1915_ The Death of Innocence - Lyn Macdonald [296]
What had happened to cause that debacle? Much later when we went up the road to where the trouble started there was a shelled GS wagon in the ditch at the side, and dead horses and three dead men that no one had had time to attend to.
We came to the conclusion that this was the first time those men in front had seen such a sight and at that psychological moment they got their first shelling. The combination was probably too much for them and they broke and ran. Of course those behind them couldn’t have known why, but inevitably they became infected and mass hysteria was the result. That seemed to us the only reasonable explanation.
It was not the sight of the dead that had panicked the troops of the leading battalion, it was the salvo of shells that fell among them as they drew closer to Loos. But the panic was soon contained, the ranks were re-formed, and they marched on. Halted a mile behind them the Northumberland Fusiliers had no idea what had caused the hold-up. It was a good half hour before they set off again.
Capt. D. Graham-Pole, 12th Bn., Northumberland Fusiliers, 62nd Brig., 21st Div.
Then I got orders to march on after the Battalion which had already started for Loos. We had just taken it from the Germans that morning. As we marched along we met most ghastly sights – officers and men lying dead and dying on and alongside the road. Star shells went up and showed us up and shrapnel came crashing amongst us. Horses lay with broken legs and still the men marched on steadily. There was no time to attend to the wounded and if your best friend was knocked out you just had to leave him and go on without breaking the column of fours. I was proud of my men; no shouting required, no bullying, only ‘Steady lads, steady’, and on they came and never even looked back. Then we got to Loos and wherever we went, along streets or more in the open, shells followed us, falling amongst us or into the houses, making them rock and fall or huge pieces fall out of their sides.
But the Battalion had escaped the worst of it. It was the transport column at the rear that caught the full force of the shelling.
Less than a mile away the 24th Division was making for the Hohenzollern redoubt where the 9th Scottish Division was clinging to a wavering foothold.
Pte. G. Marrin, 13th Bn., 73 Brig., 24 Div.
We marched straight into the battle. By the time we got into the front line we were right by the coal mine, Fosse 8, on the left, that’s where the Scots got slaughtered, yes, because we saw these men lying around and coming in wounded – thousands of them! The whole thing was an absolute shambles. We were frightened out of our lives. It was terrible. It was our first experience of warfare, and there was machine-gun fire and shelling, and everything seemed to be exploding everywhere. You just didn’t know what was taking place. Then we got somewhere – they said it was in the line. We didn’t know! You were facing one way and they said, That’s where they are’, but you didn’t know! You put up rifle fire but you didn’t know what you were shooting at! You’d no idea what you were doing or supposed to be doing. It was just a continual bashing of gunfire. Terrifying! You couldn’t think! We were scared out of our wits.
The guns boomed on, but late in the evening the rain eased off. A full moon sailed from behind the clouds and shone so brightly that, squatting in a field outside Loos, Captain Pole could see well enough to write a letter to his sister. It calmed his nerves, and it was something to do to pass the time while his Battalion waited for orders.
Sunday 26th September 1915. 3 a.m.
(In action).
A day, Jessie, I shall never forget.
Well, we have been in action right enough but as far as we were concerned with no chance of replying. (I am writing under shell fire by moonlight.) Forgive the writing Jessie, this is being written on top of a map where we have been most of the night and an hour ago it didn’t look as if a single one of us would shortly be alive. My servant Holbrook lying by my side got a bullet in his