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Hirgen at 00:16, 31 October 2008

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	again, and we had received orders to take part in it to the northwest		again, and we had received orders to take part in it to the northwest
	of Sommepy.		of Sommepy.
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Hirgen at 00:47, 2 September 2008

2008-09-02T00:47:36Z

New page

<CENTER>VIII 

NEARLY BURIED ALIVE ON THE BATTLEFIELD </CENTER>

 THE commander of the artillery smilingly came up to the major
of the infantry and thanked and congratulated him.

 We then went after the rest of our attackers who were in full
flight. The machine guns kept them under fire. Some two hundred
might have escaped; they fled in all directions. The artillery
thereupon began again to fire, whilst we set about to care for
our wounded enemies. It was no easy job, for we had to draw the
wounded from beneath the horses some of which were still alive.
The animals kicked wildly about them, and whenever they succeeded
in getting free they rushed off like demented however severely
they had been hurt. Many a wounded man who otherwise might have
recovered was thus killed by the hoofs of the horses.

 With the little packet of bandaging material which we all had
on us we bandaged the men, who were mostly severely wounded, but
a good many died in our hands while we were trying to put on a
temporary dressing. As far as they were still able to speak they
talked to us with extreme vivacity. Though we did not understand
their language we knew what they wanted to express, for their
gestures and facial expressions were very eloquent. They desired
to express their gratitude for the charitable service we were
rendering them, and like ourselves they did not seem to be able
to understand how men could first kill each other, could inflict
pain on each other, and then assist each other to the utmost of
their ability. To them as well as to us this world seemed to stand
on its head; it was a world in which they were mere marionettes,
guided and controlled by a superior power. How often were we not
made aware in that manner of the uselessness of all this human
slaughter!

 We common soldiers were here handling the dead and wounded
as if we had never done anything else, and yet in our civilian
lives most of us had an abhorrence and fear of the dead and the
horribly mangled. War is a hard school-master who bends and reshapes
his pupils.

 One section was busy with digging a common grave for the dead.
We took away the papers and valuables of the dead, took possession
of the eatable and drinkable stores to be found in the saddle
bags attached to the horses and, when the grave was ready, we
began to place the dead bodies in it. They were laid close together
in order to utilize fully the available space. I, too, had been
ordered to "bring in" the dead. The bottom of the grave
was large enough for twenty-three bodies if the space was well
utilized. When two layers of twenty-three had already been buried
a sergeant of the artillery, who was standing near, observed that
one of the "dead" was still alive. He had seen the "corpse"
move the fingers of his right hand. On closer examination it turned
out that we came near burying a living man, for after an attempt
lasting two hours we succeeded in restoring him to consciousness.
The officer of the infantry who supervised the work now turned
to the two soldiers charged with getting the corpses ready and
asked them whether they were sure that all the men buried were
really dead. "Yes," the two replied, "we suppose
they are all dead." That seemed to be quite sufficient for
that humane officer, for he ordered the interments to proceed.
Nobody doubted that there were several more among the 138 men
whom we alone buried in one grave (two other, still bigger, graves
had been dug by different burial parties) from whose bodies life
had not entirely flown. To be buried alive is just one of those
horrors of the battlefield which your bar-room patriot at home
(or in America) does not even dream of in his philosophy.

 Nothing was to be seen of the enemy's infantry. It seemed that
our opponent had sent only artillery and cavalry to face us. Meanwhile
the main portions of our army came up in vast columns. Cavalry
divisions with mounted artillery and machine-gun sections left
all the other troops behind them. The enemy had succeeded in disengaging
himself almost completely from us, wherefor our cavalry accelerated
their movements with the intention of getting close to the enemy
and as quickly as possible in order to prevent his demoralized
troops from resting at night. We, too, got ready to march, and
were just going to march off when we received orders to form camp.
The camping ground was exactly mapped out, as was always the case,
by the superior command, so that they would know where we were
to be found in case of emergency. We had scarcely reached our
camping grounds when our field kitchen, which we thought had lost
us, appeared before our eyes as if risen from out of the ground.
The men of the field kitchen, who had no idea of the losses we
had suffered during the last days, had cooked for the old number
of heads. They were therefore not a little surprised when they
found in the place of a brave company of sturdy sappers only a
crowd of ragged men, the shadows of their former selves, broken
and tired to their very bones. We were given canned soup, bread,
meat, coffee, and a cigarette each. At last we were able to eat
once again to our hearts' content. We could drink as much coffee
as we liked. And then that cigarette, which appeared to most of
us more important than eating and drinking!

 All those fine things and the expectation of a few hours of
rest in some potato field aroused in us an almost childish joy.
We were as merry as boys and as noisy as street urchins. "Oh,
what a joy to be a soldier lad!"---that song rang out, subdued
at first, then louder and louder. It died away quickly enough
as one after the other laid down his tired head. We slept like
the dead.

