They Were There in 1914: Memories of the Great War 1914–1918 by those who experienced it

360 Pages·2014·28.35 MB·English

by  Langford

They Were There
Memories of the Great War 1914-1918
by those who experienced it
Edited by
William Langford
First published in Great Britain in 2014 by
P E N & S W O R D M I L I T A R Y
an imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd,
47 Church Street, Barnsley,
South Yorkshire.
S70 2AS
Introduction © William Langford 2014
ISBN 9781783831050
The right of William Langford to be identified as Editor of this Work
has been asserted by him in accordance with the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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Contents
Editor’s Introduction
One Man’s Road to Adventure
British Troops Arrive in Mons
The First Shot Fired at Mons
The First Hours at Mons
He Rode With Fear
Long Lines of Death
Terror and Tribulation
Saving Haig’s Corps at Landrecies
Affair of Mattresses in Landrecies
Unseen Killers at Le Cateau
Stragglers Lost For a Week
Laughing Dawn of Despair
Epic Story of St. Quentin
The Rallying of Demoralized Men
A Diary of the Great Retreat
About to be Shot for a Spy
Infantry Subaltern on the Retreat
The Account of L Battery
Wounded, Captured, then Rescued
The Crossing of the River Marne
Death in a Wood on the River Aisne
German White Flag Treachery
Doom Over Antwerp
An Antwerp Adventure
When They Lost Zonnebeke
Cabaret of Death
Stopping the Prussians
They Saved the Day at Gheluvelt
London Scottish Before Messines
The Horror of Sanctuary Wood
The Historic Christmas Truce of 1914
German Bombardment of Hartlepool
Editor’s Introduction
IN SEPTEMBER 1938, tensions were increasing throughout Europe as the
Führer of Germany strutted and loudly demanded self-determination for Sudeten
Germans in Czechoslovakia. In a flurry of appeasement the British Prime
Minister flew to Munich intent on placating the dictator. He returned on 30
September waving a piece of paper – an Anglo-German agreement, signed by
‘Herr Hitler and myself’ pledging that the two nations would never go to war
against each other again.
This was the month when a new magazine was launched in Britain with the
title The Great War: I Was There. It carried the sub-title Undying Memories of
1914-1918, and was published by The Amalgamated Press Ltd and edited by Sir
John Hammerton.
In its editorial introductory letter it announced: ‘The story of the Great War
of 1914-18 has been told in many ways, but there has never before been
collected in the scope of one work a narrative account of those years, every word
of which has been written by an eye-witness of the actual events described.’ The
declared intent of the publisher was to make effective use of personal narratives
of those who experienced the events of the ‘war to end all wars’. Twenty years
had elapsed since the Great War ended and in that period hundreds of books on
the subject had been written by those who took part. It was from these published
sources that extracts would be taken to bring to life the pages of the magazine I
Was There. Each issue of the magazine would be on sale every Thursday for
price of 9d (£2.10 present-day value). There would be fifty-one parts in the first
series – taking its weekly publishing to 19 September 1939.
So it was, one year later to the month the final edition of I Was There was
published and contained the announcement:
‘In view of the outbreak of the European War subscribers to I
Was There will not be surprised to learn that the publishers have
decided not to proceed with the issue of a proposed New Series.’
With Hitler’s invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany
on 3 September 1939. The Great War was about to be eclipsed by round two.
The Second World War proved to be ‘greater’ in terms of loss of life, material
destruction and suffering than the Great War of 1914-1918. The First World War
brought massive changes to the extent that the world of mankind would never be
the same again, as empires disappeared and social norms altered forever; and the
Second conflict completed those changes and ended with an even greater threat
to security of mankind with a nuclear age and ‘mutually assured destruction’ –
or MAD.
What lessons are really learned from history? And when learned, are applied
by the decision makers in government to present-day affairs so as to bring about
true peace? The League of Nations, set up after the First World War, had failed
to prevent the dictator Mussolini from offensive actions in Libya, Ethiopia and
Albania and finally collapsed with the outbreak of global conflict once more. It
seems that mankind does not have the inherent ability to direct his own steps by
means of self government.
Yet the stories of those who took part in the first world conflict of the
twentieth century have a message for later generations – that there is nothing
glorious in armed conflict; the stories these witnesses tell are of fear, great
suffering and the onset of a callousing with regards to the plight of his fellow
man, who by politics and birth, must be viewed as ‘enemy’.
