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A German Raid

“And what sort of time have you had here?” I said to the corporal of the ___ whose sentry group I was taking over.

“Oh it’s been all right until the last two days. It’s been awful since then. There’s nothing you need to be afraid of except those Minenwerfers. You can see ‘em coming so if you keep a good look-out you’ll have a chance to dodge ‘em.” “Right oh!” I replied.

The Y. and L. men filed out, very relieved to get out of the trenches which they had held for the past thirteen days.

“They hadn’t half the wind up about those trench mortars!” said Skinnaw

“They must be awful things the way they’ve bashed the trenches in!” added Bill

“Well we’ll have to keep a sharp look-out for them.”

Everything was quiet until late in the afternoon when they commenced to shell our communication trenches with high explosives. They had the range accurately and there was practically no trench at all in places. Soon after tea our curiosity about the Minenwerfers was satisfied for ever. From half-past five until half-past eight we were subjected to a strain almost beyond endurance. As soon as the first Minnie burst we jumped to our feet. We realised what the unfamiliar explosion was. Then we craned our necks upwards searching the sky for the new thing.

Fortunately they began to fall on our right at first. From spotting the first one we could see them coming. They were of two shapes, one like a big shell, the other a cylinder nipped in at the middle. The first kind rarely revolved but came from a great height point downwards. The cylindrical type slowly turned over and over.

As soon as they fell we heard an earsplitting report more terrible than anything we have known. The ordinary trench mortar was as nothing to these things. They exploded as if the earth itself had burst. Soil, sandbags, and anything they fell upon splashed upwards to an enormous height like some devilish black subterranean fountain. Our trenches crumpled in like an empty box. As long as these horrible things fell away from us we watched them with an absorbed impersonal interest. It is a strange feeling that has come over us, and one might hastily pass it over as selfishness. To-day our comrades are killed or wounded; to-morrow we shall dance and sing almost entirely forgetful that a friendship two years’ old has been tragically ended. Familiarity breeds blindness; personal risks are so great as to saturate the individual with the instinct of self-preservation; indeed this capacity of living for the moment is necessary in order that the bloody business and appalling discomforts of modern war can be endured. A soldier is not supposed to feel.

We watched the Minenwerfers falling away from us with more interest than fear. But when one seemed to be coming straight for us our whole being concentrated on our safety.

“It’s going to land in the bay!” shouted Frank

“Run to the right!” I yelled. We ran. The rushing, swishing sound of the mortar (a heavy regular breathing), became louder until we knew without a word that the time had come to duck. There was an alarming report; the trench shook; it had fallen just behind us; it had missed us. This was our only concern. The black smoke and earth were blown thirty feet above; soil and sods fell upon us but we did not care. It had missed us. Rising to our feet we watched for another.

“Listen for the report of the gun” said Arthur. Presently was heard a sound resembling a rifle shot except that it was duller and longer.

“There she goes!” we exclaimed together.

“I can see it!” cried Bill, pointing at the sky. “Oh, it’s going well over” I said. “We’ll stay here”.

The shell reached its height and for a moment was lost in a low cloud. We waited with anxiety until it was seen to emerge, making in our direction but over. We had a fine view of it. As it dropped we crouched to the side of the parados to escape flying splinters. The sound of the explosion was terrifying; it threatened to blow in our ears. Afterwards we found a base plate measuring nine inches across.

In such manner we listened for the report of the gun; searched the sky for the shell; judged its destination and acted accordingly. It was difficult to dodge one coming very near. Its falling a few yards in front or behind meant life or death to us. More than once we ran into them. On one of these occasions Lc/Cp. J. Hall (’10-’12), was hurled against the door of a shelter and pinned up to the neck with the debris. He was soon dug out and we were very relieved to find that he had sustained nothing worse than a few bruises and slight shock.

