A War for King and Empire Read online

  Several miles to the northeast, rolling ponderously along the ground and all but obscuring the smoke from bursting shells, was a yellowish-green fog whose dense billows clung to the horizon. Borne by a lazy breeze the greenish cloud – a force of nature unknown to me then – crept ominously and inexorably towards our lines. The air was warm but at the sight of this strange and foul apparition a cold shiver ran down my spine. After a minute in which I stood transfixed, overcome by a mixture of fascination and I dare say even fear, I turned and began to run – down the road in the direction of Brielen and Ypres. The battalion headquarters was close to the canal, a short five-minute walk north of the city’s Dixmude gate. I had to get there as fast as I could. It was two, maybe two-and-a-half miles. I lengthened my pace.

  A short time later I was overtaken by three mounted horses, which came upon me suddenly from behind and I was startled by the clatter of their hooves. They were galloping as if pursued by the headless horseman himself. I was of two minds whether to stand and salute – they could only be officers – but common sense took charge and choking and waving at the cloud of dust they churned up, I stumbled on. Before the dust plumes enveloped me I caught a glimpse of Major Ormond, the battalion adjutant. Major McLaren, the second-in-command, and a third officer followed, all bent over low and riding like their lives depended on it. Major Ormond’s eyes touched on me fleetingly as the trio thundered by but I don’t think the recognition clicked in.

  For some reason that morning I awoke with a feeling of dread in my gut, a gnawing uneasy ache that neither breakfast nor the cheerful chat of my mates dispelled, and it puzzled me. We were in reserve.

  We’d arrived back in the Salient a week before aboard double-decker buses still adorned with the logo of the London General Omnibus Company – destination Victoria Station – and were promptly sent to a hamlet by the name of Gravenstafel. There we settled into the shallow, filthy ditches the French had bequeathed us before they bid the Salient a hasty and not so fond adieu. If there were any doubts what war entailed, they were soon dispelled. Under constant fire we toiled day and night digging the fire-trench to a proper depth; wiring the line extensively where the French had made do with a single strand – Major McLaren had unknowingly almost walked straight into the German lines – burying the decomposing bodies and excrement that lay everywhere, and filling sandbags for the parapet and the parados. All to get it in an order that befit not simply the British Army but our own curious, home-brought sense of propriety. With that unpleasant, and occasionally horrifying, task behind us we were ordered to billets four miles to the rear, on the northern outskirts of Ypres.

  There was no reason to be anxious. The general feeling was one of relief. The breakfast of fried bacon, bread and sweet tea was the best I’d had in a long while, and it was a gorgeous day.

  The morning passed uneventfully. However, around three the rumblings of my stomach all at once seemed prophetic.

  The enemy began a tremendous bombardment of the city and the front line we’d just departed. Guns of all calibres cracked and roared, and every so often they were outdone by the distant boom of a giant siege gun, a 420mm howitzer. I recognized it from the bombardment two days earlier; its shell roaring forward, an out-of-control Ypres Express tearing a hole in the air around it until a deafening THUMP signalled that it had reached its terminus. A stream of shells plunged into the city. Every seven or eight minutes one of the big ones landed; entire stone buildings crumbling in a single blast. Soon there were fires and the ancient, pretty city of textile merchants was enveloped in a thick grey and black haze. Ugly plumes spiralled upwards, defiling the brilliant blue sky.

  The smartest amongst us were keeping close to the concrete bunkers near the Yser Canal where the staff and the officers held court. Though frankly even in a bunker I wouldn’t have given much for our chances. These were the very guns – equivalent to those on a dreadnought – that had laid waste to the reputedly impregnable Belgian forts of steel and concrete at Liège and elsewhere.

  Some of the officers were noticeably antsy. Despite the danger they were mingling with the men in the field, keeping an anxious eye with their field glasses on the bombardment that enveloped the city and stretched off to the northeast. They’d probably come to the same conclusion I had – it didn’t really matter where you stood – not if one of those monsters landed nearby. It was then I heard Lieutenant Lowry mutter, ‘They’re up to something.’

  I moved closer. ‘You think the enemy is planning something, sir?’

