels. How the weary, hard-tried infantry kept at it was nothing less than miraculous. Rarely have troops been so tried, for it must not be forgotten that the men who now pursued were the same who had passed through the privations and horrors of the retreat from Mons, and they had not rested, or even had proper hours of sleep, since they had landed in France.

It was a devastated country through which we passed—ruined villages, trampled vineyards, wrecked farmhouses, and constantly by the roadside the still, grey-clad figure of a German soldier who had fought his last fight. The almost tropical heat of the previous days had changed to driving rain and bitter cold; the roads were churned into deep mud by the passing of thousands of horses, men, guns, and transport, and at night most of us found no better bivouac than a field of turnips, and were thankful if it had a hedge under which we could crawl to shelter from the rain.

Saturday, September 12, is memorable to the members of 14th Field Ambulance, for it was then that, for the first time during the campaign, they enjoyed the luxury of a ' billet.' We marched into the little town of Chacrise at dusk, the rain coming down in sheets, and were told we were at liberty to find shelter in the houses, stables, and barns, and make ourselves comfortable for the night. My billet was in the house of an old couple, all of whose sons were away fighting, and whose joy it was to make my comrades and self as comfortable as they could. Everything they had was placed at our disposal, and we spent a delightful evening by the great open fire in their quaint, old-fashioned kitchen, and later I made my bed on the tiled floor in front of the same fire.

But even here we were not permitted to forget that we were on active service, for a seriously wounded Hussar was brought in, and he had at once to be attended to. Whilst on reconnaissance with his regiment he had been shot through the abdomen, and had actually galloped two miles in that condition to where he knew the ambulance was billeted, with the result that his serious injury was greatly aggravated. The medical officer who examined him returned with a grave face, reporting, ' I fear that ride has finished him. His only chance is for us to operate at once.' Hastily the little parlour of the farmhouse was converted into an operating-room, and the surgeons started their grim but merciful work. But it was in vain. The Rev. D. P. Winnifrith was with him at the end, and at dawn he was laid to rest in the cemetery of the little church below the hill.

The next day was Sunday, but was by no means a day of rest, for then began that long-drawn-out battle, or series of battles, which is not yet ended, and which, for want of a better name, is called the Battle of the Aisne. At 3.30 a.m. we were on the move, at dawn the heavy guns came into action, and later we learned that the cavalry were in touch with the enemy. The rain had cleared off, but the wind was keen and searching ; my horse went dead lame, and for the rest of the day I had to trudge through the ankle-deep mud.

At midday we reached the beautiful little town of Serches, surrounded by steep, pine-clad hills, and here the three ambulances of the 5th Division were ' parked ' in a meadow; houses were occupied as temporary hospitals and dressing-stations, and after a hurried meal the stretcher parties started to look for and bring in the wounded. The noise of battle was now deafening, and through the roar of artillery and the bursts of rifle fire could be heard the regular rip-rip-tip of the Maxims, which told that the infantry must be in close touch with the enemy.

In company with Majors Goldsmith and Fawcett, and the bearers of No. 14, I went forward in the direction of that awe-inspiring din, and as we advanced we learned that our whole strength was being hurled upon the German line in order to force the passage of the River Aisne. In the village of Jury we halted the bearers and rode on to reconnoitre. Soon we were passing through batteries which were hotly engaged, and from a hillside got a bird's-eye-view of the infantry fighting in the plain below, but soon decided that for the present it was impossible for the bearers to reach the wounded, who we knew must now be there in great numbers.

Still the dreadful noise of battle, and the bursting of shell in the midst of the batteries we had just passed. Overhead a German and a British aeroplane were engaged in an exciting duel, and at the same time both sides seemed to be shelling them. As we watched with strained eyes the German gave a sudden lurch and appeared to be falling, then turned and lolloped away like a lame duck, dropping as it flew, and just managed to land within its own lines, closely pursued by our bursting shrapnel—the British airman was victorious.

Then came tidings—' the Germans have been driven from their first line of trenches, and have crossed the river, blowing up the bridges behind them,' and a bridging train of the Royal Engineers went rumbling by at the gallop with their great pontoons, advancing to bridge the river, so that the infantry might continue their pursuit.

