Suddenly a fire-storm broke loose from the direction of Sapign-ies. No question, this smooth rumbling, this incessant roaring and stamping signified more than merely the turning back of our ill-conceived little attack. Over me I saw the granite face of Lieutenant Schrader under his steel helmet, loading and firing like a machine. There as a conversation between us that was a little like the tower scene in St Joan. Albeit, I didn’t feel amused, because I had the clear sense I was done for.
Schrader rarely had time to toss me a few words, because I didn’t really figure any more. Feeling my own feebleness, I tried to glean from his expression how things stood for us up there. It appeared that the attackers were gaining ground, because I heard him call out more frequently and with greater alarm to his neighbours, pointing out targets that must be very close at hand.
Suddenly, as when a dam breaks under the pressure of flood water, the cry went up:
‘They’ve broken through on the left! They’re round the back of us!’ going from mouth to mouth. At that terrible instant, I felt my life force beginning to glimmer again like a spark. I was able to push two fingers into a mouse-or mole-hole level with my arm. Slowly I pulled myself up, while the blood that was bogging my lungs trickled out of my wounds. As it drained away, I felt relief. With bare head and open tunic, I stared out at the battle.
A line of men with packs plunged straight ahead through whitish swathes of smoke. A few stopped and lay where they fell, others performed somersets like rabbits do. A hundred yards in front of us, the last of them were drawn into the cratered landscape. They must have belonged to a very new outfit that hadn’t been tested under fire, because they showed the courage of inexperience.
Four tanks crawled over a ridge, as though pulled along on a string. In a matter of minutes, the artillery had smashed them to the ground. One broke in half, like a child’s toy car. On the right, the valiant cadet Mohrmann collapsed with a death shout. He was as brave as a young lion; I had seen that at Cambrai already. He was felled by a bullet square in the middle of his forehead, better aimed than the one that he had once bandaged up for me.
The affair didn’t seem to be irrevocably lost. I whispered to Corporal Wilsky to creep a little left, and enfilade the gap in the line with his machine-gun. He came back straight away and reported that twenty yards beyond everyone had surrendered. That was part of another regiment. So far I had been clutching a tuft of grass with my left hand like a steering column. Now I succeeded in turning round, and a strange sight met my eyes. The British had begun to penetrate sectors of the line to the left of us, and were sweeping them with fixed bayonets. Before I could grasp the proximity of the danger, I was distracted by another, more startling development: at our backs were other attackers, coming towards us, escorting prisoners with their hands raised! It seemed that the enemy must have broken into the abandoned village only moments after we had left it to make our attack. At that instant, they tightened the noose round our necks; we had completely lost contact.
The scene was getting more and more animated. A ring of British and Germans surrounded us and called on us to drop our weapons. It was pandemonium, as on a sinking ship. In my feeble voice, I called upon the men near me to fight on. They shot at friend and foe. A ring of silent or yelling bodies circled our little band. To the left of me, two colossal British soldiers plunged their bayonets into a piece of trench, from where I could see beseeching hands thrust out.
Among us, too, there were now loud yells: ‘It’s no use! Put your guns down! Don’t shoot, comrades!’
I looked at the two officers who were standing in the trench with me. They smiled back, shrugged, and dropped their belts on the ground.
There was only the choice between captivity and a bullet. I crept out of the trench, and reeled towards Favreuil. It was as in a bad dream, where you can’t pick your feet off the floor. The only thing in my favour was perhaps the utter confusion, in which some were already exchanging cigarettes, while others were still butchering each other. Two Englishmen, who were leading back a troop of prisoners from the 99th, confronted me. I aimed my pistol at the nearer of the two, and pulled the trigger. The other blazed his rifle at me and missed. My hurried movements pushed the blood from my lungs in bright spurts. I could breathe more easily, and started running along the trench. Behind a traverse crouched Lieutenant Schlager in the middle of a group of blazing rifles. They fell in with me. A few British, who were making their way over the field, stopped, set down a Lewis gun on the ground, and fired at us. Except for Schlager and me and a couple of others, everyone went down. Schlager, who was extremely shortsighted, told me later that all he had been able to see was my map case flying up and down. That was his signal. The loss of blood gave me the lightness and airiness of intoxication, the only thing that worried me was that I might break down too soon.
Finally, we reached a semi-circular earthworks to the right of Favreuil, from where half a dozen heavy machine-guns were spitting lead at friend and foe alike. Either the noose hadn’t been completely drawn tight, or else this was one last pocket of resistance; we had been lucky to find it. Enemy bullets shattered on sandbags, officers yelled, excited men leaped here and there. A medical officer from the 6th Company ripped my tunic off, and told me to lie down immediately, otherwise I might bleed to death in a matter of minutes.
I was rolled in a tarpaulin and dragged to the entrance of Favreuil, accompanied by some of my soldiers, and some from the 6th. The village was already heaving with British, so it was inevitable that we soon came under fire from very short range. The medical officer of the 6th, who was holding the back end of my tarpaulin, went down, shot in the head; I fell with him.
The little group had thrown themselves flat on the ground, and, lashed by bullets, were trying to creep to the nearest dip in the ground.
I stayed behind on the field, bundled up in my tarpaulin, almost apathetically waiting for the shot that would put an end to this Odyssey.
But even in my hopeless plight I was not forsaken; my companions were keeping an eye on me, and soon fresh efforts were made to rescue me. At my ear I heard the voice of Corporal Hengstmann, a tall blond Lower Saxon: ‘I’ll take you on my back, sir, either we’ll get through or we won’t!’
Unfortunately, we didn’t get through; there were too many rifles waiting at the edge of the village. Hengstmann started running, while I wrapped my arms around his neck. Straight away they started banging away, as if it were a prize-shoot at a funfair. After a few bounds, a soft metallic buzz indicated that Hengstmann had stopped one. He collapsed gently under me, making no sound, but I could feel that Death had claimed him even before we touched the ground. I freed myself from his arms, which were still securing me, and saw that a bullet had drilled through his steel helmet and his temple. The brave fellow was the son of a teacher in Letter near Hanover. As soon as I was able to walk, I called on his parents, and gave them my report on their son.
This discouraging example didn’t deter the next volunteer from making a bid to rescue me. This was Sergeant Strichalsky of the Medical Corps. He put me on his shoulders, and, while a second shower of bullets whistled around us, he carried me safely to the shelter of a little hump of ground.