DOCTORS & STRETCHER BEARERS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2998, 8 February 1917, Page 6

DOCTORS & STRETCHER BEARERS

WITH THE NEW ZEALANDERS ON THE SOMME

THRILLING TALES OF DEVOTION AND HEROISM (from M'akolm Ross, Official War Correspondent with tlie N.Z. Forces.) France, December J. No account of tlio fighting on tho Somme would bo complete without reference to the splendid work dono by the New Zealand Medical Corps. Jt was on September 13 that the corps took over from the English Division that our troops relieved. In a German <nig-out at a place known to us as Hat Iron Copse the advanced dressing station was established. It was' all the tamo under shell-fire. Two of the orderlies were killed on the first afternoon. The place was made splinter proof with sandbags and iron. At one stage of tho big attack, when the dugout was full and wounded were lying all around, the Germans suddenly started shelling and our men had to get. busy and get as many of the wounded as they could away and the others undbr cover. Tho main dressing station_ was three miles farther back. A mile away, in advance of the main dressing station, at what we called Thistle Alloy, was the bearer relay post, but after the second day this really became the advanced dressing station. On arrival at the advanced dressing station tho wounded! were taken into the "dressing room." There they were examined, tallies made, and fastened to each man's tunic. Every wounded man who could eat or drink or smoke was given hot drinks, cake, or biscuits, and! cigarettes. Then, in batches of ten or twehe, those who coukl walk were directed to the main dressing station. Onr doctors made great use of the ammunition wagons that were returning empty from the field of battle. In this way a tally of sixty were got away in one batch on tlie Friday night. English wounded also were coming in, and the lyingdown cases were sorted' out-, tlie Jfow Zealauders and the English going in motor ambdlanco cars each to their own main dressing station. All the cases had to be taken down from Thistle Alley to Flat Iron Copse on ordinary stretchers or on wheeled carriage stretchers, because the Germans were shelling the road and vc could not- get our ambulances up in safety. Carrying Througn a Barrage. Two thousand yards away was Flers, ftoout wnich the battle raged for some time. From there the bearers had to carry uphill, over sodden ground, through a fairly heavy barrage of 5.9 high explosive and shrapnel. It was a long and difficult job, but, rain or shine, tFey never ceased their, efforts. In many cases it took six bearers five hours to bring in a wounded man from the relay post five hundred yards south of Flers. A medical officer and twelve men were sent out there. The post was 110 sinecure. There, it .was that Major Martin and Captain Bogle were killed. They were splendid fellows, and very brave. Dr. Martin was standing just outside the dug-out when a shell burst near bim, aiid he lfceived his fatal wound's. One of our dcctcrs went right through with him on the long journey to the New Zealand Hospital at Amiens, where, after an operation, ho (lied almost immediately. One of the stretchei'-bearers who came back anu found that he had been mortally wounded said of him: "He was a brave man, and one of the best officers in the N.Z.M.C." Captain' Bogle had also done heroic work. ITurihg the whole of the first Week the Germans kept up their barrage witli view to preventing transport and troops' getting up to Flers; but during the whole of the fighting not a single man ever hesitated to go forward when required. "I had to stop them twice,"' said the doctor who liad charge of all this forward work. "I went up myself and had a look at the barrage. I would not have' gone through it myself, so I reckoned I should not send my men through it." But as soon as the shelling moderated, away they trotted as as possible. "It;; Jove," he added, "tlie.v were great, those boys!"

