The fighting strength of the three batteries of a Brigade of Field Artillery, at the time of the First Expeditionaries, totalled 18 guns, 18 officers, and about 650 non-commissioned officers and men. You might remember those figures, or when you have finished the reading of this tale just refer back to them.

The Brigade was posted before the action opened in a cornfield which lay on the banks of a canal, and the guns were ‘concealed’ behind some of the innocent-looking stooks of cut corn which were ranged in rows along the field. It was the Brigade’s first action, and every officer and man waited with expectant eagerness for the appearance of the enemy. On the other side of the canal there was a wide stretch of open ground, but to the gunners it appeared too good to be true that the enemy would advance across that open and give the guns a chance of sweeping them off the earth with shrapnel. At some points tongues and spurs of thick wood ran out towards the canal, and it was rather through and under cover of the trees that the artillerymen expected the enemy to try to press in on the front which ran roughly along the line of the canal. Such an advance would not give the guns so visible and open a target for so long a time; but, on the other hand, there was still an open space between the nearest parts of the woods and the canal bank, and if the attack were confined to the approaches through the woods it meant that the guns could concentrate on a much narrower front, and there was never a gunner of them there but believed his own battery alone, much less the whole Brigade, capable of smashing up any attempt to debouch from the woods and of obliterating any force that tried it. Nevertheless, all their training and teaching and manœuvres and field-days of peace times indicated the woods as the likeliest points of attack, because it had been an accepted rule laid down in peace—and there were plenty of men in the batteries who remembered the same and very much sterner rule laid down in the South African War—that infantry could not, across the open, attack entrenched positions held by infantry and covered by artillery.

On the whole, the Brigade were very well satisfied with the look of things, and having taken careful ranges to the different points of the probable targets, with special attention to the wood edges, uncapped a goodly number of fuzes, given a last look to the mechanism of guns and gear, put some finishing touches to the cunning arrangement of corn stooks, they lit pipes and cigarettes and settled down comfortably to wait developments.

The developments came rapidly, but being at first more or less after the expected routine as laid down in their teaching, the Brigade were not unduly disturbed. The first fire of the enemy artillery was, as far as the Brigade could see, not particularly well aimed, and although it made a great deal of noise and smoke appeared to be doing little harm to the infantry trenches, and none to the artillery behind them. Presently the men watched with great interest, but little realisation of its significance, a grey dove-winged shape that droned up out of the distance across the line, swung round and began a careful patrol along its length. But after that the shells commenced to find the infantry trenches with great accuracy, and to pour a tremendous fire upon them. The Brigade listened and watched frowningly at first, and with growing anger and fidgetings, the screaming and crashing of the German shells, the black and white clouds of smoke that sprang so quickly up and down the infantry lines before them. They were at last given orders to fire, and although at first they were firing at an invisible target, the gunners brisked up and went about their business with great cheerfulness. All along the line the other British batteries were opening with a most heartening uproar that for the time filled the ear and gave the impression that our guns were dominating the situation. That, unfortunately, did not last long. The German rate and weight of fire increased rapidly, until it reached the most awe-inspiring proportions, and it began to look as if the British infantry were to be smothered by shell-fire, were to be blown piecemeal out of their scanty trenches, without being given a chance to hit back.

The Artillery Brigade whose particular fortunes we are following had, up to now, escaped quite lightly with nothing more than a few slight casualties from chance splinters of high-explosive shells that had burst some distance from them.

But suddenly the gunners were aware of a strange and terrifying sound rising above the thunder-claps of their own guns, the diminishing whinny of their own departing shells, the long roll of gun-fire on their flanks, the sharp tearing crashes of the enemy shell-bursts—a sound that grew louder and louder, rose from the hissing rush of a fast-running river to a fiercer, harsher note, a screaming vibrating roar that seemed to fill the earth and air and sky, that drowned the senses and held the men staring in amazement and anticipation of they knew not what. Then when the wild whirlwind of sound had reached a pitch beyond which it seemed impossible for it to rise, it broke in a terrific rolling c-r-r-r-ash that set the solid earth rocking. One battery was hidden from the other two by a writhing pall of thick black smoke, out of which whirled clods of earth, stones, and a flying cloud of yellow straw. When the smoke dissolved, and the dust and straw and chaff had settled, the other two batteries could see a gun of the third overturned, the gunners rolling or limping or lying still about it, an odd man here and there staggering from the other guns—but all the rest of the gunners in their proper and appointed places, the five remaining guns firing one by one in turn as regularly as if on a peace practice. The Brigade had been introduced to something quite new to it, and that it certainly never expected to meet in open field of battle—a high-explosive shell from one of the heaviest German pieces. But unexpected as it was, more terrible than the gunners had ever imagined, there was no time now to think about such things. The German infantry attack was advancing under cover of their artillery, a crackling roll of rifle fire was breaking out from the infantry trenches, sharp orders were shouting along the lines of guns. There was a pause while fuses were set to new times, while fresh aim was taken and new ranges adjusted.

