Tommy's Ark: Soldiers and Their Animals in the Great War. Richard Van Emden (23 page)

Lt G.P.A. Fildes, 2nd Coldstream Guards

The day of our relief had dawned in auspicious fashion, a common knowledge of our impending rest calling forth a general light-heartedness. A company from a battalion of the South Staffordshire Regiment was expected to make its appearance about 2 p.m., so it was arranged that the work of cleaning up should be completed by the men’s dinner hour. This was done accordingly, and by 12.30 all was reported correct in the front line.

Scattered in gossiping groups about the fire bays, the men abandoned themselves to their own devices, some arguing over a venerable newspaper, others, pipe in mouth, basking lazily in the sunshine. The air hummed to the sound of flies, and, emerging from their myriad nooks, beetles and other insect life paid homage to the summer’s day. To and fro, winging their course around the parapet, flitted elusive butterflies, whose satin wings contrasted brilliantly with the background of sky. Blending with the voices of nature, countless chirrups arose from invisible grasshoppers, who, from their forest glades, now raised their hymn to heaven, thereby humbly endeavouring to rival the melody of a lark high overhead. Rising and falling in an endless torrent of sound, this seemed to pour forth the utterance of a fairy world.

2/Lt Wilfrid Ewart, 1st Scots Guards

For the first time in many months one seems to leave the war behind, and as we march out into the country – a merry, chaffing, laughing column of schoolboys – no stench of motor lorries and petrol or swarms of troops greet us, but only the heavy silence of the woods and fields and villages, dreaming away their midday rest. A yellow cat strolls across the village streets, dogs lie basking outside the unsubstantial looking inns – peculiar looking dogs and very sleepy. Barely can they raise the energy to wag a tail at the flies which everywhere buzz and hum, creating with the drowsy heat an indescribable languor and murmur of summer. We halt in a shady oak wood, and the men, recklessly happy, throw themselves down amid the long grass, the convolvuli, the straying honeysuckle. Yes, we are happy now, we who have suffered much!

Large tracts of the Somme battlefield resembled a moonscape, for without any great elevation it was hard for the ordinary soldiers to glimpse the distant villages and woods that were yet to be targeted in the battle. For those who could remember them, the battles of 1915 were a distant memory, when farm implements, semi-derelict farmhouses and abandoned crops still gave the battlefield an earthly feel. No more. Villages and woods were likely to be identified by a wooden signpost stuck in the ground. Such sights threw the world behind the lines into the starkest relief imaginable.

2/Lt Wilfrid Ewart, 1st Scots Guards

It was almost pitch-dark, and when after a mile or two we emerged, twilight had descended upon the world, and one could barely distinguish the hillside opposite. Here a halt was made, and it was pleasant to rest upon the bank in the cool dusk, watching the last embers of a gorgeous sunset die out of the sky. Close at hand, on the edge of the forest, no sound could be heard but the ceaseless chirruping of grasshoppers and crickets, the occasional croaking of a bullfrog in some distant pool, and the whoo-twhoo-whoo-whoo of an owl coming from the depths of the woods. Not far off was a railway, and the one lone lamp which stared out of the middle distance and the occasional whistle of an engine only served to emphasise the remoteness and solitude of the place.

Now it was completely dark, a thousand summery scents rose from the earth, the sky was bejewelled with stars, low down on the horizon a golden-coppery harvest moon, not yet at the full, sailed in the heavens. The night was indescribably contemplative; many and strange thoughts came to the mind. It is from this, this pageant of peace and plenty and beauty, that one goes into the bloody nightmare of battlefields . . . What do the stars say, those stars so wise, so inscrutable? What do they say to each man who in such quiet moments asks himself whether, after all, this is not the end – of a life? Of how many lives? For many must travel the same road before the trees have lost their leaves . . .

Lt Philip Gosse, RAMC attd. 10th Northumberland Fusiliers

It was a hot sunny day and on the top of one of the haycocks I spied a little owl fast asleep. I approached slowly and quietly, until I stood within a few yards of it, and still the owl slept with eyes tightly closed, oblivious of its mortal enemy.

