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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Clinton News Record, 1918-4-11, Page 6'VV. S. NORMAN HALL,. CHAPTER x,--(Oont'd.)%i), "Jamie.," he said, "take mir place at' Sentry for a few minutes, will yoe? • I've lost my ,water -bottle. It's 'ere in the clug•ont sinew'ere, I'll be only a Minute," • • I went out to the gun ,Poottjaa a few yards away, and unmediethly afterward s the Germans ' began a bombardment of am line. One's ear become exact in distingujishinw the size of shellby the sotmd which they make in travelling through the air; and it is possible to judge the direction and the probable place , of their fall. Two of us stood by the machine gun. We heard at the same time sounds which meantdanger, possibly death, .It was the awful whistling roar of. a high explosive. Wedropped to the floor of the trenah at once. The explosion blackened our faces with lyddite and half -blinded us. The dugout which I had left less than a moment ago was a„mass of wreckage. Seven of our comrades were inside, One of them crawled out, pulling himself along with one arm. The other arm was terribly crushed and one leg. was hanging by a tendon and a few shreds of flesh. "My and, bey's!, Look. wot they • did to mel" Ile kent saying it over and , over while, we cut - the cords frons our bandoliers, tied them - about his leg and arm and tkvisted them up to stop the flow on -blood. .11e, was a fine, healthy lad. A moment before he had been telling us vhat he was going to do when we went home mi furlough. Now his face was the color of ashes, his voice grew weaker and weaker, and he died while we were working . over ihun. High explosive shells were barst- ing all along the line, . Great masses of -earth and chalk were blown in on top of men seeking protection where there was none. The ground rocked like so much pasteboard. I heard frantic: cries for "Picks and shovels!" "Stretcher-bearers! Stretcher-bearera this way, for God's sake!" The voices sounded as weak and futile as the squealcing of rats in a thui.derstorm. When the bombardment began, all off-duty men •were ordered into the deepest of the shell -proof dugouts, where they were really, quite safe. But those English 'lads .were not cowards. Orders or no orders, they carne out to the rescue of their com- rades. They worked without a thought of their own danger. I felt actually happy, tor I was witness- ing splendid heroie-things, It was an experience which gave one a new and unshekellle faith in his fellows. • se The sergeant and I rushed into the ruins of our machine-gun dugout, The reef still held hi one place, Thera we ound Mao, his head split in two as. though it has been done with an Axe. Gardner's head was. blown com- pletely off,t and his body was so terribly Mangled that we did not know until later who he was, Preston wee ly- ing on his back with a• great jagged, blood-stained hole thropgh hie tunic. Bert Powel was so badly lutist that we exhausted our supply • of field -dress- ings in bandaging him. We found little Charlie Hanlon lying elm to the side of the wall, geeing at his crushed foot with a look of incredulity and horror pitiful to see. One of the men gave him first aid with all the deftness and teuderness of a woman. The rest of us dug hurriedly into a Mat heap of earth at the other end Of ,the shelter, We quickly uncover- ed Walter, a lad who had kept us laughing at is thollery on many a rainy night. The earth had been heaped loosely on him and he was still conscious. "Good old bop," he said weakly; "I was about done for. In our haste We •dislodged another heap " f oarth which eompleioly buried him again, and it seemed a lifetime before we were able to re- move it. I have never seen a iiners display of pure -grit than Walter's. "Easy now!" he said. "Can't feel anything below me waist. I think I'm 'art down there." 