Whereas the Second World War was a war against fascism it's hard to understand what the First World was for. The sad thing is thousands, millions of people died in what was a senseless slaughter. On the first day of the Battle of the Somme, 1 July 1916, the British suffered 57,420 casualties, including 19,240 dead. It was the bloodiest day in the history of the British Army. It is truly sad to read a war memorial and see so many men die so young.
As the Poet Wilfred Owen wrote
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.
GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Owen was no pacifist he was awarded the Military Cross his citation read:
For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty in the attack on the Fonsomme Line on October 1st/2nd, 1918. On the company commander becoming a casualty, he assumed command and showed fine leadership and resisted a heavy counter-attack. He personally manipulated a captured enemy machine gun from an isolated position and inflicted considerable losses on the enemy. Throughout he behaved most gallantly.
Alas he died on 4th November 2018 one week before hostilities ended.
Neither of my grandfathers died in the first war although my maternal grandfather was a POW and came home a young man with white hair.
So today 100 years on let us remember the sacrifices of a generation and pray to god that we never see its like again.
Laurence Binyon
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
1 comment:
A moving and poignant post Pete.
I never knew my maternal grandfather as he walked out on my grandmother when mum was a baby :( but my paternal grandfather survived the war. He fought with the Herefordshire regiment and recently I've been doing some research into this. He would never talk about that time though.
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