Читать книгу How I Filmed the War - Geoffrey H. Malins - Страница 24

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Boxing Day—But No Pantomime—Life in the Trenches—A Sniper at Work—Sinking a Mine Shaft—The Cheery Influence of an Irish Padre—A Cemetery Behind the Lines—Pathetic Inscriptions and Mementoes on Dead Heroes' Graves—I Get Into a Pretty Warm Corner—And Have Some Difficulty in Getting Out Again—But All's Well that Ends Well.

Boxing Day! But nothing out of the ordinary happened. I filmed the Royal Welsh Fusiliers en route for the trenches. As usual, the weather was impossible, and the troops came up in motor-buses. At the sound of a whistle, they formed up in line and stopped, and the men scrambled out and stood to attention by the roadside. They were going to the front line. They gave me a parting cheer, and a smile that they knew would be seen by the people in England—perchance by their own parents.

I went along the famous La Bassée Road—the most fiercely contested stretch in that part of the country. It was literally lined with shell-destroyed houses, large and small; châteaux and hovels. All had been levelled to the ground by the Huns. I filmed various scenes of the Coldstreams, the Irish and the Grenadier Guards. At the furthermost point of the road to which cars are allowed shells started to fall rather heavily, so, not wishing to argue the point with them, I took cover. When the "strafing" ceased I filmed other interesting scenes, and then returned to my headquarters.

The next day was very interesting, and rather exciting. I was to go to the front trenches and get some scenes of the men at work under actual conditions. Proceeding by the Road, I reached the Croix Rouge crossing, which was heavily "strafed" the previous day. Hiding the car under cover of a partly demolished house, and strapping the camera on my back, my orderly carrying the tripod, I started out to walk the remaining distance. I had not gone far when a sentry advised me not to proceed further on the road, but to take to the trench lining it, as the thoroughfare from this point was in full view of the German artillery observers. Not wishing to be shelled unnecessarily, I did as he suggested. "And don't forget to keep your head down, sir," was his last remark. So bending nearly double, I proceeded. As a further precaution, I kept my man behind me at a distance of about twenty yards. Several times high explosives and shrapnel came unpleasantly near.

Presently I came upon a wooden tramway running at right angles to the road. My instructions were to proceed along it until I came to "Signpost Lane." Why it was so dubbed I was unable to discover, but one thing I was certainly not kept in ignorance of for long, and that was that it was perpetually under heavy shell-fire by the Germans. They were evidently under the impression that it was the route taken by our relief parties going to the trenches at appointed times during the day, and so they fairly raked it with shell-fire.

Unfortunately I happened to arrive on one of these occasions, and I knew it. Shells dropped all round us. Hardly a square yard of ground seemed untouched. Under such conditions it was no good standing. I looked round for cover, but there was none. The best thing to do under the circumstances was to go straight on, trust to Providence, and make for the communication trenches with all speed. I doubled like a hare over the intervening ground, and I was glad when I reached the trenches, for once there, unless a shell bursts directly overhead, or falls on top of you, the chances of getting hit are very small.

I was now in the sniping zone, and could continually hear the crack of a Hun rifle, and the resulting thud of a bullet striking the mud or the sandbags, first one side then the other. The communication trenches seemed interminable, and, as we neared the front line, the mud got deeper and parts of the trench were quite water-logged.

Plod, plod, plod; section after section, traverse after traverse. Suddenly I came upon a party of sappers mending the parapet top with newly filled sandbags. At that particular section a shell had dropped fairly near and destroyed it, and anyone walking past that gap stood a very good chance of having the top of his head taken off. These men were filling up the breach. "Keep your head well down, sir," shouted one, as I came along. "They" (meaning the Germans) "have got this place marked."

Down went my head, and I passed the gap safely.

We were now well up in the firing trench. Fixing the camera, and the rest of the apparatus, I began taking scenes of actual life and conditions in the trenches—that mysterious land about which millions have read but have never had the opportunity of seeing. No mere verbal description would suffice to describe them. Every minute the murderous crack of rifles and the whir of machine-guns rang out. Death hovered all round. In front the German rifles, above the bursting shrapnel, each shell scattering its four hundred odd leaden bullets far and wide, killing or wounding any unfortunate man who happened to be in the way.

The trenches looked as if a giant cataclysm of Nature had taken place. The whole earth had been upheaved, and in each of the mud-hills men had burrowed innumerable paths, seven feet deep. It was hard to distinguish men from mud. The former were literally caked from head to foot with the latter. I filmed the men at work. There were several snipers calmly smoking their cigarettes and taking careful aim at the enemy.

Crack—crack—crack—simultaneously.