For a good ten minutes I stood there watching the slumbering owl, when at last he woke up, frowned angrily at me for disturbing him, and flew away. Within an hour he was back again on the same haycock.

It might be wondered how a grown-up man could sit down in a hayfield and do nothing for a whole hour, but the truth is that after being in or about the line for several months, one was content to sit in the sunshine and do nothing at all, beyond admire the flowers and listen to the song of the birds and enjoy the quiet. It was medicine for the mind and solace for the soul.

On such rare occasions and at such a place, it was blessed, after the noise and the alarms, to sit in the sunshine, forget the past and the future, and revel in the present.

Lt James McQueen, Sanitary Officer, 51st Div.

My men lived in tents and bivvies in the field. The life was excellent and living in tents in the summer time is very pleasant, provided you are not billeted next to an ammunition park with restive mules. Mules appeared to me to have a wonderful faculty for breaking loose in the middle of the night and when one is wakened by them charging between your tents, it is not the danger of a mule crashing with your tent that worries one; it is the danger of a mule being tripped by the guy ropes of the tents that gives the sense of insecurity.

2/Lt Wilfrid Ewart, 1st Scots Guards

Already the birds were awaking, and there was that deliciously fresh feeling in the air which comes just before dawn in summer. Already the cool grey light had begun to peep in through the open doors and windows of the barn.

That barn! It was a place of unknown horrors which in due course the glaring midday sunshine revealed. Black beetles were crawling everywhere – black beetles that fell from the wooden partition; black beetles that crawled into and out of and under one’s sleeping bag and – yes, over one’s prostrate body; black beetles that did company or battalion drill upon the floor under one’s very nose.

Rats: for some men the reaction to their presence could be extreme and bordering on the phobic. For others, they were a nuisance that could be disregarded, annoyance at their company reduced by careful protection of uneaten food and by prudent sleeping arrangements. What could not be eliminated was their noise, their scurrying feet and their incessant squealings.

Driver James Reynolds, 55th Field Coy, RE

We were billeted in a dilapidated old farm just outside the village. That first night Jock Frazer woke us all up by throwing his blankets off him and hollering like blazes. When we asked him what was the matter, he told us he was wakened by a rat running over his face and though, as I found out subsequently, he was a brave chap, he could not stick rats at any price. He packed up his kit there and then, right in the middle of the night, and went over to the house where most of the other drivers were and of course his pal went too. That dugout was rather infested with rats though. I’ve laid down sometimes of a night with just a candle burning to have a read, and on looking up seen as many as ten or a dozen pairs of bright eyes watching me, no doubt waiting for me to put the light out before going on the scavenge.

Lt Leonard Pratt, 1/4th Duke of Wellington’s Rgt

I found out last night where a rat starts eating when he finds a corpse. I was just dozing off in my hammock when I felt a sharp pain in the knuckle of my middle finger, right hand. Evidently a rat had mistaken me for a dead man. Two nights ago I found a similar cut on the knuckle of the same finger of the other hand. It is badly swollen now. Why the rats should start there I cannot imagine.

L/Cpl Arthur Cook, 1st Somerset Light Infantry

Where we are is the worst we have struck for rats, there are thousands of ’em. You cannot put a mouthful down but what they won’t pinch it. We have to suspend our food in sandbags from the roofs of our dugouts, and wake up in the night, to find them having a swing on the bags, cheeky rascals. We have to cover our faces at night as several men have been bitten, and we only have our greatcoats for cover, we keep our boots and putties on to protect our legs. They crawl over you at night, and we give the thing a biff from under the coat and send him squealing in the air, there is a short silence, then a thump as he reaches the ground, a scuffle, and he is gone. If you walk along the track near the reserve trenches with a torch at night you can kick a rat every two paces.

