9th-12th-Lancers - Year 2003 - Page 0076
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| Regiment | 9th/12th Lancers |
|---|---|
| Year | 2003 |
| Transcription |
74 REGIMENTAL JOURNAL OF THE 9TH/12TH ROYAL LANCERS (PRINCE OF WALES’S) In September 1917, Martin noted the severe treatment meted out by the French authorities to strikers: ‘I was down in Boulogne this other day, they have fairly dropped bombs on it and the day before... the “Gyppy” dock workers struck, so they turned a machine gun on them and they killed 400 of the dev- ils’. The normally dispassionate Martin stated the contempt which soldiers often held towards wartime strikers: ‘that’s what they ought to do at home....’ His mother Jessie often sent Martin welcome supplies of life’s comforts, cakes, ham, port, oranges, chocolates and socks! The Regiment staged polo matches, race meetings and horse shows. A fall in a show jumping competition once sent Martin to hos- pital with concussion and contusions from which happily he made a rapid recovery. Occasionally the officers enjoyed some rough shooting. In April 1917 Martin wrote: ‘the other day ‘Tiny’ Busk (one of his fellow-subalterns) and I got forth and slew one roe deer, which is excellent eating. I have been looking around for wild pork with out any success so far.’ Martin and a brother-officer twice went to Paris on leave, once visiting the Folies Bergere which did not impress them: ‘Rotten show, atmosphere appalling, beset on all sides by ladies of doubtfiJl virtue’. Returning from leave in the UK, he managed to smug- gle a dog ashore past the watchful eyes of the police and the landing officer. Strangely enough, his letters never mentioned the dog again. Martin’s letters contain a hint of the resentment felt by Regimental soldiers towards higher ranking officers and the staff, directed in their case against their divisional command- er, General Mullens. On March 12 1916 Martin wrote to his father: ‘On Sat. we had a divisional route march, the column stretched for some 8 miles...and as it was a very cold day and as we could not go out of a walk it was not greatly appreciated by all concerned except perhaps by Gen. Mullins (sic) who arrived in a Rolls Royce with tons of rugs, etc’. In retrospect, it seems strange that a mere divisional commander should be entitled to a Rolls Royce. In the following month Martin gave his father a vivid description of a divisional inspection, enlivened by his irreverent sense of humour: ‘We went to the sea-side today to be inspected by Maj. Gen Mullins. We arose at 3 am. to get to the sea by about 9 am. where the whole division formed up in line and the Gen. galloped down fol- lowed by an enormous staff who were all taken in charge. (i.e. their chargers ran away with them) He had a good gallop of about 4 miles down the line and his horse nearly collapsed when he passed us in a sort of quick sand but the gallant staff rose to the occasion and warned ‘ his fatness’ of his impending downfall, so all was well. We got back to billets at 3.30 pm feeling very bored with the world in general.’ In May 1916 Martin was back at the seaside telling his sister Jean: ‘We are ‘au bord de la mer ‘and have been here 3 days. Coming here was awful, every thing white with dust but the first thing we did on arrival was to swim the horses which was great fun especially as the sea was ‘boiling hot’. It is simply great fun. It is simply top-hole bathing. Yesterday we played polo on the sands, we defeated the 18th by 2 goals but we had to change our field twice as it got a bit rough....’ Those who have swum in the English Channel might challenge Martin’s opinion of its tem- perature! In April 1917 the Regiment was put on readiness during yet another abortive big push, the battle of Arras: ‘We have been up to the battle...every night it snowed, every one had to sleep out in it, very wet and beastly cold, hairies (the affectionate nick- name for the Regimental horses) looked appalling with mud up to their hocks and two inches of snow up to their hocks. The Cavalry Corps lost about 2,000 hairies from being shot at and exposure.’ The horses suffered much from the excesses of the weather. In June 1917: ‘The hairies have to stand out in the heat all day long and you can hardly put your hand on their backs, there isn’t any shade...’ In the severe January of 1918: ‘No one has been on a hairy for a fortnight, the unfortunate bloods get walked up and down for an hour every morning about 6 or 7 of them come most imperial tosses. The worst part is going down to water as the track they go down is just like glass, and you can’t keep frost nails in them all the time, because the poor devils get corns.’ The Cavalry was given various chores including the unpleasant task which Martin called vulturing, the burying of corpses and bringing in the wounded from No Man’s Land. Writing to Hy in July 1916 during the Battle of the Somme: ‘It is not a very nice job but much more interesting than living back with the Regt. Where everyone is longing to do something (Martin’s let- ters indicate that this was a frequent complaint in the Regiment) I had a quite exciting ride up to this place...we...have to bring the wounded down from about 1 ? miles from the present front line. Two days later he told Jessie: ...we had quite a merry night, old Fritz would not leave us alone; he kept on sending over ‘coal boxes’ (a particularly lethal type of shell) and ...shrapnel all night ...and gas. You cannot imagine the row that goes on all night.’ Martin was briefly in charge of a POW Camp and in January 1917 he told Hy: ‘I am digging again or rather...laying railways: it’s wonderful what the Brit. Cav. can do when they really try. Our OC I believe is the G.WR. director, made a General for the job.’ Martin was referring to Sir Eric Geddes, the former Deputy General Manager ofthe North-Eastern Railway, whom Haig had made Director-General of Military Railways in France with the rank of Major-General. Geddes was a man with a well deserved reputation for getting things done. In 1916-1917 he built over 1,000 miles of track at a rate as high as 50 miles a week. The employment ofa detachment of the Ninth in this astonishingly successful venture indicates, as Martin noted, the adaptability of the British cavalry. Haig thought so highly of Geddes that he named him as a godfather for his son, born in March 1918. On the basis of his achievements Geddes was sent to the Admiralty to take charge of their shipbuilding programme and two months later in July 1917 promoted First Lord of the Admiralty. In November 1917 the Ninth was stood to for the Battle of Cambrai. Martin’s war diary relates a series of forced marches and cavalry actions, in which he took part on the first two days of the Battle (November 20 and 21). Martin then acted as a Squadron Leader of a dismounted party, telling Jessie on November 26 that he was: ‘40 ft underground in a Bosch dug- out in the Hindenburg Line... Last night I was sent out on patrol. We were fired on most of the time by snipers and machine guns. Two days later he wrote to James: We are out of the fight now and back in billets. On the whole the show was quite good fun for the cavalry...we managed to slay about 160 Huns...Yesterday we came out of the ditches at 3.30 am and marched 14 miles, snow and gale all the way, reached the Regiment at 8.30 and moved off on horses at 9.45. So you can imagine the men were prettybeat when they arrived here at 5.30 pm...not having slept for 3 nights on account of the cold and damp, and no cover and very little food, but all is well again.’ This is a testament to the spirit of the Regiment in these adverse conditions. In March 1918 the German Army, heavily reinforced by divi- sions transferred from the Eastern Front, mounted a massive offensive against the overstretched British Fifth Army, which was forced to retreat. In the process a gap opened between two British Corps. On the morning of March 24 the Ninth was dis- mounted and dug in on a ridge east of the village of Montauban. At around 9 am on the next day the Germans attacked. The |
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