Read Online Canada in the Great Power Game 1914-2014 by Gwynne Dyer - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Gwynne Dyer
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were so disciplined that it sounded like a hundred machine-guns going off at one time. So at our front, the Canadian front, we tried to do the same thing [starts to cry].
Q. What happened?
Well, the boys were fighting away there and trying to do the rapid fire, but you see the Ross rifle had a lock bolt with grooves in it. So it went all right for a while, but then we noticed that we couldn’t bring the bolt back. When the rifles got hot, they jammed.
So what did we do? ’Course we were under cover, eh? We’d sit up and try to use our foot to push the bolt down. That’s when it started. Over that rifle I bet we lost about 1500 or 2000 men either wounded or killed, just over that silly damn thing. It was a lovely target rifle, but as an active service rifle, no, no.
Leslie Hudd
I have been seeing a bit of real warfare recently. Three nights ago we charged and took a German trench.
Under the flare of rockets they put up, they sent a terrific rifle fire into us. But almost immediately on our reaching their trenches, they fled. Our Battalion, the 16th, was only supposed to be supporting another battalion, which was to do the charging, but a great many of our boys reached the trench as soon as any. When we were first told to take a German trench, my nerves were a bit jumpy, otherwise one is warmed up and excited and doesn’t care. But it was a sad, sad roll-call. Half or more of my chums were missing. Some, no doubt, will recover.
After getting through this bout alright, I was mug enough to volunteer yesterday morning to leave a trench for a building some distance off, where the cook had some soup for our boys, who needed something bad enough. The shell fire was heavier than I anticipated, and so I’ll have a little holiday.… One in my right forearm and two in my left leg, but all clean wounds, although my leg is broken.… In all probability, I will convalesce in England.
Jairus Maus, letter home of April 1915
At the Forks of the Grand
, vol. 2
Maus left the line just before the Canadians came to be among the first troops in the world to experience a new horror. From the middle of April there had been persistent warnings that the Germans were going to use poison gas. There were reports of a German rush order in Ghent for twenty thousand mouth protectors “to protect men against the effects of asphyxiating gas,” and Belgian intelligence estimated that the attack would come on the front where the German 26th Reserve Corps were dug in. “All this gas business need not be taken seriously,” replied French headquarters. And it wasn’t.
Facing the German 26th Reserve Corps were colonial troops: Canadians of the First Division and Algerian troops of the French African Light Infantry. When the Germans released the greenish-yellow gas on 22 April, the Algerians fled and the Canadians had to stretch their line out to cover that part of the front, too.
Instead of being two or three men every two or three feet, we were one man to about four or five feet.… I was gassed, but you see, we had no idea what it was.
We saw this stuff coming over, it was sort of mist. The wind was blowing our way, towards the trenches. So next we knew it was gas, chlorine gas. The only thing we could do, we covered our mouths. So we took a piece of shirt, anything you could get, and wet on it. I don’t know if I should say how we wet on it, but we wetted it, anyway, and wrapped that around our faces, and we had to take a chance on our eyes.
Anyway, it worked some, but we lost a lot of men over that. It was hell, that gas.… We did what we could, and when we were taken from the trenches, we got a big name over in England over this.… The papers were full of what the great, brave Canadians … [cries].
Leslie Hudd
It was a screeching of shells, men falling on all sides, Frenchmen retreating in disorder, yelling all kinds of things we could not understand, until they saw our gallant boys in khaki advancing in one thin line at the
Q. What happened?
Well, the boys were fighting away there and trying to do the rapid fire, but you see the Ross rifle had a lock bolt with grooves in it. So it went all right for a while, but then we noticed that we couldn’t bring the bolt back. When the rifles got hot, they jammed.
So what did we do? ’Course we were under cover, eh? We’d sit up and try to use our foot to push the bolt down. That’s when it started. Over that rifle I bet we lost about 1500 or 2000 men either wounded or killed, just over that silly damn thing. It was a lovely target rifle, but as an active service rifle, no, no.
Leslie Hudd
I have been seeing a bit of real warfare recently. Three nights ago we charged and took a German trench.
Under the flare of rockets they put up, they sent a terrific rifle fire into us. But almost immediately on our reaching their trenches, they fled. Our Battalion, the 16th, was only supposed to be supporting another battalion, which was to do the charging, but a great many of our boys reached the trench as soon as any. When we were first told to take a German trench, my nerves were a bit jumpy, otherwise one is warmed up and excited and doesn’t care. But it was a sad, sad roll-call. Half or more of my chums were missing. Some, no doubt, will recover.
After getting through this bout alright, I was mug enough to volunteer yesterday morning to leave a trench for a building some distance off, where the cook had some soup for our boys, who needed something bad enough. The shell fire was heavier than I anticipated, and so I’ll have a little holiday.… One in my right forearm and two in my left leg, but all clean wounds, although my leg is broken.… In all probability, I will convalesce in England.
Jairus Maus, letter home of April 1915
At the Forks of the Grand
, vol. 2
Maus left the line just before the Canadians came to be among the first troops in the world to experience a new horror. From the middle of April there had been persistent warnings that the Germans were going to use poison gas. There were reports of a German rush order in Ghent for twenty thousand mouth protectors “to protect men against the effects of asphyxiating gas,” and Belgian intelligence estimated that the attack would come on the front where the German 26th Reserve Corps were dug in. “All this gas business need not be taken seriously,” replied French headquarters. And it wasn’t.
Facing the German 26th Reserve Corps were colonial troops: Canadians of the First Division and Algerian troops of the French African Light Infantry. When the Germans released the greenish-yellow gas on 22 April, the Algerians fled and the Canadians had to stretch their line out to cover that part of the front, too.
Instead of being two or three men every two or three feet, we were one man to about four or five feet.… I was gassed, but you see, we had no idea what it was.
We saw this stuff coming over, it was sort of mist. The wind was blowing our way, towards the trenches. So next we knew it was gas, chlorine gas. The only thing we could do, we covered our mouths. So we took a piece of shirt, anything you could get, and wet on it. I don’t know if I should say how we wet on it, but we wetted it, anyway, and wrapped that around our faces, and we had to take a chance on our eyes.
Anyway, it worked some, but we lost a lot of men over that. It was hell, that gas.… We did what we could, and when we were taken from the trenches, we got a big name over in England over this.… The papers were full of what the great, brave Canadians … [cries].
Leslie Hudd
It was a screeching of shells, men falling on all sides, Frenchmen retreating in disorder, yelling all kinds of things we could not understand, until they saw our gallant boys in khaki advancing in one thin line at the
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