's . • We worked as swiftly and as care- fully as -we could, We knew that he- . was badly wounded, for the earth was soaked with blood; but 'when we saw, we turned away , sick with horror. Fortunately, he lost consciousness while we were trying to disentangle him from the fallen timbers, and he died on the way to the field dressing - station. Of the, seven lads in the dugout,' three were killed outtight, three died within half an hour, and one escaped with a crushed foot which had to be amputated at the geld hos- pital. What had happened to our little group was happening to others along the entire line. Americans may have read of the bombardment which took place that autumn morning. The dispatches, I believe, described it with the usual official berevity, giving .411 the information really necessary from the point of view of the general pub- lic. • "Along the Loos -La Bassee seater there was a lively artillery action,. We demolished some earthwork in the vicinity • of Hulled, Some of our trenches near Hill '70 were dam- aged." • "Damaged!" It was guarded admis- sion. Our line was a shambles of loose earth and splintered logs. At some placed it was difficult to see just where the trench. had been. Had the Germans launched a counter-attack immediately after the bombardment, we should have had difficulty in hold- ing the pOsition.. But it was only what Tommy called "a big 'ap'orth 'ate." No attempt was made to fol- low up the advantage, and we at once set to work rebuilding. The loose earth had to be put into sandbags. the 'ptusapets mended, the holes, blasted out by shells, filled in. The worst of it was that we could not get away from the sight of the • rvi Shpr-O din mangled bodies of our coinrades, ,Arms and lege stuck out of the wreekr age, and on every aide we saw torted human faces, the Tacos of men vve bad kaewn, with whom we had lived and shared hardships :and dan- gers for months past, Those Who Kaye never lived through eXpertences of this sort cannot poseibly. know the horror of them. It is not in the heat uf battle that men lose their rea-, son, I3attle' frenzy is, neishaimi temporary madness. The real clan- ger comes when the strain is relaxed, Ifferetook about them and see the bodies .of their comrades torn to pieeee as though they bed been hacked and butchered by fiend, One thinks of the human body as inviolate, a beauti- ful .and sacred thing. The sight of it' dismembered or disenthoweled, trampled in the bottom of a treneh, smeared with blood and filth; is so revolting as to be hardly endurable, And yet, we had to etidure it We could not escape it. Whichever way we looked, there were the dead, Worse evert than the sight of dead men were the groans and entreaties of those lying wounded 'In the trenches waiting to be taken back to the dress- ing -stations, "Pin shot. through the stomach, matey? Can't you get me back to the ambulance? Ain't they some way ,you can -, get me back out o' this?" "Stick it, old lath You won't 'ave long to with, They'll be some .of the Bed Cress along 'ere in a ' jiffy now," "Give me a lift, boys, an't you? Look at my leg! Do you think. it'll 'ave to mine off? Maybe they could save it if 1 could get to 'ospital in time! Won't some of you give me a lift? I can 'obble along with a little 'elp."' • • "Don't you ftsen sonny( You're a-go'n' te,,ride back in a stretcher presently. Keep yer courage up a little w'ile longer." - Some of the men, in their Suffering, forgot every one but themselves, and it was not strange that they should. Others, with more iron in their na- the Picking up, and herrying the ehil- tures, endured fearful agony in sil- dren off to school, and darning, and, ence. During memorable half-houfs, oh, well, you all do the same things. filled with danger and death, many of So why go over them? my gross misjudgments of character Were made clear to me, Men whom 110 One had credited with heroic qualities revealed them. Others fail-, 11/11EN RBSOLIITIONS TOTTEit Ten/ it funny haw good resolutions morning when 1 got up with a head - fade away When the sungStrilses thenui Just like .some of the dyed stuffs we're getting now. Atter the children' have been put to bed and the 'pan- cakes Set and the kitchen door locked end the knitting gotten out, and yeti San it down with peace reigning within, if non abroad—then's the time you resolve firmly, and let' us hope ProYorfuilY, to make a better,job of it to -morrow. Thates when you admit that you're a scolder and a nagger, and that it's all your fault when things go wrong, because the mother makes the home atmosphere, And you promise yourself ferventl3rilot to scold the children again, ever, no mat- ter what they do. And not to say, "Dont," And to keep a cheery tone in your voice and not to "yelp" when father spills the gravy on the brand clean table cloth, And not once to feel sorry for yourself when you see your neighbors - going. by, all gaily dressed, to some afternoon party or lecture or concert, while you sit home and tend the baby, lamplight is surely the time for making resolutions. For