After my delightful few days of leave, things moved fast. I was back in Dover just two days when I, with two hundred other men, was sent to Winchester. Here we were notified that we were transferred to the Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment.
This news brought a wild howl from the men. They wanted to stop with the Fusiliers. It is part of the British system that every man is taught the traditions and history of his regiment and to know that his is absolutely the best in the whole army. In a surprisingly short time they get so they swear by their own regiment and by their officers, and they protest bitterly at a transfer.
Personally I didn’t care a rap. I had early made up my mind that I was a very small pebble on the beach and that it was up to me to obey orders and keep my mouth shut.
On June 17, some eighteen hundred of us were moved down to Southampton and put aboard the transport for Havre. The next day we were in France, at Harfleur, the central training camp outside Havre.
We were supposed to undergo an intensive training at Harfleur in the various forms of gas and protection from it, barbed wire and methods of construction of entanglements, musketry, bombing, and bayonet fighting.
Harfleur was a miserable place. They refused to let us go in town after drill. Also I managed to let myself in for something that would have kept me in camp if town leave had been allowed.
The first day there was a call for a volunteer for musketry instructor. I had qualified and jumped at it. When I reported, an old Scotch sergeant told me to go to the quartermaster for equipment. I said I already had full equipment. Whereupon the sergeant laughed a rumbling Scotch laugh and told me I had to go into kilts, as I was assigned to a Highland contingent.
I protested with violence and enthusiasm, but it didn’t do any good. They gave me a dinky little pleated petticoat, and when I demanded breeks to wear underneath, I got the merry ha ha. Breeks on a Scotchman? Never!
Well, I got into the fool things, and I felt as though I was naked from ankle to wishbone. I couldn’t get used to the outfit. I am naturally a modest man. Besides, my architecture was never intended for bare-leg effects. I have no dimples in my knees.
So I began an immediate campaign for transfer back to the Surreys. I got it at the end of ten days, and with it came a hurry call from somewhere at the front for more troops.
II
Going In
The excitement of getting away from camp and the knowledge that we were soon to get into the thick of the big game pleased most of us. We were glad to go. At least we thought so.
Two hundred of us were loaded into side-door Pullmans, forty to the car. It was a kind of sardine or Boston Elevated effect, and by the time we reached Rouen, twenty-four hours later, we had kinks in our legs and corns on our elbows. Also we were hungry, having had nothing but bully beef and biscuits. We made “char,” which is trench slang for tea, in the station, and after two hours moved up the line again, this time in real coaches.
Next night we were billeted at Barlin—don’t get that mixed up with Berlin, it’s not the same—in an abandoned convent within range of the German guns. The roar of artillery was continuous and sounded pretty close.
Now and again a shell would burst near by with a kind of hollow spung, but for some reason we didn’t seem to mind. I had expected to get the shivers at the first sound of the guns and was surprised when I woke up in the morning after a solid night’s sleep.
A message came down from the front trenches at daybreak that we were wanted and wanted quick. We slung together a dixie of char and some bacon and bread for breakfast, and marched around to the “quarters,” where they issued “tin hats,” extra “ammo,” and a second gas helmet. A good many of the men had been out before, and they did the customary “grousing” over the added load.
The British Tommy growls or grouses over anything and everything. He’s never happy unless he’s unhappy. He resents especially having anything officially added to his pack, and you can’t blame him, for in full equipment he certainly is all dressed up like a pack horse.
After the issue we were split up into four lots for the four companies of the battalion, and after some “wangling” I got into Company C, where I stopped all the time I was in France. I was glad, because most of my chums were in that unit.
We got into our packs and started up the line immediately. As we neared the lines we were extended into artillery formation, that is, spread out so that a shell bursting in the road would inflict fewer casualties.
At Bully-Grenay, the point where we entered the communication trenches, guides met us and looked us over, commenting most frankly and freely on our appearance. They didn’t seem to think we would amount to much, and said so. They agreed that the “bloomin’ Yank” must be a “bloody fool” to come out there. There were times later when I agreed with them.
It began to rain as we entered the communication trench,
