1914 (British Ace) (5 page)

“Come on lads, give us a song.
Send them to sleep.”

Although they were in different carriages we had the adjoining doors open so that they could hear each other.
Doddy hummed the opening and his brother joined in.  They chose a lilting Irish melody.  Soon every man in my section was singing.

Oh, Danny Boy the pipes are calling

From glen to glen, and down the mountain side,

The
summer's gone and all the roses falling,

It's you, it's you must go, and I must bide,

But come ye back when summer's in the meadow,

Or when the
valley's hushed and white with snow.

It's I'll be here in sunshine or in shadow,

Oh, Danny Boy, oh Danny Boy, I love you son!

But when ye come, and all the flow'rs are dying,

If I am dead, as dead I well may be,

Ye'll come and fine the place where I am lying,

And kneel and say an A-ve there for me;

And I shall hear though soft you tread above me,

And all my grave will warmer, sweeter be,

For you will bend and tell me that you love me,

And I shall sleep in peace until you come to me!

The effect on the horses was nothing short of miraculous.  Soon every horse was chewing happily from their nosebags. The boys all enjoyed the singing. Doddy and Tiny knew many songs and they even sang a couple of the newer songs.  Those were sung just by the two of them but, as the others listened
and learned the words they joined in too.

Up to mighty London came an Irishman one day,

As the streets are paved with gold, sure ev'ryone was gay;

Singing songs of Piccadilly, Strand and Leicester Square,

Till Paddy got excited, then he shouted to them there:--

"It's a long way to Tipperary,

It's a long way to go;

It's a long way to Tipperary,

To the sweetest girl I know!

Goodbye Picadilly,

Farewell, Leicester Square,

It's a long, long way to Tipperary,

But my heart's right there!"

Paddy wrote a letter to his Irish Molly O',

Saying, "Should you not receive it, write and let me know!

"If I make mistakes in "spelling," Molly dear," said he,

"Remember it's the pen that's bad, don't lay the blame on me"

"It's a long way to Tipperary,

It's a long way to go;

It's a long way to Tipperary,

To the sweetest girl I know!

Goodbye Picadilly,

Farewell, Leicester Square,

It's a long, long way to Tipperary,

But my heart's right there!"

Molly wrote a neat reply to Irish Paddy O',

Saying, "Mike Maloney wants to marry me, and so

Leave the Strand and Piccadilly, or you'll be to blame,

For love has fairly drove me silly--hoping you're the same!"

"It's a long way to Tipperary,

It's a long way to go;

It's a long way to Tipperary,

To the sweetest girl I know!

Goodbye Picadilly,

Farewell, Leicester Square,

It's a long, long way to Tipperary,

But my heart's right there!"

“That’s a nice one,
lads.”

Robbie McGlashan shouted from two carriages up, “Let’s have that again.  I like that one.”

The journey seemed much shorter as they sang their way south.  When we stopped at Crewe to change engines, Sergeant Armstrong came down the platform with a bottle of beer for each of us. “Compliments of the major.” He winked at me.  “He reckons you lads are doing a good job keeping them quiet.”

“What is it like in the carriages?”

“The usual.  They are all playing cards and most of them are losing. They’re mugs. We can hear you singing sometimes when we stop at the points.  Your lads are good singers.”

“It calms the horses and they enjoy it.”

We chose the quieter, country sections of track to clean out the horses.  I imagine the farmers were happy to have their fields fertilised but we were happier to have rid ourselves of the smell. It was getting towards dark when we reached the siding close to our new camp.  We were not far from the sea; we could smell it.  The horses were led down the ramps and each section collected their own.  We were the last off the train.  I hoped that wouldn’t mean we had the worst tents.

I knew that the Quartermaster Sergeant didn’t particularly like me.  It had been ever since John and Tom had spoiled our Christmas.  It seems they had got into a fight in Burscough village and the sergeant’s brother had received a black eye.
He didn’t deliberately go out of his way to make life hard but if he had a choice then we would always get second best.

Luckily for us Major Harrison had made sure that our tents were on a dry part of the camp. Sergeant Armstrong and the major got on better than the major and some of the officers. In this instance we were looked after.

I had never spent much time under canvas and it was an interesting experience.  I knew that this would be the future.  There would be no comfortable billets or barracks.  The camp bed was no hardship but I wondered how it would stand up to the rigours of campaigning. We had no idea how long we would have to put up with these conditions.  Perhaps peace would break out and this tension would not lead to war. The griffin suggested that this was serious and we wouldn’t be going home any time soon.

The next day we received even more equipment.  We all had a gas mask or as it soon became known, the
’google eyed booger with the tit
’. They had a strange rubbery smell and I wondered if we would ever have to use them.  When they brought the ones for the horses my heart sank. Even Caesar, a placid and docile horse, baulked when we had to put them on.

“Sarge, if we have to put these on in a hurry then how do we do it?”

I think old Sergeant Armstrong felt the same as we did but he had been obeying orders for years and he shrugged, “The same way as we do anything, practice and more practice.”

In the end we did
not have enough time to practise.  War was declared on August 4
th
1914 and two days later we sailed for France.  Our own war had begun. Many of the lads who boarded the boat would never see Blighty again.  Even worse, many of the fine animals which we led across the sea to France would fall in a foreign field.  To horseman like us that was even worse; at least, as soldiers, we had had a choice.  The horses just followed us and obeyed us. It was sad really.

