BEHIND THE FIRING LINE

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2651, 23 December 1915, Page 6

BEHIND THE FIRING LINE

e WITH THE MOTOR CORPS , LETTER FROM MR. F. W. HAYBITTLE Writing from a baso in France, Mr. F. W. Haybittle, of Messrs. George Thomas and Co., who is serving with the Motor Corps, expresses some interesting sentiments about war, and those who make it. He writes to a friend iu Wellington as follows:— "I am in my fifth month on active service, and tho weather is now cold, rainy, and bleak; the mud is simply, deadly, and rising as I have to at 6 a.m. and preparing my car for the road is an act worthy of at least a D.5.,0. medal. I am at a great hospital and reinforcement camp at Etaples, about 45 miles behind the trenches. It is a wonderful base, "has accommodation for 19,000 beds, and the reinforcements have tents for 23,000 soldiers, so that you can - well understand that we dispatch motorists are kept very busy. There are hospital bases in our district, at Boulogne, Treport, Montreuil, Abbeville, and Wimmereux, and ours is headquarters. I am attached to the 11.A.M.C., and I mess with the officers of the Convalescent and Isolation Camps—23 fino chaps (surgical, medical, pathological, and laboratory). I often nave to .run up past G.H.Q. to the dressing stations behind the tiring line, and it is on these trips that I see and share in exciting times, for you never know when a stray bit of shrapnel will hum along. I always, when reaching the dressing station, make for .the cover of a wood, and there hang out until the R.A.M.C. men or the lady superintendent is ready to return. It is on these occasion's, wliilo waiting, that I got through my correspondence. Just at the present time I have turned off a lane into a little wood, or foret, as they rail it. The rain is pouring down, aiui the erstwhile Wellington citizen is seated in his car with gum boots, leather jackot, and 1 oilskin on. All around aro evidences of a late autumn, the brown leaves making a thick carpet for the little car, while in tho distance I hear our guns blazing out, firing at something, I suppose, but nothing can bo seen. It is- really, uninteresting at _ the actual front, for there is very little movement, everyone being under cover, and only orderlies, a few reliefs, R.A.M.C. men> and nurses to be seen. The most : intensely, fascinating dut.v that I undertake is visiting the reserve' parks. A reserve park is worth describing. Dotted behind the length of the firing line at intervals, about 20 miles behind, are about eight parks. These consist each of about 250 fullyloaded big A.S.C. wagons, tarpaulined and ready for instant mobilisation; there are 600 to 700 'liorses or mules, about 40.0 drivers, six officers, and a medico. The wagons have three days' rations for a division, and they, are formed for the purpose of action should an advance take place where railway work is inaccessible, or if the train service is temporarily disorganised. Tlicy stay in a village about' threo weeks, and then shift their location about three miles or so, and rest again, and so you have the spectacle of a quiot, dreamy old French hamlet suddenly transformed

liito life and movement by the advent of. one of these parks. Barns, stables, cottages, haylofts, and anything with a cover is commandeered for the drivers, while the officers _ billet in the chateau of. the village. I take the saaiitation officer from our, base who inspects the housing of the Tommies and tho stock. The wagons, of course, line along the one street, and-all here is bustle, movement, and activity, and to see 'yours truly' dodging through 600 kicking mules is to suggest a splendid certificate as a fearless Red Cross driver. Driving to these ccntres takes me t/lirough beautiful typical French rural landscape, and I have- to 'get through,' for I have no guide other than a map: fortunately French guideposts and'signs. are good, but I wis]i I possessed a better French vocabulary. "lii these remote parts a few Now Zealanders are seen. Kehbell, of Oliau, is driving an ambulance; Aubrey Smith, son of Mr. C. Smith, of Cuba Street, is on the French border at Mervillc, also doing ambulance work. I met liim a few weeks ago, and had quite a pleasant chat. ■ Miss Valerie Menteath, of Wellington, is a nurse at our baso at Etaples, and I often meet her... "To-day is All Souls' Day, and the little military cemetery, started in July at Etaples! has, alas, over 500 officers and mon quietly sleeping their last sleep. There is a. great decoration service this afternoon, conducted by the iiead chaplain. Evfery / grave _ has a bunch of clirysanthemums, provided by officers and motorists, and placed on each grave by the Sisters. It should prove an impressive and pathetic ceremony, for over 4000 will bo present. "I have seeu life here jn all its varying and changing conditions —its absorbing fascinations and its painfully

pathetic passages—and when I return 1 shall carry with me an indelible memory of the fortitude, the valour, the everbrimming humour, under sometimes most agonising circumstances, of the private soldier. To me, a Tommy will always. in the future be raised on a pedestal. And what can be said of the officers? I wish I could paint in words my sentiments of admiration for, particularly, the young officer of 21 to 25 who lias gone to his death cheerfully leading on his men, forgetful of self. And the same may be said for the captain, the major, and the colonel. "Whether the strategy of the higher command is perfect, and on a par with the dauntless bravery of subaltern and men,who can say? I think it could be improved; but one must recognise that the conditions surrounding this war are totally different to anything in tho past, and old methods consequently receive a rude shock. • All I can say is' this, and speaking for this front only: While we have such splendid men — Regulars, Terriers, Canadians, and Indians—fighting with such magnificent elan, and when knocked out their one desire being to get back and 'get some of .their own back,' we must eventually win home, be it of short or agonisingly long duration. One tribute I must pay, and that is, whether our fighting forces were unprepared or not/, , the same cannot be said for the splendid preparedness of the Armv Service Corps and the Royal Army Medical Corps. Their organisation is a treat to contemplate, and will stand for all time as a monument of earnest and brilliant work. Of course, the fighting men are (and naturally) always in the limelight, and get any honours that aro going; then come the R.A.M.C. and A.S.C. The units who are apt l to be forgotten are the hospital staffs and the Red Cross men. To soe the thousands of beautiful womon doing nursing work iu our base, in lints and tents, moving about in rain, mud, and slush, is calculated to arouse sentiments of admiration for their devotion that can . hardly be expressed.' _ As to we Red Cross fellows, well, Milton has well expressed the sentiments in my mind when ho wrote: "Thoy also serve who only stand and wait."