1915_ The Death of Innocence - Lyn Macdonald [108]
The Germans were not above employing devious tactics, particularly in the field of propaganda, which frequently backfired despite their best intentions and their desire to adopt a virtuous stance which would impress neutral nations with the justice of their cause. Two days after the capture of the second prisoner and on the very day of the British assault on Hill 60, the German newspapers carried a virulent story, dripping with righteous indignation, which categorically stated that the British had committed the unspeakable crime of using poison gas against defenceless German troops, thus contravening not only the laws of war but the unwritten laws of civilisation itself. It was a cover story, designed to justify the fact that the Germans themselves were planning to use the illegal weapon in an attack which they hoped would be seen at home and abroad as ‘retaliation’. It was reported by Reuter, noted in London and disregarded, if they ever heard of it, in France – although General Plumer had passed on the French report to his Divisional Commanders ‘for what it is worth’!
The Germans hoped that their new secret weapon would be worth a great deal. Their chemists had been working on it for a long time, and it was weeks since the first experimental cylinders had been dug into position. All that was lacking were the favourable winds that would carry the gas across to the British lines and the Ypres salient had been selected because, according to German meteorologists, the wind in springtime invariably blew in a south-westerly direction. A steady breeze was what was needed. If the wind were too strong the gas would be too quickly dissipated, if it blew in sudden gusts it would be just as ineffectual, and worse, if it suddenly changed direction there was no saying what the result might be.
As the weeks passed, and the wind disobligingly continued to blow from the wrong direction, the German Command began to be seriously worried. Too many people were in on the secret. Special troops, rudely referred to as ‘Stinkpionere’, had been instructed and trained to operate the gas cylinders, and, since it took eight men to carry one, hundreds of troops had slogged for many nights to carry the cylinders and the cumbersome ancillary apparatus to the line. Thousands of respirators had been manufactured locally in occupied Belgium where spies abounded, and now that they had been issued to soldiers in the Ypres sector, rumour was spreading like wildfire along the line and heavy hints that something interesting was in the offing were carried back to Germany by soldiers home on leave and also in optimistic letters from the front. Musketier Pieter Amlinger wrote home:
Within the next week we can expect to launch a large offensive between Bixschoote and Langemark. Follow the news bulletins closely. The great offensive about which you wrote is a fact and with some luck there may be peace at the end of May. We also have a ‘Dicke Bertha’ at our back whose loud voice – although not so beautiful – will be there to support us.
The ‘Big Bertha’, like the other heavy guns that would support the German attack, was all too necessary, for the German troops on the northern stretch of the western front were still vastly outnumbered by the allies. But the Germans had been heartened by the outcome of the battle of Neuve Chapelle and regarded the failure of the British to push home their initial success as a sign of weakness which