The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade: August 1914 to March 1915

The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade.

August 1914 to March 1915.

In accordance with the order received at Belfast at 5.30 P.M. on the 4th, the 15th Brigade started mobilizing on the 5th August 1914, and by the 10th was complete in all respects. We were practically ready by the 9th, but a machine-gun or two and some harness were a bit late arriving from Dublin--not our fault. Everything had already been rehearsed at mobilization inspections, held as usual in the early summer, and all went like clock-work. On the 8th we got our final orders to embark on the 14th, and on the 11th the embarkation orders arrived in detail.

Brigade Headquarters consisted of myself, Captain Weatherby (Oxford L.I.) as Brigade Major, Captain Moulton-Barrett (Dorsets), Staff Captain, Captain Roe (Dorsets), Brigade Machine-Gun Officer, Lieutenant Cadell, R.E., Signalling Officer, and Lieutenant Beilby, Brigade Veterinary Officer. Military Police, A.S.C. drivers, postmen, and all sorts of odds and ends arrived from apparently nowhere in particular, and fitted together with extraordinary little effort. The battalions grew to unheard-of sizes, and by the time that all was complete the Brigade numbered 127 officers, 3958 men, 258 horses, and 74 vehicles.

Aug. 14th.

The Cheshires[1] and Bedfords[2] arrived by train in the early morning of the 14th from 'Derry and Mullingar and went straight on board their ships--Brigade Headquarters, Dorsets,[3] and half the Norfolks[4] being in one, Cheshires and the other half of the Norfolks in another, and the Bedfords in a third.

[Footnote 1: 1st Batt. (Lieut.-Col. D. C. Boger).]

[Footnote 2: 1st Batt. (Lieut.-Col. C. R. Griffith, D.S.O.).]

[Footnote 3: 1st Batt. (Lieut.-Col. L. J. Bols, D.S.O.).]

[Footnote 4: 1st Batt. (Lieut.-Col. C. R. Ballard).]

Great waving of handkerchiefs and cheering as we warped slowly out of Belfast docks at 3 P.M. and moved slowly down the channel.

Aug. 16th.

The weather was beautifully fine on the passage, and on the 16th we all arrived at our destination.

The Bedfords had arrived on the previous tide to ourselves, and were already fast alongside the quay. Orders were received from the Disembarking Officer, and we disembarked and formed up independently and marched off to Rest Camp No. 8, six miles off on the hills above Havre.

It had been pouring heavily on shore for two days, though it was quite fine when we landed; so the ground where we were to encamp was mostly sopping. It was not easy to find in the dark, especially as the sketch-maps with which we were provided most distinctly acted up to their names. Added to these difficulties, a motor-lorry had stuck on the way up and blocked our transport for the night. I rode ahead alone, but had immense difficulty in finding the Brigade Headquarters Camp, which was quite a long way from the other battalion camps. These were dotted on the open fields at some distance from each other, and pitched in no particular order, so that by the time I had got my bearings and brought in the battalions, it was about 11 P.M. There was of course no baggage, nor anything to sleep on except the bare ground under the tents, with our saddles for pillows; and as a pleasant excitement nearly all our horses stampeded about 2 A.M., tore up their picketing-pegs from the soft ground, and disappeared into the darkness in different directions.

Aug. 17th.

Daylight, however, brought relief, and a certain amount of our transport; and all the horses were discovered in course of time and brought back. Most of the morning was spent, unsuccessfully, in trying to bring up the remaining transport up a steep and narrow road which was the only alternative to the blocked one. But some of the horses jibbed, and we had eventually to give it up and bring up supplies by hand.

The battalions were comfortably settled down under the expectation of another night there; but at 2.15 P.M. we got orders to move off by train at night. This we did from three different stations, at times varying from 12 midnight to 5.45 A.M., having arrived according to order at the stations four hours previously. This is the French system, allowing four hours for the entraining of a unit. Although a lot of manhandling had to be done, and the trucks were not what we had been accustomed to, we all entrained in about forty minutes, so had any amount of time to spare.

Silver (my first charger) was very bobbery as usual, and it took a good half-hour to persuade him to enter his truck. Once in, he slept like a lamb.

Aug. 18th.

We were comfortable enough, though packed like sardines, and with three-quarters of an hour's rest at Rouen for coffee, and another rest at Amiens--where we heard that poor General Grierson, our Corps Commander, was dead--broke a blood-vessel in the train--we arrived at Busigny at 2.15 P.M. Here we found Captain Hyslop[5] (Dorsets), who had been sent ahead from Belfast, and who gave us orders to detrain at Le Cateau, a few miles farther on. I must say that all these disembarking and training arrangements were extraordinarily well done, and reflected great credit on the Allied staffs combined. No hitch, no fuss, no worry, everybody got their orders in time, and all necessary arrangements had been carefully thought out beforehand.