there is some- thing about "the cold, gray dawn of the morning after," that chases them all alway, I "do hereby resolve" every evening of my life, But the next morning --well, that's another ache and symptoms of a eold, and one boy wailed; as on even/ morning; "Can't 1 Walt until after breakfast, to clean. my teeth, Mother?" And the other one got half dressed, as on every miming, and then namich- ed around and around in a circle his room singing and waist around by one initton. ` And the baby cried; And the furnace fire was out, And the mills was frozen, And the pan -calm% had refused to get light. And 1 forgot the salt in the oat meal, and it was wheatles sday and I had to make corn meal muffins, be- cause they wouldn't eat the cakes, and the coffee didn't percolate long enough and I was too cross to put it back on again, and husband was too tired to talk, and I dropped a spoon and broke my pet cup. Well, what's the use? You all know what I did. And you know where MY good resolutions went to. I even shook the poor baby because he 'cried, and, quite naturally, made him ay harder, But I'm -not through with resolu- tions even yet. Some days I manage to keep them fairly well. And, I'm go- ing to keep right on making thlim, and breaking them, until the breakages, gradually dwindle away and cases to story. The mornings usually begin be, with the thought expressed by one of But the chief reason. for my deter - the boys. urination to keep on is the thought "One more day of this awful lifel that we're all here to build character, Got to get up and clean my teeth and and that if the things I have been brush my hair!" .Though I vary the given to do hadn't been the best way phrasing by going over the breakfast to bring 'Mille out, I wouldn't have and the beds, and the baby's bath, and been set at this particular job. So I'm going to resolve again, and Yet again, not to scold nor nag, nor rage. And if I break my resolution, I'll get up and try again, knowing Last night I resolved even more that "though I fail, I shall not be ut- strennously than ever. But this terly cast down." expectations. • It seemed to me that ed rather pitiably to live up to one's there was. strength or weakness in men, quite apart from ' their real selves, for which they were in no way .respensible•, but doubtless it had al- ways been there, waiting to be called forth at just such crucial times. During the 'afternoonI heard for the first time the hysterical cry' of a man whose nerve had given way.' Ile picked up an arm and threw it far out in front of the trenches, shouting -as he did so in a way that made one's blood run cold. Then he sat down and started crying and moaning. He was taken back to the rear, one of the saddest of casualties in a war of in- conceivable horrors. I board of STORY OF A BR TISK PRIVATE LIFE AT THE FRONT AND ON SHIPBOARD. Torpedoed by a German Submarine Worse Than Two Years in , the Trenches." . a When the war broke out Frede.riek many instances of nervous breakdown, Dixon joined the army service corps but r witnessed surprisingly few of as a private in'the Eighth Xing's Liv - them. Men were often badly shaken and trembled from head to foot. Usti-onerpool Regirtient. }Ii command was ally they pulled themselves together e of the early ones hastened to under the tapas of their less suscept- Flanders. He dug trenches and after - :hie comrades. (To be continued.) -- • Every pound of poultry_produee raised in Canada this year will release a pound of beef or bacon overseas. ANH Ek.rgf.w--Tr'7•A osacsestitn itttliVete;;;sceeo" - ' 'c...1:44rtY• .RCOINA0( •0•10KG ••`, • '0*mM IlINGSTO• IALWAK• ward fought in them. For more than a year he took his turn in the water -filled gullies, occa- sionally limiting a dash over the top. At the battle of Mons he was in -the thick of it. • "1 saw thousands of men falling— shot. They were going down so fast and so close to me that I kept saying to myself, it will be your turn next." But while the British lost -heavily, Dixon came outof the fight without so much as a tear in bis clothing. "I. couldn't make it out. I don't know how I escaped," he mused. "I could see great solid shot, so big fair men could scarcely lift there, hurtling by. Some exploded, Others the ground and lay there dead. went into a shell hole With a Party I and an officer and we saw a solid mass of steel with a long conical point. It stood about four feet high and was more than a foot in diameter'. I tried to