The Great War As I Saw It

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d June

t where Ouderdom was. None of them knew. I was forced once again to take my solitary journey into the great unknown. It was therefore with much satisfaction that, when quite dark, I came upon some wooden huts and saw a number of men round a little fire in a field. I went up to one of the huts and found in it a very kind and courteous middle-aged lieutenant, who was in charge of a detachment of Indian troops. When he heard I was looking for the Field Ambulance and going towards Ouderdom, he told me it was much too late to continue my journey that night. "You stay with me in my hut, Padré," he said, "and in the morning I will give you a horse to take you to your men." He told me that he had been living by himself and was only too delighted to hav

r a waggon cover, had a very happy home. Near us an Imperial battery fired almost incessantly all night long. While lying awake one night thinking o

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er from a green and slimy pond and put it on the other side of a hedge, and there I retired to have a wash and change. I was just in the midst of the process when, to my confusion, the Germans began to shell the adjoining field, and splinters of shell fell in the hedge behind me. The transport men on the other side called out to me to run and take cover with them under the waggons. "I can't, boys", I replie

ith a brass hat and red badges, made his way into my room, and startled me by saying, "I am the Deputy-Judge-Advocate-General." "Oh", I said, "I was hoping you were my batman." He laughed at that and told me his business. There had been a report that one of our Highlanders had been crucified on the door of a barn. The Roman Catholic Chaplain of the 3rd Brigade and myself had tried to trace the story to its origin. We found that the nearest we could get to it was, that someone had told somebody else about it. One day I managed to discover a Canadian soldier who said he had seen the crucifixion himself. I at once took some paper out of my pocket and a New Testament and told him, "I want you to make that statement on oath and put your signature to it." He said, "It is n

pt in a general way. But now I noticed a great change. A wild flower growing in a ditch by the wayside seemed to me to be almost a living thing, and spoke in its mute way of its life of peace and contentment, and mocked, by its very humility, the world of men which was so full of noise and death. Colour too made a most powerful appeal to the heart. The gleam of sunlight on the moss that cov

. Everything was wonderful and beautiful. The golden sunlight was streaming across the earth in full radiance. The trees were fresh and green, and hedges marked out the field with walls of living beauty. The grass in the meadow was soft and velvety, and, just behind the spot where I had placed the altar, a silver stream wandered slowly by. When one adds to such

The mean people, the men who thought only of themselves, were either being weeded out or taught that there was no place for selfishness in the army. One great lesson was impressed upon me in the war, and that is, how wonderfully the official repression of wrong thoughts and jealousies tends to their abolition. A man who lets his wild fancies free, and gives rein to his anger and selfishness, is going to become the victim of his own mind. If people at home could only be prevented, as men were in the war, from

et a comfortable billet for myself in the house of a carpenter. My bedroom was a tiny compartment which looked out on the backyard. It was quite delightful to lie in a real bed again and as I was enjoying the luxury late in the morni

elf, "Hello, here comes Joan of Arc." Then a general appeared with his brilliant staff. The General advanced and we all saluted, but he, spying my chaplain's collar, rode over to me and shook hands and asked if I had come over with the Canadians. I told him I had. Then he said, "I am so glad you have all come into my Army." I did not know who he was or what army we were i

of coffee. At five a.m. I started to walk, but it was not long before I was overtaken by the car of an artillery officer, and carried, in great glory, past the General and his staff, whose horses we nearly pushed into the ditch on the narrow road. The Brigadier waved his hand and congratulated me upon the way in which Providence was looking after m

place, free from those inhabitants which infested the ordinary places of repose. Of course we did not sleep much, and somebody, amid roars of laughter called for breakfast about two-thirty a.m. The cook who was sleeping in the same room got up and prepared bacon and coffee, and we had quite an enjoyable meal, which did not preve

