1914 Chapter 14

14.    Messines Ridge

Abel Langer

I sat up on the bedding in my tent. It was a thirty hours shift before I took to my rest. We had soldiers carried in faster than I could operate on. It came to a point, I literally do the surgery on the stretchers and sometimes without any care of the soldier’s cry for relief. I had a case of an officer who levelled his gun towards me.

“You will attend to my office or I will have you shot.” I looked hard at the officer. He held the rank of Hauptmann but was new to the Division. I was doing my work than on a chest wound. I ignored him until he placed the gun at my back.

“Do it, Hauptmann. Kill me and you will have a dozen more to join me in my walk to Hell.”

“I don’t care, Surgeon. My officer matters most.” The Hauptmann shouted at me. I turned to look at him and aimed the exposed vein towards him. The blood spurted out at the Hauptmann’s uniform. He stood back in anger and raised the gun at my face.

“I will have….”

“Shoot me now, Hauptmann. You can do it.” The Hauptmann would have done it if not for the arrival of the Oberst.

“Hauptmann John Gunter! I am ordering you to stand down.” Oberst Kroner addressed the Hauptmann. He knew the Hauptmann was new to the Division.

“Oberst, that man there is my aide.” The Hauptmann reported to the Oberst. The senior officer approached the aide that was lying on the stretcher. The wound seen by me was major, the bullet had penetrated at the left ribs and probably punctuated the lungs. The aide was already dying but there were few others like him on the flooring. I could not stop the mine to take care of him.

“The officer will take his turn like the others.” The Oberst voiced out. “That is an order.”

I could not save the aide and left the Hauptmann to his sorrow at the far corner. I was disrobing then my apron when Stella my nurse approached me. She offered me a schnapps in a metal canister. I drunk it all in one long swing and offered her my supply in the tent. We retired there and slept for the next four hours.

I got out of the bedding and walked to the basin of water. I washed my face with it. It smelt of alcohol and was probably it to wash off the germs. I got into my uniform unwashed for a week and donned on a new apron. I looked at the bedding and saw Stella lying there.

“Can I lie in? For an hour or so?” I nodded to Stella’ request. I walked back to the surgery tent and saw the others were hard at work. The queue of patients was still there. I was to approach the surgery cot when an Orderly stopped me.

“Sir, just to let you know. The Hauptmann had returned to the front line but he left you the aide’s name tag. He wants you to remember the name.”

“Give it to the Sergeant on duty. He will arrange the burial.” I told the orderly. I was not a God but a surgeon. “And if you see the Hauptmann again for surgery or any wounds, send him to the long waitlist.”

Dieter Luther, Gefreiter/Sergeant

I was back on my feet and crawled back to my platoon. Everyone there greeted me with enthusiasm. I was given wine and bread. The meat was scarce but the greeting was warm. I met the Hauptmann and told I was ready to fight.

“Your wound has healed?”

“Yes, I can’t sit long but can run,” I replied. Then someone heard me and added in some racy remarks. I turned to take over the situation. I was the Sergeant and there was a formidable task ahead of me. I was brief by the Hauptmann.

“We had forced the British off the ridge but the French stopped us. They hold the high ground now. Since then, we have a lull in the battle. But not for long. Tomorrow was November 10 when we will take on Dixmude. It will be our breakthrough. Get a good rest now.”

I was awakened by the roar of the guns and it was ours. We were bombing Dixmude on that day. Once the bombardment ended, we were told to move in. I called up the platoon and moved onto Menin Road. We met resistance by the French and then British.

“We are under fire, Sergeant.” A young recruit lamented to me. I pressed him to move forward and fight. There were so many young faces and I felt remorse sending them to their early death. I pulled the ones that were wounded to the sides and moved on.

“Sergeant, we have resistance from that cottage.” I looked at the single unit there beside the road. I signalled the platoon to lay fire cover while two of the men crawled on their belly towards it. Once they were near to the cottage, they tossed in the grenades. It ended the fight and we approached the cottage. We found five British there killed by the grenades.

