menu_book Chapter 4

CHAPTER IV. ON NUMBER. ambulance train two first battle of ypres october twentieth nineteen fourteen to november seventeenth nineteen fourteen the sundering line of battle stands and in the air dust moans and sings but day shall clasp him with strong hands and night shall fold him with soft wings jolien grenfell tuesday october twentieth six p m just leaving rouen for boulogne we've seen some of the indians the canadians seem to be still on salisbury plain no one knows what we're going to boulogne empty for we have been busy to-day getting the train ready stocking dressings etc all the five hundred blankets are sent in to be fumigated after each journey and five hundred others drawn and stared and while they may be

one of the difficulties is the lively condition of the men's shirts and trousers which is worse than fleece when they come from the trenches in the same clothes they have worn for five weeks or more you can't wonder we make tracks for a bath at rouen we've just taken on two belgian officers who want to live to boulogne wednesday october twenty first arrived at boulogne six a m went on to calais and reached st homer at two p m where i believe we are to take up from the motor ambulances a train of indians is here some belgian refugees boarded the train at bologna and wanted to live to calais but i had to be turned off reluctantly on both sides have been going through bedding equipment to-day no mail for me yet but the others have had one to-day three thirty p m off for steenwerk close to the belgian frontier north-west of lille good business

just seen five aeroplanes have been warned by major to wear brassards in prominent plays owing to dangerous journey and view this feels like the front again thousands and thousands of indian tropes are marching close to the line with long fair british officers in turbans mounted who salute us and we wave back Transport on mules. Gorgeous sunset going on. Perfectly flat country.

No railway traffic except de la guerre. 6 p.m. Steinwork. Page dark. Saw big guns flashing some way off.

The motor ambulances are not yet in with the wounded. The line is cut farther on. 8 p.m. We have had dinner, and have just been down the line to see the place about a hundred yards off.

The Germans were here six days ago, got into a big sewer that goes on the line and blew it up. There is a hole thirty feet long, fifteen across, and fifteen deep. Very good piece of work. They occupied the station and bragged about getting across to England from Calais.

The medical officer, who lives here, to be the link with the surgeon and seven men, between the field ambulances and the trains, dined with us. It is a wee place. The station is his headquarters. Thursday, October 22nd. second. Took on from convoys all night in pitch darkness. A very bad load this time, going to go septic, swelling under the bandages. There was a fractured spine and a malignant eodema, both dying. We put these two off to-day at Saint-Omer. We came straight away in the morning and are now nearly back at Boulogne. Ypres.

Friday, October 23rd All unloaded by 11pm last night 1800 in a day and night Number Ambulance train was in

Visited M and S Bed by 12 Clothes on for 40 hours Slept alongside K Two hospital ships in

Watched them loading up from ambulances No time to go ashore The wounded officers we had this time said, The fighting at the front is very heavy. The men said the same.

They slept from sheer exhaustion almost before their boots were got off, and before the cocoa came round. In the morning they perked up, very pleased with their sleep, and talked incessantly of the trenches, and the charges, and the odds each regiment had against them,

and how many were left out of their company, and all the most gruesome details you can imagine. They seem to get their blood up against the Germans when they're actually doing the fighting. You're too excited to notice what hits you, or to think of anything but your life, and your country, one man added.

Some of us has got to get killed, and some wounded, and some captured, and we wonder which is for us. 11.15. Just off for... I was in the act of trotting off into the town to find the bars, when I met a London Scottish with a very urgent note for the officer commanding. Thought I'd better buy the we, and it was to say, your train is urgently required, how soon can you start?

So I had a lucky escape of being left behind. We had leave till 1pm. m then the major nearly got left we couldn't start that minute because our stores weren't all in and the rail transport officer came up in a great fuss that we were holding up five supply trains and reinforcements so the british army had to wait for us The worst discomforts of this life are A. Cold B. Want of drinking water when you're thirsty

