Letters From the Front

Dated: December 20, 1916

Letters From The Front

Capt. Herald writes to his sister, Mrs. (Rev.) J. Morrow, Medicine Hat, in part:--

Going into the trenches this time my medical cart dumped my supplies two miles from our dressing station, the transport being unable to get any further on account of shell fire. This was at 7 in the evening and I had to stay with the supplies, with three of my men, until 6 in the morning and that without a bite to eat, I got out a stretcher, unrolled my Wolsey sleeping bag, got into a shell hole, took off my boots in the mud, turned in and went to sleep. It was bitterly cold and about 4 started to rain, and all through the night shells were screaming and bursting all over the place. I don't want you to get the idea that this was in any way a brave thing to do but simply all in the day's work.

My dressing station was in the cellar of a ruined chateau and made a first rate place to handle the wounded. I established a soup kitchen and had hot pea soup, Oxo and coffee, steaming hot night and day and this, I insisted, was given to all who came in, wounded, carriers, runners and those exhausted. I don't think that I ever got so much pleasure from anything as I did from this, and watching the marvelous change that it works in the tired and worn out men. It bucked them right up and back they went to the firing line feeling like new men.

The other day two runners came in, caked with mud, wet, chilled and weary. They were two boys from Winnipeg, 19 years old, bright and smiling in spite of their condition and such good soldiers. They answered my questions so nicely and were ready to leave when I asked them to have some hot soup and promptly proceeded to fill up their bellies. You should have seen the thanks and gratitude in their eyes.

One of the hard problems here is getting the wounded from the firing line to the dressing station. This sometimes takes hours and taxes the endurance of the bearers to the limit. You can imagine a pitch dark night, a narrow and twisting trench, the mud and very often they strike overland as the trench is impossible. All this time the shelling goes on and often one or other of the party falls into a shell hole and sometimes all of them, including the injured one. The beautiful feature about the rescue and delivery of the wounded is that the men never refuse the duty, never complain and I have heard them say they had not done anything that was worth talking about.

I have had my steel helmet rattled three times by small pieces of shrapnel and have had shells drop quite as close to me as I care to have them. If there is time and they are close, the fellows throw themselves on their faces and if possible roll into a shell hole. The other night we were at dinner and one hit practically on our cellar, blew out the light, blew in the window and rattled some bricks down the stairs. There was a laugh, the candle was relit and the meal went on. This is not bravado on the part of the boys but this indifference must be maintained otherwise the atmosphere in which we live would be impossible. To take the thing seriously would be to go "bug-house."

Another thing that I want to tell you about, and which the papers have got right and do not lie about is the conduct of the men when wounded. They do not whine or moan or grumble, but chat if they can and make light of it if they can talk and they do at once smoke a cigarette as the papers say they do. I have had bad cases do all of this. For instance, a man with five shrapnel wounds and a smashed leg did it and did not do it in a boasting way.