A Regimental Surgeon Read online

  "Let us now," said the major, "examine an English rifle, and I will show you how you English have given to your army the means of mutilating these bullets," and he pulled from his pockets three of our cartridges with the tips broken neatly off. An English rifle was produced: "Now," he said, "we will get the wounded soldier from the back room to show us the parts of this English rifle." And a wounded man of the Cheshires was brought in. "Explain the mechanism of this rifle." And the private soldier did so. This the breech, that the magazine, this the safety catch, and here the cut off! "Stop!" said the major; "the cut off, and what is it intended to cut off?" "'Taint to cut off nothing," said our man, "it's to shut off the magazine." But the major would not have it. "It is clear," he said, "that this soldier is lying, for had it been used to shut off the magazine alone, as one sees it can, why not call it the ' shut off'? " "And now," turning to me, "what is this hole in the cut off? Don't lie to me, as the soldier did. I will show you." Producing a good English cartridge he put the point into the hole in the flat metal plate and slammed the cut off home. Lo! the tip of the bullet was broken clean off! Here was proof most damning and circumstantial. But I had had time to think. "The hole in the cut off," I rejoined, "is made by the armourer in order to hang them on a string in the armourer's shop." It was weak, but it was all I could think of. Afterwards I learnt that it was really the correct explanation of an apparently useless hole. The English soldier was then produced again, the demonstration once more gone through; but he was staunch and swore he had never seen it used for that purpose or even heard of it. My suggestion that it was a German discovery merely added fuel to the flame.

  I was sent into an inner room and told to sleep with a private soldier on one narrow mattress. Now this would have been considered a deadly insult to a German officer, many of whom would rather die than sleep with one of their private soldiers. But I cared for none of these things, and soon we were both asleep. Waking, I reflected that I had had many a more unpleasant bedfellow. I had not bathed for three weeks; but he had hardly so much as seen water for three months. Yet the wind is tempered to the shorn lamb in the matter of smells as well as other things. The end organs of olfactory sense in the nose become blunted by custom, and the smell of unwashed humanity is no longer appreciated after a while. Only a drawing-room soldier would have smelt us. All these long unwashed weeks we had often discussed the matter. Why was it we did not smell? and why had our toe-nails not grown if we had not removed our boots for weeks? Be the explanation what it may, we all might have been using lavender bath salts every morning and none of us a whit the wiser.

  Next day a little horse meat was placed for me on a table with the head doctor. He preserved the cold official manner. I did most of the eating. Then a serious conversation followed. I was to be liberated, I was informed, in ten days and sent to Holland; in the meantime I should be required to work in this dressing station and take charge of it. I would, of course, be on parole not to escape during that time. Word had now reached this regimental doctor of how well we had looked after the wounded of his regiment in our farm-house. Gladdened by the news of impending liberation I would have agreed to anything. So I was sworn, much handshaking, much reiteration of parole d'honneur, the small dark eyes of my interlocutor sternly gazing into mine. All day I was free to work in that hospital and to take charge of German wounded in the row of small houses on both sides of the street. Steadily the stream of casualties came in, were dressed by me, and the heavily-armed German orderly who was also my gaoler. Methodically I examined all the German wounded in the houses. What a state they were in! One must admit they were almost as brutal to their own wounded in La Bassée as they were to ours. But my wounded English I never saw again; they had gone, so I was told.

  In these houses all the German wounded were on mattresses; all jumbled together with nothing but their first field dressing on their wounds, and the German first field dressing is a piece of pink boracic lint wrapped up in a gauze bandage; a flimsy thing compared with ours. For food: the plain soldiers' ration of thick soup and black bread, regardless of whether the wound was in the stomach or in the leg. As the brain cases were unconscious, they perforce had to starve and the bowls of food beside their mattresses were black with flies. Here I found my nice unteroffizier, quite unconscious, and very near his passing. The wounded lay so thick that there was not room to step between them. Begging for ease from pain, for the necessary needs of hospital nursing, calling me "Lieber Doktor" too! I gave them all the morphia I had stolen from the medical stores in the café, and did my best, though a poor one. "Why can't I feel my leg?" said one who spoke English well. And I saw a limb, blue mottled, cold and senseless, telling of the gangrene that had supervened days previously, of the leg that should have been taken off long ago. What could I tell him, but that absence of pain was, at least, a good thing, and I would speak to the head doctor when I saw him?

  But the sights and sounds of hospital were not all that I saw from that café window. I could just see over the top of the curtain, and even then the passing soldiers knew me and cursed me for an Englishman. On the kerbstones of the pavement was a Jaeger regiment, resting from their long march; for they had just arrived from Antwerp. Down the middle of the street rode smart German officers. All day long the regiments passed, infantry and cavalry, transport and artillery.

  I counted in one day, at least, a division of cavalry and four divisions of infantry alone; some with the dust of Bruges upon their feet, others muddy from the local trenches, but marching quickly to their billets. Fifty thousand men, at least, I saw in those two days, passing north and south.