[Footnote 5: Hyslop was very severely wounded six days afterwards and taken prisoner, but exchanged later on.]

We arrived at Le Cateau at 3.10 P.M., and detrained in half an hour, baggage and all. The battalions marched off to their billets,--Dorsets and Headquarters to Ors, the other three battalions to Pommereuil: nice clean little villages both of them.

When about halfway out to Ors--I was riding on ahead of the Brigade with only Weatherby--we were met by a motor bikist with a cypher telegram for me. This stumped us completely, as, not yet having reported to the Division, we had not yet received the local field cypher-word; so, seeing a car approaching with some "brass hats" in it, I rode across the road and stopped it, with a view to getting the key. To my horror, Sir John French and Sir A. Murray descended from the car and demanded to know why I had stopped them. I explained and apologised, and they were very pleasant about it; but on looking at the wire they said that I could disregard it, as they knew what it was about, and it was of no particular importance by this time; so we pursued our way in peace.

The billeting had already been done for us by our (5th) Divisional Staff, and we found no difficulty in shaking down.

I was billeted on a small elderly lady of the name of Madame W----, who was kindness itself, and placed herself and her house at our disposal; but I regret to say that when our men, in search of firewood, picked up some old bits of plank lying about in the garden, she at first made a shocking fuss, tried to make out that it was a whole timber stack of new wood, and demanded fifty francs compensation. She eventually took two francs and was quite content.

Here it was that Saint Andre joined us, having been cast off by the 5th Divisional Staff at Landrecies as a superfluous interpreter. Looking like an ordinary French subaltern with a pince-nez, he was in fact a Protestant pastor from Tours, son of the Vicomte de Saint Andre, very intelligent and "cultured," with a great sense of humour and extremely keen. I really cannot speak too highly of him, for he was a most useful addition to the Staff. In billeting and requisitioning, and in all matters requiring tact in connection with the inhabitants or the French Army, he was invaluable. I used him later as A.D.C. in action, and as Officier de liaison with the French troops. I don't know what his knowledge of divinity may have been, but if it was anything like equal to his military knowledge it must have been considerable. He had studied theology at Edinburgh, and his English was very fluent, luckily untouched by a Scottish accent. He was always bubbling over with vitality and go, and plunged into English with the recklessness of his race; when he couldn't express himself clearly he invented words which were the joy of the Mess,--"pilliate," "whizzle," "contemporative," and dozens of others that I can't remember; and what used to charm us particularly was that he so often went out of his way to put the accent on the wrong syllable, such as in bilyetting, brigade, attack, ambassador, &c. He was, indeed, a great acquisition to the Brigade.[6]

[Footnote 6: He was subsequently awarded the D.S.O. and Croix de Guerre (aux Palmes) for excellent and gallant work achieved under fire.]

Aug. 19th.

Next morning I rode across to have a look at the other battalions. The transport horses of the Cheshires were perhaps not all they might have been, but it was the particular stamp of Derry horse that was at fault, and not the battalion arrangements. Otherwise we were ready for the fray.

Aug. 20th.

We had arrived on the Tuesday (18th), and on the Thursday Sir C. Fergusson (commanding 5th Division) paraded the Brigade by battalions and made them a short speech, telling us we were to move on the morrow, and giving us a few technical tips about the Germans and how to meet their various wiles, largely about machine-guns and their methods of attack in large numbers. The Bedfords were the most interested audience, and interrupted him every now and then with "'Ear, 'ear," and a little handclapping at important points. I think the General was a little nonplussed at this attention: I know I was. Whether it was due or not to the audience being accustomed to attending political meetings at home, or to the air of Bedfordshire being extremely vitalising I don't know, but once or twice afterwards when the battalion was addressed by General Smith Dorrien,[7] and even by Sir J. French, they showed their approbation in the manner above set forth--somewhat to my confusion.

[Footnote 7: Commanding of course the 2nd Corps (composed of the 3rd and 5th Divisions).]

Aug. 21st.

Next day we moved off early. I already found myself overburdened with kit--although I had not even as much as the regulation 150 lb.--and I left a camp-bed and a thick waistcoat and various odds and ends behind in Madame W----'s cupboard, under the firm belief that I might at some future period send for it if I wanted it. Alas! the Germans have now been at Ors for close on three years.

A hot march of about fifteen miles brought us to Gommignies. Stragglers, I regret to say, were already many--all of them reservists, who had not carried a pack for years. They had every intention of keeping up, of course, but simply could not. I talked to several of them and urged them along, but the answer was always the same--"Oh, I'll get along all right, sir, after a bit of rest; but I ain't accustomed to carrying a big weight like this on a hot day," and their scarlet streaming faces certainly bore out their views. To do them justice, they practically all did turn up. I was afraid that, in spite of great care and the numerous orders I had issued about the fitting and greasing of new boots, it was the boots which were at fault; but it was not so, except in a very few cases.