C. The appalling atmosphere of the French dining car D. Lack of room for a bath and difficulty of getting hot water E. Dirt F. Eccentricities in the meals G. Bad or no lights

h. Difficulties of getting laundry done i. Personal capture of various livestock j. Broken knives k. Want of exercise on the up-journey Against all these minor details, put being at the front, and all that that includes of a thrilling interest,

being part of the machinery to give the men the first care and comparative comfort since they landed at the time they most needed and least expected six p m a hauserbrook again we are said to be going to belgium this time possibly ypres there are a terrible lot of wounded to be got down more than all the trains can take they are putting some of them off on the stations where there is a medical officer with a few men and going back for more there were two lovely french torpedo boats alongside of us at boulogne 7.30 p.m. Ypres. Just arrived, all very bucked at being in Belgium. An armoured train, projective coloured all over, in huge dabs of red, blue, yellow and green against aeroplanes,

is alongside of us in the station, manned by thirty men, Royal Navy. Three trucks are called, Nelson, Jellicoe, and Drake, with guns. They look fine. The men say it is a great game. They are directed where to fire German positions or batteries, and as soon as they answer, the train nips out of range. They were very jolly and showed us their tame rabbit on active service. They have had no casualties so far. Our load hasn't come in yet. We are two miles

from our fighting line. No firing tonight to be heard. Soon began, though. Sunday, October 25th. Couldn't ride last night. The only thing was to try and forget it all. It has been an absolute hell of a journey. There is no other word for it. First you must understand that this big battle from Austin to Lille is perhaps the most desperate of all, though that is said of each in turn. more the n and this but the men and officers who have been through all say this is the worst the germans are desperate and stick at nothing and the allies are the same and in determination to drive them back each man personally seems to be the same

consequently the carnage is being appalling and we have been practically in it as far as horrors go guns were cracking and splitting all night lighting up the sky in flashes and fires were burning on both sides The clearing hospital close by, which was receiving the wounded from the field and sending them on to us, was packed and overflowing with badly wounded, the medical officer on the station said. We had three hundred sixty-eight. A good two hundred were dangerously, and seriously wounded, perhaps more, and the sitting-up cases were bad enough. The compound fractured femurs were put up with rifles and pick handles for splints, paired it with bits of kilts and straw. Nearly all the men had more than one wound. Some had ten.

One man with a huge compound fracture above the elbow had tied on a bit of string with a bullet in it as a tourniquet above the wound himself. When I cut off a soaked three layers of sleeve, there was no dressing on it at all. They were bleeding faster than we could cope with it, and the agony of getting some of the stretchers onto the top bunks is a thing to forget. We were full up by about 2 a.m., and then were delayed by a collision up the line, which was blocked by dead horses as a result. All night, and without a break till we got back to Bologna at 4 p.m. next day, yesterday,

we grappled with them, and some of them were not dressed when we got into B. The head-cases were delirious in trying to get out of the window, and we were giving strychnine and morphia all round. Two were put off dying at St. Omer, but we kept the rest alive to Bologna. The outstanding, shining things that hit you in the eye all through,

was a universal silent pluck of the men they stuck it all without a whine or complaint or even a comment it was would you mind moving my leg when you get time and thank you very much or that's absolutely glorious as one boy said on having his boot lace cut or that's grand when you struck a lucky position for a wound in the back one badly smashed upset contentedly i was lucky i was the only man left alive in our trench so was another in another trench sixteen out of twenty-five of one company in a trench whereon the train all seriously wounded except one one man with both legs smashed and other wounds was asked if it was all by one shell oh yes why the man next me was blown to bits the bleeding made them all frightfully thirsty they had only been hit a few hours many of them and luckily we had gotten a good supply of boiled water beforehand on each carriage so we had plenty when there was time to get it in the middle of the worst of it in the night i became conscious of a belgian boy scout of fourteen in the corridor with a glass and a pail of drinking water

that boy worked for hours with his glass and pail on his own or wherever you sent him we took him back to calais he had come up into the firing line on his cycle fitted with a rifle with tobacco for the troops and lived with the british whom he loved sharing their rations he was a little brig one of the civil surgeons got him taken back with us where he wanted to go there were twenty-five officers on the train they said there were eleven thousand germans dead and they were using the dead piled up instead of trenches about one o'clock that night we heard a rifle shot it was a german spy shooting at the sentry sailor on the armored train alongside of us they didn't catch him it took from four to ten p m to unload our bad cases and get them into hospitals and motor ambulances they lay in rows on their stretchers on the platform waiting their turn without a crumble there have been so many hundreds brought down this week that they've had suddenly to clear four hotels for hospitals we are now in the filthiest of sightings and the smell of the burning of our heaps of filthy debris of the train is enough to make you sick

