ON THE SOMME.

Taranaki Daily News, 8 February 1917, Page 6

ON THE SOMME.

DOCTORS AND STRETCHERBEARERS. HOW THE NEW ZEALANDERS WORKED. THRILLING TALES OF DEVOTION ' AND HEROISM, . ; (From Malcolm Ross, Official Wat' Correspondent with the X.Z. Forces). France, December ). No account of the lighting on tin. Sr,ninio would be complete without reference to the splendid work done by the New Zealand Medical Corps. I have already referred to it, both in telegram 1 ; and letters despatched from the scene of the battle. I purpose telling now the story more in detail. It was on the 13th September that the Corps took over from the English Division that our troop relieved. hi a German dug-out at a place known to us as Flat, Iron Copse (he advanced dressing station was established. It was all Ihc time under shellfit'c. At one stage of the big attack, when the.dug-out was full and wounded wore lying all around, the Germans suddenly started shelling- and our men had to «et busy and get as many of the wounded as they could away and the others under cover. The main dressing station was three miles farther i back. A mile away, in advance of the I main dressing station, at whal we called j Thistle Alley, was the bearer relay post, ! but after the second day this really became the advanced dressing station. On arrival at the advanced dressing station the wounded-were taken into the "dressing room." There they were examined, taliies'madc, and fastened to each mail's tunic. Every wounded man who c-ould eat or drink' or smoke was given liot drinks. cake, or biscuits, and cigarettes. Then, in batches of ten or twelve, those who could walk were directed to the main dressing station. Our doctors made great use of the ammunition waggons that were returning empty from the" field of battle. In this way a tally of sixty were got away in one batch on the Friday night. English wounded also were coming in, and the lyingdown cases were sorted out, the New Zealanders and the English going in motor ambulance 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 ov on wheeled carriage stretchers, bec.'iuse the Germans were shelling the road ana we could not get our ambulances up in safety. The station at Thistle Alley was not palatial. It was simply a sandbagged dug-out, about Oft. square, under cover j of a sft. high bank. It was repeatedly shelled by the enemy. It is only fair to say that it was not necessarily in-tc-itionally shelled. Most probably the Germans were only searching for our batteries, and in such eases we made a point of never flying the red cross flag as such flags might be useful to the German observers for ranging. It is the fate here as it was on Gallipoli for dressing stations to be close to batteries, because where there is cover for one there is cover for the other. And our batteries wore by this time so thick along the slopes that it was difficult to find good places for them all. The Germans mi?:ed their high-explosive with gas and with tear shells. Occasionally the' swish of shrapnel added still more variety to the performance. In the way of' varied interest and excitement one generally got one's money's worth in taking one's walks abroad in that direction. In the night-time it was especially interesting because in addition to the spectacle of the flashing guns and the bursting shells there was always facing you the goddess of chance with a possibility that you might yourself become a walking or a lying-down case—or a "case" in which the subsequent proceedings would interest you no more. Several bearers were killed in the vicinity of the station. Others were wounded. One night both doctors and men worked for hours in their gas-helmets. And that is not an easy job.

CARRYING . THROUGH A BARRAGE.

Two thousand yards away was Flers, about which 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 expletive and shrapnel. It was a long and difficult job, but, rain or shine, they 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 no sinecure. There it was that Major Martin and Captain Bogle were kilicd. They were splendid fellows, and very brave. Dr. Martin was/standing just outside the dug-out wlren a shell burst near him, and he received his fatal wounds. One of our doctors went right through with hint on the long journey to the New Zealand Hospital at Amiens, where, after nn operation, he died almost immWiatcly. One of the stretcher-bearers who came back and found that lie 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.

During the whole of the first week the Germans kept up their barrage with a view to preventing transport and troops getting up to Tiers; but during tlie whole cf the fighting not a single mini ever hesitated to go forward when required. "I had to stop them twice,"' said the doctor who had charge of ail 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 cheerfully as possible. "By Jove," he addea, "they were great, those boys!" GREAT WORK IN THE FIELD. Some of these bearers worked'for 4ft lieurs, 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 hearer was wounded, but went on carrying in other wounded till wounded a second time. He was shot in the leg. Latet he was shot in the arm, lmt eve# then lie 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 now proudly wears the riband of the Military Medal.