Lt Richard Talbot Kelly, 52nd Brigade, RFA

One morning, up at the Observation Post, a very large rat came and sat right in the middle of my loophole, completely blocking my view of the enemy lines and obstructing the observation I was supposed to be carrying out. It sat just out of arm’s reach and washed. I shouted at it, flicked mud at it, threw pebbles at it and not the slightest heed was taken. Eventually in desperation I fetched my stick and, measuring the distance carefully, was able to give it a very violent jab in the middle. It then moved to one side and continued to wash. But I was determined that next time I went up to the OP I would bring my revolver and deal with it more thoroughly. This I did, shooting it through the throat.

Rifleman Alfred Read, 1/18th London Rgt (London Irish Rifles)

Another night while walking along the duckboard track, another orderly and myself saw two rats just in front. Being only room enough to walk in single file we could not pass, so made a noise to frighten them. They were both about a foot long and too fat to run. This is because they used to feed on our dead, excuse enough for us to detest them. Well, one flopped into the water, but the other became bold, turning round and making a hissing noise. I, being the nearest, had visions of having my throat clawed, so bringing my rifle down, I took aim from about five feet and fired. I hit him fair and square, but the noise brought plenty of chaps (in reserve) running from dugouts wondering what had happened and I was lucky not to get into trouble. After this we always carried a stout stick (cosh) to protect ourselves.

The rat population was barely controlled. Poisons such as Rodine could be sent by friends at home, but there were simply too many rats to kill, and the effectiveness of the poisons was, at times, dubious.

Capt. Charles McKerrow, RAMC attd. 10th Northumberland Fusiliers

The rat poison merely stimulated our domestic rodents till they flew up and down the walls of our dugout like flying squirrels. I found a corpse shortly after the poison was put down and hailed it as my first victim, till one of our servants explained that ‘a bash t’ b-b-b-wi’ a brick’. The exact rendering would pain the censor.

Frank Richards was many miles away from where he had seen an enormous rat staring fixedly at Dann. Since then, the battalion had moved to the Somme and Richards and his close friend were to be found sitting in a wood which had only recently been taken in bitter fighting.

Pte Frank Richards, 2nd Royal Welsh Fusiliers

Just inside [Mametz] Wood, which was a great tangle of broken trees and branches, was a German trench, and all around it our dead and their dead were lying. I was in luck’s way: I got two tins of Maconochie’s and half a loaf of bread, also two topcoats. The bread was very stale and it was a wonder that rats hadn’t got at it. Although gas destroyed large numbers of them, there were always plenty of them left skipping about. I returned to Dann, telling him how lucky I had been, and that we would have a feed. ‘Righto,’ he replied, ‘but I think I’ll write out a couple of quick-firers [brief letters] first.’

Enemy shells were now coming over and a lot of spent machine-gun bullets were zipping about. He sat on the back of the trench writing his quick-firers when – zip – and he rolled over, clutching his neck. Then a terrified look came in his face as he pointed one hand behind me. I turned and just behind me on the back of the trench saw the huge black rat that we had seen in Hulloch. It was looking straight past me at Dann. I was paralysed myself for a moment, and without looking at me it turned and disappeared in a shell-hole behind. I turned around and instantly flattened myself on the bottom of the trench, a fraction of a second before a shell burst behind me. I picked myself up amid a shower of dirt and clods and looked at Dann, but he was dead. The spent bullet had sufficient force to penetrate his neck and touch the spinal column. And there by his side, also dead, was the large rat: the explosion of the shell had blown it up and it had dropped by the side of him. I seized hold of its tail and swung it back in the shell-hole it had been blown from. I was getting the creeps. Although Mametz Wood was, I daresay, over fifty miles as the crow flies from Hulloch, I had no doubt in my own mind that it was the same rat that we had seen in the latter place. It was the only weird experience I had during the whole of the war. There was no one near us at the time and men on the right and left of us did not know Dann was killed until I told them. If I hadn’t handled that rat and flung it away I should have thought that I had been seeing things.