 We could sleep till six o'clock the next morning. Though all
of us lay on the bare ground it was with no little trouble that
they succeeded in waking us up. That morning breakfast was excellent.
We received requisitioned mutton, vegetables, bread, coffee, a
cupful of wine, and some ham. The captain admonished us to stuff
in well, for we had a hard day's march before us. At seven o'clock
we struck camp. At the beginning of that march we were in fairly
good humor. Whilst conversing we discovered that we had completely
lost all reckoning of time. Nobody knew whether it was Monday
or Wednesday, whether it was the fifth or the tenth of the month.
Subsequently, the same phenomenon could be observed only in a
still more noticeable way. A soldier in war never knows the date
or day of the week. One day is like another. Whether it is Saturday,
Thursday or Sunday, it means always the same routine of murdering.
"Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy!" "Six
days shalt thou labor and do all thy work. But the seventh day---thou
shalt not do any work." These, to our Christian rulers, are
empty phrases. "Six days shalt thou murder and on the seventh
day, too."

 When we halted towards noon near a large farm we had again
to wait in vain for our field kitchen. So we helped ourselves.
We shot one of the cows grazing in the meadows, slit its skin
without first letting off the blood, and each one cut himself
a piece of meat. The meat, which was still warm, was roasted a
little in our cooking pots. By many it was also eaten raw with
pepper and salt. That killing of cattle on our own book was repeated
almost daily. The consequence was that all suffered with their
stomachs, for the meat was mostly still warm, and eating it without
bread or other food did not agree with us. Still, the practice
was continued. If a soldier was hungry and if he found a pig,
cow, or lamb during his period of rest, he would simply shoot
the beast and cut off a piece for his own use, leaving the rest
to perish.

 On our march we passed a little town, between Attigny and Sommepy,
crowded with refugees. Many of the refugees were ill, and among
their children an epidemic was raging which was infecting the
little ones of the town. A German medical column had arrived a
short time before us. They asked for ten sappers---the maids of
all work in war time---to assist them in their labors. I was one
of the ten drafted off for that duty.

 We were first taken by the doctors to a wonderfully arranged
park in the center of which stood a castlelike house, a French
manor-house. The owner, a very rich Frenchman, lived there with
his wife and an excessive number of servants. Though there was
room enough in the palace for more than a hundred patients and
refugees, that humane patriot refused to admit any one, and had
locked and bolted the house and all entrances to the park.

 It did not take us long to force all the doors and make all
the locks useless. The lady of the house had to take up quarters
in two large rooms, but that beauty of a male aristocrat had to
live in the garage and had to put up with a bed of straw--- in
that way the high and mighty gentleman got a taste of the refugee
life which so many of his countrymen had to go through. He was
given his food by one of the soldiers of the medical corps; it
was nourishing food, most certainly too nourishing for our gentleman.
One of my mates, a Socialist comrade, observed drily,

 "It's at least a consolation that our own gang of junkers
isn't any worse than that mob of French aristocrats; they are
all of a kidney. If only the people were to get rid of the whole
pack they wouldn't then have to tear each other to pieces any
longer like wild beasts."

 In the meantime our mates had roamed through the country and
captured a large barrel full of honey. Each one had filled his
cooking pot with honey to the very brim and buckled it to his
knapsack. The ten of us did likewise, and then we went off to
find our section with which we caught up in a short time. But
we had scarcely marched a few hundred yards when we were pursued
by bees whose numbers increased by hundreds every minute. However
much we tried to shake off the little pests their attentions grew
worse and worse. Every one of us was stung; many had their faces
swollen to such an extent that they were no longer able to see.
The officers who were riding some twenty yards in front of us
began to notice our slow movements. The "old man " came
along, saw the bees and the swollen faces but could, of course,
not grasp the meaning of it all until a sergeant proffered the
necessary information. "Who's got honey in his cooking pot?
" the old chap cried angrily. "All of us," the
sergeant replied. "You, too?" "Yes, captain."
The old man was very wild, for he was not even able to deal out
punishments. We had to halt and throw away the "accursed
things," as our severe master called them. We helped each
other to unbuckle the cooking pots, and our sweet provisions were
flung far away into the fields on both sides of the road. With
the honey we lost our cooking utensils, which was certainly not
a very disagreeable relief.

 We continued our march in the burning noon-day sun. The ammunition
columns and other army sections which occupied the road gave the
whirled-up dust no time to settle. All around us in the field
refugees were camping, living there like poor, homeless gypsies.
Many came up to us and begged for a piece of dry bread.

 Without halting we marched till late at night. Towards nine
o'clock in the evening we found ourselves quite close to the town
hall of Sommepy. Here, in and about Sommepy, fighting had started
again, and we had received orders to take part in it to the northwest
of Sommepy.

VIII NEARLY BURIED ALIVE ON THE BATTLEFIELD - Revision history

Bkimberl at 18:38, 13 July 2009

Hirgen at 00:16, 31 October 2008

Hirgen at 00:47, 2 September 2008