Willy Breton

“ What words can fitly describe the patience, courage and endurance of these workers, perpetually overlooked by the enemy, toiling to exhaustion under the fire of machine-guns trained on our lines, exposed to death-dealing bombs, a single one of which would sometimes nullify the efforts of a whole night or burst like a thunder-clap in the midst of a group of men, scattering death and horrible wounds? ”

“ As the soldiers of justice and right, they wish to be—and will be—the soldiers also of deliverance and liberty. They know that their hour is coming and that they cannot choose it; but they are ready to throw themselves heart and soul into the thick of the fray when they get the impatiently awaited signal.
Meanwhile they are content simply to do their hard duty in what remains of a free country—a tiny corner of Belgium where the eye sees nothing but a vast battlefield with its ruins; its camps, bubbling with active life ”

“ Simultaneously with the tremendous effort which resulted in its glorious resurrection, the Belgian Army has done wonders along this front under peculiarly trying conditions, by dint of hard work and stoical endurance. Amid mud and water its soldiers have raised fortifications which are models of strength and ingenuity. So that the Belgian front, despite the unparalleled difficulties to be overcome, is admittedly among those whose defences have been constructed in the most solid possible manner. It is, in fact, a vast fortress, extending over many square kilometres. ”

“ Carrying loads which added to the difficulties of progress, the men plodded along almost indistinguishable paths and tracks where the least slip threatened to send them headlong into deep mud. Extreme caution was needed to avoid rousing the enemy. Lights were constantly thrown up from his lines, flooding the dreary country with their pale radiance. When one rose, the men instantly threw themselves flat in the mire. ”

“ The soft bottoms of the whole system of defences must also be carefully consolidated to render their occupation possible and to enable the men to move about with ease. Duckboards, assembled just behind the front and then brought into the lines, have had to be laid everywhere with infinite labour in the muddy bottom of the trenches—dozens of miles of them—and relaid heaven only knows how often! ”

“ These conditions are all the more difficult to fulfil when the defences are rendered less permanent by the nature of the ground, as is the case on the Belgian front, where one cannot burrow into soil which is practically at sea level. It thus comes about that—to take an example—the organised zone, 10 to 12 kilometres deep, between the two natural defensive lines of the Yser and the Loo canal, is nothing more than an unbroken series of organised lines, placing as many successive obstacles in the path of an assailant who may have succeeded in breaking through at any point. ”

“ The first defensive measure consisted in the construction of trenches, which it was imperative to build at once, whether in water which oozed up at all points or in deep mud. Working with feverish activity, men piled sand-bags, brought up in a constant stream from the rear, on the marshy soil. In this manner parapets of a steadily increasing solidity slowly formed a continuous front which, though still of doubtful strength, sufficed to protect the occupied zone against surprise attacks. ”

“ On November 10th, 1914, the weakened French and Belgian troops, whose muddy trenches had been blown to pieces by the bombardment, had to give ground before the enemy's pressure and fall back on to the left bank of the Yser, leaving the ruins of Dixmude in the hands of the Germans. But all attempts of the enemy to cross the river were fruitless. The Germans encountered so stubborn a resistance that they soon abandoned a project which had already cost them frightful losses.
With the approach of winter, fighting gradually died down all along the Flanders front. ”

“ Can anyone realise fully the kind of life Belgian soldiers are leading, even now that the essential military works are completed? A division guarding a sector of the front invariably divides its time between duty in the trenches, outpost duty and rest. ”

“ During the happy times of peace the only shelter to be found on the plain was that of the villages or hamlets, their houses as a rule grouped round a slated steeple, and of the isolated farms whose red roofs relieved the monotony of the landscape with bright splashes of colour. ”

“ The features emphasised by us will enable readers to understand the very special character of the defence works which it has had to construct, and the amount of patient labour which was and still is imposed on it.
For Germany is not the only foe that the Belgian Army has to fight. It must struggle ceaselessly with the weather and the treacherous water which oozes from the inhospitable soil and gnaws at the foundations of defences whereon shells and bombs fall day in, day out. It lives in a country which has a disagreeable climate; where rain persists for two-thirds of the year ”

“ For three years German guns have battered everything within range, and converted the humble, peaceful villages of Veurne-Ambacht into heaps of ruins. One must go far behind the front to find any premises that have still escaped shell-fire. In them have been established all the organisations which need not be actually in the lines, and there also are quartered as large a part as possible of the resting units. But they cannot hold all the troops not in the trenches ”

“ Communication trenches, allowing movement out of sight of the enemy, connect the various positions, and the successive lines of a position, with one another. Shelters have to be constructed everywhere—they cannot be built too strong, to protect the men as much as possible from bombardment and from the weather during their long spells on guard in the trenches. Special emplacements must be most carefully prepared for machine-guns, bomb-throwers and trench-mortars, which play a part too important to need special comment. ”

“ So everything—sand-bags, stakes, tree-trunks, rails, cement, bricks, shingle, hurdles, barbed wire—has to be moved to the front lines by night on men's backs or in light vehicles able to carry only a strictly limited load, as a heavy one could not be got along the muddy and soft roads. ”

