A Guard on the Yser:—The Death Trench (June 2, 1915)
By Corporal J. Libois, of the 12th Line Regiment
This day's work was more terrible than the Dixmude battles. I certify that Corporal Libois has given an exact account of the critical situation in the Death Trench of Milestone 16 on the Yser. Sub-Lieutenant Vueghs of the 12th Line Regiment.
Extract from a letter, 12.9.15.
The French offensive of Arras led to unusual activity on our front. Our Regiment, which had just come back from the thankless Oostkerke Sector, had some very painful experiences during that week, and some of our Battalions were severely tried.
On the night in question, our Company had to relieve guard. Certain sections were ordered to the outposts.
"To-morrow," said Lieutenant Vueghs, "we shall occupy a position on the Yser dyke. Our various posts will be ranged along a communication trench that has been made by the Engineers, but in this trench, a result of recent attacks, there are still about thirty dead men. As we come across them, we are to pick them up and place them on the parapet. The stretcher-bearers will then take them away. One[Pg 351] more word, this trench leads into the German lines on the other side of the Yser, and comes, therefore, under the enemy's firing. You will have to stoop down, and even creep along, when the passage is too low. There must be great caution as you go along. That is all I have to say. As for the rest, I trust to you."
The Lieutenant was to command the sap head, Trench No. 1. This was the most advanced of all the posts, only thirty yards away from the Boches. I was to be there too, and Sergeant Deltenre with about ten men. What would be the outcome, we wondered? At any rate, it would be something fresh, and we were delighted at this.
The summer twilight came very gradually. The soldiers lined up, with their heavy knapsacks on their backs, and their wallets containing provisions for two days.
"Right! Four in a line! March!" and quite tranquilly, the Company filed by in a long column, crossing the meadows and the fields of sweet-scented horse-beans. We went along humming and singing. Half-way, we had the usual halt and rest. The soldiers lying in the fields, in the dusk, gave a picturesque note to the scene. The purple-tinted clouds of the beautiful sunset of Flanders gradually took a pinky shade. In front of us, towards the east, was the horribly mutilated steeple of the Oostkerke Church, standing out, with extraordinary clearness, against the great red disc of the moon, which was just rising. And in the background could already be seen mysterious stars flashing forth from the earth. These were the brilliant and ephemeral enemy fuses. Everything else was absolutely calm. From time to time, a[Pg 352] cricket replied to another cricket. A cool wind swept over us and, from the various groups, here and there, melancholy refrains lulled us and made us dreamy.
Our officers appeared to be enjoying the poetry of it all, for they gave us a rather longer halt than the time fixed.
"Laugh and sing," they perhaps thought, "be gay and joyful, a little later on, we shall, perhaps, bring back with us, the glorious remains of one or other of your comrades, now singing there!"
On the Yser plains, there are probably places destined for many of us. Heaven knows that we all value life, and yet these thoughts do not make us sad and, thanks to a force of character which we never suspected, there is more liveliness and sincere gaiety to be found among the simple soldiers than anywhere else.
Presently the order came to shoulder arms, and we set off once more. The calm that we had enjoyed was only a truce. It was now broken by the deafening volleys of our guns. The enemy's lines were being bombarded and it was a great joy to us to see the flashes over there, to the right, produced by the explosions of our shells. We had now entered the danger zone and the darkness was intense. We advanced in Indian file, one platoon at a time. In the background, lighted up almost all the time by the luminous fuses of the Germans, we could see outlines of figures bending down, stooping low, and then standing up again. It was like a scene out of some enchanted land.
Finally, we reached our trenches. The relieving of the guard took place very quickly with no waiting about. The enemy was bombarding us, but the aim[Pg 353] was not good. We began to fit up and remake our shelters. I made a reconnaissance in the direction of the communication trench. The entrance was obstructed by the evacuation of the dead bodies. We had a most awful task. The stretcher-bearers, moving along on their backs, dragged the bodies with them by ropes. These bodies were already in a state of decomposition and, when they came into the light, it could be seen that their clothes were torn off and that their skin was grazed. Shrapnels kept exploding near us, so that we had to keep close to the parapet. The night passed without any other incident than the visit of the General of the Division. In the morning our watch was over and, when the lookouts were placed, we had permission to sleep. All day long we remained walled up in our trenches of sacks. From the Dixmude posts, which dominated us, the enemy kept an eye on us and, each time that we showed any sign of life, proved to us that we were very carefully watched. From time to time, by way of entertainment, our outposts were bombarded. At night, our time came for relieving guard again. We restored ourselves with coffee, for we were in a very thirsty place. We took a good provision of cartridges, of sacks of earth, and, with heavy shields, leaving our knapsacks in safety, we started, at 11 o'clock, on our march through the Yser communication trench.
It was a march that appeared to us to last a century, and certainly Dante's imagination, in his visions of hell, never surpassed the horrors of it. The passage was narrow and skirted the parapet of the Yser. Its access was so difficult and trying, that it was no use thinking of removing the dead which obstructed it.[Pg 354] We had to imitate the serpent, the toad, and the mole. In order to pass the guard we were relieving, the men had to lie down flat and we had to crawl over them. No one spoke a word. Shrapnels kept exploding and bullets whizzed along continually, flattening themselves against the parapet. I saw some of them ploughing up the earth scarcely twenty centimetres above the heads of my comrades, and I was afraid each time that, in rebounding, they would wound one or another of them. We were all wedged in as though in a vice. At times, we had to advance quickly, bent nearly double, our backs almost broken, at times we had to crawl along, pushing ourselves onward with our elbows and knees, letting go our shields which encumbered us and which, knocking against the sides, made a sonorous noise. When we came to embattlements, watched as we were by the marksmen posted on the other side of the Yser, we had to rush for our lives. Our faces were bathed in perspiration. Suddenly, we came across a dark, motionless mass on the ground. We thought it might be one of the engineers at work.
"Hi there, what are you doing? Answer!" ordered the Lieutenant. Shaking his arm, we found that it dropped lifeless.
"Forward! over the dead man!" was our order. Shuddering, and gasping for breath, we obeyed. Feeling for him with our feet and slipping over his head, we went on our way. Presently we had reached the spot known as "the house in ruins." The parapet had been torn away by a shell, and this might expose us to view. We had to climb and jump at the same time. Horrors! I fell with my hand on the icy face of a dead man. The German Artillery now came into[Pg 355] play. The devilish Schoorbakke battery took the dyke by enfilade and bombarded us. The shells arrived whizzing along and bursting with a frightful noise, making the dyke crumble, and sprinkling us with all kinds of rubbish. There was a second's calm. By the livid light of the fuses, a horrible sight was to be seen, living men swarming along the passage among human fragments in a state of decomposition, the most appalling and terrifying wrecks of humanity imaginable. Horror, repulsion, and disgust were what we felt, but we were compelled to master our feelings. We had to be superhuman. The perspiration ran from our faces on to the dead men, as we climbed over them. And............