The Shadow of War (40 page)

Tom thinks Billy's response is a very considered reply; he suspects this is not the first time Billy has been asked the question.

‘Besides,' Billy continues, ‘as I've always said, if a man's been caught buggering the boys, he's sent to a naval prison in Blighty, where he'll get right royally buggered 'imself. Serves the bastard right!'

Tom smiles, thinking this is an even better answer that obviously reflects Billy's true feelings on the matter.

And so, a few days after taking on coal at Montevideo, Tom is staring at the metropolis of Port Stanley. Billy Cawson joins him. It is 9.45 in the morning.

‘Bloody hell, Tom, it looks worse than the Outer Hebrides – an' a godforsaken place that is!'

‘There's no mistakin' it's a long way from Radnorshire too, Mr Cawson.'

Port Stanley is no more than a few streets with rows of small wooden houses covered by corrugated iron roofs. The only buildings of substance are Government House, with its quaint green roof, and the newly rebuilt, neo-Gothic Christ Church Cathedral.

Inflexible
has taken on coal and is getting up steam. There is a sudden flurry of activity on deck, alerting Billy.

‘Come on, lad, I think we're off!'

The Battle of the Falkland Islands is about to commence. Admiral von Spee's squadron has taken on coal at Picton Island from a captured British collier, but he is short on shells, having used a large part of his arsenal at the Battle of Coronel. For reasons unfathomable by his own senior officers, and despite being out-gunned by the British ships and slower than the ‘greyhounds'
Invincible
and
Inflexible
, he decides to attack. His senior commanders advise him to make a run for Germany, but he chooses to ignore them.

He commands two armoured cruisers,
Scharnhorst
and
Gneisenau
, and three light cruisers,
Nürnberg
,
Dresden
and
Leipzig
. Besides
Invincible
and
Inflexible
, the British squadron consists of armoured cruisers
Carnarvon
,
Cornwall
and
Kent
and the light cruisers
Bristol
and
Glasgow
.

The day has improved; there is good visibility, the sea has become placid and the sun has broken through. As the mighty warship pulls away from Port Stanley, Tom and Billy go below decks to their battle station next to the engine room. Tom has never felt or heard the engines at full speed. It is like being in the belly of a giant beast as it digests its prey, the rhythm of the engines like the monster's beating heart. The heat becomes intense; the air thick with a heady mix of oil, coal and human perspiration.

At about 13.00 hours, the ship suddenly lurches to port,
throwing men off balance and sending anything not lashed down flying in every direction. Billy shouts at Tom.

‘Brace yourself!'

Within moments there are two huge explosions, and the ship shudders. Tom's face becomes a picture of terror. He thinks
Inflexible
has been hit.

‘It's all right, laddie, that's our big Vickers fartin'!'

The explosions then come in pairs at regular intervals. It is like being in the barrel of a gun, with every recoil juddering
Inflexible
's superstructure as if it were in an earthquake.

‘Jesus, Mr Cawson, it's like being in a biscuit barrel with a packet of 'apenny bangers!'

‘Just say a prayer to thank him upstairs that you're not on the receivin' end!'

Von Spee's flagship takes extensive damage; its funnels are flattened and it begins to list. She sinks at 16.17, taking von Spee and his two sons with her; there are no survivors.
Gneisenau
sinks at 18.02,
Nürnberg
at 19.27 and
Leipzig
at 21.23. Two of the vessels produce multiple explosions as their armaments magazines go up. There are only 215 German survivors; a total of 1,871 men perish. The Royal Navy squadron loses ten men, killed in minor damage to the
Invincible
.

Tom goes up on deck to help the German survivors come aboard. Some are smooth-chinned boys, no older than the wonks and boys on
Inflexible
, but most are gnarled veterans of the Kaiser's marine: cooks and wardroom waiters, gunnery artificers and able seamen. In fact, the men of the two navies could be interchangeable.