‘Target, infantry advancin’—open sights...!’ said one of the gun-layers in repetition of his orders. ‘But where’s the bloomin’ infantry to get my open sights on?’

‘Where?’ shouted his Number One, and pointed over the layer’s shoulder as he stood up to look over the gun shield for a wider view. ‘Can’t you see ’em there? ’Ave you gone blind?’

‘That?’ said the layer, staring hard. ‘Is that infantry?’ He had been looking for the scattered dots of advancing men that were all his experience had told him to see of an advancing line. He was quite unprepared for the solid grey mass that he actually did see.

‘That’s infantry,’ snapped his sergeant. ‘Did you think it was airyplanes? Get to it now.’

The layer got to it, and in a few seconds the whole of the Brigade was pouring shells on the advancing mass as fast as the guns could be served. The Battery commanders had a vague idea that the enemy infantry had made some terrible mistake, had in error exposed themselves in mass in the open. When the guns had brought swift retribution for the mistake the mass would vanish; but meantime here was the guns’ opportunity—opportunity such as no gunner there had ever hoped to have. But when the mass persisted and pushed on in the teeth of the fire that every one knew must be murderous beyond words, the rate of gun-fire was slowed down, and the batteries set themselves deliberately to wipe this audacious infantry out of existence.

But then suddenly it began to look as if it were to be the Brigade that would be wiped out. A number of German guns turned on it, battered it with heavy high-explosive, lashed it with shrapnel, rent and tore and disrupted it with a torrent of light and heavy shells, a scorching whirlwind of fire, with blasts of leaping flame, with storms of splinters and bullets. One after another guns of the Brigade were put out of action, with guns destroyed or overthrown, with ammunition waggons blown up, with gun detachments killed or wounded. Gun by gun the fighting strength of the Brigade waned; but as each gun went the others increased their rate of fire, strove to maintain the weight of shells that a Brigade should throw. The guns that were destroying them were themselves invisible. To the Brigade there was no movement of men, no tell-tale groups, no betraying flash even, to show where their destroyers were in action. It is true that the Brigade spent no time looking for them, would not have spent a round on them if it had seen them. Its particular job had been plainly indicated to it—to stop the advancing infantry—and it had no time or shells to spare for anything else.

But grimly and stoically though they took their punishment, gamely and desperately though they strove to fulfil their task, it was beyond them. The grey mass was checked and even stopped at times, but it came on again, and at the guns the ranges shortened and shortened, to a thousand yards, to eight, seven, six hundred. After that it was a hopeless fight, so far as this Brigade was concerned. Most of their guns were out of action, their ammunition was nearly all expended, they were under a rifle fire that scourged the guns with whips of steel and lead, that cut down any man who moved from the shelter of his gun’s shield. Such guns as were left, such men as could move, continued to fire as best they might at ranges that kept getting still shorter and shorter. No teams could bring up ammunition waggons, so the rounds were carried up by hand across the bullet-swept field, until there were no more rounds to bring.

Since they were useless there, an attempt was made to bring the guns out of action and back under cover. It failed when after a minute or two half the remaining men had been cut down by bullets, and the commanders saw that nothing could move and live in the open. Then the order was passed to leave the guns and retire the men as best they could. That was at high noon, and for the next two or three hours the gunners tried in ones and twos to run the gauntlet of the fire and get back to cover. Some tried to crawl or to lie prone and wriggle out on their bellies; others stripped off bandoliers and haversacks and water-bottles, some even their jackets and boots to ‘get set’ like runners in a hundred-yard dash, crouching in the shelter of the gun shield, leaping out and away in a desperate rush. But crawl or wriggle or run made little odds. Some men went half the distance to safety, a few went three-quarters, one or two to within bare places of cover; but none escaped, and most went down before they were well clear of the gun. The few that from the first refused sullenly to abandon their guns, that swore amongst themselves to stick it out till dark if necessary and then drag the crippled guns away, came off best in the end because they lay and crouched under the scanty cover the guns gave, and watched the others go out to their deaths. They lay there through the long dragging hours of the afternoon with the bullets hissing and whistling over and past them, with the shells still crumping and crashing down at intervals, with the gun shields and wheels and steel waggon covers ringing and smacking to the impact of bullet and splinter, with one man here and another there jerking convulsively to a fresh wound—his first or his twenty-first as the case might be—groaning or cursing through set teeth, writhing in pain, or lying silent and still with all pain past.