we all slept like logs last night and could have gone on all day but the train has to be cleaned down by the orderlies and everything got ready for the next lot they nearly moved us up again last night but we shall go to-day i think if one knew beforehand what all this was going to be like one would hardly want to face it but somehow you're glad to be there we were tackling a bad wound in the head and when it was finished and the man was being got comfortable he flinched and remarked that leg is a beast we found a compound fractured femur put up with the rifle for a splint he had blankets on and had never mentioned that his thigh was broken it too had to be packed and all he said was that leg is a beast and that leg is a beast Monday, the 26th, 7am, Ypres.

We got here again about 10pm last night in pouring wet, and expected another night like Friday night. But we, for some reason, remained short of the station. And when we found there was nothing doing, lay down in our clothes and slept, booted and spurred in Macintosh, aprons, etc. We were all so tired and done up yesterday. —medical officers, sisters, and orderlies—that we were glad of to respite.

There was a tremendous banging and flashing to the north about three o'clock, and this morning it was very noisy, and shaking the train. Some of it sounds quite close. It is a noise you rather miss when it leaves off. One of the last lot of officers told us he had himself seen in a barn

three women and some children, all dead, and all with no hands. The noise this morning is like a continuous roll of thunder, interrupted by loud bangs and the popping of the French mitrailleuses, like our Maximes. The nearest Tommy can get to that word, as Millet draws us.

There are two other ambliants drained in, but I hear we are to load up first. This place is full of Belgian women and children refugees in a bad way from exhaustion. A long line of our horse ambulances is coming slowly in. Had a very interesting morning.

Got leave to go into the town and see the cathedral of Saint-Martin. None of the others would budge from the train, so I went alone. Town chock full of French and Belgian troops, and unending streams of columns. also Belgian refugees, cars full of staff-offices. The cathedral is thirteenth century, glorious as usual. There are hundreds of German prisoners in the town and cloth hall. It was a very warish

feeling saying one's prayers in the cathedral to the sound of the guns of one of the greatest battles in the world. A medical officer from the clearing hospital, with a haggard face, asked me if I could give him some haute colonie and Beauvril for a wounded officer with a gangrene's leg, lying on the station. Sister X and I took some down, or some Morphea, and fed them all. Frightful cases and stretchers in the waiting-room.

They are for our train when we get in. He told me he had never seen such awful wounds, or such numbers of them. They are brought to down in carts or anything. he said there are fifteen hundred dead germans piled up in a field five miles off they say the german officers of ten days service are commanding tuesday october twenty seventh boulogne We got loaded up and off by about 7 p.m. and arrived back here this morning.

There are two trains to unload ahead of us, so we shall probably be on duty all day. It is the second night running we haven't had our clothes off, though we did lie down the night before. Last night we had each a four-hour shift to lie down, when all the worst were seen to. One man died at 6 a.m., and another is dying. Many, as usual, are delirious, and the hemorrhage was worse than ever.

It is frightfully difficult to stop it with these bad wounds and compound fractures. One surgeon has both eyes gone from a shell wound. The twelve setting-up cases on each carriage are a joy after the tragedy of the rest. They stop talking and smoking till late, because if they are so surprised and pleased to be alive,

and it is too comfortable to sleep. One man with a broken leg gave me both his pillows for a worse man and said, I'm not bad at all, only got me leg broke. A redding man, with his face wounded and one eye gone, kept up a running fire of wit and hilarity during his dressing

about having himself photographed as a guy forks for sketchy bits. Wednesday, October 28th Got to Bologna yesterday morning. Then followed a most difficult day. It was not till 10 p.m. that they began to unload the SIG. The unloading staff at Bologna have been so overworked night and day, the trains get piled up, waiting to be unloaded.