Then the wounded German sailors are helped aboard. Some are badly burned, their clothes ripped off by explosions, their skin blackened like overcooked meat. Bright-red blood oozes from the worst burns, making them look like hot embers in a hearth. Lifeboats are lowered to help the worst cases. Bodies are pulled up to check if there is still life
in them; if there is not, they are put back like the unwanted catch from a fishing net.

Tom has not been sick for the entire trip, but he is now. He has never seen anything like it.

Inflexible
's Ship's Surgeon and his Sick Berth Stewards are going to have a busy night. But no matter how hard they try, they are unlikely to be able to save the worst burns cases as they will not be able to prevent infection. Those who die on board will be buried at sea in the time-honoured naval tradition, sewn into sailcloth, weighted with whatever is to hand and cast overboard. In Nelson's day, the dead were sewn up in their hammock, with the last stitch through their nose to make sure they were dead rather than unconscious, then a couple of round shot at their feet to take them to the bottom.

The German dead are blessed just like British tars with the immortal words used on such occasions.

We therefore commit his body to the deep, looking for the general Resurrection in the last day, and the life of the world to come, through our Lord Jesus Christ; at whose second coming in glorious majesty to judge the world, the sea shall give up her dead; and the corruptible bodies of those who sleep in Him shall be changed, and made like unto his glorious body; according to the mighty working whereby He is able to subdue all things unto himself.

It has been Tom's first experience of war, but he witnessed the battle in semi-darkness, miles from the focus of the action. Not a single bullet, nor an explosive shell, came anywhere near him, and yet he feels exhausted and troubled as if he has been in the thick of it.

Billy Cawson consoles him.

‘Tom. We don't live or die like soldiers, who fight face to face with the enemy. We die with our ships; if our ship survives, we all live; if she goes down, we all go with her, or we end up like these poor sods.'

After the Battle of the Falkland Islands, raids on commercial shipping around the world by the Kaiserliche Marine, the Imperial German Navy, cease. Britain's naval supremacy across the world's oceans is restored.

Tom Crisp soon gets over his first experience of war and settles into life on board HMS
Inflexible
. Although he needs a little more time before he is certain, he is confident that when they next reach a British port, he will ask Billy Cawson to take him on permanently as part of the ship's company.

Tommy and his fellow volunteers Mick, Vinny and Nat feel much more like real soldiers and much less like the Boy Scouts they were accused of being in November. The taunts that greeted them from less than generous observers as they marched past have stopped.

Uniforms of Kitchener's
melton blue
, rather than khaki, arrived early in December and the volunteers thought they looked very smart, positively handsome, in their matching side caps worn at a jaunty angle. Some young girls even wolf-whistled as they passed. Rifles arrived two weeks later, as did horses for the officers, most of whom had to learn how to ride them and also find somewhere to stable them.

With appropriate military paraphernalia came proper training. Range practice began on Hambledon Moor, as well as proper military exercises, including manning outposts and picketing. Lectures and demonstrations were given in rifle maintenance and map reading; in many instances, lessons in the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic were needed. Route marches became longer and more arduous, the worst being what the lads called the ‘Witches' Marathon' – thirty-five miles over the Nick O' Pendle and back through the haunts of Pendle's famous witches, Old Mother Demdike, Anne Chattox and Alice Nutter.

The route took them past Nat Haythornthwaite's front door, in Sabden, where ‘Mrs Twaites' invited Nat and his mates in for a cup of tea and a rest. They managed to drop
out without being seen and rejoined the column on its return. However, someone must have snitched on them and they each got one week's field punishment, which was ordered to be a timed, six-mile march every morning at 6 a.m., including Sunday.

The excursions of C Company on the moors above the town have led to some amusing incidents.

During one exercise, Tommy's platoon was high on a moorland road, doing a picketing exercise. He and Mick, who were acting corporals, sent Nat and Vinny to a remote spot miles from anywhere, where they were told to close the road to anyone unless they used a password. They saw no one all morning and were freezing cold as biting Pennine winds blew sleet and snow all around them. Then, early in the afternoon, an old farmer appeared through the snow with his sheepdog. Vinny asked him where he was going.