nches, I shook hands with one or two and then, as they passed up, half the battalion shook hands with me. I was glad they did, but at the same time I felt then that it was not wise for a chaplain to do anything which looked as if he were taking matters too seriously. It was the duty of everyone to forget private feelings in the one absorbing desire to kill off the enemy. I saw the different battalions going up and was returning towards headquarters when whom should I meet b

iding for us tonight." We made our way back to the main road and there I saw an Imperial Officer who was acting as a point man and directing traffic. I told him my difficulty and implored him, as it was now getting on towards eleven p.m., to tell me where I could get a lodging for the night. He thought for a while and then said, "I think you may find a bed for yourself and your man in the prison." The words had an ominous sound, but I remembered how often people at home found refuge for the night in the police station. He told me to go down the road to the third farmhouse, where I should find the quarters of some Highland officers and men. The farm was called the prison, because it was the place in which captured Germans were to be held until they were sent down the line. Followed by Murdoch, I made my way again down the busy road now crowded with transports, troops and ambulances. It was hard to dodge them in the mud and dark. I found the farmhouse, passed the sentry, and was admitted to the presence of two young officers of the Glasgow Highlanders. I told them who I was and how I had been bidden by the patrol officer to seek refuge with them. They received me most cordially and told me they had a spare heap of s

which was a voluntary one, had therefore an underlying pathos in it. Shells were falling in the fields on both sides of us. The great red sunset glowed in the west and the trees overhead cast an artistic gray green light upon the scene. The men were facing the sunset, and I told them as usual that there lay Canada. The last hymn was "Abide with Me", and the words, "Hold Thou Thy Cross before my closing eyes", were peculiarly touching in view of the fact that the working party was to start as soon as the service was e

ms of windmills gave away the location of our troops. At any rate everyone had a bad attack of spy-fever, and I did not escape it. One night about half past ten I was going down a dark road to get my letters from the post office, when an officer on a bicycle came up to me and, dismounting, asked me where a certain British Artillery Brigade was. I was not concerned with the number of the brigade, but I was horrified to hear the officer pronounce his "rs" in the back of his throat. Of course, when we are not at war with Germany, a man may pronounce his "

uld get a squared map. "Do you take me for a spy?" he said. I replied gently that we did, and that he would have to come to Headquarters and be identified. He had an ugly looking revolver in his belt, but he submitted very tamely to his temporary arrest. I was taking him off to our Headquarters, where strange officers were often brought for purposes of identification, when a young Highland Captain of diminutive stature, but unbounded dignity, appeared on the scene with four patrol men. He to

prisoner. It was a delightfully weird experience. There was the long quiet moonlit road and the desolate fields all around us. While I was talking to one of the men, the patrol officer, unknown to me, allowed the spy to go off on his wheel, and to my astonishment when I turned I saw him going off down the road as hard as he could. I asked the officer why he had let him go. He said he thought it was all right and the man would be looked after. Saying this, he called his patrol about him and marched back again. The thing made me very angry. It seemed to me that the whole war might depend on our capturing the spy. At least, I owed it to the British Army to do my best to be certain the man

. I made my way through the garden and entered the house. The colonel, an oldish man, was sitting at a table. In front of him was an empty glass and an empty whisky bottle. It struck me from a

rather disconcerted. The Colonel called to his adjutant who was sleeping in a bed in the next room. He came out in a not very agreeable frame of mind and began to ask me who I was. I immediately told my name, showed my identification disc and engraved silver cigarette case and some cablegrams that I had just received from home. The Colonel looked up with bleary eyes and said, "Shall I put him in the guardroom?" but the adjutant had been convinced by my papers that I was innocent and he said, "I think we can let him go, Sir." It was a great relief to me, because guard-rooms were not very clean. I was just making my way from the garden when out came the young despatch rider. I bore him no malice for his patriotic zeal. I felt that his heart was in the right place, so I said to him, "You have taken the part of this unknown officer, and now that you are sure I am all right, may I ask you what you know about him?" "I don't know anything", he said, "only that I met him and he asked me the way to the Brigade, and as I was going there myself I told him I would act as his guide." "Well", I said, "we are told that there are spies in the neighbourhood reporting the location of our batteries to the Germans, so we ought to be v