  The infantry with their loose-limbed gait were not entirely impressive, very patchy, very footsore, of all sizes and shapes, some marching well under their heavy packs, and others bowed down and walking with a stick. Little difference was noticeable between them and our soldiers. In the rear of each battalion there were very well set up unteroffiziers, and they saw to all little matters To each regiment were attached eight machine guns; and every double company had its ambulance wagon. The ambulance wagon took the place of our regimental Maltese cart. There was room in it for four lying-down cases, and cupboards near the seat for drugs and surgical dressings. And these ambulances were empty. To have sore feet is a crime, and there is no extenuation in the German army.

  But my heart sank when I saw their cavalry and artillery horses; horses groomed, brass work all shining, the hoofs of the officers* chargers blacked. I had come from an army where the horses were all skin and bone and sore backed and foundered, and here were young animals, fresh and in excellent condition. How could one compete, I thought, with such an army as this? The cavalry were all armed with the lance; both Dragoons, with red and white pennants, and the Death's Head Hussars. But all the troopers were so wooden, such bad hands, riding on their horses' mouths, rising so stiffly in their saddles. They should have seen our Cavalry Brigade of the Fifth Division; we may not have had many horses, but the men could ride.

  Back the next afternoon came the regimental medical officer, whom I had replaced. After that, he said, I would no longer be required. And why had I been in the garden so often, when I had given my parole d'honneur? It was clear they did not want me in La Bassée; window-gazing by an English prisoner did not suit the official eye, and it had been reported; and the back garden commanded a view of the trenches I had lately left. So with the escort of a wounded man, a volunteer from Magdeburg, I set out to march to Haisnes. Before I left I had another talk with the head doctor. Where was I going? Ah! that he could not say. Send a letter to England? Impossible! The wounded German soldier whose leg required amputation? So! there were many, but they could not do operations here, and the field lazarettes were full! It was a long march for me and my escort was waiting— Auf wiedersehn!

  On the road I was the object of much interest, and the butt of many gibes from the regiments on the march. "Schweinehunde Englander!" became quite familiar to my ears. Black looks, too, from the passing officers,
my escort plainly aghast that I did not salute. Taken to report at the big stationary hospital in Haisnes, I was conducted into the dining-room and gravely inspected by the whole mess. I looked at the coffee; one officer remembered, and a cup of lukewarm fluid was my reward. Then I was marched out again to another village. On the way the deep boom of an unfamiliar gun startled me. Behind a cottage was a huge gun with a short fat barrel pointing to the skies. Set up on caterpillar wheels, it was dragged by a traction engine. Carelessly screened by branches of trees it lay well behind the line, and feared no aeroplane of ours. Yes! it was one of the 38-centimetre guns from Antwerp, said my guide. And I looked again at the thing that had dropped the big shells into Violaines and the garden of my hospital on the night of the big attack. At last we reached a resting place in the house inhabited by an officer of the Divisional train. Standing, we waited until he was seated at supper. All laughed at his sallies. His personal servant, who dared not answer, was the butt of his endless buffoonery. Finally he rose; so did we. The officer retired to bed upstairs; we to share a heap of straw on the floor of the room in which we fed.

  Next day a march to a Feld Lazarette, which corresponds roughly to our casualty clearing hospital. One of the doctors had been at the German Hospital in Dalston. They did not want me: did not know that I was coming. Wiry did not someone send a messenger? It was quite like home again, and just as irresponsible! They let me see the English wounded, and one young soldier I found much disturbed. No word could he gather of last night's examination except "amputiert," but that was enough, and he thought they were about to cut off his leg in sheer vindictiveness. It was quite all right, he said, there was no pain, he was sure it would do well if left alone. One glance was enough to enable me to assure him that if all the College of Surgeons of England were there to see him, they could come to no other conclusion. Another case of gangrene from injury to the big vessels of the leg above the knee joint. I left him unhappy but comforted. He was in the Cheshire regiment, too, and had known me before. The surgery I was allowed to see. The surgeons wore gloves and sterile gowns, and some were very human. When I left in a motor ambulance for Douai that evening I felt that I had come across efficiency and kindness in one German hospital at least. For forty miles, to Douai, we passed through the French industrial villages and saw everywhere the Divisional trains, ammunition stores and commissariat. The very men, most probably, who did such dirty work in Belgium, but now they were tame; all the wine and cognac were long since finished.