Those who had made a career of the army had been brought up on a diet of
glory, on stories of daring-do as the heroes of the British Empire sorted out the
cruel and blood-thirsty pagan natives in far away places such as Africa, India
and the Far East.
Around the turn of the twentieth century there had been uneasy indications
that all was not well with British imperialism; during the fighting with the Dutch
settlers in South Africa. The Boer farmers, with their Mauser rifles and hit-and-
run commando tactics, had, on numerous occasions, bested the British Army and
dealt it a bloody nose. However, the British regular soldier and the Territorial
warrior (part-time soldiers or ‘Saturday Night Soldiers’) would find out about
the hardships and privations on a far greater scale in the conflict breaking out in
Europe in 1914.
In John Lucy’s eye-witness account of the fighting in Sanctuary Wood,
November 1914, he describes how a sergeant fell near him when a piece of
shrapnel entered the back of his head: ‘He lay unconscious all the day nodding
his holed head as if suffering only from some slight irritation, and did not
become still until evening.’ one young soldier wanted to put him out of his
misery by shooting him. An older and more experienced man pointed out that
the sergeant was already as good as dead and was not suffering. In the same
account a German attempting to surrender is shot out of hand in reprisal for the
death of another British sergeant who had been shot whilst attempting to rescue
a wounded German. Yes, there are also tales of bravery and selfless acts which
took place among that murderous activity, yet the callousness comes through.
As the next four years dragged on disillusion would set in among those who
were wielding the weapons. The potential for this can be discerned in these
accounts at the beginning of the Great War: near rebellion of elements of the
demoralized British Expeditionary Force occured following the fighting at Mons.
Furious soldiers could only look on helplessly as their headquarters staff
crowded the last trains out of St Quentin leaving them, thoroughly exhausted by
the retreat, to resist the enemy hordes bearing down on the British rearguards.
Two British colonels took steps to surrender their commands to the Germans.
There is the account of a British major, Tom Bridges, who rallied the
surrendered men just before the enemy arrived to take them into captivity. How
he twarted the surrender of two battalions and led them off to join the general
withdrawal is remarkable. Tom Bridges achieved the amazing transformation
with stirring words – along with a tin drum and a toy whistle.
There followed the Battle of the Marne, which the French called a miracle
when the invaders were stopped before Paris and the Allied counter-attack drove
the Germans back to the river Aisne. The two sides carried out a series of
outflanking movements, wheeling their tired formations in cross-country sweeps,
which is refered to in history as the race to the Sea. The First Battle of Ypres
took place when the Germans were halted in the north. With the Channel coast
blocked and denied to the Germans the belligerents dug in, and glared at each
other across a strip of ground which would become known as ‘No Man’s Land’
and which ran for 300 miles.
This rework – They Were There – has allowed their stories of 1914 to be
aired once more in personal accounts – from Mons to the Christmas Truce and
the German naval bombardment of East Coast of England.
We hope you agree, these stories are well worth ressurecting and presenting
to readers of the twenty-first century. In this, another age, judgements will be
made afresh and opinions formed, and some may even wonder how the strange
belligerent behaviour arose in the first place. Present-day readers may be led to
consider the dividing influences existing among humankind: nationalism,
patriotism, religion, which still fuels prejudice down to this hour, and which a
further world peace-keeping organization the United Nations seems unable to
control. Some might conclude that a benevolent world dictatorship is the only, as
yet untried, answer.
In the editing of these stories originally typed-up seventy to a hundred years
ago it has meant making some minor alterations. For example some abreviations
familiar back then require spelling out today. reference to certain people, events
and their usage would be unfamiliar: Blondin was, in the nineteenth century, a
well known French tightrope walker, but is not part of present-day awareness
(and could now be confused with a female popstar). Usage of military terms has
settled down and is here standardized. Some words have faded into the
background such as ‘hence’ and ‘whence’; ‘intercourse’ nowadays conveys
something different to ‘conversation’ and so on. Where confusion is unlikely the
words and sentences have been left as originally written, as it helps the flavour
of what is being reported.
So – I Was There has become They Were There and it is hoped that what
these men had to say over a generation ago is informative and interesting to
readers today.