  Grimly Lowry nodded. ‘This can’t be for show alone. They’re targeting all the approaches to the front.’ He put down his glasses and looked to see who’d addressed him. When he saw it was me he rolled his eyes. ‘I ought to have known,’ he grumbled. I was forever pestering him with this question or that, so my curiosity was no great surprise.

  Streams of downcast civilians began filing out of town, their precious belongings stuffed in jute sacks over stooped shoulders, dangling from bicycle handles, piled precariously in all manner of carts jolting their way over the cobblestones. I don’t imagine many of those fleeing thought they were leaving for good. If they’d asked me I’d have advised an extended leave of absence. In the months I’d spent near Ypres the neighborhood had deteriorated almost daily, although the stately Cloth Hall and grand Cathedral were gamely holding their ground like weary heavyweights, standing drunkenly as the blows rained down. Of late Duke Albrecht’s pawns were more intent than ever to fell Ypres so it was little wonder the faces were so morose.

  I had no great faith that German efficiency was such that I could rule out a sleep-deprived gunner rotating a wheel two notches too far and sending a 2000-pound shell down on my head – albeit by accident – so it was with some relief that I had heard the call for a runner to carry despatches to Division.

  By the time I reached Ypres and the canal-side bunkers, I was sweating like an otter in July and panting heavily. The Germans had resumed their shelling of the city. And a strange chemical odour permeated the air. If I didn’t know better it was precisely the sort of smell I’d whiffed when my mother had the bleach out.

  Gathering myself, I took a deep breath of it then rushed through the doorway into the battalion headquarters, a small red-brick building. ‘Sir,’ I gasped at the first officer I came across, and fumbled a salute. ‘There’s a strange-coloured smoky cloud moving our way, sir, coming from the direction of the French.’ I stood there blinking.

  BOOM. There was a huge blast nearby. The windows in the room shattered in a single crack, followed by a tinkling of glass.

  ‘Yes, yes, we’ve heard,’ said the battalion commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Boyle. Ignoring both me and the windows he turned and my eyes followed him. A sizeable group of officers were assembled around the table only a few feet away. Fortunately they were as interested in me as in the lichen-covered brick wall I was standing next to. So I leaned against it, caught my breath and listened.

  ‘Higher-up sent a message a few days ago that we should be prepared for the Germans to use gas,’ said Major McLaren. He’d obviously ridden in well before I had bearing the exact same tidings, which the staff were now meeting to discuss. McLaren looked to his side at Major Ormond who grimaced.

  Ormond said: ‘The message also told us to take the necessary precautions. Didn’t it?’ McLaren nodded his head in agreement.

  ‘What did they mean by gas, exactly?’ asked the colonel. ‘And what are the necessary precautions?’

  ‘That’s just it, sir,’ responded Ormond. ‘We don’t know. I called Brigade to ask, but they couldn’t tell me anything other than to do our best. But this cloud must be what they meant.’

  ‘They’re up to something,’ muttered Colonel Boyle darkly, echoing the very words of Lieutenant Lowry from earlier.

  The colonel drew himself erect, which was a sight in itself as he was well-built, a foot taller than I was, and with his curly dark hair he couldn’t have made it out the door without ducking; I was six foot one and I’d barely scraped by.

  Boyle had been a rancher before the war and he looked the part. He had a cowboy’s rugged square chin while his mouth was lost in the thick bushy chevron of a moustache. The colonel made an intimidating figure, all right. And that was a useful trait when corralling the wild spirits of his battalion into something approaching an army. A glance from his piercing blue eyes was usually enough to stop most men in their tracks and I remembered once on Salisbury Plain when he challenged a loudmouth in the ranks to a boxing match. Without further ado that settled matters.

  It was obvious from the squirms that those around the table were edgy. Nor did our Officer Commanding (OC) look overly pleased. In fact he looked downright grumpy. From what I’d heard his officers hadn’t been able to tell him much of anything, something I suspect they were painfully aware of. However, before the colonel could utter another word, a runner bustled in.

  ‘Sir. It’s for you. Urgent from Brigade,’ said the soldier, breathing heavily. I winked at him in recognition. From the canvas despatch pouch he produced a folded sheet of paper.