  At Douai, after a long examination at the office of the Commandatur, I was taken to a tiny room at the railway station. The door opened and shut behind me; but there was another occupant, the machine-gun officer of the Dorsets—he was taken in Violaines in that last dreadful night that saw my finish too. A small gas stove, one table, the bare floor for bed and that was all. An hour later five more scarecrows arrived; in their torn tunics, frayed puttees, capless, with three weeks' beard, they could only be British officers. Three of them South Lancashires, two of them from the D.C.L.I.; all taken at lilies on the same night. We were thankful, anyhow, to be alone. During the week that we stayed in this appalling room we got quite accustomed to the hard floor. For food we depended on the French Red Cross, kindly and charming ladies, who endured very much at the hands and from the mouths of our sentries, to bring us food. And such food too! Excellent in quality, abundant, well cooked, not since our arrival in France in August had we fed so well. Twice a day we looked for them and their cheerful greetings, and we can never be sufficiently grateful for their unforgettable attentions. We had no exercise except an occasional walk across the paved yard. The rest of the station buildings were packed with French civilians and the lavatories were unspeakable. There one day came a curious adventure. In the lavatory a French peasant was standing close beside me. Our sentry had turned away for the moment, when, to my astonishment, my neighbour spoke in English without turning his head: "I'm a French officer disguised, I go to Boulogne tonight, thence to England: if I can send news to any of your people give me a letter at six tonight here." Now by chance I had a list of all the names and addresses of the whole seven of us ready for just such an occasion as this; in fact, I had intended to try quite a different person. Turning round I pushed against him and thrust the paper into his blouse. He was not a spy as we afterwards had feared, but a good fellow who kept his word. So well did he keep his promise that very soon after we had all been reported "missing" by the War Office our respective families each got a letter from him. It was not till nearly two weeks later at Crefeld that the Germans let us write.

  It is in the rule the Germans make of not allowing any communication by prisoners when confined or in hospital in occupied territory of France or Belgium, that the only hope for the men long "missing" lies. Apparently it is feared that information may be carried to England or France. If an officer or man lies wounded in hospital in occupied territory, even for as long as six months, he is not allowed to communicate with his people, nor may he receive letters. Only after prisoners are taken into one of the prison camps in Germany itself are they allowed to write.

  One morning we were all interrogated, singly, in a private room by an officer who said that he was of the staff of the Foreign Office in Berlin. Speaking perfect English he asked me my regiment. A doctor! "So! then why do you wear an artillery button on your tunic? "My servant was a Garrison artilleryman, and, one of my buttons having been lost, he had given me one of his own. This, I found, was merely to impress me with the profundity of his knowledge and observation; for he had already received a report about me from La Bassée. The regiment you were attached to? But I'd forgotten! "Let me see," he said pleasantly, "if I can't refresh your memory." "Shell shock, no doubt," he remarked with a smile. "Your Brigade and Division?" Again I had forgotten! "What a dreadful thing!" and pulling out a chart, marked in black and white figures, he showed me the German Intelligence chart of the British Expeditionary Force. Army Corps, Corps Commanders' names, Divisions, Brigade, even the regiments with their commanding officers all neatly printed. Black and white diamonds represented the artillery, oblong figures the cavalry, squares the infantry battalions. "Let me see now," he continued, "2nd K.O.S.B. Ah! here it is, 13th Brigade, 5th Division; General Smith-Dorrien, Charles Ferguson: Cuthbert, your Brigadier."

  I was speechless, he seemed to know it all! And he smirked at me, as if to say, "Now you see what German High Headquarters can do in the matter of intelligence." "There's nothing in that," I said, "that you couldn't get out of any daily paper," but I was most uneasy. Softly, he purred, "So! Your late colonel is now a prisoner. Yes! at Magdeburg." "Now," he said briskly, "we shall be able to have quite a nice chat. When did you land in France and where?" Then I told him the truth; for it was clear he was trying to find if there had been any British troops in Belgium before the Germans crossed the frontier at Liege. "We know everything about the perfidy of the British Government; we found all the secret treaties when we took Brussels. Oh! Yes! You were with the K.O.S.B.

  "It is an abominable thing" —he rapidly switched off the other subject— "that you should use coloured troops against us." But I didn't see why the natives of India should not have a word to say as to the fate of their own country. It was clear that all that was to be settled in France. He wouldn't see it in that light.

  After seven days at Douai, I was taken away to the Kommandantur and marched off to the station. On the way, I remember, a French woman offered me chocolate and a boy some cigarettes. My guard threatened them savagely, and they hesitated, but I turned and accepted them with thanks.

  CHAPTER V

  CREFELD

  The journey from Douai by train to Cologne was made in unwonted luxury. Instead of the cattle truck that, at this time, was the car de luxe reserved for the transport of wounded British officers, I made the journey on the wooden seats of a third class carriage in the company of my escort, two soldiers of an infantry regiment. Through devastated Belgium we passed, and I began, as I looked upon
the fair land destroyed, to believe the whispers of Belgian atrocities which had reached us in the English newspapers as we lay before La Bassée. The attitude of my escort was peculiar; later on I began thoroughly to understand it. When the ubiquitous German officer passed through the train and regarded me with an air of studied ferocity, my escort copied his example to the life, and bellowed at me not to look out of the carriage window; but when this threatening cloud of German discipline had passed, they shyly offered me a portion of their black bread and sausage. Even then I noticed that the frightfulness of the German officers and soldiers varied in direct relation to their distance from the trenches. The further away they were from the front, and, judging by their uniforms the less likelihood of their ever having been under fire, the more savage did they appear. So I was not surprised then at the attitude of the doctors and Red Cross nurses, when the engine driver leant out of his cab as we drew up at each station shouting that Englander gefangener were on board.