A Surgeon in Arms

9 April – 16 May 1917

Battle of Arras (1917)

CHAPTER IV

On a delightful spring day after the Battle of Arras, our battalion was holding the front line out beyond Thelus. My aid post was on a sunken road near Willerval, one of the many sunken roads which are talked about by anyone who has ever been at the front. The wounded had to be brought to us by stretcher bearers at night, as the whole front here was a huge salient with the Huns pumping lead forget-me-nots from three sides by day on the least exposure of our men.

CHAPTER IX

Often dugouts are but shelters dug into the wall of a trench, a thin sheet-iron roof put on top, and two or three layers of sandbags on top of that. This gives protection against bullets, shrapnel, or bits of shell, but a straight hit from a medium-sized shell would go right through. And yet it is strange how seldom these are hit direct, considering their large numbers. This may in part account for one's feeling of relative security while in them, but this feeling is no doubt also partly due to our resemblance to the ostrich which hides its head to avoid danger. Be this as it may, many a good night's sleep have I passed in shelters such as this, with shells bursting within one hundred yards at frequent intervals during the night. During the month previous to the Battle of Arras my orderlies and I lived in an abode of this nature most of the time, only 500 yards from our front line trenches. Shells continually fell well within the hundred yard radius of it--as a matter of fact, shortly afterwards this dugout was completely blown in--yet no one worried in the least about it. This is not told as a strange experience, for all officers who have served at the front have often lived in the same surroundings. This experience is related only to illustrate one type of protective shelter.

CHAPTER IX

"Not on your life, doctor," cheerfully replied Colonel J----. And he was right, for a few moments later we were stumbling into the entrance of Zivy cave, and that slimy, dark, four-foot opening was more welcome to us than would be today the spacious rotunda of the Savoy. I always admired the Colonel's cheerful confidence, but, as Kelly well said, "Confidence is a foine thing, but it raly has very little affict in stoppin' a Hun shell that's comin' yer way." This, the Colonel unfortunately found out in the Battle of Arras.

CHAPTER XIII

Major Peters.--This officer somehow impressed me as being without any semblance of nervousness under any conditions. He was always an interesting study. If a shell burst in our neighborhood, close enough to make most of us "duck," Pete would go on serenely as if on church parade. Rather slow thinking, he was sure in judgment. He never made haste to give his thoughts tongue, "nor any unproportioned thought his act." He had a quiet, dry humor, and generous, kindly nature. He was invariably late on parade, and probably improperly dressed. I have met him on one occasion wandering aimlessly across an area looking for his company, which he had somehow mislaid. If the orderly room gave out an order for some return to be made by company commanders by 8 a.m., his was never in before 10, and then only after he had been reminded of the order. After the Battle of Arras he forgot altogether to put in his recommendations for bravery on the part of any of his men, though by a rush movement he succeeded in getting them in on time.