Tommies: No Man's Land

TOMMIES

Life in the Trenches in World War I

Steve Stone

Tommies: Life in the Trenches in World War I

Steve Stone

Copyright © by Steve Stone 2014

Smashwords Edition

Steve Stone has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

Published by Digital Dreams Publishing 2014

Tommies is fact based fiction.

Introduction

The First World War or Great War shaped the world that we live in. Man learnt and forgot many lessons from the war in equal measure. The First World War also set the scene for the second world. The First World War lasted from 28 July 1914, to the armistice on 11 November 1918. The war was centred around Europe, and drew in all he world’s economic powers. On 28 June 1914, Gavrilo Principa Serbian shot Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria. It was part of a much larger assassination attempt with several attempts already having been unsuccessful. Within six weeks of the assassination, many of the countries of Europe had become involved in a war that was to cause the deaths of millions of soldiers and civilians. Four other main causes of the war stemmed from:

Nationalism - the belief that one country was better than another. This made nations more assertive and aggressive.

Imperialism - the desire to conquer colonies, especially in Africa. This brought various powers into conflict - Germany wanted an empire. France and Britain already had empires.

Militarism (Arms Race) - the attempt to build up a strong army and navy gave nations the means and will to make war.

Alliances - in 1882, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy formed the Triple Alliance. This caused France, Britain and Russia to become alarmed by it. By 1907, they had all joined the Triple Entente. Europe was divided into two armed camps, to help each other if there was a war.

During the war there was the Eastern Front that encompassed at its greatest extent the entire frontier between the Russian Empire and Romania on one side. The Austro-Hungarian Empire, Bulgaria and Germany on the other. It stretched from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Black Sea in the south, which included most of Eastern Europe and stretched deep into Central Europe. There was also the Western Front, which started at the outbreak of war in 1914. The German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The advance of the German Army, was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne. Following the race to the sea, both sides dug in along a meandering line of fortified trenches, stretching from the North Sea to the Swiss frontier with France. This line remained essentially unchanged for most of the war. One side may gain a small amount of ground, and then lose it before gaining it back again. However, the western front in the main was a static war, fought from a vast network of trenches. New technology, including poison gas, tanks and aircraft all made their first proper appearance in anger, during the First World War.

The war had consequences, not just with the high loss of the male population, but also to the subsequent care of those injured both physically and mentally. Of the 60 million European soldiers who were mobilised from 1914 to 1918, 10 million military personnel were killed, 7 million were permanently disabled, and 15 million were seriously injured. The total number of military and civilian casualties in World War One, was over 37 million. There were over 16 million deaths and 20 million wounded, 7 million of these were civilians.

The armistice between the Allies and Germany, known as the Armistice of Compiègne after the location it was signed in. The armistice ended fighting in western Europe and came into effect at 11am on 11 November 1918, it also meant Germany had been defeated, setting the backdrop for the rise of the Nazis and the Second World War. The war on the Eastern front ended on 3 March 1918, when the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed. This was a peace treaty between the new Bolshevik government of Russia and the Central Powers, which consisted of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey. This ended Russia's participation in World War One. As part of the treaty, Russia ceded both the Baltic States to Germany and its province of Kars Oblast in the south Caucasus to the Ottoman Empire, and was also forced to recognise the independence of Ukraine, along with paying six billion German gold mark in reparations. However, after the German defeat on 11 November 1918 the treaty was practically obsolete.

Chapter One – Willing to fight

The First World War brought a new kind of horror for man to endure. Not only the constant threat of bullets, bombs and gas, but also living conditions that were so bad, if we had been animals today, the British Army would have been in trouble for animal cruelty. I was one of the lucky ones to survive the trenches when millions did not make it back home, from all sides. The visions of my time in the trenches are etched in my mind as if it was yesterday. I can still see faces screaming out in pain, asking to be put out of their misery, mounds made up of bodies that cast an eerie shadow under the moonlight. The stench of death mixed with cordite wafting over you in the breeze…

My story starts in a bank in Baltimore. I was sitting at my desk talking to a colleague Jack about the war in Europe. On the wall was a big war map that had several small flags pinned into it, showing the position of the opposing armies on the Western Front. I had taken a real interest in the war in Europe, to a point that some would say mildly obsessed. Sitting on my desk was a newspaper with the headlines ‘LUSITANIA SUNK! AMERICAN LIVES LOST!’ I looked out into the spring morning with the hustle and bustle Baltimore. Jack looked across at me, So are you still planning on joining up?

I replied, Yea, I think so, I really want to see some action, after all, I have to avenge my uncle who was on the Lusitania, still yet to hear any news of him, but the Germans need to pay.

Later that night I finally left my office and walked towards home, the city felt different somehow, the lights seemed brighter than they ever had, almost as if they too were angry over the sinking of the Lusitania and the 1,198 souls lost. The ship had been identified by the German U-boat, U-20 and torpedoed, sinking in 18 minutes. It is hard to imagine the horror on board the ship that night, as people scrambled to the lifeboats or simply jumped into the cold sea, before quite quickly succumbing to the cold. It was the turning point for America and pivotal in the decision for us to enter the war.

Months passed and my yearn to do my part in the war, had not faded. The more I read about the war in Europe, the more I wanted to be part of it. Then one day I was called into my manager’s office. Business was not that good at the moment – he had no choice but to let me go. This made the final decision for me, rather than look for a new job; I would become a soldier on the Western Front. I used what savings I had for a ticket on a steamer to England.

The journey of England was completely uneventful and I landed at Tilbury. Before getting into one of the many awaiting cars and being whisked off to London, arriving at 10pm. I booked myself into a hotel room near St Pancras station. My first night in London was marked by a German airship raid in the form of a Zeppelin, I could not see much of the raid and was so tired from my journey, I fell asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow. The next morning I woke up early and decided to go for a short stroll, there was no sign that I could see of the raid, with everyone going about their normal day to day business. I stopped a London Police Officer or Bobbie, and asked him, Can you direct me to the place of damage?

He asked me, What damage?

In surprise, I answered, Why, the damage caused by the aid last night.

With a wink, he replied, There was no damage, we missed them again.

With that he carried on walking as I accosted several locals and they just starred at me blankly. The first raid on England took place on the night of 19–20 January 1915. The Kaiser authorised the bombing of the London docks on 12 February, 1915, but no raids on London took place until May 1915. The raids did cause a small loss of civilian life, sadly, although they were never of any real significance, more physiological. Although the direct military effect of the raids was small, they caused widespread alarm, leading to the diversion of substantial resources from the Western Front and some disruption to industrial production.

As I wandered I noticed the now classic picture of Lord Kitchener pointing his finger and the words Your King and Country Need You. Here I was, an American making my way to a British Army recruiting office to join the fight on the Western Front. On arrival at the recruiting office, a single male sat at a desk, almost as if he was awaiting my arrival. I found his broad cockney accent hard to understand; almost to the point he seemed to be speaking a totally different version of English to my own. After two attempts, I finally worked out, he was asking me if I wanted to join up. He then suggested I joined the Royal Fusiliers. I simply said, yes pretending to know who the Royal Fusiliers were. I then spent a further half an hour, trying to decipher the various stories I was being told about life on the frontline. After which I was taken to the recruiting headquarters to meet a Captain. Here I met my first issue, in that Americans were still deemed neutral and by enlisting me, would breach neutrality. I tried to argue my point, but to no avail. I felt dejected and was just about to leave when a sergeant who had overheard my conversation, pointed me in the direction of a newly commissioned officer. He told me the lieutenant would enlist me, as would have no idea what neutrality is. I