One Day's ork
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Third Series
The Six o'Clock Squads.
At 5.30 a.m, the three occupants of our " bivvy " are awakened by the Corporal of the Guards, with the question "Are you the motor drivers for the six o'clock squads?" With a reply unintelligible to anyone not versed in the genial swear language of Britain's soldiers, we turn out and don the essential garments, if any, that we shed the previous night.
A Contrast in Purrs.
Beyond a hasty swill in a bucket there is no attempt to make ourselves look pretty : prettiness and barrack-square ceremonies are thankfully dispensed with by R.E. sappers and miners on Active Service. Besides any self-decorative efforts would soon be spoiled by the strenuous business of starting
up. My pocket handkerchief is used for wiping dew from the sparking plugs, one of its manifold duties ; two of the cylinders are primed with petrol from a conveniently-bent tobacco tin the Solex carburetter is well flooded, and a. few sharp turns at the starting handle sets the engine of the ancient "B "-type L.G.O.C. purring comfortably ; but not with the hearty, healthy purr of the big Daimler that is to accompany us on this trip, and of which we are a little envious.
A Lead That Stows Itself.
The drivers of the said Daimler seem to have an idea that being served out with this fine lorry is -in some way creditable to them personally instead of being purely accidental ; and this absurd idea of theirs causes some irritation during our frequent and heated discussions of the relative merits of our "mounts." As ray lorry mate was on duty until well into the small hours, I work this trip solo, and leave him slumbering. A part of our live load is already aboard by the -time the 'engines are started, so we drive round to another billet to pick up the remainder. A Jiving freight appeals to one because it. loads and stows itself, unloading itself at the end of the
B44 journey, besides bringing interesting souvenirs from the trenches. Sometimes the souvenirs are grey in colour, very much alive, and very undesirable, but it is not that kind I was referring to.
Pay That Would be Scorned by Men Who Strike..,
Did ever lorries carry such loads as we are transporting? Twenty odd, brave fellows who cheerfully snake this journey day after day. always with the knowledge that they may not be brought back by the relief lorry, but will instead be carried out on a stretcher or buried in the clay of Northern France ; working hard and skilfully for a rate of pay that would be scorned by men who strike and quibble over trifles at home, content to sleep in any old place and eat any old thing.
Army Horses Shy.
We are, soon well away on our journey to the trenches and have time to realize what a glorious, cloudless, sunny morning it is, and why we have that fit and "glad I came" feeling. At this early hour
the Army is astir, and we pass files of artillerymen riding and leading horses for exercise. Curious how nearly all Army horses shy at motor lorries. Across the canal by one of the many "Fonts Levis," then a stretch of winding macadam With a gradient, 'welcome because it is a, pleasing variation of the deadly flatness we have .got so tired of, through the outskirts of a townlet, round some tricky corners, and we get on to a fineexample of the renowned roads of France, tree-lined and with pezve" surface.
Why They Live in Wreckage.
Our journey finishes with a stretch of macadam, scarred by shells and worn by military use. We stop where we could get no further with the lorries, within 800 yds, of the front fare trenches. The last part of our five-mile, circuitous journey, has been through a district in which the numerous houses, including a village, have been reduced by shell-fire and closequarter fighting to heaps of debris with a few ragged walls standing. Here and there civilians still live in the wreckage, and this despite almost daily shelling by the enemy, which knocks further bits off their "homes." Perhaps the profit on the sale of well-watered beer and famine-price groceries to British Soldiers is sufficient compensation for the risk and inconvenience.
Waiting for the Back Load.
• I hand to an K.O.O. a box of rations fof one of our officers who is doing a long spell in the trenches, and our load having departed, we turn our lorries in the direction of home and settle down to a two-hour wait for the squads our last load will relieve. The abandoned gardens, ruined buildings and communication trenches provide an interest which prevents time hanging heavily on our hands. My search among the strawberry beds proves nearly fruitless in both senses of the word, but the loaded currant bushes have not come in for so Much attention from our gunners, so .I get a healthful before-breakfast feed.
Planes That Never Get Hit.