Croat Work, in the Field. Some of these benrers worked for 48 hours, some for 72 hours, without sleep, and with but little food. One, who brought a wounded man right down to Flat Iron Copse, was, at the finish, almost worse than his patient. Another bearer was wounded, hut went on carrying in other wounded till wounded a second time. He was shot in the leg. Later he was shot in the arm, bnt even then he picked up his stretcher and wanted to carry on,' and would have done so were it not for the fact that a doctor'ordered him away: He 'liow proudly wears the riband of the Military Mednl. Several! of the bearers earned Military Medals on the Somme. There are others who found graves there who also earned them; pome whft earned them over and over again. Time after time they led parties through the barrage to look for wounded. V.C.'s have been uiven for less. And here let me mention a wonderful thine. Tli<? big attack started on the morning of the loth. On the ineht of the 17th_the colonel sent out 200 men and one medical Auckland captain—with orders to search for wounded on the ground over lvhicli wn had advanced. A systematic search of the whole area failed to find a single wounded man left out! On this particular iob the New Zealanders had two men killed and five wounded., Thus the only wounded they brought in wore their own! That performance from start to finish must surelv stand out as one of the most magnificent of its liiiwl ever recorded in ii great battle. I:i spite of heavy casualties every wounded man had been brought in within 48 hours after the time the first infantry went over the parapet. Not only did the New Zealanders do this in regard to their own men, but then also carried in English wounded as well, and quite a number of these were cleared from our stations. The Germans, with their barrage, were dropping shells along tbo ridge. The whole of the ground was pock\ marked by exploded shells. On such a track you could scarcely be expected to do a hundred yards in evens. Some didn't bother to try—they just walked. On the Somme, when you are endeavouring to get near a bic fight, it doesn't take more than half a hour to turn you into a firm fatalist. Owinsr to the casualties in the New Zealand Medical Corps, orders wore given hv the Army Corps that regimental officers and other officers and bearers were to go out only at night. So f.ar as I could see, there was no verv laudable intention of .carrying out that order. The Now Zealanders salved their consciences by counting day as night. In this way they got one long night of twenty-four hours. In other words, they wont right through—night and day.

As an instance of tin; initiative of our men it is worth mentioning that the. first of the , stretch-hearers tlint went out along this trench were seen to bs carrying shovels as well an stretchers. One.might have been pardoned for imagining that they wero adding to their usual errand nf mercy, the occupation of grnvodipaers. As a matter of fact tliey were only bent upon

rounding off th% corners of the traverses, so that they could get tho stretchers past with greater comfort to the wounded. To see our bearers going and coming through the barrage, some of them wounded, yet always cheerful, though they had no covering and nowhere to sleep but in the mud, was indeed a rovelation. "War is surely a hard taskmaster, but youth is its noble servant. Even tho middle-aged and the elderly rise- to heights of valour and self-sacrifice unexcelled. Thoro wero two brothers no longer young who had arrived with our last rcinj'orcemonts. On the 14tli they went into tho trendies. While waiting for their turn to go foward they tired of "fnactiou. So on the 15th they got a stretcher and left the shelter of the trench to look for wounded. They had not gone far when a shell hurst beside thorn and killed them both. Grim as was the work of the doctors and stretcher-bearers, they never failed tr> find some humour in the day's work. One day when tho Germans were shelling tho vicinity of a dressing-station an unlucky shot demolished the cookhouse and buried in tho debris a leg of mutton in'the process of being roasted. GreSft- hopes wero being built on that savoury haunch, and proportionate disappointment roijjiiecl when its fate became known. But, next day they dug it out of tho ruin, reeooked it, and had it for lunch! Tho story that wont the rounds to the effect that a Medical Board had sat upon it, and injected a dose of anti-tetanic serum was, 1 believe, not true. At times German prisoners wore made to act as stretcher-bearers. Generally they were very pleased to do so. Once when two German bearers were carrying in a wounded comrade witli two of our men walking behind, a German shell burst and killed the two 'ormer. One lot of our bearers got hold of a German Red Cross man, and worked with him all day. ?hey_ jj£ive him food and cigarettes to TiTs Heart's content. Then it would he a case of '"Come along, Fritz!" and Fritz would toddle cheerfully off with his stretcher on his shoulder. When the day's work. was done they filled Fritz up with more food and cigarettes and sent him down to his cage for tho night. ' r Heroic Stretcher-Bearers. In the words of an officer well able to judge impartially, tho New Zealand stretcher-bearers on tho Soimn'e "wero out on their own." It confirmed my own impressions from what I saw with my own eyes. The shelling was nerve wracking; the conditions under which they worked sufficient to depress the grimmest stoic. Yet, however deadly the shelling, and however trying the s!ougirof Despond through which they dragged their weary feet, no wounded man that could he reached by human endeavour was left unsuccoured. The stretcher-bearers got to work early ou September 15, the day we made the big bound forward to Flers. From now on they were very busy, and not a day passed without casualties in their ranks. With grim determination they stuck to tlfcir work On the 17th a sergeant that I know of ■ got orders at 11 a.m. , to take 44 bearers out across the ridge to a collecting post that had been established near Flers. It was nearly a three-mile journey. Just before topping the ridge they encountered a German barrage. 'High explosive and shrapnel wero bursting 200 yards ahead. "It was," said the sergeant, ''a responsibility that I never want again. My orders were to go right through, and yet it seemed certain death to put the men through it. Wβ scattered and made a dash down the other side, covering three-quarters of a mile in record time. Major Martin, afterwards mortally wounded, said when we got down that ho had been watching us.through his glasses, anr! would Hot order the men "back unless they were willing to go. To a man the boys said 'Yes.' I sent them back a squad at a time, waitiug myself to go with the last lot. It was a nervewracking experience watching them climb back, slowly this time, their burdeiufyslaiming all their attention; It was a remarkable thing, but, not a shell out 6f the hundreds thai, burst on the ndge during the three or four hours, hit the thin train we made on the . way back. Water-carriers and ■Russian bearers were killed ou both sides, but that day only two New Zealand Medical Corps men were killed.' The trail we took seemed the only safe course over huudreds of acres of ground. I had the cold fear of death ' on me for the half hour it took to go over tho top. The shells wore landing before and' behind and on both sides, and by the time I reached the advanced dressing station I was done."