“ Yet in this, as in other spheres of activity, work can never stop. Bad weather and bombardment alike inflict constant havoc; and in spite of the most ingenious precautions the enemy always succeeds eventually in spotting the emplacement of this or that battery or in marking off an area which conceals a group of batteries. A furious fire from heavy guns is then concentrated upon the point discovered, and by the time our artillery manages to [Pg 33] silence it the damage done is sometimes of such a nature that works which represent long months of labour may have to be practically reconstructed. ”

“ Nevertheless, our men have never been able to consider their job quite done, since on the Belgian front one has constantly to reconstruct, repair, even entirely rebuild, fortifications damaged by the enemy's fire or by water—that second foe which is often more destructive than the first. ”

“ To give a better idea of the work imposed on the Belgian Army it will be convenient to summarise what, in the present war, is implied by organising the defences of a sector. The power of modern artillery and explosives, which are able to destroy the most massive fortifications, renders it impossible to rest content with a single position, however strong it may be. Hence the absolute necessity for extending the state of defence to a deep zone and for creating [Pg 13] several successive positions. ”

“ Among the ruins rise practically indestructible observation posts, themselves invisible from afar, but commanding the whole country. From these a ceaseless watch is kept upon the enemy's lines. Artificial screens protect the works from direct observation, and clever "camouflage" entirely conceals them from overhead view. To mislead the enemy, "dummy" batteries are scattered about everywhere. Many reserve positions have also been prepared so that, should the need arise, the batteries may be shifted and re-concentrated in different sectors. ”

“ Concrete Shelters, Redoubts and Fighting-Posts.—The weakness of earthworks constructed with sand-bags, which are scattered in all directions by bursting shells, has compelled us to build numerous concrete shelters, though the [Pg 26] work is beset by many difficulties and sometimes has to be executed right under the enemy's nose—bombproofs, machine-gun posts and fighting-posts for the battalion, regimental and battery staffs. All construction of this kind must be preceded by a thorough consolidation of the ground, which in its natural condition is too soft to support such heavy weights. ”

“ It would be a good thing if one could regard the works when once carried through as definitely finished; but that would be too much to hope for, since the most solid revetments crumble in sorry fashion under bombardment, and the elements also seem to be bent on destroying them. Anything heavy settles little by little, owing to the lack of consistency in the subsoil. In bad weather especially, when the rain never ceases and the floods spread, our men daily report parapets giving way and duckboards disappearing under the water or mud. ”

“ Finally, provision must be made for draining off the water promptly and carefully, should the need arise, so as to prevent a disaster being caused by the enemy increasing the inundation, or merely by the torrential rain which falls at times with disheartening persistence in this depressing region. A constant struggle between the two opponents was thus always in progress. Let us say at once that the ingenuity and unwearying exertions of our men always triumphed in contests of this kind. They continue to dominate the situation completely, and the Germans have had to own themselves beaten. ”

“ The magnitude of the movements of troops and material, as well as the need for ensuring rapid transfer in all directions, have compelled the creation of all means of communication to alleviate the existing shortage—roads, tracks and railways of standard or narrow gauge. The execution of such work is attended by great difficulty where the soft nature of the soil gives an unreliable foundation. ”

“ At every step the men stumbled in the heavy and sticky mud, over displaced cobbles or in shell-holes brimming with water. They had to struggle along in this fashion, sometimes for hours on end, to reach the "material depôts" where such sand-bags, stakes, corrugated iron sheets, barbed wire and tools as could be got together were distributed among them. To-day there is an abundance of all these things ”

“ While engaged in continually harassing the enemy and also putting the fortress into a proper condition for defence, the Belgian Army was preparing, in the closing days of September, for a fresh and vigorous offensive to be directed chiefly against the left wing of the German containing forces, when it was confronted by a pressing danger which completely altered the aspect of affairs. ”

“ But perhaps in these few pages we may have succeeded in making the merit of our fearless and tenacious troops better appreciated, and in showing how well they have earned the homage due to the determined energy which they have displayed for more than three years, with no thought but that of valiantly performing a duty of prime importance to the common cause, though it brings no glory with it. ”

“ Work of any importance could not, of course, be done in broad daylight, for, as we have already said, nothing escaped the enemy's notice. Though far away, his guns never ceased to plough up the grounds, and to what losses should we not have exposed ourselves had we attempted to strengthen our positions in daylight, close up to his fines and before his very eyes! ”

“ You may imagine also how complicated the task is when foot-bridges, in many cases several hundred yards long, have to be carried right across the floods in full view of the enemy, to give access to the most advanced positions. In conclusion, we may mention among the most important undertakings the vast network of telegraph and telephone wires, with which the whole of the occupied zone has to be covered in order to inter-connect the numberless centres and keep them in touch with the posts close to the enemy lines. ”

“ Without fear of being accused of exaggeration, we may, therefore, reckon the total length of the trenches which the Belgian Army had to make, as 10 to 15 times that of the front itself. To this we must add the many kilometres of communication trenches which allow the men to move from one line to another without being seen and to a certain extent without being hit by the enemy. ”

“ The only means of blinding him was to protect all our works with artificial screens, composed of branches, hurdles and canvas set or hung all over the area occupied. Viewed by an observer in the German lines, these screens overlap in such a way as to form a virtually unbroken barrier, impenetrable to the eye.
To the layman this picturesque solution of the problem may seem simplicity itself, because he does not take into account the trouble of establishing these screens. As usual, all materials have to be brought to the spot from the rear. ”