Several of the bearers earned Military ileitis on the S«mme. There are others

who feund graves there who also earned them; some who earned them over and over again. Time after time they led parties through the barrage to look for wounded. V.C.'s have been given for less. - And here let me 'mention a wondetful thing. The big attack started on the morning of the loth. Oil the night of the 17th the colonel sent out 200 men and one medical officer—ail Auckland captain—with orders to search for wounded on the ground oves- which we had advanced. A systematic search ol the whole area failed to find a single wounded man left out! On this particular job the New Zealanders had two men killed and five wounded. Thus the only woi.nded they brought in were their own! That performance from start to finish must sure-lv stand out as one of the most magnificent of its kind ever recorded in a great battle. In 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 (he New Zealanders do this in regard to tlu-ir own men, but they also carried in Enjlidi vouiuled as well, and quite a number of these were cleared from our stations.

The Germans, with their barrage, were dropping shells along the ridge. /The whole of the ground was pock-marked by exploded shells. On such a track you could scarcely he expected to <lo a hundred yards in evens. Some didn'l bother to try—they just walked. On the Somme, when yon are endeavoring to get near a big fight, it doesn't take more than half an hour to turn you into a firm fatalist.

Owing to the- casualties in the New Zealand Medical Corps, orders were given by the Army Corps that regimental officers and other officers and hearers ivere to go out only at night. So far as 1 could see there was no very laudable intention of carrying out. that order. The New Zealanders salved their consciences by counting day as night. In this way they got one long night of 24 hours. In order words, they went right through —night and day.

As an instance of the initiative of our men it is worth mentioning that the first tlx? stretcher-bearers that wont out along this trench were seen to be carrying shovels as well as stretchers. One might have been pardoned for imagining that they were adding to their usual errand of-mercy, the occupation of gravediggers. As a matter of fact they 'were only bent upon rounding oil' the corners of the traverses so that they could fret the stretchers past with greater comfort to the wounded.

To sec our hearers going and coining through the barrage some of them wounded yet always cheerful, though they had no covering and nowhere to sleep but i/i the mud was indeed a revelation. W/ir is surely a liarel taskmaster, hut youth is its noble servant. Even the middleaged and the elderly rise to heights of valor and self-sacrifice unexcelled. There were two brothers no longer young who had arrived with our last reinforcements. •On the 14th thev went into the trenches. While waiting for their turn to go for-iTi-rd they tired of inaction. So on the hVh they got a stretcher and left the ••lielter of the trench to look for wounded. They had not gone far when a shell burst beside them and killed them both.

IK'MOIt AMIDST THE GRIMNESS. Grim as was the work of the doctors and stretcher-hearers they never failed to find some Inunor in the day's work. One day when the Germans were shelling the vicinity of a dressing-station an unlucky shot demolished the cook house and b'uried in the debris a log of mutton in the process of being roasted. Great hopes were being built on that savoury haunch, and proportionate disappointment reigned when its fate became known. But next day they dug it out of the ruin, recookcd it, and had it for lunch! The story that went the rounds to the effect that a Medical Board lmd sat upon it and injected a dose of antitetanic scrum, was, I believe, not true. At times German prisoners were made to act as stretcher-bearers. Generally they were very pleased to do so. Oneo when two German bearers were carrying in a wounded comrade with two of our men walking behind, a German shell burst and killed the two former. One lot of our bearers got hold of a German Reel Cross man, and worked with him all day. They gave him food and cigarettes to his heart's content. Then it would he a ease of "Come along Fritz!" and Fritz would toddle cheerfully off with his stretcher rtn 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 the night.

HEROIC STRETCHER-BEARERS In the words of an officer well able to judge impartially, the New Zealand stretcher-bearers on the Somme "were out on their own." It confirmed my own impression from what I saw with my own eyes. The shelling was nerve racking; the conditions under which they worked sufficient to depress the grimmest stoic. Yet, however deadly the shelling, and however trying the Slough of Despond through which they dragged their weary feet, no wounded man that could be reached by human endeavor was left unsuccourcd.

