Now It Can Be Told · Part VI · Part 6 10 (2/2)

“Yes, I can hear you. Yes, go on. ‘Our men seen leaving High Wood.’ Yes. ‘Shelled by our artillery.’ Are you sure of that? I say, are you sure they were our men? Another message. Well, carry on. ‘Men digging on road from High Wood southeast to Longueval.’ Yes, I’ve got that. ‘They are our men and not Boches.’ Oh, hell!⁠ ⁠… Get off the line. Get off the line, can’t you?⁠ ⁠… ‘Our men and not Boches.’ Yes, I have that. ‘Heavily shelled by our guns.’ ”

The staff-officer tapped on the table with a lead-pencil a tattoo, while his forehead puckered. Then he spoke into the telephone again.

“Are you there, ‘Heavies’?⁠ ⁠… Well, don’t disturb those fellows for half an hour. After that I will give you new orders. Try and confirm if they are our men.”

He rang off and turned to me.

“That’s the trouble. Looks as if we had been pounding our own men like hell. Some damn fool reports ‘Boches.’ Gives the reference number. Asks for the ‘Heavies.’ Then some other fellow says: ‘Not Boches. For God’s sake cease fire!’ How is one to tell?”

I could not answer that question, but I hated the idea of our men sent forward to capture a road or a trench or a wood and then “pounded” by our guns. They had enough pounding from the enemy’s guns. There seemed a missing link in the system somewhere. Probably it was quite inevitable.

Over and over again the wounded swore to God that they had been shelled by our own guns. The Londoners said so from High Wood. The Australians said so from Mouquet Farm. The Scots said so from Longueval! They said: “Why the hell do we get murdered by British gunners? What’s the good of fighting if we’re slaughtered by our own side?”

In some cases they were mistaken. It was enfilade fire from German batteries. But often it happened according to the way of that telephone conversation in the tent by Bronfay Farm.

The difference between British soldiers and German soldiers crawling over shell-craters or crouching below the banks of a sunken road was no more than the difference between two tribes of ants. Our flying scouts, however low they flew, risking the Archies and machine-gun bullets, often mistook khaki for field gray, and came back with false reports which led to tragedy.