I think that the generals thought that we were ready for war.  They were wrong.  We were as unprepared for a war as it was possible to be.  We had fired our guns at targets and used live ammunition on a handful of occasions. We had played at war games once or twice but as we had all been wearing either bright red or blue arm bands it hardly replicated war. This was not my view but the sergeants and officers like Major Harrison who had been to war themselves. I was lucky with my section; they were sensibly minded and down to earth.  They were not expecting a glorious ride to victory over the fleeing Germans but some of those who came from places like Liverpool and Preston were confident that this would be
a war won in a few weeks and the Lancashire Yeomanry were just the boys to do it.

We landed at Dunkirk.  It was a cold windswept sandy beach.  It reminded me of Southport. We unloaded the horses; they were becoming used to being transported.  Colonel Mackenzie had gone ahead with the headquarters staff and that left Major Harrison to organise us. We rode east.  This time we would have to erect our own tents.  The major had the map coordinates but we had no idea what the terrain would be like.  As it turned out it was a large farmer’s field.  I would have expected the farmer to be upset about a regiment of cavalry camping on his land but they
were all worried about an army invading them who would not pay for the privilege: the Germans.

This time we had to lay out horse lines, dig latrines as well as erecting our tents too. By the time we had finished the field was a muddy morass which promised to become worse should we get any rain.

Our new officer, replacing Lord Burscough, was Lieutenant Ramsden.  He was an affable young chap but terribly keen.  He loved to volunteer for anything. We learned that he had been an officer at University and his uncle was Colonel Mackenzie. This was his chance to show what he had learned and we were his guinea pigs.

When the colonel returned from the briefing at the headquarters he held an officers’ briefing.  The keen lieutenant then called a meeting of his non commissioned officers.
We were short of one sergeant and one corporal but as we only had twenty five troopers in the troop that was not a problem.

The fresh faced schoolboy rubbed his hands in anticipation.  “Well chaps
, Major Harrison must like us for he has given us the job of scouting the area to the east.  What fun eh?”

Sergeant Armstrong looked at me and gave a slight shake of the head. “Sir, when you say east, can you be more specific?”

The question did not seem to bother the lieutenant. “Just find out what’s up the road I expect.”

I shifted in my seat, “Sir, do we have any maps?”

If I had spoken in Urdu I might have had the same response.  He adopted a puzzled look and then said, “Maps?” His expression seemed to suggest he had never thought of them.

“Yes sir, maps of the area.  It might help.  You know to find the roads.”

It was as though a penny had actually dropped, “I say, what a capital idea.”

Before he could embarrass himself any more Sergeant Armstrong said, “I’ll get some from the adjutant sir.  There are bound to be some.”

“Jolly good.  Well, see you tomorrow eh chaps? Reveille, breakfast and then tally ho!”

After he had gone we both burst out laughing. “He means well
, William, but you and I will have to steer him in the right direction.” I think he meant he would do the steering but I was touched that I was included in the comments.

I went around the men’s tents warning them of the planned patrol.
“Make sure you have all your equipment with you and that you have spares of anything which needs spares.”

“Gas masks as well?” Jack Lynch was a happy go lucky trooper but if there was a line of least resistance then he would take it.

“Everything: full bandoliers of ammunition, swords, the lot. I want to be prepared for whatever we meet.  I saw them all exchanging looks.  “When we have done this for a week or so then we will have a better idea of what we are likely to meet and we can think about leaving spare equipment in the tents.”

It had been easier when I had been one of the lads. 
They would have just listened to me.  Now I was a corporal and a figure of authority.  They would push the boundaries as far as they could. The trouble was I didn’t know much more than they did.  We relied heavily on Sergeant Armstrong.

I was awake and up well before reveille. I wanted to be sure that I was as fully prepared as possible. The gas masks and ammunition made for a heavy load and I was grateful that Caesar was such a big horse. I had cleaned my Lee Enfield the night before and sharpened my sword.  I did not think it was likely we would need our swords but it paid to be ready.

I heard a noise behind me and turned to see Sergeant Armstrong yawning.  He chuckled, “A good habit to get into William.” He tapped his nose, “And it means you get fed first.”

After we had saddled our horses we led them to the mess tent. There was a short hitching rail outside and we tied our mounts to it. It could only accommodate five horses and ours were the only ones there.

The mess tent was empty but there was the smell of breakfast in the air. The sergeant cook came from Manchester and was a blunt chap. “What the bloody hell are you two doing up?  Have you wet the bed or summat?”

“No
, we thought if we came early we might actually get something that was almost edible.”

The cook snorted, “Doesn’t matter when you get here; the food is always shite.  It’s what they give us to cook. Tea’s up anyroad.”

We poured ourselves a mug of hot steaming tea and loaded it heavily with sugar. We sat at one of the trestle tables and Sergeant Armstrong lit his pipe.

“Sarge, do you reckon we will see action today?”

“There’s no point worrying about that. We have the hardest of jobs today; we are scouting.  That means seeing them before they see you. If there is any action it will be upon you in a minute and over as fast. You have to react faster than the enemy.” He shook his head and examined the glowing tobacco in his pipe. “I am too old for this game son.  You will need your eyes, ears and wits.  I can tell you what to do but I should be at home digging my garden and putting in my taters.”