The stretcher-bearers got to work early 011 September 15, the day we made the big bound forward to Flers. From now on (hey were very busy, and not a day passed without casualties in their ranks. With grim determination they stuck to their work. On the 17th a sergeant that I know of got orders at 1 a.m. to take 44 bearers out across the ridge to a collecting post that had been established near Flers. It was nearly a tiiree-miic journey. Just before topping the ridge they encountered a German barrage. High explosive and shrapnel were bursting 200 yards ahead. l; Tt was," said the sergeant, "a responsibility that I never want again. My prders were to go right through, and yet it seemed certain death to put the men through it. We 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 he had been watching us through his glasses, and would not order the men back unless they were willing to go. To a man, the boys said 'Yes.' I sent them hack a squad at a time, waiting myself to go with the last, lot. It was a nerve-racking experience watching them climb hack, sio.r'.y th\s time, their burdens claiming afl tlieir attention. It was a reitfarkablc thing, hut not a shell out of the hundreds -hat hurst on the ridge during the three or four hours, hit the thin train we made on the. way back. Water-carriers and Russian bearers were killed on both sides, but that, day only two A T ew Zealand Medical Corps men were killed, The trail we took seemed the only safe course over hundreds of acres of ground. I had the cold fear of death on me for the half hour it- took to go over the top. The shells were landing before and behind and on both sides, and by the time I reached the advanced dressing station I was d«n«.'-

HATS OFF TO THE INFANTRY! Anyone who has had a few weeks' experience of the Somme battlefield takes off his hat to the infantry. The infantryman undoubtedly bears the brunt as he bears the glory of the fighting. Every man who goes over the parapet is it hero. And most men who stick it out in the shattered trenches, tired and hungry and thirsty, digging in under an enemy barrage, or holding the position against 'counter-attack, are heroes. But there f s a great deal to be said also for the stretcher-bearer. lie is not to the same extent in the limelight; He has not the excitement of the charge with the bayonet, none of the thrill of the. attack over the parapet with a thousand of his companions in the advancing lines. Under such conditions courage nns high. In-sl'-aii. lie marches slowly, .vith the slings about his neck, bearing his precious burden—some mother's boy, some wife's husband,, some girl's sweetheart —to a place where in comparative safety the wounded may have their wounds dressed. For him there is no sudden rush, for safety into trench or shell crater. His first consideration is for the man he is carrying. Nothing but a direct hit will mike him drop his .stretcher. Half tlu time he is going wiih his back to the enemy's shelling, which is a situation likely to- breed doubt and fear rather than certainty and courage. To he brave under such circumstances is to be brave indeed. DIFFICULTIES OF STRETCHERBEARING.

By .September IS there had been so I much rain that the roads had become 'most impassable. The difficulties of cher-bearing was such that almost ....; erhuinan effort was needed. It was almost a five-mile carry now because the motors and even the horse, ambulance could not get through the mud. Tiu men were almost worn cut. Next morning at 4 o'clock, while it was still dark, a sergeant went forward with a party of thirty-six men. It was still raining, and six men to a squad found it almost impossible to carry. Thankful to havu crossed the ridge before the enemy balloons could begin spotting, they reached the collecting post just as the day was bunking. At the collecting pest they were forced to wait for five hours, because the position was being so heavily shelled. Standing behind the sandbagged parapet, they watched the shrapnel bursting SllUyils away. The German gunners were "searching'' for one of the more daring of our batteries that had pushed right up and was firing point-blank at the German wire and the trench just beyond, At 2 p.m. this party of bearers started on their return journey. Again they encountered barrage fire, but.it was noc so heavy- as on the previous day. Tim ground over which they had to travel was, however, worse than before, and it seemed as if they would never gel through. It meant a change of bearers every fifty yards, and the wounded on the stretchers must have suffered greatly. "Wc arrived in almost a fainting condition/' said one of these bearers, '-'and the rum issue was like nectar. Even ill's. Harrison Lee would have served it out to us if she had seen us that day!" Yet, in spite of all the difficulties, a New Zealand mail foqjul its way up, and added greatly to tilie delight of the men in getting through.