The Ambulances. There was a heavy strain on the ambulances. Two days after the start of the advance no fewer than ten of our cars were in the workshops. We had altogether twenty-one cars and nine horse-ambulances. The British trailsport in the vicinity temporarily broke down in the afternoon of the first day, but the New Zealand drivers managed to keep going, and evacuated,' British and New Zealanders alike. During the twenty-two days they were working they evacuated several thousand wounded. In the procoss the corps earned nine military medals. It was nervewrnoking work driving the ambulances, especially in the darkness, with lights out. The drivers never quite know when they might.find themselves in a shell-hole or over a bank. The transport between Thistle Alley and the advanced dressing station was often held up by the shelling of the road, and often the ambulance drivers had to bring their wagons down through a hail of shrapnel. The horses suffered from shrapnel wounds. 'A driver .was wounded in the arm. A horse was- shot through the ear. Work of the Doctors. The work of the doctors from beginning to end was magnificent. They do not say muoli about it themselves, but those of us who saw something of it. can estimate it' at its true value, and the estimao is a very high one. As all the advanced dressing stations and aid posts they weue under shell fire, but they stuck to their work day and night with a heroism worthy of the best traditions of British doctors under fire. Three out of our small band lost their lives on the Somme. -The Uegimental Aid Post at one place was simply a hole under the parapet. The shells burst about it. The Battalion Headquarters next door were blown in. At great, personal risk, the doctor went over the parapet and dressed the wounds of a most valuable n.c.0., of whom it was reported that immediate attention might save his life. He worked all night, and the following night, although fired at, went to the assistance of another unit. The same mm, at a later stage of the fighting, whei no safe place could be found for an R.A.P., worked practically in the open under heavy shell fire." Tho battalion had suffered considerably. At night he filled his pockets with dressings, and, in spite of artillery and' machine-gun fire, went to and fro on tho field of battle, dressing the wounds of men lying out, and thus saved many lives. He repeated the performance on the following night, finding several men whom he had missed on the previous night. The men simply worshipped that man. Dr. Bogle, whose death has been reported, did fine work. At Piers he worked ceaselessly in the open, under continual shell fire, for 36 hours, without rest or meals, till killed by a jshcll five minutes before the battalion moved out. By his extraordiuary devotion to duty he saved many lives. The Padres. The work of the Medical o>rpß was well soconded by tho labours o< tho

chaplains. Day and r.ight, often un&ST fire, they administered toVtho wants of tho living and tho dying, and, whenover possible, gave- tho dead decant burial. Theirs is work that does nob como greatly under observation, but they carried out their duties with a lieroic devotion worthy of ; their calling. There is a Roman Catholic padre that i know of who accompanied tho troops to tho point of attack from Flcrs on tho 16th, and who then and during tho two following days did fine work.Though continually under heavy firo, he attended the wounded and the dying, and his courage and cheerfulness wen> an inspiration to all round him. Other padres also did splendid work at great risk to their own lives.