Late in the afternoon there came a lull in the firing and a lessening of the bullet storm, and the order—a very imperative order—was passed for every man who could move to retire from the guns. So the few whole men came away, helping the wounded out as best they could; and even then they would not come empty-handed, and since they could not bring their guns, and they knew it was a retirement from the position, they stayed to collect the gun fittings, crawling about amongst the disabled pieces and shattered carriages, with the bullets still hissing and snapping about their ears, throwing dust spurts amongst their feet, whisking and swishing through the scattered corn stooks. They brought away the sights and breech mechanisms and sight- and field-clinometers, and every other fitment they could carry and thought worth having (and in that they were even wiser than they knew, for in those days such things as dial-sights were precious beyond words, and once lost could scarcely be replaced). And laden down under the weight and unhandiness of these things—the breech fittings alone weigh some forty pounds, and make a most unpleasantly awkward thing to carry—the handful of men left in each battery doubled laboriously out across the field and into comparative safety. At the cost of persistent attempts and some more men a gun was also manhandled out.

The battery that had salvaged its gun brought it safely through the Retreat which followed the action. The other batteries had to be content to keep their pitifully scant ranks together and stagger wearily over the long miles of the great Retreat lugging their cumbersome breech-blocks and dial-sights and gun gear with them. They clung at least to these as the outward and visible sign of being Gunners and the remains of Batteries, and they marched and hung together, waiting eagerly and hopefully for the day that would bring new guns to them and reserves to ‘make up the strength.’

An unknown General passed them one day where they were halted by the roadside for what one of the gunners facetiously called ‘inspection of gun-park an’ stores.’ And ‘just see all the batteries’ guns is in line an’ properly dressed by the right,’ he added, with a glance at the one gun left to them.

‘What—er—lot is this?’ asked the General of the officer who was ‘inspecting.’

‘The Umpty-Noughth Brigade, Field Artillery, sir,’ said the officer; ‘Umptieth, Oughtieth, and Iddyieth Batteries.’ (It may have sounded pathetically ridiculous, but it was no more or less than the bare truth; for it was as units and batteries that these remnants had marched and hung close together, and, given new guns and fresh drafts, they would be batteries and units again. After all, it is the spirit of and as a unit that counts.)

The General looked at the drawn-up ranks of the batteries, the gun detachments represented by two or three men, or by one man, or by an empty gap in the line; he saw the men grey with dust, with torn clothing, with handkerchiefs knotted at the corners replacing lost caps, with puttees and rags wound round blistered feet—but with shoulders set back, with heads held up and steady eyes looking unwinking to their front. He looked, too, at the one gun, scarred and dented and pitted and pocked with splinter marks and bullet holes, at each little pile of breech-blocks and sights and fittings that lay spread out on handkerchiefs and haversacks and rags in the place of the other guns; and he noticed that dirty and dusty and dishevelled as the men might be, the gun parts were speckless and dustless, clean and shining with oil.

The General spoke a few curt but very kindly words to the officer quite loud enough for ‘the Brigade’ to hear, saying he remembered hearing some word of their cutting up and the fine finish they had made to their fight, congratulating them on the spirit that had held them together, wishing them luck, and hoping they would have their new guns before the time came to turn and hit back and begin the advance.

‘I hope so, sir,’ said the officer simply; ‘and thank you.’

The General saluted gravely and turned to go, but halted a moment to ask a last question. ‘How many of you—how many of the Brigade came out of that show?’ he said.

‘Only what you see here, sir—one gun, one officer, and fifty-three men,’ said the officer.

You may remember what was the full fighting strength of a Field Artillery Brigade; but you must also remember that there is another sort of ‘fighting strength,’ greater far than mere numbers, the sort of strength that this poor shattered remnant of a Brigade still held undiminished and unabated—the stoutness of heart, the courage, the spirit that made the old ‘Contemptible Little Army’ what it was.

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