‘None o' thy business,' was the abrupt reply.

Vinny tried to assert his authority.

‘Well, tha'll need t'password when tha comes back, old fella.'

‘Will I now?'

‘Aye.'

‘So what's t'password?'

Vinny realized that Tommy hadn't told them what password to use, but Nat came to his rescue and made one up.

‘Dirty Gertie!'

Vinny could not believe the name Nat had chosen. The old farmer looked stunned.

‘Don't be bloody soft, I'm not sayin' that,' he muttered, and wandered on his way.

Two hours later, the old man returned, bow-legged and wizened, with his white muffler wound tightly around his neck and his clogs jangling along the road. When he was challenged, he ignored the two men in blue and walked past.

Nat looked at Vinny.

‘What do we do now?'

‘I think we're s'posed to shoot 'im.'

‘We can't do that.'

‘Why not?'

‘Cos all our bullets are blanks!'

‘Well, should we at least tell 'im 'e's been shot?'

‘Might as well.'

Vinny shouts after the old farmer, who has, by now, almost disappeared in the swirling snow.

‘Eh, old fella; tha's been shot!'

‘Nay, lad; tha's missed!'

On another occasion, a platoon would not let a delivery lad from Oddies' Pies pass their checkpoint unless he handed over a tray of pies ‘for t'ungry lads defendin' King and country', or so they said.

Oddies complained to Captain Slinger, the battalion adjutant, and the miscreants all received one week of field punishments. The price of the pies was deducted from their pay.

As well as the four ‘Accrington Pals', several others in Burnley's Keighley Green Club are in uniform. Because John-Tommy Crabtree, the former steward at the club, is a Pal, the Club has become D Company's main watering hole. John-Tommy is there with some older men. Cath and Mary are also there; it is their night off from washing pots. Cath is huge; she has still not given birth, although the midwife thinks she is at least two weeks' overdue.

They had invited their Burnley officers to join them, but army protocol demands that officers and men do not fraternize openly. The Thorn Hotel, only 200 yards from Keighley Green, Burnley's oldest tavern, and situated in the middle of the town amidst its better shops, has become D Company's unofficial officers' mess. The Thorn has several luxuries not
typical of most of the town's public houses. One of them is fitted carpets, even in the bar, another is bar food and a third, perhaps the most radical, is no spittoons.

Tomorrow will be Christmas Eve and everyone in the Keighley Green Working Men's Club is in festive mood.

The Pals are having a late drink, having been at Accrington Town Hall for a battalion Christmas concert. It was a great success, and all the acts were performed by the officers and men. There was good humour between the battalion's companies from different towns: A Company (Accrington lads), chided D Company (Burnley lads), while B Company (from Blackburn) did the same to C Company (from Chorley).

John Harwood, Mayor of Accrington and founder of the battalion, gave a speech before the concert. He spoke well and with considerable East Lancs pride in what has been achieved. He also talked with some pathos about the casualty figures from France and about the plight of men at the Front shivering in their trenches. He knew that none of it would discourage the 900 men in front of him; quite the reverse, they are made of sterner stuff.

C Company's contributions to the concert included Captain Raymond Ross and Lieutenants Riley, Heys and Tough singing – reasonably melodiously – extracts from
HMS Pinafore
by Gilbert and Sullivan, although Fred Heys clearly had a much better voice than the other three. CSMs Severn, Muir and Lee played the spoons and brought the house down. Not only were they dressed in Egyptian fezzes and caftans, which seemed to have no relevance to a rendition of spoon harmonies, but their playing was neither tuneful nor in unison.

