A surgeon in khaki

As the fighting is still going on round this district any description of military positions or dispositions would be quite out of place.

Our headquarters at Château Gorre was a beautiful two-storied stone building, quite modern, and well arranged in every way with spacious lofty halls, dining-rooms, lounges, bedrooms, and bathrooms.

When we took up our quarters here we knew that we would soon be busy with wounded, and the central hall of the château was at once prepared for their reception. Two larger rooms opening to the right and to the left off the hall were covered with mattresses and blankets, hot water was prepared, operation table opened out, and towels and instruments made ready. Just when we had about finished preparations our first arrivals, four men of the Dragoon Guards, turned up. They had been wounded slightly in the arms and face while advancing along the road towards Festubert. Twenty minutes later fifty-four wounded arrived, Bedfords and Cheshires, most of whom had slight wounds of the arms and hands and scalp, and were able to walk.

Urgent orders came in to send six ambulance waggons down the Festubert road. These were sent forward with stretcher parties and six medical officers. This was the beginning of a very “bloody” night. All that evening and all night wounded were continually coming in. I was on duty in the château as surgeon till 4 a.m., when another medical officer relieved me. Red Cross ambulances were driven up frequently and took away all our lightly wounded and those fit to travel. These were sent to Bethune, and thus the château was kept from becoming too congested. These Red Cross ambulances had been provided and equipped by British residents in Paris; they were splendidly handled, and proved a godsend to us. Many of them were converted “Ford cars,” and could carry six lying-down patients and one sitting up beside the driver. The stretchers were swung on trestles and chains, and fitted easily. Our ambulance waggons and stretcher-bearers were out all night and had a very dangerous time at the front. At 10.30 next morning the heavy artillery firing eased off, and at eleven o’clock occurred one of those extraordinary lulls when all the big guns and little guns cease firing and everything seems strangely silent.

A chaplain arrived at the château in the morning and read the service over one of our wounded who had died during the night from a broken spine. The grave was dug near the flower garden at the foot of the lawn, and many graves were dug there in the three succeeding terrible weeks of fierce, bitter fighting. On this day the Dorsets, who were in reserve and quartered near the gate of our château, went into action and were badly handled by the Germans, suffering severe losses, chiefly from a concealed German machine-gun opening on to them from near the canal. The Devons had to move up later to support the Dorsets, and did it in a most gallant style. About two o’clock in the afternoon we had a great number of casualties; our waggons were constantly arriving, unloading their wounded, and setting off again for the front.

The Red Cross ambulances were evacuating the light cases as speedily as possible to Bethune, but we very soon had all our rooms full of wounded men and were working at high pressure at the operation table. At three o’clock the artillery firing was tremendously heavy, and every gun was in action. The château shook with the explosions; every window rattled and some were broken. The concussion of the air outside and the terrible din were distinctly unpleasant. Then the cracking of the rifle-firing became audible, and reports came in that our men were retiring. Shortly after an imperative order was sent to our O.C. telling him to evacuate the château at once with his wounded and move off the Field Ambulance to the other side of the canal. The horses were at once put in the various supply waggons. We had only two ambulance waggons at the time, as the rest were at the front collecting wounded. Some Red Cross ambulances, however, turned up and took away twelve of our most serious cases. All the lightly wounded were sent under charge of R.A.M.C. orderlies to walk back across the canal to Bethune. Some men with shrapnel wounds of thigh and leg also had to walk and get along somehow, and miserable and pitiable these poor fellows looked, limping and struggling along the muddy road in their bloody bandages. Things looked pretty serious at this moment, and I was ordered to mount and gallop ahead to direct the waggons on to the right road and to “round up” our poor wounded fellows who were trudging along the roads. To make matters worse, heavy rain came on. Big artillery practice always brought down the rain. I soon reached the head of our column and gave the sergeant the necessary instructions.

On the side of the road there was an old inn or estaminet. I pulled my horse up here and put two men on duty to stop all our walking wounded and collect them into the front room of the inn. I went inside and arranged with the woman in charge to light a big fire, make some tea, and have bread and butter and anything else she could get ready for our men, and to do it quickly. She set to work at once. I had then to gallop back to the Château Gorre to help get away the serious cases and to collect any empty lorry or waggon I could get. When I reached the château the O.C. told me that we had moved up some reserves, and the Germans in their turn were now retiring. He said that he would now keep his serious cases at the château till motor ambulances arrived. I was ordered to gallop again to the head of our column and turn back all the supply waggons, equipment carts, and water carts, but to send the ambulance waggons with their wounded on to Bethune. It was now dark, and after incredible trouble my mission was accomplished and our drivers were already driving the carts back. I now looked in at “mine inn.” All our wounded fellows were sitting round the fire having tea, bread and butter, and slices of cold boiled ham, and looked very happy. I asked the woman of the inn what the cost was, and she only charged me ten francs. I never parted with money so willingly. The privilege of being able to do something for these good lads, and their appreciation of the hot fire and the hot tea, was something I would not willingly forget.

The Château Gorre was once more re-established as an advanced ambulance dressing station, and continued so for over three weeks. It was situated right inside the shell zone, and had many “alarms and excursions” during this period, but none quite so dramatic and sensational as that recorded above. The work done by this ambulance at the château was extraordinarily good and useful, and owing to its very advanced position so close to the fighting line it was able to receive and treat the wounded very soon after they had been hit.

When the order came to evacuate at the time of the incident related above, the instructions given to our Commanding Officer were to get out all the lightly wounded cases and to leave the serious cases in the château. Our O.C. was a soldier, and he said that if he had to go he would get all the wounded out, and that he would be “damned if he would leave any seriously wounded man in the hands of the b—— Germans.” Strong language at times is sweet music, and our O.C. was a man of his word. The wounded men heard this story, and I heard some of them talking about it later to each other. The O.C. took a high place in their estimation.

At the château I was talking to a young lieutenant who had just received a commission in the D—— Regiment. He had served as a private at the beginning of the war and won his sergeant’s stripes for general good conduct and gallantry under fire, and was then given a commission in another regiment. He was hard put for a smoke, and could not get any cigarettes, but fortunately I was able to give him some.

Ten days later, at Bethune, he was brought in to me with a crushed arm, hanging by only a thread of muscle to the shoulder, and I had to amputate it under chloroform. He recognised me as the man who had given him the cigarettes, and said, “Hullo, doctor, you’re always doing me kind things, so now take my arm off.” I was very sorry that I had to do it, but such is war and the aftermath of victory.

Next day after our big alarm I was sent back by the Assistant Director of the Medical Service of this Division to take up duty at Bethune, four miles back from where we were, at the Château Gorre, and to help in the organisation for handling and treating our many wounded there. Bethune was on the other side of the canal to the château, and during the succeeding three or four weeks became a very big hospital centre for the British engaged in the direction of La Bassée.

The Field Ambulance headquarters, with the waggons, still remained at the château closer to the firing line, and evacuated their many wounded as speedily as possible in to us at Bethune. These were strenuous days of hard and obstinate fighting, and the casualties were heavy. The life of the medical officer was at this place arduous and sleepless, but the motto of the Royal Army Medical Corps is “In arduis fidelis,” which may be freely rendered “Always do your job.”