Modern World History-Honors

Mr. Fisher

World War 1 reading:

(From Rites of Spring, Modris Eksteins, Houghton Mifflin, 1989, pp. 139-142).

IV Rites of War

Battle Ballet:

The artillery barrage is deafening. When the air is still, the din can be heard faintly in London and Paris. Sometimes the pounding lasts for days. In June 1916 at the Somme it continues for seven days and nights. Field artillery, medium artillery, and heavy howitzers. The fifeen-inch-caliber gun of the British can fire a shell of fourteen hundred pounds. “Big Bertha” of the Germans, with a caliber of seventeen inches, can project a missle weighing over a ton. At Verdun in 1916 the Germans bring in several of those twenty-ton monsters. Each is moved into position by nine tractors; a crne is required to insert the shell. The impact of this shell annhiilates buildings; it shatters windows ina a two-mile radius. In August 1914 these huge machines of war had demolished the purportedly impregnable forts of Liége. As the Krupp guns “walked” their shlls toward the final target, Belgian defenders inside the forts went mad.

For concentrated attack there is usually one field gun for every ten yards under fire, and one heavy -- six-inch caliber and up -- for every twenty yards. When the huge shells burst, they ravage the earth with their violence, hurling trees, rock, mud, torsos, and other debris hundreds of feet into the air. Craters the size of swimming pools remain. When a lull comes and the rains return, men bathe in these cavernous holes. The small and medium shells, which make up most of the barrage, are less sensational in their effect. But to the soldier they too can mean annililation with trace. “A signaller had just stepped out,” wrote a medical officer of the 2nd Royal Welsch Fusiliers, “when a shell burst on him, leaving not a vestige that could be seen anywhere near.” The same officer described another image of shellfire:

Two men suddenly rose into the air vertically, fifteen feet perhaps, amid a spout of soil 150 yards ahead. They rose and fell with the easy, graceful poise of acrobats. A rifle, revolving slowly, rose high above them, still revolving, it fell.

Defenders huddle either in “funk holes” burrowed out of the forward side of the trench, or in dugouts, often fifteen to twenty feet underground, perhaps five paces square and about six feet high. The heavier shells not only demolish trenches; they can bring the wooden support beams, currugated iron, and wire netting of the dugout tumbling down and at the very least rearrange the earth above so as to obstruct exists. Acetylene lights and candles flicker. Larger concussions extinguish them altogether. A respite, wil it come? Yes. Finally. But then the muted voice of a sentry, who has survived in a forward sap, is heard to shout “Gas!” There is a wild scramble to find masks, to tug and pull to get them on; and the ordeal mounts as gas fumes begin slowly to mix with darkness and smoke. At last there is stillness, apart from muffled breathing, some rasping, coughing, and traces of weeping.

Will the cycle begin again? Is the attack on its way? Have the sentries survived? Are the periscopes manned? For when the attack comes, there will be a “race for the parapet,” up the dugout steps, should that still be possible, into the trenches, if they are still there, to fix bayonets, to assemble machine guns, to locate grenades, and if time permits, to man mortars, flame throwers, and other sundry weapons of this war of “troglodytes.” One must reach the parapet before the enemy arrives!

Over on the other side of no man’s land men wait. Faces assembled at scaling ladders are drawn and ashen. The tot of navy rum or Schnaps or pinard, which has been distributed a few minutes earlier, can dull the senses but not reverse the flow of blood. Equipment has been checked. Picks and shovels, bags for sand, Verey lights, wire. A load of over sixty pounds rests on each man’s back. Along with personal kit there is a water bottle, rations, a gas mask, field dressings, mess tins, ammunition. Some men carry hand grenades and trench mortar bombs. “Carrying your house on your back is no joke,” wrote Peter McGregor, a choirmaster from Edinburgh. Officers travel more lightly, the British with swagger sticks to indicate commands, for a voice is unlikely to be heard above the tumult, with a pistol in lieu of a rifle, and without most of the other more cumbersome gear. Conversation at this point is almost insignificant. A few men chatter nervously. Some exchange final wishes. Some whisper prayers. Watches of platoon leaders are now synchronized.

Zero. A shrill whistle. The wave of a cap. Men clamber up ladders. Many are clumsy--because of the load, from fear, or by nature. Over the top! Physical nakedness is the first sensation. The body is now exposed, tense, expectant, awaiting direct violence upon it. Even if one is to follow the “creeping barrage”--the practice by 1917--of one’s own artillery toward the enemy trenches, that first moment of exposure reduces him to innocence. “A man who stepped out of the trenches at that moment and lived through has never in all the ensuing years faced such a climax,” wrote a survivor.

Then the advance. Slow and faltering, because of the load, because of the terrain, and because of the tactics of the attack. The Germans and French are more innovative, often rushing forward in groups. The British are more systematic. A man every two or three yards, platoons abreast, a second wave twenty yards back. Heads are bowed, byt he weight of the pack and by the instinctual effort to shrink the target presented to the enemy.

The cratered honeycomb of no man’s land quickly breaks down any planned order. Men slip and fall. The line becomes straggly. Some get up and continue. Others cannot. In the mud of Passchendale in 1917 some men drown in the huge, sewerlike craters filled with slime that comes of rain, earth, and decomposition. Some now begin to hear the bullets. Some note the stench, an overpowering odor, emanating from the corpses the barrage has churned up. Some are hit. The race for the parapet has been lost. The field is now being swept by machien guns, pocketed by mortar fire, and scoured by rifle bullets.

More men fall. Some cry out. Most are silent. The wounded rarely feel pain initially. Officers try to keep the line together. But these men in the limbo of no man’s land, these “wanderers between two worlds,” need little encouragement., for isolation in this situation means fear. Only in the group is there any emotional safety, any comfort. Indeed, the attackers are inclined to bunch, to herd together for mutual protection.

Has the artillery managed to cut the wire, as promised? Rarely, with any kind of consistency. Breathless, on the brink of exhaustion, men look for gaps in the wire. The disappointment is overwhelming. The gaps are few, if any. The enemy fire has become withering. Only a handful of men reach the wire. They pitch their grenades. They fire their rifles. A few get through to the enemy trench, but bayonet combat is uncommon. Most of the officers leading the attack have been hit. Communication has ceased. The second wave experiences the same fate as the first. The thrid wave then decides that the attack has failed. Another whistle, this time a faltering one, signals retreat. Survivors stumble back. Some are disoriented and head in a lateral direction. Wounded men crawl. Some huddle in shell holes. The enemy artillery opens up, wreaking havoc on the retreat, but at least this time there is no counterattack. A remnant of the attacking unit returns.

The wounded in no man’s land are left to their fate until nightfall. Then an attempt will be made to bring them in. They try to stifle their rising agony. Moans bring down a torrent of bullets. And at last, a tortured stillness falls on the battlefield.