Fifty motor ambulances have been sent forward to the front, and here they have to depend largely on volunteer people with private motors. Then trains get blocked by other trains, each side of them. and nothing short of the fear of death will move a french engine-driver to do what you want him to do meanwhile two men on our train died and several others were getting on with it and all the serious cases were in great distress and misery as a crowning help the train was divided into three parts each five minutes walk from any other dispensary on one bit kitchen on another everybody got very desperate and at last after superhuman efforts the train was cleared by midnight and we went thankfully but rarely to our beds which we had not got into for the two previous nights

the day was fine and sunny and while the train was getting in store we went into the town to find the blanchisserie and bought a cake and a petticoat and had a breath of different air we expect to move up again any time now most welcome mails in news of the wet's rebellion to-day i wonder if both of them will be able to hold it the times of yesterday which you can get here and to-day's daily mail say the fighting beyond ypres is severe but that gives the british public no glimmering of what it really is the regiment had three men left out of one company the men say general cried on seeing the remains of the regiments who answered the rolls and yet we still drive the germans back there is a train full of slightly wounded indians in there are cooking chupattis on nothing along the quay the boats were packed with refugee families yesterday we had some badly wounded germans on our train and some french officers the british army doesn't intend the germans to get to calais and they won't get thursday october twenty ninth nieppe woke up to the familiar bangs and rattles again this time at a wee place about four miles from armentier

we are to take up a hundred and fifty here and go back to bayeux for a hundred and fifty there it is a lovely sunny morning but very cold the peasants are working in the fields as peacefully as at home a royal army medical corps lieutenant was killed by a shelf three miles from here three days ago we've just been giving out scarves and socks to some field ambulance men along the line just seen a british aeroplane send off a signal to our batteries a long smokest snake in the sky also a very big british aeroplane with a machine gun on her a german aeroplane dropped a bomb into the field on tuesday meant for the air station here this is the headquarters of the fourth division friday october thirtieth boulogne While we were at Niep, after passing Bayeux, a German aeroplane dropped a bomb onto Bayeux.

After filling up at Niep, we went back to Bayeux, and took up two hundred and thirty-eight Indians, mostly with smashed left arms from a machine gun that caught them in the act of firing over a trench. They are nearly all forty-seventh Sigs, perfect lambs. They hold up their wounded hands and arms like babies for you to see, and insist on having them dressed, whether they have just been done or not.

They behave like gentlemen and salam after you have dressed them. They have masses of long, fine, dark hair, under their turbans done up with yellow coombs, glorious teas and melting dark eyes. One died.

The younger boys have beautiful, classic Italian faces, and the rest have fierce black beards curling over their ears. We carried 387 cases this time. Later. We got unloaded much more quickly today, and have been able to have a good rest this afternoon,

as I went to bed at 3 a.m. and was up again by 8. It was not so heavy this time, as the Indians were mostly sitting up cases. Those of a different caste had to sleep on the floor of the corridors, as the others wouldn't have them in. One compartment of four lying down ones got restless with the pain of their arms, and I found them all sitting up rocking their arms and wailing,

Aye, aye, aye. Poor pets. They all had morphia and subsided. One British Tommy said to me, Don't take no notice of the dirt on me flesh, sister.

I ain't had much time to wash. Quite seriously. Another bad one needed dressing, I said. "'I won't hurt you,' and he said in a hopeless sort of voice, "'I don't care if you do.' I had been through a little too much.

"'It is fine getting the same day's London Daily Mail here by the Fogstone boat. "'It is interesting to hear the individual men express of their conviction that the British will never let the Germans through to Calais. They seem as keen as the generals or the government. That is why we have had such thousands of wounded in Bologna in this one week. It is quite difficult to nurse the Germans, and impossible to love your enemies.

We always have summoned the train. One man of the Durham Light Infantry was bayoneted in three different places, after being badly wounded in the arm by a dum-dum bullet. They make a small entrance hall, and burst the limp open in exit. The man who bayoneted him died in the next bedroom in the clearing hospital yesterday morning.

You feel that they have all been doing that and worse. We hear at first hand from offices and men specified local instances of unprintable wickedness. Saturday, October 31st. Left Bologna at 12 and have just reached Bayeux, 6pm, where we are to take up wounded Indians again. Somehow they are not so harrowing as a wounded British.

Perhaps because of the blocking language, and the weirdness of them. Big guns are booming again. This was the most critical day of the First Battle of Ypres. H. sent me a lovely parcel of fifty packets of cigarettes, and some chocolate, and A. sent a box of nut-milk choc.

They will be grand for the men. One drawback on having the Indians is that you find them squatting in the corridor, comparing notes on what varieties they find in their clothing. Considering the way one gets smothered with their blankets in the bunks, it is a most personally alarming element in the war so far.