A tow rifle bullets that whistle past are probably strays, so we take no Special interest in them or in the shelling of a couple of our aeroplanes ; for the latter never get hit, and it is only when the bits of shell threaten to fall on us that we worry about them. Our return load is along almost before we expected it, muddy from caps to boots, some of them still wearing mining shirts and sweating from their work and difficult progress in communication trenches. I am joined on the box seat by one of our offieers, even more thickly plastered with grey mud than the men.
Deshabille and Billets.
With exhortations from my load to " Go like 'ell," etc., for they are in a hurry to get much-needed refreshment and sleep, I return to the billets, covering the same route
as -on the outward journey. By now eivilians are out and about, and the jeune fillcs, in various stages of deshabille, engagel in domestie occupations, salute us as we pass. Incidentally I may mention that a large proportion of them have left for Central France to be out of the way of the " Roches."
French Swear Words Wanted.
The English carter on country roads has a well-deserved reputation for sleepiness, sluggishness, driving on the wrong side, deafness and general " obstructiveness," but in all these vices the civilian driver around. here has him beaten, all the way. And, moreover, the French driver "controls". his horse with a. single rein of tring, so, however good. his intentions and however willing he may be to get out Of the way quickly, the manceuvring of his ramshackle threewheeled contrivance is a delaying
and irritating affair, carried out to the accompaniment of language from our load that can only be described. as appropriate to the cir
cumstances. A few really fierce French swear words or epithets would often prove a useful addition to the motor-lorry driver's vocabulary out here. 4 tin of bully used as a missile might pies e an effective awakener of these stubborn carters, and would show that tins of bully have other uses besides their principal one, viz., as
a temporary barricade against enemy fire.
The Horrible Clutch.
Despite such delaying factors we make good progress. I appreciate the steering of the " B " type and deprecate its horrible clutch, when, on a gradient just after an awkward turn, second speed is called for. We hurxy past a patch of particularly evil-smelling ditch, so bad as to warrant the use of our
respirators, and arrive at the billets, where our load, even the not inconsiderable part that has fallen. asleep during the journey, is soon off. We find that the run has, in spite of smells, given us an appetite for the bacon, tea, bread and jam which our M.T. cook has ready and waiting. After breakfast there is time for a good wash and a general straightening tip of our huts, or " bivvics," composed of lorry tops which we have had to take oft because our work is often on roads where signal wires are festooned low enough to catch them.
A Load of Miners Explosives.
My lorry is shortly detailed for a journey to a distant rail-head to fetch stores, and we are soon well away, the two drivers and an R.E. sergeant on the front seat, and a fatigue party of two in the back, for loading and guarding the load which is to consist chiefly of miners' explosives. Fatigue party is an appropriate name, tor riding in the back of an unladen lorry on these war-worn roads of Northern France is not a. joyous affair in fact one dare not sit down.
Scientific Brake Adjustments.
Our "B "-type is an unlovely grey lorry with high solid sides, and has been completely rebuilt early this year, before I was afflicted with it. Regrettable is the omission of the repairers to give us any steering lock to speak of on one side. The clutch would be improved by the addition of a second pedal so that the spare driver might lend a foot to help disengage it. This clutch and the joints behind it are not the original ones, but have been inaprovized by the repairers. Our brakes present two alternatives : we can adjust them for every variation in the load, or avoid such frequent adjustment by having moderately efficient brakes when fully laden and none at all when empty, due to the radial movement of the
back axle and propeller shaft not coinciding with that of the brake gear. Of course, we choose the latter alternative, the engine serving as an additional brake.
One Tire Short.
We are one back tire short, all the rubber .having peeled off. All these matters could be, aridwill be, corrected when the lorry can be spared, but there is no immediate prospect of its being spared.Our company's complement of lorries is limited to four, its needs are increasing, and 2,0 a lorry has to be real bad before it goes into dock.
In a Recently-shelled Town.
Apart from the little imperfections mentioned our "B"-type goes very well, and we soon are inquiring our route in the fair-sized town of INN, its broken shop windows and scarred walls indicating recent shell visitations. Our route next lies along a level, straightroad, with, on the whole, good pave surface, and we pass columns of lorries at intervals. The way this road has withstood many times its normal tgaffic for months past is a matter for pride in its constructors.