lift it,.but it was as much as four of us could dosto do that. "The air was filled with these ter- ,, rible things. Yet I escaped. • "I was in several other engage- " merits, but they did monist -fount to much. Then last spring, at the battle of Loos, it all came at once. As a result of my 7 -two" minutes'. exposure I spent more than nine months. in a hospital and then was discharged. as medically unfit. . - -VOR the war against hunger as well as for the war against the Hun. Foievery Canadian fighting overseas, at least two on farms at home are serving none the less effectively because they wear neither uniforms nor marks of rank or valour. Long and itrenuous days are theirs, without leave or furlough a steady drive through the daylight hours to keep the work' abreast of the 6eason, and save the crops so sorely needed to feed our fighting men; Only those who spend such days can realize how good it feels -to have a "wash- up" and a clean Gillette shave at night— or how it itsa- man to enjoy the evening's rest or pleasure of the trip to town. The busier you are going to be this summer, the more you'll need a Gillette Safety Razor, 'with its clean, comfOrtable, five-minute shave. And the better you know and like good tools, the more ypu'll appreciate the simple mechanical perfec- tion that gives the Gillette such a lead over every other razor. The Gillette Safety Razor is made in several differentstyles, civilian and military. Choose one of the farmer for yourself and delight some soldier friend with' a new Military Set Your dealer can supply you at V.3.00 up. Gillette Safety Razor o. of Canada, Limited Office and Factory GILLETTE BLDG., MONTREAL. STANDARD 0.00 310 DOLL DO 4 0,66 NOMEAR161166661116666 The Battle of Loos. , • "When a bins battle is on .the sky looks as red as blood. It did at Loos. It was at night. The guns had been roaring for hours, Then came the order to get over the -top. The .sky . was red for miles. Ever*ime a big gun was fired it added more of the in- tense red light. c, , "I jumped. and started' off over tho parapet. I had not gone twenty yards when I was atruck in :the left shoelder by a shell. It tore out my arm, and as I was falling to the ground I was strut( by a bullet over my right eye. 1 lay unconscious for four days, When I revived I WAS iT1 a base hospital. "But while I had lain ou ti -se ground' a piece of shrapnel had struck me in the mouth and torn out nearly my teeth and the guns on the right sida. My torn gums were lying in my mouth. T had also been shot in the back of the head by another bullet, "Two yeers in the trenches with- out a scratch, and than in two minutes to be tom in font places almost at once! "Vor four months I was in a base hospital 111Frame, Shen I was carried to Woolwich, in London, anti was in the hospital there for five months Mere. "My left arm Was black; there was a hump of muscle on the back of my slionIclers, I could seareely see out of my right eye, and I had such awful pains in wiy head, I had to wear an iso cap on my hoed -for elx months. I thought I was pretty badly cut up, but it WAS almost nothirig, Why the man who lay en the cot next to mine had eleven ballets in him, I had only two in the head. The (lector said to tae, tualtofs a little hole going in, but wn liavn to incite it bigger to take it nut,' Marvellous Surgical Work. "I was worried about my arm, 'Will I be able to use it again, doctor?' I asked, and he said he would try to fix me up. And he did it. I never could have done it myself. But every day they took my arm and raised it a little and slowly worked the fingers. It caused me great pain, but I could see that it was getting better. I could (raise it myself, after a time, by taking the left arm by my right hand and gently raising. it. Finally I had nearly the full power restored. Of course, it is not as dciod as before. But, you see, L.can use it pretty well." As he spoke the soldier gave a de- monstration and -made me marvel at the good' surgery. Unless he had told me of his plight I could not have ?It eased it. His eyesight, too, is daily • improving. But his teeth are gone and his head still causes biro some •thconvenience. "The doctor told me," he -says, "that I must not run and I must not worry or it will hurt my head." !"andthen signed papers for another "I made one voyage," he 'went on, on the ship Commodore. Torpedoed by a II -boat. . "We had not been long out when we sighted a German submarine at work. We saw four