Shortly afterwards two other men ran past us shaking and crying with shell-shock. It was pitiful to see them. At the beginning of the bombardment we had one of the finest men in the Company killed, Lc/Cp. Fairless, a St John’s College man. His death was an instance of how fine may be the boundary between death and safety. Fairless was standing in the middle of a bay; on his right and only a few yards away was a comrade. The shell that knocked in the trench that killed the one, left the other with the shell-shock, but with no other hurt. Serg. N. Thompson (’10-’12), was near Fairless too and was fortunate enough to escape.

The three hours’ bombardment by Minenwerfers left us considerably shaken and with aching necks. On the left of our post the trench had been knocked in for a distance of over a hundred yards. It was nothing but a long heap of raw earth and torn sandbags, with here and there the vestiges of breastwork showing. Behind it the land had been broken up into holes deep enough to bury a horse in each. It was as if a giant had frolicked in a garden. This stretch of trench was quite untenable. Moreover it isolated us, the right flanks from Company Headquarters and the remaining three platoons.

When “Stand to!” was passed along, everything was quiet. We sat on the fire-step staring at the dusky, golden sunset, wondering how long we were to be left in tranquillity.

“I hope we have a quiet night” said Serg. Ashley. “We all need it. You remember M – going out with shell-shock? I was sitting next to him on the fire-step when a shell blew in the breastwork. We were both buried up to the chest.”

“How do you feel now?” I enquired

“Oh, all right!” he replied with a laugh.

“It was funny to see us all rushing about like surprised mice, wasn’t it?”

“And all our holes blocked up eh?” someone added. “Ah well” chimed in Skinnaw, “it’s quiet enough now.”

“Stand to!” said a member of another sentry group. We dispersed to our posts, fixed bayonets, mounted double sentries and settled down for the night.

Suddenly the full fire of the enemy’s artillery opened out upon us. The noise was a continuous roar punctuated by the bursting of his larger shells. The dark night was lit up by flashes, purple and yellow, which seemed near enough to blind us. We opened the Grenade boxes and dealt out the bombs. We had two dozen. We took our bandoliers from our pouches and secured a plentiful supply of reserve ammunition. Then, with the exception of the two sentries, we cowered into the side of the parapet, and waited. We were all ready.

“Do you think they’ll come over!” said the Platoon Officer who was sat near me.

“No, I hardly think so. If they knock in our trench, I believe they’ll come.”

The shelling proceeded; the earth trembled; soil pattered over us and fragments of warm spent shell fell upon us.

“Isn’t it awful!” said one.

“It’s Hell!” murmured another.

We were all breathing quickly and striving to hide our fears in our talk.

“Are you all right, Bill!” repeatedly asked the sentries. “And you, Frank!”

“Tres bon” yelled Frank in an uproar.

“How would a pint of Susie’s Bass go down now?” asked Bill.

“Fine fellows!” smiled the Officer.

“Everybody all right here Jimmy!” shouted Sergeant Ashley, as he rushed past on his way to the other groups.

“All right – and the others?”

“No one hurt as yet.”

The bombardment lasted for an hour and a half. Towards its close we waited for the barrage lifting. Presently, Sergt. Ashley came to us again. He had a look over the parapet from the next bay.

“Watch out lads, they’re here,” he yelled.

“Up you get boys, “I cried, “Give ‘em Hell,”

“They’re coming, they’re coming,” shouted the sentries simultaneously as we jumped on the fire-step.

On the next bay on the left was a Vicker’s Gun manned by two men of the Machine Gun Corps. At the time of warning they were smoking cigarettes. At once they leaped into position. Luckily, there was no need to alter the aim. Before the gun’s rattle-song rang out, we had thrown our first bombs. In the very dark night we could make out the unsubstantial shadows of a group of running men, some twenty yards away.

“Come on Germany!” invited Skinnaw, as he blazed away. “Come on yer dirty devils,” bawled Bill.

“Take that and that!” cried Frank, as he threw them a couple of bombs.

We were all in an ecstasy of happiness. We were drunk with excitement. We shouted, sang, and said the silliest of things, but never stopped firing or throwing. The shells continued to pour upon our supports. We were oblivious to this, to everything but the foe in front.

“Damn these pins” said Bill. I can’t pull ‘em out. You pull the pins out and I’ll chuck the bombs, “he cried to Arthur.

