Explosions and sporadic shooting from our left flank indicated when the enemy closed up to our belt of wire. Then, for a few brief seconds under the lights of our own Veery flares, we could see shapes looming closely in front of us. A dozen Mills bombs exploded in quick succession, brilliantly illuminating our tiny patch of battle in a series of brilliant flashes. The Lewis gun raked the forward line of the barbed wire with a withering fire. Then, a few moments later, almost as if on cue, it was quiet again. Whatever was left of the enemy’s assault line fled back through the darkness to their own trenches. All of us, wounded and fit, were utterly drained, but for a brief time we were happy and relieved; the assault was over.
It was to be a long night. Just beyond our wire a German soldier was wounded. Somewhere out there, he lay in terrible pain out of sight in a shell crater. This time there was no gallows humour or crude joking. Minutes after the firing stopped, he began to moan and his moans soon turned to screams. He sounded like a young man, and he shrieked and moaned in the most pathetic manner for several hours. As the end came, he called repeatedly for his mother. His shouting became steadily weaker and his voice increasingly hoarse, but those pitiful shrieks pierced our souls. Years later, the smell of burlap and freshly turned earth drags those awful screams into my mind. He died two hours after dawn. On one side of me, Hendricks, the divinity student, sobbed, and on the other, I could hear the profane and bellicose Lance Corporal Mullin repeating snatches of prayer to himself.
Our third day under fire in the Loop was as warm and filled with sunshine as the first two. The two lance corporals left in Two Platoon organized things remarkably well. Dugouts were freshly excavated, sentries were posted, weapons were cleaned, and men were ordered to eat and get whatever rest they could in shifts. I was too weak to protest when Mullin moved me back to the firing bay that held the wounded. There were only four men in there by morning of the third day. Our dead were stacked in the communication trenches running between Two and Three platoons. I remember little of that day. Sometime around midday a German aeroplane zoomed in from nowhere and tried to drop an aerial torpedo on us. He missed by only a few feet and aside from startling all of us and moving a great deal of earth, he did no damage. He then circled back to machine-gun our trench line. He wasn’t very accurate with either attempt and only served to give us notice that Fritz was still interested in taking our miserable little patch of ground from us.
Whenever I drifted into wakefulness that day, I saw the divinity student tending to us. He sponged our heads, gave us water to drink, brushed away flies, and kept the rats at bay. It was the best medical treatment available and we were grateful for what little comfort he provided.
Two or three hours before nightfall, a runner from the Forty-ninth Battalion from Edmonton crawled into our position. He informed us that we were to be relieved after dark that night but also that aerial reconnaissance indicated the Germans were continuing to mass fresh troops all along the trench lines facing Sanctuary Wood. It wasn’t what we wanted to hear.
At around six that evening, Jerry began to shell us again. He must have anticipated that we were to be relieved as he started pounding our rear areas first. That, along with the aeroplane’s visit, was an indication of what was to come. The divinity student shepherded all the wounded into our tiny dugouts and then stoically went to his position carved into the wall of the adjacent fighting bay.
I don’t know how any of us who were wounded survived the pounding we took when the Germans shifted their guns onto our position. It is one thing to endure this endless series of bombardments when you are fit; it was quite another to live through one with your strength expended and your spirits bled into the mud. Although I was conscious for the entire barrage, I fully expected to die and cannot remember much of it. It was one of the few horrors of the war that my mind has deliberately erased from memory.
The inevitable attack that followed was different in that when the German artillery lifted, ours began to pound him. Someone must have been directing our guns from a distance or from an aeroplane. Those who have never had to fight for their lives will probably never understand this, but the sound of artillery falling on my tormentors warmed the furthest reaches of my soul and I was filled with a sense of joy knowing that the men on the other side of that field were now in their turn being horribly mutilated and killed.
As the barrage lifted, the divinity student raced back to our bay and began to attend to each of us in turn. I could hear him as he moved to the first dugout. “Oh, dear God,” was all he said and he moved on to the next man. “You’re looking chipper, Ford, it’ll be dark soon and we’ll have you back at the regimental aid post before you know it.”
When he got to me he was positively exuberant. “Mr. Ferrall, you look wonderful. You’d think you just had a nap.” I felt utterly dejected and lifeless. My hand and head throbbed with a pain I am at a loss to describe now. I was feverish, thirsty, and trembling from lack of food but Hendricks’ presence and his sense of purpose gave my spirits a lift. There was an inspiring simplicity to this man and he breathed new life into those of us who were wounded and survived the shelling in our muddy little scrapes.
Private Hendricks secured our dressings, brushed off the dirt that showered over us during the barrage, said a few kind words to each of us, and took up his post with his rifle in front of us on the firing parapet. He was an average man in dire circumstances calling upon extraordinary reserves of energy and vigour. He was about five-foot seven, and sturdily built; in his early twenties, he was fair-skinned with a ruddy complexion. His steel-framed glasses gave him a solemn scholarly look.
He kept up a regular commentary in his gravelly voice advising us on the progress of the battle. “Fritzie’s a little slow getting out of his trenches this time. He’s probably been badly hit by our artillery. Oh, Oh … Here he comes now.”
From my scrape in the trench wall, I had a good view of Hendricks. His red face was sweating profusely. He wore the collar of his tunic buttoned up as per regulations and kept his forage cap squarely on his head as if on parade. Something about him gave him the appearance of being the kind of man who viewed his life’s responsibilities as unshakeable obligations. Just the day before, our earnest divinity student had scarcely seen any of us. Now we were lying helplessly at the bottom of a collapsing trench and this stranger had willingly assumed the role of our guardian and rescuer. He possessed a sense of duty that made him the sort of man armies, and when you think about it, all other institutions, can’t survive for long without.
Apart from Hendricks, I could see nothing but the trench wall opposite me. Hendricks began firing his rifle, taking very deliberate aimed shots. He would periodically turn and shout to us, “They’re 100 yards away now … They’ve closed up to fifty yards. They’ve stopped and gone to ground … What’s left of ’em are heading back … We’re going to make it through this one boys … Now our artillery is falling on their position again. Whew, I wouldn’t want to be out there.”
Hendricks turned around and stared at the sky behind him. “There’s an aeroplane up there, one of ours; I’ll bet that’s who’s directing the artillery fire on the Hun.” Hendricks certainly sounded cheerful but I wondered where that bastard in the aeroplane had been two days ago when the Germans were killing us so efficiently.
By nightfall, the German artillery, in anticipation of our being relieved, began to shoot at our rear areas and communication trenches again. Sometime after dark, I was awakened by the presence of dozens of men filing quietly past me through our trench. Hendricks’ tired raspy voice cut through my fever and pain. He barked in a subdued voice, “Watch where you’re stepping! The wounded are in those scrapes.” The Forty-ninth Battalion