ships torpedoed, and the captain said, 'We will be next,' And ; we were. The ship was making a zig- Izlig course at the time, bat we saw- a torpedo calving. We could trace it through the water for .almost two miles. "Op the torpedo came. The engi- neer ran 40 the bow of the boat, 'ex- , pecting the thing would strike us aste4n, ,, as the most 'dreadful sight I • ever witnessed. To see scores of men ,blown up by a torpedo is the most as'ful thing in the worlds "I jumped into the water, which was ici`cold.' I was able to swim for about half an hour when a raft floated near me. I was almost too stiff with the cold' to grasp it, I managed to do so and crawl on board. We floated around and afterward ethers came up to the raft, and with those already aboard we were able to drag them out of the water. They weretoo weak to haul themselves up. 'Fiver a whole day and a night we floated in the cold Atlantic, and then - we were picked up by a Spanish ship and -brought to Philadelphia,. "No," he explained, "T won't ship again until after the war." The 'harrowing sights of two years in the trenches and in dashes over the top he regards as nothing to being torpedoed by a submarine. In Proof of His Point. Withering indeed was the retort' of the old gentleman wbo, having dealt for some years with the same grocer, detected hint in seine shady practices. Going to his shop, he gave the de- linquent a piece of his mind, and 'stamped out, exclaiming; "You're a. swinger, and -never enter your door again!" The next day, however, he came back and bought five pounds of sugar. "Dear me," said the grocer, smiling in a forgiiiing way, "I thought you were 'never going to enter my shop again," "Well, 1 didn't mean to," said the customer coldly, "but yours is the only shop in the place where / can get what I want, You see, 1 me going to pet some plants and I need sand," In a tat carried oat by Prof. Zavith of the 0,A,C. without fertilizere the average yield sI petals:lee amounted to 122,4 bushels per acre, With 820 portals, of fertiliser per aero the yield was seised to 141.8 bushels, With 820 pounde of fertiliser plus 10 tons of manure the yield was increased to 1434.11 bushels ner aere, FERTiLiZER ONTARIO PERTILIZERS, LIMITED WEST TORONTO CANADA Food Control Corner 1••••••0* To satiety the needs o ieat Britein and her allies the Nerth American continent Mad raise 240;- 000,000 bushels more wheat this year than in 1917. •••••-•,,i No one in the Royal Household ef Great Britain Is allowed to exceed the rations. Meat is seldom served at the family table, the King and Queen rarely eat butter, and bread and jam often constitute the tea meal. Mr, Arnold Bennett, the famous English novelist, writes: "We shall not in future get as much as we want or as much as we need, Thome is and there will be a serious ehortage, Submarines are*not the original cause of the shortage . , , Tho shortage is a world shortage . . French food supply is down by 40 per cent. If we no not 'help France, Frame col- lapses, and we might just as well put the shutters up et the War Office and implore Hindenburg to behave ehivel- rously to his fallen foes," It. is imperative that all chickens be hatched early this, year ber cause under present conditions of high feed prices chickens hatched late can hardly be reared srofitably. The eggs for hatch- ing should be selected with care. They should each weigh about two ,ounces, have a smooth surface and be oval in shape. The fresher the eggs the better they are for incubation but they may be held for seven days, dur- ing which time they should be kept in a temperature of fifty to sixty de- grees and they should be turned oc- casionally. Professor Elford of the Poultry snAlf.• Ins•4 ,t ;ANESTIS IVA1TEgumin 5505555105 t/11011 fall=r1= 0:17,e3DPA 5321 SFARCia pikEntiNOWS :flUE*4.7471 5053 .W.O1LLETT COMPANY LIMITED TORONTO, C'115. MONTIACAL Division of the Experimental Farm in a lecture before the Ottawa Poultry A.ssociation, told how household waste could be utilized as feed for chickens. With a flock of twelve pullets in his own backyard he produced eggs at a cost of 214, cents each, feeding table waste, as compared to a cost of 31k cents at the Experimental Farm from hens fed on regular chicken feed. Table scraps hi Canada, he asserted, would produce five and it quarter mil- lion eggs worth over $3,000,000. Be urged city people to set eggs this spring and rear chickens. 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