1915_ The Death of Innocence - Lyn Macdonald [317]
I was put on a train to the base hospital at Rouen. On Saturday 2 October, I was taken aboard the hospital ship, St George, and by hospital train to Derby. We had a wonderful reception when we arrived at Derby. It seemed as though the whole town turned out to wave and cheer. Women were kissing us and we were showered with cigarettes. How lovely it was to lie in a nice warm bed! By the way, the wounded man I went out to was rescued. I met him later at camp in Sheerness.
Young Bill Worrell who, thanks to Ben Williams, had got out early, was taken to a base hospital at Rouen.
Rfn. W. Worrell.
It was a canvas marquee hospital and I woke up – I’d been half-conscious, most of the time – and I woke up and behold, there was somebody I knew. It was Doctor Dowding, a great friend of my aunt, and there he was, to my absolute astonishment. He was in the RAMC then. He’d seen my name on the casualty list and he’d come in to have a look. So he said, ‘Well, we’ll get you back to England as soon as possible.’ My jaw was all wired up by then and I could hardly speak, but I said, ‘Do you think I’ll get there?’ He said, ‘You certainly will! Now is there anything you want?’ ‘Well,’ I said, ‘I’ve lost my hat. Could you possibly find me an officer’s hat with a Rifle Brigade badge?’ Of course we all used to scrounge there, because there were no strict restrictions on dress – and out of the line any time you wore any sort of cap – that was before they issued the floppy cap that you could put in your pocket. But for your best, you’d always try, if you could, to get an officer’s hat. That was a mark of complete distinction – an officer’s hat with a floppy top, a big rim, and you were made! I don’t know how Dr Dowding wangled it but next day, sure enough, he came back with an officer’s hat – Rifle Brigade badge and all.
Well! I clung to that hat. I wouldn’t let it out of my sight in case it got pinched – in fact at night I slept with it under my pillow. You see, when we went into the line that night we were wearing woollen helmets because of having our gas-masks rolled up over them, which you couldn’t do over a cap, though as things were I’d probably have lost my cap in any case. Anyway, Dr Dowding got me a really posh hat, though it was ages before I could wear it because when I got to England I was months in bed in hospital. But I kept it with me all the time. It was my most prized possession and when I did eventually get out in my hospital blue suit I wore my officer’s hat and I was as pleased as Punch.
Not all the wounded had been got away safely and the troops could only hope that the injured men they had been forced to leave close to the German line had been picked up and cared for by the enemy. The dead were another matter. They were long past help and it was pointless to risk more lives just to retrieve their bodies. Old soldiers accepted this but there were men in the New Army who did not agree with that precept. A day or two after the opening of the battle Colonel Thuillier commanding the 1st Division’s artillery, had a chance meeting that deeply impressed him.
Lt. Col. H. F. Thuillier.
Returning from Loos along the straight Lens Road I met a sergeant and six or eight men of the 7th KOSB near the top of the ridge where the old German front line had been. I warned the sergeant that he would be exposed to enemy machine-gun fire farther along the road, and advised him to take his men across country. He thanked me, and asked how he could get to Hill 70. I replied that he couldn’t get there at all, because it was now in the enemy’s hands. He said, ‘How can that be, sir? The Regiment took the hill and got over the other side.’ I answered that there had been a lot of fighting since then, and that the Germans were on the top of it now, and I asked him why he wanted to go there. He said that his Colonel had sent him up to bury