were obdurate and said they wouldn't let us go till we could be identified in the morning. Then the officer requested that he might be sent to the Brigade under escort. The sergeant asked me if that would meet with my approval. I said, "Certainly", and so, turning out three members of the guard with fixed bayonets, they marched us off towards the Brigade. The spy had a man with a fixed bayonet on each side of him: they gave me only one. I felt that this was a slight upon my manhood, and asked why they did not put a soldier on each side of me too, as I was as good a man as the other. It was a queer procession in the moonlight. At last we came to the orchard in which stood the billet of the General commanding the Artillery Brigade. I was delighted to find that some Canadian Batteries were there, and told the men what my mission was. They instantly, as true Canadians, became fired with interest and spy-fever. When we got to the house I asked to see the General. He was asleep in a little room off the kitchen. I was shown in, and he lit a candle and proceeded to get up. I had never seen a general in bed before, so was much intere

was reported to be going about through our lines dressed in a British uniform. He had been seen at an observation post, and was making enquiries which aroused suspicions. This of course made me mo

one who had caused him so much inconvenience. Once more the call of duty came to my soul. I felt that this man had dodged the British authorities and was now giving his information to a French interpreter to transmit it at the earliest possible moment to the Germans. I told my young friends to carry on as if nothing had happened, and excusing myself, said I would come back in a few minutes. I went out and inquired my way to the Town Major's office. There, I stated the object of my journey and asked for two policemen to come back with me and mount guard till I identified a suspicious looking officer. I then re

erson the extraordinary and eccentric conduct of a Canadian Chaplain, who persisted in arresting a certain British officer whenever they happened to meet. He wound up with this cutting comment, "The conduct of this chaplain seems to fit him rather for a lunatic asylum than f

d that I would be more careful in the future about being carried away by my suspicions. I told people howeve

The shops were well provided with articles for sale, and a restaurant in the quaint Grande Place, with its Spanish tower and Spanish houses, was the common meeting ground of friends. The gardens behind private residences brought back

vous excitement over his recent efforts. I made a bargain with him to give us a recital on the following evening. At the time appointed, therefore, I brought some of our men with me. The young organist met us at the church and I led him over to a monastery in which a British ambulance was making its headquarters. There, in the chapel, the blind man poured out his soul in the strains of a most beautiful instrument. We sat entranced in the evening light. He transported us into another world.

ng sold to the Belgian army, he was mercifully shot, by the orders of our A.D.V.S. Dandy certainly was a beauty, and his lively disposition made him interesting to ride. I was able now to do much more parish visiting, and I was rather amused at the way in which my mount was inspected by the different grooms in our units. I had to stand the fire of much criticism. Evil and covetous eyes were set upon Dandy. I was told he was "gone" in the knees. I was told he had a hump on the back-he had what is known as the "Jumper's bump." Men tickled his back and, because he wriggled, told me he was "gone" in the kidneys. I was told he was no proper horse for a padré

I loved you dearly, Dandy, and I wish I could pull down your soft face towards mine once again, and talk of the times when you took me down Hill 63 and along Hyde Park corner at Ploegsteert. Had I not been wounded and sent back to England at the end of the war, I would have brought you home with me to show to my family-a friend that not merely uncomplainingly but cheerfully, with prancing feet and arching neck and well groomed

speak the language of the others, yet the sympathy of each enabled us to understand and appreciate one another's opinions. I always knew what Dandy thought and what he would do. I always knew too what Philo was thinking about. Philo had a great horror of shells. I put this down to the fact that he was born at Beuvry, a place

ly morning and listened to the French guns pounding away wearily near Souchez. At noon I started with a staff officer in a motor for Boulogne. It was a lovely day, and as we sped down the road through little white