“Something like a war this!” said Bill.

“I believe we’re winning!” laughed Arthur.

“Steady lads, stop firing unless you get a target!” I cried.

We had no Vevy [Very] pistol to provide us with light.

Presently the Bosch ceased his bombardment and we could only hear our shells whistling overhead and dumping with a thud upon his front line. Then flares from our flanks gave us a momentary glimpse of huddled, still figures lying together in disorder amongst our wire.

After a time, our state of exultant frenzy gave place to a sober feeling of thankfulness. Whilst we prepared ourselves for a renewal of the fight, we took stock of the situation. As yet we were ignorant of the fate of our comrades in other platoons. It seemed indeed as if we had been guarded by Providence. A strong party of the enemy had crept towards us under cover of the darkness and of their own fierce barrage, evidently making for the broken part of the trench on our left. Owing to our lack of a Vevy [Very] pistol they had mistaken their direction and had rushed to the first manned bay on the right of the untenable stretch of trench, into the mouth of a Vicker’s Gun and in front of an alert Sentry group. Fortunately, not one of us in this area has been touched by the heavy, vicious bombardment. The attack found us unharmed and prepared. It is easy to imagine what might have happened, had the enemy got into the smashed trench and bombed his way towards us.

When we had beaten off the attack, Sergt. Ashley, loth to give any of his men such a task, went down to Headquarters in the open, though the bombardment was still proceeding and the attack had not finished on the left. Having reported he returned to us giving us news that C. Company had suffered heavily, the enemy had got in and had been subsequently bombed out, and that one of our men suffering from shell-shock had been captured.

Everything was now quiet in front of us. The Bosch began to send up his flares.

From No Man’s Land we heard a cry, then a groan. “Kamerad, Kamerad, help, help.” By the light of a flare we saw a wounded Bosch wandering aimlessly amongst the wire.

“Try to get him in!” I said.

Then Skinnaw, of Shields, shouts to him – “Aaway hinney! Coom alang! Away! Tak hod o’ my bayonet an a’ll pull thee in.

Despite our invitation he did not come; the night took him into its shelter: whether he returned safely to his lines or succumbed from wounds, is a matter of conjecture.

In the morning we counted thirty dead Germans quite close to our bay. One of them had desperately jumped into the borrow trench at the base of our parapet. Night patrols reported many bodies further out. For three nights we had the unpleasant task of bringing in the bodies. Some had blackened faces; one had his rifle loaded with filed cartridges; most carried bombs and revolvers. A large number of souvenirs were obtained, including many helmets.

Sergeant Pinkney (’09-11), then a Corporal, was in charge of No. 8 Platoon on the night of the raid. L./Cp. W. Marshalll (’11-13), was with the same platoon. Sergt. Ashley held the right flank. Pickney’s trench had been knocked in during the final stage of the preparatory shelling, and several of his men were wounded, many of them having their rifles and bombs buried in the debris. The enemy had entered the trench during this confusion.

Pickney, being a Range-finder, had the privilege of carrying a revolver. He was standing in a bay when he saw some of the enemy led by an Officer, jump into his trench. Drawing his revolver he advanced towards them, and shot the Officer and the man following him. The others, not bargaining for this reception made off. Meanwhile other Germans had entered the trench behind him, and a scuffle was ensuing between them and some of our own men who had lost their weapons. Pinkney immediately rushed to the rescue; shot one of the two men who were attempting to take one of our men prisoner, and chased off the others. For this gallant conduct in the face of most unnerving circumstances, he was recommended to the DCM [Distinguished Conduct Medal] which was duly given him. Two Military Medals were awarded that night. One was given to a Stretcher-bearer for attending the wounded amidst shelling during the raid; the other was given to a Battalion Runner, who succeeded in delivering his messages in the front line in spite of a heavy barrage.

J.J.S (’09-’11)

Author: James Johnson Sanderson

Reference: https://www.dur.ac.uk/library/asc/roll/publications/

Where to find this: Online Resource
Bede Magazine Dec 1916

Contributed by Fiona Johnson - Durham