Five hundred yards from the river we found an advance dressing-station, and meanwhile Colonel Crawford had pushed on his ambulance (No. 14), and had established his headquarters in the village of Jury, where was ample accommodation in great barns for the wounded and for his own men, whilst in a farmhouse a room had been converted into an operating-room which would have been a credit to any hospital. Then darkness; but still the dreadful noise of battle, and rain which was tropical in its violence.

Our arrangements were hardly complete before the ambulance waggons from the advance dressing-station began to roll in with their loads of mutilated men. ' And still,' they said, ' the bearers are bringing them in as fast as they can across the heavy, rain-soaked fields, for Majors Richards and Fawcett have crossed the river on the Engineers' rafts, and are in close touch with the fighting infantry.'

All through the night the bridging train worked at their bridges, whilst a Field Company of Royal Engineers, with pontoon rafts, ferried the fighting troops over the river, and all night long the German guns searched the valley, striving to prevent the work, but when day dawned the whole fighting force of the 5th Division had crossed the Aisne. With the coming of day the firing was redoubled, and still the ceaseless pouring rain, and we were told that the enemy had fallen back upon a range of hills, where they were strongly entrenched, a position which had been rendered well-nigh impregnable by weeks of ceaseless preparation. This our infantry were about to attack. Later in the day I paid a visit to our advance dressing-station, and arrived to find Major Fawcett and Major Richards just starting out with their bearers. We got as far as the pontoon raft, by which we had hoped to cross the river, but here were stopped. ' There are plenty of wounded and dead,' they said, ' but they can only be reached by crossing an open plain, over which nothing can pass alive ; you must wait until dark.'

Later we got into touch with some of the infantry, and the wounded began to trickle in; then the darkness, and for the stretcher-bearers serious work began. 'They had to carry the wounded a distance of over two miles across ploughed fields, sodden with rain, in darkness black as the grave; and from sunset till dawn they kept at their work with never a word of complaint. Truly there are no braver or more self-sacrificing men in this army than the orderlies and stretcher-bearers of the Royal Army Medical Corps.

Meanwhile, at the advanced dressing-station, and in Jury, the doctors were hard at work. I never saw better arrangements, or, indeed, arrangements half as good, as those which Colonel Crawford and his officers made at Jury. Many an officer and man, during this and the following days, who owe their lives to the surgical skill of Captain Lindsay and Lieutenants Tasker and Clark, could not possibly have been saved but for the careful preparation beforehand, and the almost ideal operating-theatre into which the room in that little farmhouse had been converted. All through the night they laboured at the operating-tables 'lopping the limb to save the life,' and it was not until dawn, when for a time the incoming stream of casualties was stayed, that they were able to snatch a brief sleep. During the night over 150 men had passed through their hands.

But the carrying of the wounded out of action, the dressing of their wounds, and, when absolutely necessary, operating, is by no means all that has to be done by a Field Ambulance. For from the operating-room the wounded were carried to barns strewn with clean straw, where nursing orderlies watched over them and refreshed them with hot beef tea, &c; and it is here that the chaplain has one of his best opportunities of service. Later, when rested and refreshed, the injured men have again to be placed in the ambulance waggons, conveyed to 'refilling point' (the point where the motor-lorries which bring supplies  to the fighting force transfer their loads to the regimental supply waggons), and there transferred to the empty lorries returning to railhead.

This has to be done every night, for the Held Ambulance accompanies the fighting force, is constantly on the move, and cannot be cumbered with sick, as its ambulance waggons may be required for fresh casualties at any moment. Sometimes it is not possible to reach the motor-lorries in time, and the order to march comes before we have ' evacuated' our sick ; then a house is converted into a temporary hospital, a medical officer and nursing orderlies are left behind in charge, with orders to rejoin the column as best they can when they have sent their sick down to the base —which often means that they are separated from us for days.

