I crossed the Paddebeek after the utmost exertions, and only with the help of some poplars that a shell had flung across it; and found the officer in command of the 5th Company, Lieutenant Heins, in a giant shell-hole, with what remained of his company around him. Their shell-hole line lay on a slope, and, since it was not entirely flooded, might be called habitable by the unassuming front-line soldier.
Heins told me that the English had come on in line that morning, but had disappeared when fire was opened on them. The enemy had, however, shot a few men of the 164th Regiment who had lost their way and ran for it at their approach. Apart from this all was in order; and I returned forthwith to headquarters and made my report to the commanding officer.
On the following day we were most rudely interrupted at lunch by a few shells planted right in front of the door. Descending fountains of soil beat long tattoos on our tarred roof. There was a rush for the door. I fled to a farm close at hand, and as it was raining I went inside. In the evening the same performance was repeated; only this time, as it was fine, I stood outside the farmhouse. The next shell fell right in the middle of it. Such are the chances of war. Here more than anywhere it is a case of little causes and great effects. Seconds and millimetres make the difference.
On the 28th we were driven from the huts by eight o’clock, and one of those opposite us got a direct hit at the second shot. Others fell in the waterlogged meadows. They made less noise, but they scooped out some fine holes. Prompted by the experiences of the day before, I sought out a lonely shell-hole, of dimensions to inspire confidence, in the cabbage-field behind headquarters, and I would never leave it again until a considerable safety margin had elapsed. I heard that day the news, particularly distressing to me, of the death of Lieutenant Brecht. He had met his heroic death in the shell-hole area to the right of the Nordhof, while acting as a divisional observation officer. He was one of those few who were encircled by a nimbus of romance, even in the most material of wars, owing to their insatiable daredevilry. Men like him always stood out from the common run; they laughed every time an attack was ordered.
The morning of the 26th was occupied by drumfire of unusual intensity. Our artillery, too, doubled its fury when the signals for a barrage went up in the front line. Every little bit of wood and every hedge was crammed with guns, and behind them the half-dazed gunners were kept hard at work.
As the reports of the wounded about an English attack were confused and exaggerated, I was sent forward at eleven with my four men to obtain more exact information. We had to pass through a sharp fire, and met a great number of wounded, among them Lieutenant Spitz, commanding the 12th Company, wounded in the chin. Even before reaching the headquarters of the battalion in the line we were in a direct machine-gun fire, a sign that the enemy must have broken through. This fear was soon confirmed by Major Dietlein, commanding officer of the 3rd Battalion. I found the old gentleman in the act of creeping out of the entrance of his blockhouse, which was three parts under water, and fishing zealously for his meerschaum cigar-holder, which had fallen into the mud. The enemy had broken through the front line and taken a ridge from which he commanded the important area of the Paddebeek and battalion headquarters situated there.
After I had marked the alteration of the front in blue chalk on my map, I set out on a fresh steeplechase through the mud with my men. We ran at full speed over the exposed ground till a slope gave us cover, and then we proceeded more slowly to Nordhof. Shells were falling to right and left in the boggy ground, and throwing up large mountains of mud surrounded by countless smaller ones. Nordhof was being shelled with H.E. in a nerve-shattering manner, and we had to reach it in jumps. The noise these things made was really most hideous and quite deafening. They came over in groups at short intervals. The only thing to do was to cover the ground in short darts, and then wait for the next shots in a shell-hole. The interval between the first distant howl and the explosion near by is marked by a peculiarly painful emphasis upon the instinct of self-preservation, since the body is reduced to a state of defenceless and motionless waiting. But I am afraid my insistence on the fact that the war was no child’s-play will become burdensome. The picture of every day was at last made up of such experiences.
There was shrapnel, too, among the rest. One of them scattered its bullets with a clatter among us, and one of my men was hit on the hind rim of his helmet and thrown to the ground. After he had lain stunned for some while, he picked himself up and ran on. The ground round Nordhof was strewn with terribly mutilated bodies.
As we carried out our job in a sporting spirit, we were often in places that had just ceased to be possible. In this way the unseen events of the battlefield came to our
