Crack! The loud noise frightened me, and I jumped out of bed to discover the rest of the platoon putting on their service caps and loading their rifles, many still wearing their undershirts. I look at my friends from training, and then glanced at those who had fought at mons. We thought them fools last night, as they had went to sleep wearing their uniforms. Now we knew why. We began to hear screaming as I loaded my rifle and begin to run to the surface, emerging from the subterranean lair, and threw myself against the wall of the parapet, and glancing over the top to get a look at the enemy. As my head peaked up, I felt a massive shockwave, and dirt went flying into my face as I ducked down. I slowly began to raise my head, listening to the ever-louder screaming of the germans shambling forward, bayonets ready, eyes as cold as steel. Many seemed half dead. My shock soon gave way to fear, as I shouldered my rifle, flipped of the safety, and prepared to fire in a panic..
̈Hold the line!¨ My Non commissioned officer(nco) screamed. I looked around to see other men leaning against the wall, some still putting on their caps, many didn't have their puttees or their equipment on. I look back at the grey clad men running through the shell covered hell that is no man's land, and braving the monumental amounts of dead bodies(both friend and foe) and and the endless stream of bullets hailing from our machine guns.
̈ ̈Prepare to fire!¨ I heard over the incessant gunfire. I watched in a macabre fascination as men died, with others behind them using their bodies like a ladder to bypass some of our barbed wire. They came closer and closer, and as I saw one of those damn huns ready a potato masher, I heard the word.
̈Fire!¨
In a moment stuck in time, the entire field seemed to stand still, frozen, like a deer in headlights. Then, after this moment of serenity, all hell seemed to break loose. We began to fire with reckless abandon, as there were so many that we did not need to aim our weapons. As we unloaded our ammunition in the sadistic shooting gallery, they began to flee. However, as they did so, carrying as many of the wounded as they could, I heard the whistle. I turned to see where it came from, to see an officer waving his webley around, a whistle between his lips, practically screaming into it. Men ran past him, yelping in low, thundering tone. Many next to me began to climb over the parapet, running towards the enemy line. As we gave the hun chase, I saw two men carrying a wounded ally.
I saw the fear in their eyes, as we were almost upon them. But then one gave in. He dropped his comrade and and ran. Soon, the wounded man was left to die, at the mercy of our rifles. His despair, and anguish were so apparent I could smell it, and as I got close enough, I drove my bayonet into his belly. I began to tug savagely, trying to pull out the blade from his cold, young body. So I fixed my boot to his ribs, and as I put pressure on the bayonet, I pulled with all my might. The blade practically flew out of its own accord, as if trapped, hungry for it next kill. I continued to run,(albeit slightly behind my brothers in arms) and chased the poor men to their own trench. As we hit the barbed wire, they scrambled over the front of their trenches, and fired a volley our way. Men fell to the ground in tens, as we began to turn back and run. As we ran, more of our men fell dead. As we reached our own dugouts, I heard a wale of pain as my nco got hit in the stomach by a round from the enemy machine gun, while escorting a soldier who had been shot in the eye, blinding him. As he tumbled into a shell hole, the blind man stumbled himself, and fell. He cried out in anguish, as he began to flail on barbed wire and surrounding corpses.
“ Oh, god, Help me, HELP ME!”
He wailed, and I wanted to help. But I simply couldn't. In the second of\ thought, another man ran on top of him, crushing him under his boots. I began to turn and run, but as the man’s pitch rose, I looked back at the sorry sight. A man covered in blood, with his eyes blown off, rolling around in the mud, screaming and grabbing at the dead body next to him, oblivius that its owner left long ago. As I reached the trench, and jumped inside, I looked around to see who was still alive. I found the rest of our platoon doing the same. I then began to heave, and gag, as the shock of all this morning began to wear off. War doesn’t seem so good now.
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I began to walk among the copious amounts of dead bodies, left in the wake of the elite german thrust men. I leaned over to a corpse, with the vision windows of his gas mask kicked in, dried blood surrounding his eyes like a demonic ringworm, and a large depression in the chest. I squat down and pull at his shirt for a moment. As the top button came undone, I tried to find his steel identification disks. After ripping these off his body, I look at them, to figure out just who this man was.
Williams, james
Protestant
1894
After reading through these, I whistle to a comrade a little bit away from me. we have to get rid of all the bodies here. These dumb arses decided to try and hold a trench. The poor bastards had practically no training, and only a week of experience under their belt. I have to say, though, what they lacked in experience and training, they made up for in dividends with bravery.
And more importantly, equipment. We all began to rip their rifles, ammunition, field rations and puttees, cutlery, and grenades. As we continued this macabre ceremony.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“Look at that, eh?” I say to my brother in arms. “People still believe this stuff?”He shot me a dirty look before lifting up a body by the arms, dragging it “ Not everyone is a cultist like you, squinty!” I chuckled lightly at the racist remark. The sergeant was just angry that a man of his “exalted rank” should not be doing manual labour. Instead, he was stuck with, as he would put it, a bunch of dominion savages with no real decency. Funny because he would probably loves his sheep, welch bastard. It’s even funnier because I ain’t even canadian. I’m an american. This sorry bastard just enlisted a month ago, where as the rest of us have been around since the first half of the war. Well, at least my platoon.