  Boyle grabbed at it and opened it with a flip of his thumb. After a moment’s pause for reflection, he nodded decisively. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said. ‘We have been aching for a fight and now were are going to get it. Muster the men. You have forty minutes.’

  Quickly we assembled on the road at Devil’s Elbow, just outside of Ypres, and in a long column began marching up the pavé towards St. Jean and Wieltje, and the trenches we’d left only a few days earlier. The stench in the air seemed to have grown stronger and it scratched irritably at the back of my throat. Before we made it further than the junction at Well Cross Roads – a distance of only 500 or 600 yards – our ordered lines ground to a halt.

  The vi
ew in front was one of sheer pandemonium.

  The tree-lined road was packed with other columns of men and transport plodding forward to the front, with orders to hurry, and you could sense their impatience. The road resembled not so much a road as a frenzied bazaar.

  From across the budding green fields to the north and streaming down the road towards Ypres, hordes of soldiers were running, clad in the grey-blue of France and the mustard colour of their colonies. Everywhere I looked I saw them, not in a neat double file as we were, but running as men possessed, in groups or individually, stumbling and clutching at their throats, their arms waving madly. The heads around me darted from side to side in total mystification. Ignoring us, and even the angry shouts of the battalion officers and NCOs demanding to know their business, throngs of French pushed through our lines and fled southwards as fast as their feet would permit.

  Ahead of us was a battery of RHA guns. The horses were jittery, whinnying loudly. Having once seen a stampede, I had visions of the frightened animals with heavy guns in tow turning in a panic and smashing through our ranks. Though there was little room to turn with the roads so packed with men.

  A short whistle sounded overhead and a couple of men ducked. It was followed by a blast several hundred yards to the rear. Turning I saw a plume of white smoke curl into the air near the junction. There were screams from the refugees still fleeing the city. Confusingly others from the villages to the north were flocking towards it. Shells kept falling. The scene was now a perfect chaos.

  The battalion lines began to dissolve at the danger from the bombardment. My preferred course of action of seeking cover in the ditches was apparently not under consideration and we stood there milling around. Undeterred by the shells the waves of French kept coming.

  There was a dark swarthy tint to them and others had noticed it as well.

  Jones was beside me. ‘They look African,’ he said.

  ‘That’s because they are,’ I said. ‘Turcos and Zouaves, from one of the French colonial divisions.’

  ‘They’re what?’

  ‘Turcos and Zouaves. Come on, Pat, Zouaves.’

  Pat looked more confused than before.

  ‘You know, from Algeria,’ I said, ‘with the blue tunics and the red baggy pants? They’ve obviously had the good sense to shed the pants. They’re one of the most decorated units in the entire French army. The Turcos are the ones in mustard. Tirailleurs they’re called, local Algerians. It’s all very simple. Think of it this way; the French have the Turcos and the Zouaves, and the British have… well… that would be us.’

  At this Jones smiled uneasily, unsure whether I was joshing with him. He stroked at the thin wiry tangle of blond hair above his lip that passed as a moustache and nodded knowingly. It was obvious he hadn’t a clue what I was on about.

  ‘What do you think is going on, Mac?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘but it looks to me like a rout.’

  ‘So why are they sending us forward?’

  At first I said nothing, but naturally I couldn’t leave it at that. ‘Did you ever consider, Pat, who’s holding the line to our left if the French clearly aren’t?’

  It was Jones’s turn to say nothing. He might not have known much history, but he knew very well that the whole left side of the Salient was defended by the French. At least it had been.

  Ahead of me an Algerian crashed into the man in front and I came face-to-face with him. Up close it was a face of rancid yellow and panicked desperate eyes. He was gasping, short of breath. But it wasn’t a shortage of breath that afflicted him, for blood gurgled from his mouth and a white foam had formed, traces of it in his moustache.

  ‘Whoa! Hold up,’ I cried, my hand extended like a policeman’s to bar the way. ‘What’s wrong? Qu’est-ce qu’il y a?’