Our R.E. Sergeant.
Our sergeant of R.F,.s, recently promoted trom corporal, is quietly i enjoying the run, which s a pleasant change for him, and as my lorry mate is at the wheel we have some opportunities for conversation, which turns, as it so often does among married soldiers these days, on family matters. I learn that the photograph produced shows
two of Sergt. " nippers " a third having arrived so recently as a few days before.
In One Direction Only.
Soon our good progress is arrested by an M.P. (Military Police, not the Westminster variety), who informs us we are running in the wrong direction, this road being forbidden to lorry 'traffic going west. We have to go back half a mile or se and turn off into a labyrinth of by-roads, where we are presently obliged to halt and make inquiries about the route. While the sergeant goes off to make them, we d.Aermine to obtain maps, especially those with motor-lorry routes and directions marked, at the first opportunity. An Aeroplane Park near which we have stepped claims our interest during the remainder of the wait. Without much difficulty we get on to what is obviously, from its wheel tracks, the lorry route.
Arrival at Railhead,.
A group of. small boys, each -wearing some jtem of discarded khaki clothing or equipment, from putties to capor haversack, is noticed. The civilian population about here wastes nothing. After B48
passing through villages of no particular interest to us in this country, where the one great and absorbing affair is war, we reach the main road again, with further lorry columns parked at the sides. A fair-sized town is next traversed, another village, and we are at railhead, assisting the fatigue party of two in loading explosives, pumps, sandbags, and miscellaneous mining gear. Lunch, for which we can spare only a few minutes, is taken at an estami-net, where the only fare obtainable chances to be beer, bread and very salt butter, which we supplement with the contents of a tin of " bully " I happen to have on the lorry. Conversation turns on the question why, in a country famed for dairy produce, cheese and butter are dear and the latter unpalatable.
Colonel Brightens Things Up.
The return journey has to be undertaken as quickly as circumstances will permit, and except for some difficulty in passing a marching battalion whose colonel consigns us to perdition for requiring a large share of a narrow road, is uneventful. We have the use, of main roads most of the way, and drive to a snot close to where we took our morning's human load.
A Long Wait for Serk t. - While we unload, our sergeant goes off to the trenches on business. We find awaiting us a squad of our company who had missed the last return lorries, and we arrange to run them back to billets as soon as Sergt. returns. Our wait develops into one of several hours, and we even begin to speculate upon the possibility of Sergt. -having "taken a soft one," not seriously thinking that, however.
R.E. Wiremen Laugh When Shelled.
Our wait is enlivened by shells passing overhead, sometimes from our own guns and sometimes from the enemy. A wounded man is carried or wheeled past to a Field Hospital near by occasionally. Presently we h-ear a shell coining our way, but it bursts some 50 yds. off, being quickly followed by a second and third. From almost out of the craters emerge three coatless, almost breathless Efitishers, covering that 50 yds. to the shelter of the building we stand by in record time. Sp soon as they can recover breath they laugh over their apparently miraculous escape, and explain that they were engaged on signal wires.
Down Cemetery Street.
The N.C.O. in charge of the tired working squad of our company proposes to leave the next relief lorry, now shortly due, to pick up Sergt. —, and we therefore drive off down the hot, dusty road bearing a temporary name fatniliar to Londoners, and famous the world over, though it might perhaps be more appropriately christened "Cemetery Street, for it is lined with little graveyards of our men.
The Day's Work Done.
Back at the billet we do justice to our deferred tea-supper, replenish the fuel tank and radiator, oil and grease up, and the " B "-type, defects included, is ready for another good run to-morrow, when our experiences and routine will be entirely different, for M.T.s attached to R.E.s cannot complain, of monotony. A card game rounds off the day, and we turn in to sleep induced more by fresh air and lorry vibration than by comfortable quarters and beds.
The Missing N.C.O.
At 1.30 a.m. I am awakened by a sergeant under the mistaken impression that I am due out with the 2 a.m. party. His news that Sergt. will never return from his errand to the trenches spoils my luxurious tiredness. His photograph is bloody now, and the
latest arrival" will never see her father ; a small oak cross bearing his name will be made to-day.