Hoots of laughter rolled around the town hall as the three hard men, a Cockney, a Scot and a Devonian, who had spent the previous two months berating the inadequacies of their Lancastrian charges, turned a musical routine into a
comedy act. It was hilarious and convinced those present, who had begun to wonder, that their company serjeant majors were human after all.

During the concert interval, presents were distributed. Each man went onstage to collect a neatly parcelled gift of two pairs of socks from the officers' wives and from Elizabeth Sharples, the wife of Battalion CO Colonel Sharples. A boxed, initialled silk handkerchief was also given to each of the officers, including the colonel, who looked more delighted than anyone else, leading everyone to the conclusion that he was not used to receiving presents from his somewhat severe-looking wife.

At the end of the evening, Colonel Richard Sharples addressed the men. He droned on a little but, right at the last, produced the biggest cheer of the night.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted to be able to tell you this evening that, two days ago, we heard from the Ministry of War that the 11th Battalion East Lancashire Regiment will go to barracks in Caernarvon, North Wales, to complete their military training in early February next.'

At long last, the tedium and discomfiture of playing at soldiers in their own backyard will be coming to a definite end. The men had begun to think that they would never leave their hometowns and that the war would be over before they had a chance to prove their mettle.

John-Tommy Crabtree comes over to Tommy and Mick's group.

‘Alreet, Mary; Cath, that's a reet lump tha's got there, when it's due?'

‘Dunno, John-Tommy, feels like it shoulda been born a week last Christmas!'

‘So what are you two gonna do while these
daft apeths
laik at soldiers in Caernarvon?'

‘Mary an' I reckon we're gonna go down south an' drive ambulances.'

‘Can you drive?'

‘No, but one o' t'lads at Trafalgar Mill said he'd teach us on mill's lorry.'

‘But how will yer find a job?'

‘Easy, Henry Hyndman said he get us sorted. Mary winked at 'im. He fancies Mary does old Henry.'

‘What about t'child?'

‘I'll take it wi' me.'

John-Tommy then turns to the quartet in blue.

‘Hey up, Tommy, an' what dost reckon to thy lasses runnin' off down south?'

Mick smiles mischievously.

‘They can suit th'sels, they ollus do. Me an' t'lads'll be chasin' them Caernarvon lasses around.'

Cath clips Mick around his ear.

‘If you go anywhere near 'em, I'll 'ave yer knackers off an' I'll put 'em in a jam jar on t'mantelpiece. So think on!'

John-Tommy quickly changes the subject and turns to Nat and Vinny.

‘So it's off to Caernarvon fer us. Yer know they 'ave a different language yonder?'

Nat is perplexed.

‘But it's in England, in't it?'

‘Nah, lad, it's in Wales; they're Welsh.'

‘So what do they speak, John-Tommy?'

‘Welsh, Nat.'

‘Are they on our side?'

There is laughter all round, but Cath's swipe at Mick has stirred her loins. She suddenly grasps her abdomen and lets out a moan of pain.

John-Tommy is the first to react and tells Mick and Tommy to help Mary get Cath to the club office. He looks at the big clock above the bar. It's almost midnight. He smiles at Cath reassuringly.

‘Looks like tha's gonna 'ave a Christmas Eve baby, our Cath.'

Cath is too preoccupied to notice John-Tommy's words. By the time she is helped into the office she has almost given birth. John-Tommy pushes Mick into the office with his wife and Mary and gets everybody else out. He then grabs Vinny.

‘Go an' get old Ma Murgatroyd! Number 8, Parker Street, just round t'corner. Run, lad!'

Ma Murgatroyd, who used to be a midwife, is fast asleep when Vinny hammers on her door, and she takes a while to get dressed. By the time they get to the club, they are too late.

The baby, a boy, has been born.

But there are no celebrations, no cries from the little infant. The lad is stillborn and nothing can be done to help him.

Ma Murgatroyd confirms that he is dead and that he almost certainly died some time ago in the womb.

Cath and Mick are inconsolable; it will be a very sad Christmas for the Burnley Pals.