“Sergeant, there is a kitchen wagon at the rear.” I rushed over and saw the wagon there. There were the stove and the cooking utensils. There were two sacks of potatoes unpeeled there. “I think we killed the cooks.”

“They fired at us and were soldiers. That works the same to you. You kill or be killed. It doesn’t matter if you are the Oberst aide.” I looked at the two sacks of potatoes. “Take those and feed the men later.”

Peter Weiner, Hauptmann

"Well done, men.” I congratulated my men although we were under fire by the enemies. We achieved our objective but the British have left behind teams of their men to snipe and delayed our advancement. I heard of the British cooks at the cottage and took my respect towards them.

“Sergeant, have the men dig in. I have reported that the British will bring on their guns on us.” So, it was tit for tat then. Just when I had told the Sergeant the retaliation arrived. The British guns roared over us and landed the projectiles on Menin Road.

“Dieter, get the men into cover,” I called out and ran for the nearest dugout. The dugout was to assist in the case of a firefight but when it was raining projectiles, you prayed hard nothing landed near or onto you. I leaned out over the cover and saw some men were digging new dugouts. It was a foolish move but we had limited cover. I saw the ditches on the side of the road were filled with soldiers. Just when I thought it was saved, a projectile ended near the ditch. The British used shrapnel projectiles where the gunpowder charge was in the shell base with a tube running through the centre of the shell to convey the ignition flash from the time fuze in the nose to the gunpowder charge in the base. The powder charge both shattered the cast iron shell wall and liberated the bullets. The spread of the bullets scattered in an arc towards the soldiers.

The effect was a killing ring of fire.

That last took out six good men in the platoon.

“Damn you!” I cursed at the projectiles. I then ducked back into the dugout and prayed for the respite when the next salvo came. You can tell when it fell near you or nothing will be felt when it lands on you. It will then be the curses of your friends when they try to find your remains.  I had once dug up those remains and it was in parts but never the whole body. I turned to the sky and muttered my prayers.

"God, I doubt you created this for us. It's your demented creature that did this." 

Erich Kroner, Oberst

I had on the hard hat and crouched in the bunker fashioned by the platoon for me. It was under three feet of dug soils and reinforced with wood. The projectiles that struck above the bunker was not of the penetration type and would not reach the depth. I looked at the table where the maps and command notes were laid out there. I read the battle at Ypres was in a stalemate and both sides resorted to bombardment on each other’s positions.

I recalled the last note received.

Nonnebosschen.

The town next to the Polygon Wood.

It will be the final attempt by the High Command to break the stalemate. I was told the Crown Prince Rupprecht had taken overall command. The Prince was one of the able German’s Royal Generals then and by coincidence was the Jacobite claimant to the British throne for he was descended from the Stuarts through Prince Rupert of the The Rhine. Fresh Divisions were brought to the battle then.

The 4^th Division and the Prussian Guards were the reinforcements. They were ten thousand strong in twelve fresh battalions and will face the eleven British Battalions which was reduced by earlier battles to about four thousand men. I read the reports that the 3rd and 26th German division did the breakthrough to St Eloi and succeeded in advancing to Zwarteleen, some three thousand yards east of Ypres, only to be checked by the British 7th Cavalry Brigade.

We followed onto more attacks on the French and Belgian forces between Langemarck and Dixmude forcing them back to the Yser, though the Belgians blew all the crossings and bridges. The British were pinned down while the Germans advanced. However, we were slow in their advance and return fire was possible by defenders. Reckoned the German officers were cautious or total imbecile to win the war. 

The main attack soon came to opposite the Gheluvelt. It was a small village with a smaller population. It was strategic astride the Menin to Ypres road that cut through the surrounding woodland and the provided the quickest route to Ypres. The British knew this too and was determined to stop us. 

And we were determined to proceed on. At whatever cost.