  ‘Asphyxié! Asphyxié,’ he gasped. For an instant I caught his eye. They were bulging and white and in the glimpse I had of his irises flitting from side to side I saw a bottomless well, and I shivered.

  ‘What’s he saying, Mac?’ asked Jones. ‘”As” what?’ When I didn’t immediately respond he repeated the question.

  ‘Asphyxiated,’ I said softly. ‘My God they can’t breathe. Look at the poor devils.’

  They were running all around us. Their equipment was lost or forsaken, but most were still wearing the curious short toques found only in the colonial divisions of the French Army. Most, like this man, had their hands to their necks, clawing at them, tearing at their throats in search of air.

  The soldier before us began to gag and retch, bubbles forming from his mouth. I reached out to grasp his arm but before I could, he sank to his knees. Then without any warning whatsoever he fell headfirst, forward, onto the ground.

  I knelt to help. However there was little I could do; the man lay in convulsions with a horrible dry gulping sound coming from within. Gently I put my hand on his back, to comfort, the reflex of reacting to a man’s coughing fit. I tried to roll him over, but he began twitching violently. Then a final shudder came over him and he lay still. I shook him and shouted words of encouragement in French. To no avail. His head lay cocked at an impossible angle. Sighing I pulled myself to my feet.

  Most of the platoon was gathered, watching. Silent.

  ‘Is he dead?’ whispered Jones.

  Curtly I nodded. Jones whistled softly. One of the others, Tremblay, a good Catholic, crossed himself.

  I went to stand beside Jones. He was still staring at the man on the ground, shaking his head.

  Just past 7 p.m. I was in one of the first small groups to reach Wieltje. Wieltje, nothing more than a collection of modest brick buildings, was less than two miles up the road from Ypres, but in the congestion progress had felt as slow as if we’d been marching in wet cement. After the colonel split us up we made better time. I spent most of it scrambling up and down out of the ditches to get around the jam on the road. Of the horrifying cloud there was no trace; the air was fresh and the waves of panicked French troops had ebbed. I spotted the colonel. He and Major McLaren were standing in the centre of the hamlet near a fork in the road, obviously discussing our next course of action. Helpfully there was a sign: St. Julien was to the left, Fortuin and Gravenstafel right.

  While I gawked around, a thousand thoughts tumbling through my mind, and well before I could take the necessary precautions, the colonel appeared in front of me.

  ‘You’re the runner from earlier, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ I replied. ‘That’s right. Private MacPhail, sir.’

  ‘Yes, well, come with me, MacPhail. I may need a runner.’

  Which is how I ended up at Pond Farm at the headquarters of the 2nd Brigade, just outside of Fortuin. Someone later told me that Fortuin meant fortune in Flemish, although I never would have made the connection having seen the holed and broken buildings that made up the tiny settlement. Pond Farm was no more prosperous. It consisted of four or five buildings, each with a steep thatched roof of the kind you saw a lot in Belgium, though the emaciated skeletons of rafters were all that remained.

  Inside one of the better-looking buildings, the farmhouse I guessed, the colonel made immediately for our brigadier, General Currie. I’d seen Currie many times from a distance during inspections when curious eyes from private soldiers were frowned upon. Now I had a chance to size him up properly.

  He was a big man, tall with a round clean-cut, not unfriendly face, and jowls that sagged like two sacks filled with coal. What also sagged was his belly, which was out in force as he stood with both arms on his hips and his back arched, addressing another officer. He looked concerned as he turned to face Lieutenant-Colonel Boyle, waving a sheet of paper at him as he did so.

  Save a few officers gathered around Currie and Boyle the room was empty, and as I wasn’t invited I ambled over to the big wooden dinner table where I had spotted a pot of tea. However before I got my hands on the tea I noticed a large map. On it the entire Salient was drawn.

  ‘That’s interesting,’ I mumbled to myself. As the officers were preoccupied I bent over to take a look.

  The Ypres Salient was really no more than a wayward pimple in the entire front. Anybody who’d read a newspaper knew the story. In 1914 the British Expeditionary Force had rebuffed the German attacks here, leaving Ypres and a 9-mile wide bulge as virtually the last vestiges of unoccupied Belgium.