Sunday, November 1st, Boulogne, All Saints Day. We loaded up with British, after all, late in the evening, and had a very heavy night. One of mine died suddenly of femoral hemorrhage, after sitting up and enjoying his breakfast.

12. Noon. We are still unloaded, but I was up all night, and so went out for a blow after breakfast. Found two British torpedo-boat destroyers in dock, and once they were having divine service, close to the quay. I listened specially to the part about loving our enemies. Then I found the English church, colonial and continental, quite nice and good chance, but I was too sleepy to stay longer than the Psalms.

It is ages since one had a chance to go to church. After lunch, now they are all unloaded, one will be able to get a stuffy station sleep, regardless of noise and smells. We carried thirty-nine officers on the train,

mostly cavalry, very brave and angelic and polite in their uncomfortable and unwanted helplessness. They liked everything enthusiastically, the beds and the foods and the bandages. One worn out, murmured as he was tucked up.

By Jove, it is splendid to be out of the sound of those beastly guns. It's priceless. I had a very interesting conversation with the major this morning, who was hit yesterday. He says it's the only question of where and when you get it. Sooner or later, practically no one escapes.

Rifle firing counts for nothing. It is all the coal boxes and the Jack Johnsons. The shortage of officers is getting very serious on both sides, and it becomes more and more a question of who can wear out the other in the time. He said that aircraft has altered everything in war. German aeroplanes come along, give a little dip over our positions, and away go the German guns. And these innocent would-be peasants working in the fields, give all sorts of signals by whirling windmills round suddenly when certain regiments come into action.

The poor L. Regiment were badly cut up in this way yesterday, half an hour after coming into their first action. We had them on the train. They say the French fight well with us, better than alone, and the Indians can't be kept in their trenches. It is up and at them. But we shall soon have lost all the men we have out here.

Trains and trains full, come in every day and night. We are waiting now for five trains to unload. It is a dazzling morning. Monday, November 2nd,

on way up to... The pressure on the medical service is now enormous. One train came down today, without sisters, with twelve hundred sitting-up cases.

They stayed for hours in the siding nearest without water, cigarettes or newspapers. You will see in today's times that the Germans have got back round Ypres again, where I went into the cathedral last Monday.

Number **** ambulance train was badly shelled there yesterday. The Germans were trying for the armour train. The naval officer on the armour train had to stand behind the engine driver with a revolver to make him go where he was wanted to the sitting-up cases on number

got out and fled three miles down the line a black maria shell burst close to and killed a man they are again urgently needing ambulance trains so i hope we are going there to-night 80,000 German reinforcements are said to have come up to break through our line, and the British dead are now piled up on the field. But they aren't letting the Germans through. Three of our men died before we unloaded at 8 p.m. yesterday. Two of shock from lying ten hours in the trench, not dressed.

Tuesday, November 3rd, Beaux, 8.30 a.m. Just going to load up. Wish we'd gone to Ypres. Germans said to be advancing. Wednesday, November 4th, Boulogne.

We had a lot of badly wounded Germans who had evidently been left many days. Their condition was appalling. Two died, one of tetanus, and one British. We have had a lot of the London Scottish wounded in their first action. Reinforcements, French guns, British cavalry are being hurried up the line.

they all look splendid. Wednesday, November 11th. Sometimes it seems as if we shall never get home. The future is so unwritten. A frightful explosion like this hell of a war, which flared up in a few days, will take so much longer to wipe up what can be wiped up. I think the British men who have seen the desolation and the atrocities in Belgium have all personally settled that it shan't happen in England, and that is why the headlines always read,

The British Army immovable. Waves of German infantry broken. Allies throw enemy back at all points. Ypres held for three weeks under a rain of shells. You can tell they feel like that from their entire lack of resentment about their own injuries. Their conversation to each other, from the time they are landed on the train, until they are taken off, is never about their own wounds and feelings, but exclusively about the fighting they have just left. If one only had time to

listen, or take it down, it would be something worth reading, because it is not letters home, or newspaper stuff, but tall to each other, with their own curious comment of phraseology, and no hint of a gallery or a press. Incidentally, one gets a few eye-openers into what happens to a group of men when a Jack Johnson lands a shell in the middle of them.