As we finish up tossing the bodies into the cart, the whistle of shells began to increase, as well as the sporadic rifle fire. As we finish, we go back to the secondary lines, to retrieve our rifles and other armaments. As we did, the major walked over, with his assistant and he practically screamed his mouth a loud “Attention!”, with all of us standing to, dropping our rifle butts to the floor. “Alright chaps! We need a trench raiding team.” no one volunteered. He sighed “well, thanks, your squad just volunteered.” he said, pointing a fag in a clenched fist at my squad leader.
Well, damn
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We put on cloth caps, as I take a look at my homemade trench club . It was a mcadams shovel with the head removed, the spike sharpened and below that a jumble of barbed wire. I slotted it into my belt loop, and put my rifle on my shoulder. I tied my mills bombs to my chest, and my face covered in a mixture of mud and paint, to conceal my face. We finished up our work in the armoury(getting as many grenades we could talk out of the armourer, getting extra ammo, and so forth). As this little haggling session proceed, the sun began to go down. As the sun set, we finished up with our armaments, and began to walk through our trenches, knowing full well that the likelihood of us dying in the enemy’s trench was high. Each pulled out a cigarette(as we were behind the main fire trench), and puffed on them for a little bit waiting for the major to show up.
As he showed up, he pulled out a small silver pocket watch(that, surprisingly, was without mud), and gave us a look over. “ welp chaps, pull ‘em out.” we each pulled out a spoon from our puttees or webbing. We each received a full spoon of rum, and got ready as dark descended over the western front. The major put out his cigarette, and walked over to a parapet, and took a look over. “Alright, get ready.” we each took a look over ourselves and each other to make sure everything was secure, and not likely to make noise. He called me up, and I smirked as I shoved and pushed my way to the front of my squadI slowly raise my head, and, seeing nothing, I unslung my rifle and began to climb over the parapet. Slow, deliberate. This had been drilled into me since my first battle.
As my idle thoughts leave me, I realize I am in a shell hole a few dozen meters from the germans trench. I crawl up, to the barbed wire, slowly, and begin to pull out wire cutters. A chap proceeded to crawl up next to me, and, with gloved hands, grabbed the barb wire to hold it in place, making the light wrustle of barbed wire inaudible. We keep going for about half an hour, as we were only a few meters of a sappers nest. They were watching, so we had to be quiet. As the last wire was cut, I pushed my head into the mud, and dragged along the ground slowly. After a bit more time, I am at the sandbags on top of the saps nest, lying sideways along them. There is a light inside the trench, only a few meters away, so I keep my head down. But I can hear them talking, mumbling in their off tongue, aggressive in nature.
I look to the man with the wire cutters. He nods. I slowly pulled out my mcadams club, while he shrugged the enfield off his shoulder, attaching the bayonet. We began to crawl slowly to lower the amount of noise our little company made. Despite this there was a suckling sound from the thick spring mud. He rolled from the sandbags, onto the duckboards with an audible plop. I followed suit.
As my feet hit the boards, I pulled out a mills bomb from the small sack located on my right glute about the size of a ladies handbag, with a half dozen bombs inside. The rifleman marched forward, bayonet ready for stabbing, rifle at hip height, loaded and deadly. As I continued, the rest of the team followed. Next, our leader with a revolver, another rifleman, and more grenadiers with hand guns, or clubs and fighting knives. Overall, about twelve men. As we began to reach the end of the sap’s communications trench, the lead rifleman looked back at me, and I squeezed his shoulder in confirmation. He readied himself, and sprinted around the corner silently, rifle held High. I followed suit, club at the ready.
As I swung around the corner, I was an inch away from the lead rifleman. I began to sprint past him, at the filthy hun in front of my comrades. The poor boy was frozen from shock. As he finally came to his senses, my club smashed into his jaw, with a horrifying crack. Before he even hit the ground, I had struck him again, with the barbs this time. He was in too much shock to even scream. Poor fritz.
I looked behind us, and saw the other half of our little party splitting up, and running silently around a corner. As this happened, the rifleman finally pulled the bayonet out of the germans ribs, and ran past me with haste. I followed up behind him,ready and eager to kill. We sprinted forward into a small group on patrol, and soon as contact was made, I only saw red. I Roughly ripped the lead rifleman out of the way, until I was less than an inch from the enemy. In my shock, I did the only thing that came to mind.
I bit down upon the mass of cartilage called the nose,
Locking his head by sticking my club behind it, and pulling inward.
I began to tug, feeling the blood run down my own throat, I felt contact with my ribs. Yet I refused to give up my hold on this hun. Then the screaming started, followed by rapid gunfire. Finally, as his nose truly gave way, I collapsed. My body would not listen to my, it was as if I was only a passenger in my own body. Then I felt it. It was as though someone took a red hot poker and had been stabbing me. I felt my ribs give way, crushed, stabbing at my stomach. My lungs felt filled with liquid, sickening and ill. I began to cough, and sputter, and despite the noise being lost among the screaming due to the other men around me, yet it was the only thing i could hear. I saw black blood fly out of my mouth. My eyes began to tear, and cry, and sob. All of my earthly struggles, of the last few years, of all that I have survived, I would just be another casualty. I will not! I cannot abide it! I begin to move my arms, but immediately, I get a spade head rocketing into my ribs instead.