All through Tuesday the fight still raged on, though now our men had been enabled to entrench themselves, and casualties were not so heavy. Hearing that at a farm on the other side of the river, near the village of St. Marguerite, there were dead waiting burial, and about fifty wounded, I rode in that direction, crossing the pontoon bridge which had been erected by the Royal Engineers. When I reached the open plain of which we had been told the previous day, I paused, and, seeing an artillery officer in command of some ammunition waggons, which were sheltering in a little plantation, I asked, ' Is it safe to cross ?' He grinned. ' Well, Padre, nothing on this side of the river can exactly be called safe, but they have not shelled these particular fields for over two hours, and the stretcher-bearers crossed just now without drawing fire.'

I thought that was good enough, so started to trot gently across the open. I had covered about half the distance when there came the ominous shriek of a shell m flight; in a few seconds shrapnel was bursting all around me, and I confess I thought my last hour had come. Lying l lat on my horse I drove the spurs in, and let her go for all she was worth. It was a mad gallop, and it was with feelings of devout thankfulness to God that at last I drew rein in a little wood near the farm I was seeking.

There I met the General Commanding the 14th Brigade (General Rolt), and for a while stayed chatting with him and his staff. Through our field-glasses we watched the effect of our shell on the wood-clad hills which were held by the enemy, and once or twice saw bodies of German troops making desperate dashes across openings in the trees, which were simply swept by our shrapnel.

When I reached the farmhouse which the regimental doctors had made their headquarters, and into which they had gathered the wounded men belonging to the regiments to which they were attached, I found it could only be entered from the back, the road in front being so swept by the enemy's rifle, machine, and shrapnel fire that no man could stand upon it and live. Inside I was met by a scene I will not attempt to describe—a scene all too familiar to doctors and chaplains on service —the wounded fresh from the fight, grimed, unkempt, bloodstained, and many of them maimed for life. Fifty in all were gathered there ; some were dying. Others were in the trenches, whom it would be impossible to reach until after dark.

I did what little I could—and it seemed woefully little in such a case—and then, in the high-walled orchard, laid an officer and four men in their last long resting-place. As I read the glorious words of our Burial Service, there were few of those who gathered round the grave who could hear my voice, so deafening was the artillery fire, but all stood with heads uncovered and reverently bowed. And when the service was ended some constructed a rude cross to mark their comrades' resting-place, whilst others, with flowers picked in the farm garden, hid the mound of brown earth with a coverlet of red and blue and gold and white.

Then gathering round me, man after man of the East Surrey Regiment asked, ' 1 Low are they all at the Home in Eccleston Street, sir ? ' ' Yes, I know the Duke of Connaught's Home, sir. Why, last time I was home on furlough from India 1 spent Christmas with you there. Remember us to Miss Morphew and Mr. Sanford.'

Day after day the battle raged on with unabated fury. In the first four days the wounded who passed through No. 14 Ambulance numbered thirteen officers and 450 men, whilst the chaplains buried two officers and twenty men. How many more were gathered in by other ambulances, or buried by other chaplains, we have no means of knowing.

Inch by inch our men gained ground, until at last the British and German trenches were only 250 to 300 yards apart; and both sides were so well dug in that the storm of shot and shell was powerless to hurt or to move them, and the battle became an artillery duel, with some infantry ' sniping,' and an occasional fight in the air between aeroplanes, to vary what was fast becoming the monotony of our lives. The position almost resembled a siege, except that there was no shortage of rations. Sometimes a shell would get into a battery, and there would be four or five men killed and wounded ; sometimes the sniper's bullet would find its billet, and there would be a man to be carried by the stretcher-bearers across what was often still the fire-swept plain. Other parts of the fighting-line it was only possible to reach after dark, as, for instance, that part of our line near Missy-sur-Aisne, and at one time Bucy-le-Long and Sermoise.

I will not weary my readers with describing in detail the happenings of this period. One day was much as another, and it was full of glorious opportunities for doing the work we were sent here to do. Latterly it has been possible for one brigade at a time to be relieved from the trenches, and come back to the shelter of Jury for a few days' rest; and to make room for I hem the Field Ambulance moved back to the little town of Serches. This was the opportunity Mr. Winnifrith and myself had long desired, for it gave us the chance of holding services amongst the men, many of whom had not attended public worship since they left England . . .