Nearly every man on the train, especially the badly smashed-up ones, tells you how exceptionally lucky he was, because he didn't get killed like his mate. Boulogne, Thursday, November 12th, 8pm. Have been here all day. Had hot baths on the St. Andrew.

News from the front handed down the line coincides with the Daily Mail. Friday, 13th. Still here. Fourth day of rest. No one knows why.

Nearly all the trains are here. The news today is glorious. They say that the Germans did get through into Ypres, and were bayoneted out again. Friday, November 13th. Boulogne.

We have been all day in Park Lane siding among the trains. In pouring wet and slush, I amuse myself with a pot of white paint and a forceps and wool for a brush, painting the numbers on both ends of the coaches and side, all down the train. You can't see the chalk marks at night. This unprecedented four days' rest, night, in bed, is doing us all a power of good. We have books and mending and various occupations. Saturday, November 14th. Glorious sunny day, but very cold.

Still in Boulogne, but out of Park Lane Siding Slum, and among the ships again. Some French sailors of the torpedo boats are drilling on one side of us. "'everything Royal Army Medical Corps "'at the base is having a rest this week, "'ships, hospitals, and trains.

"'Major S. said "'there was not so much doing at the front, "'thank heaven, "'the line is still wanted for troops. "'We have just heard

"'that there are several trains to go up "'before our turn comes, "'and that we are to wait about six miles off. "'Better than deciding anyhow. "'Meanwhile we can't go off

because we don't know when the train will move out. The tobacco and the cigarettes from Harrods have come in separate parcels, so the next will be the chocolate and hankies and cards, etc. It is a grand lot,

and I am longing to get up to the front and give them out. Sunday, November 15th. We got to move on in the middle of the night and are now on our way up. The cold of this train life is going to be rather a problem.

Our quarters are not heated. but we have made, he'd asked, acquired, looted, a very small oil stove which faintly warms the corridor, but you can imagine how no amount of coats or clothes keeps you warm in a railway carriage in winter. I'm going to make a foot muff out of a brown blanket which will help. A small walk out of doors will do it, but that you can't get off when the train is stationary,

for fear of its vanishing, and for obvious reasons when it is moving. I did walk around the train for an hour in the dark and slime in the siding yesterday evening, but it is not a cheering form of exercise. Today it is pouring cats and dogs, awful for loading sick, and there will be many after this week for the trains. Everyone, of course, cleared out of beautiful Ypres, but we are going to load up at Boperinger, the town next before it, which is now railhead. Lately the trains have not been so far.

Monday, November 16th, Bologna, 9 a.m. We loaded up at Bayeux, 344. The clearing hospitals were very full, and some came off a convoy. One of mine died. One wounded above the knee was four days in the open before being picked up.

He had six bullets in his leg, two in each arm, and crawled about till found. One of the arm wounds he got during this. i went to bed at four the news was all good taken as a whole but the men say they were a bit short-handed one said gloomily this isn't war it's murder you go there to your doom heard the sad news of lord roberts we are all the better for our week's rest tuesday november seventeenth three a m when we got our load down to bologna yesterday morning all the hospitals were full and the weather was too rough for the ships to come in and clear them so we were ordered on to havre a very long journey

a german died before we got to abbeville where we put off two more very bad ones and at amiens we put off four more who wouldn't have reached havre about midnight something broke on the train and we were hung up for hours and haven't yet got to rouen "'so we shall have them on the train all to-morrow, too, "'and have all the dressings to do for the third time. "'One of the night orderlies has been run in for being asleep on duty. "'He climbed into a top bunk, where a Frenchman was taken off at Amiens,

"'and deliberately covered up and went to sleep. "'He was in charge of twenty-eight patients. "'Another was left behind at Boulogne, absent without leave, "'thinking we should unload, and the train went off for Avre. he'll be run in too shows how you can't leave the train just got to st just that looks as if we were going to empty at versailles instead of avre

lovely starlight night but very cold everybody feels pleased and honoured that lord roberts managed to die with us on active service at headquarters and who would choose a better ending to such a life seven a m after all we must be crawling round to rouen for havre past beauvais lovely sunrise over winter woods and frosted country our load is a heavy and anxious one three hundred forty four we shall be glad to land to them safely somewhere the amputations fractures and lung cases stand these long journeys very badly chapter four