"Sure, sir," remarked one burly Irish Guardsman, "and he'll never bob his —— head up any more. It's him I've been afther this several hours!" And as coolly as if he had been at a rifle range at home, the man discharged the empty cartridge-case and stood with his rifle, motionless as a rock, his eyes like those of an eagle.

All this time it was raining hard. I worked my way along the never-ending traverses. Coming upon a mount of sandbags, I enquired of an officer present the nature and cause of its formation. He bade me follow him. At one corner a narrow, downward path came into view. Trudging after him, I entered this strange shelter. Inside it was quite dark, but in a few seconds, when my eyes had got used to the conditions, I observed a hole in the centre of the floor about five feet square.

Peering over the edge, I saw that the shaft was about twenty-five feet deep, and that there was a light at the bottom. It then dawned upon me what it really was. It was a mine-shaft. At the bottom, men worked at their deadly occupation, burrowing at right angles under our own trenches (under "No Man's Land") and under the German lines. They laid their mines, and at the appointed time exploded them, thus causing a great amount of damage to the enemy's parapets and trenches, and killing large numbers of the occupants.

Retracing my steps, I fixed the camera up and filmed the men entering the mines and others bringing up the excavated earth in sandbags and placing them on the outside of the barricade. Then I paused to film the men at work upon a trench road. Thinking I could obtain a better view from a point in the distance, I started off for it, bent nearly double, when a warning shout from an officer bade me be careful. I reached the point. Although about fifty yards behind the firing trench, I was under the impression that I was still sheltered by the parapet. Evidently I had raised my head too high while fixing up the tripod, for with a murderous whistle two bullets "zipped" by overhead. I must be more careful if I wanted to get away with a whole skin; so bending low, I filmed the scene, and then returned.

While proceeding along the line, I filmed the regimental padre of the Irish Guards wading through the mud and exchanging a cheery word with every man he passed. What a figure he was! Tall and upright, with a long dark beard, and a voice that seemed kind and cheery enough to influence even the dead. He inspired confidence wherever he went. He stayed awhile to talk to several men who were sitting in their dug-outs pumping the water out before they could enter. His words seemed to make the men work with redoubled vigour. Then he passed on.

Along this section, at the back of the dug-outs, were innumerable white crosses, leaning at all angles, in the mud. They were the last resting-place of our dead heroes. On each cross a comrade had written a short inscription, and some of these, though simple, and at times badly spelt, revealed a pathos and a feeling that almost brought tears to the eyes. For all its slime and mud it was the most beautiful cemetery I have ever seen. On some of the graves were a few wildflowers. No wreaths; no marble headstones; no elaborate ornamentation; but in their place a battered cap, a rusty rifle or a mud-covered haversack, the treasured belongings of the dead.

I had barely finished filming this scene when with a shriek several shells came hurtling overhead from the German guns and burst about a hundred yards behind our firing line. Quickly adjusting the camera, I covered the section with my lens. In a few seconds more shells came over, and turning the handle I filmed them as they burst, throwing up enormous quantities of earth. The Huns were evidently firing at something. What that something was I soon found out. An enemy observer had seen a small working party crossing an open space. The guns immediately opened fire. Whether they inflicted any casualties I do not know, but a few minutes later the same party of men passed me as though nothing had happened.

The rain was still falling, and the mist getting heavy, so I decided to make my way back to headquarters. Packing up, and bidding adieu to the officers, I started on the return journey through the communication trenches. One officer told me to go back the same way, via "Signpost Lane." "You will manage to get through before their evening 'strafing,'" he called out. After wearily trudging through nearly a mile of trenches, I came out at "Signpost Lane," and I am never likely to forget it.

We had left the shelter of the trench, and were hurrying, nearly doubled, across a field, when a German observer spotted us. The next minute "whizz-bangs" started falling around us like rain. No matter which way I turned, the tarnation things seemed to follow and burst with a deafening crash. At last, I reached the crossing, and was making my way down the trench lining the road, when a shell dropped and exploded not thirty feet ahead. But on I went, for a miss is as good as a mile. About a hundred yards further on was the battered shell of a farm-house. When almost up to it a couple of shells dropped fairly in the middle of it and showered the bricks all round. A fairly warm spot!

I had just reached the corner of the building when I heard the shriek of a shell coming nearer. I guessed it was pretty close, and without a moment's hesitation dropped in the mud and water of a small ditch, and not a moment too soon for with a dull thud the shell struck and burst hardly seven feet from me. Had I not fallen down these lines would never have been written. Picking myself up, I hurried on. Still the shells continued to drop, but fortunately at a greater distance. When I reached Croix Rouge, I was literally encased in mud. Our progress along the road had been anxiously watched by the sentries and by my chauffeur.

"Well, sir," said the latter, with a sigh of relief, "I certainly thought they had you that time."