BRAVERY AND DEVOTION Many instances of bravery and uniting devotion to duty displayed might be given. There were men who day and night went out under .shell and machinegun fire, time and again, and, at great risk of their own lives, saved the lives of many wounded who otherwise would have died or been killed. Some of then worked continuously collecting wounded under fire, for twenty hours at a stretch. But there is no need to multiply instances. These are simply typical of the werk done by the bearers as a whole. Al- who saw them toiling under such difficulties and dangers are never tired of sounding their praises, and most of ail the doctors under whom and with i whom they worked. Our stretcher-bear-ers earned undying fame on Gallipoli. The Sonune enhanced the lustre of their laurels. There was a strong leaven of the old Gallipoli hand in at least- two of the Field Ambulances, and. while the new men showed courage and initiative beyond the ordinary, it is safe to say that the old hands were in no small measure responsible for the splendid success that was obtained on (he more strenuous battlefield of the Somme.

THE AMBULANCES. There was a heavy strain on the ambulances. Two days after the start of the advance no fewer thnn ten of our cars were in the workshops. We had altogether twenty-one cars and nine liovse-anibuhinees. The British transport 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 Zen landers alike. During the t wentytwo days they were working tlie-y evacuated several thousand wounded, In the process the corps earned nine military medals. It was nerve-racking work driving the ambulances, especially in the darkness with lights out. The drivers never quite knew when they might find themselves in a shell-hole or over a bank. The transport between Thistle Alley and the advanced dressing station v. as- often held up by the shelling of the road, and often the ambulance drivers had to bring their waggons 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 car.

THE WORK OF THE DOCTORS. The work of the doctors from begin--1o end was m:\"Vilir'eut. They do not say much about it themselves, but „i us who saw something of it can estimate it at its true, value, and the estimate is a very high one. At all the advanced dressing stations and aid posts they were under shell fire, but they stuck to their work day and night with a heroism worthy of the best traditions of British doctors under lire. Three out of our small band lost their lives on tiie Soinmc.

The Regimental Aid Post at one place wa". simply a hole under the parapet. The shr'ls burst about it. The Battalion Headquarters next door were blown in. At great personal risk, the doctor vuit over the parapet and dressed the wounds of a most, valuable ii.c.o., of whom it was reported that immedinu> attention might save his life. He worked all night, and the following night, although fifed at, went to the assistance oi another unit. The same man, at a later stage of the fighting, when no safe place could be found for an R.A.F., worked practically in the open under heavy shell tire. The battalion had suffered considerably. At night lie filled hia pockets with dressings, and, in spite of artillery and machine-gun fire, went to and fro 011 the field of battle, dressing the wounds of, liien lying out, and thus fave.il mnpv lives. He repeat'"'

performance on the following night, find-, iucr several men whom lie hail missed on the previous night. The men simply worshipped that nmn. Dr. Boyle, whostV has been reported, did fine work. At; Flers lie worked ceaselessly in the open, under continual shell (ire, for .'ill hours, without rest or meals, till killed by a shell five minutes before the batlalion moved out. By his extraordinary devotion to duty he saved many lives. Sufficient has been mentioned to show that the work of the N.Z.M.C. was nil that could have been desired, and perhaps a little more. The administration was excellent, and drew forth from the corps; aiul the Army under which the Xcv Zealanders served an unstint<nTappreciation, the terms of which I have already mentioned. THE FADES . The work of the Medical Corps was wel: seconded by the labors of the cin'.plains. Day and night, often under fire, they administered to the wants of the living and the dying, and, whenever possible. gave the dead decent burial. Theirs is work that docs not come greatly under observation, but they carried out their duties with a heroic devotion worthy *r theiv calling. There is a Roman Catholic padre that I know of who accompanied the troops to the point of attack from Fkrs on the Kith, and who then and during the two following days did fine work, j Though continually under heavy fire, he ; attended the wounded and the dying, and his courage and cheerfulness were an inspiration to all around l>fm. Other padre-; also did splendid wxJrk at great risk to their own lives.