Casca 21: The Trench Soldier (7 page)

Casca looked over the side at the tiny creatures. They looked so pathetic, their activity so pointless and random. Killing one of them would be like crushing an ant.

"No," he replied, "it's a waste of ammo, and one of them might get lucky and hit us."

The captain nodded and jerked at the line that ran through loops along the tether line, and a moment later Casca felt the balloon start to move back toward the British lines as the
Tommies at the aeronaut station hauled them in.

The commanders on both sides remained cautious, the two forces sitting just out of sight of each other, separated by the gently rolling river plains of French farmland.

Casca's company was at breakfast when alarms sounded, and they raced for the trenches. But there were no troops rushing across the enlarged no-man's-land. The threat was in the air.

An enormous dirigible was maneuvering a few hundred yards toward the British lines and perhaps two hundred feet above the ground.

Officers were shouting orders. Men were trying to tilt the machine guns in its direction. Casca and most of the infantrymen were firing their rifles at the gleaming ship. Although it was moving at about the speed of a motor car, perhaps fifty miles an hour, Casca considered that the huge ship made an easy target as it
traveled in a straight line and stayed at the same height.

The Zeppelin made a number of passes back and forth and then dropped lower and cruised along directly above the trenches. Explosions erupted beneath it, and fires broke out in the trenches. As it approached Casca could see half a dozen bombs the size of pineapples falling toward his trench, and then he saw a much bigger bomb, the size of a large oil drum.

Every gun was now aimed at the giant airship, and thousands of rounds were being fired at it, the tracer rounds from the machine guns gleaming white in the sunlight. Either they were deflected from the huge metal frame, or they passed harmlessly through the hydrogen bags, but they seemed to have no effect.

The bombs crashed into the trench around the dog-leg where Casca crouched. There was a deafening roar and a great eruption of orange flame. The blast of hot air almost knocked Casca off his feet. Then one of the smaller bombs landed a few yards away, filling the trench with fire. Several men burst into flames where they stood and ran about the trench like screaming torches until they died on their feet. A second large bomb exploded on the ground beyond the trench.

As the ship passed overhead Casca could easily read the name in huge letters on its side: Graf Ferdinand von Zeppelin-L.3.

Casca estimated that the flying ship was at least five hundred feet long. German sailors were firing rifles from the gondola that hung below the balloon and at the rear Casca could see the three huge propellers that pushed the mighty ship through the air.

Somewhere some bullets took effect, probably the heat of a tracer ignited the hydrogen. There was a bright flash. The Germans in the gondola stopped shooting and started to run about in a panic. One of the great propellers stopped turning. The big ship turned sideways in the air and began to slip toward the ground.

It dropped closer and closer to the ground. The nose rose skyward as if it were trying to gain height, but the rear sagged more toward the ground as it passed away from the British trenches and back toward the ridge that concealed the German lines.

But it failed to clear the ridge. The propellers at the sagging rear fouled in the treetops, and the big ship came to a stop. There was a flash of bright flame, followed by a dull crash and then an explosion. Flames darted upward from the propeller area and played around the rigid casing of the balloon.

A great white flash tore the shell apart and a moment later the sound of an enormous explosion came to the watching
Tommies. More flashes were followed by more explosions as one after another the hydrogen-filled compartments exploded.

The fire seemed to have started toward the rear of the gondola where the propellers were jammed in the treetops. Casca could see men leaping from the front of the gondola to the ground, but this part of the ship was still at least a hundred feet high, and none of the men moved after they hit the ground.

The flames spread as dead trees were set afire, and there were still more explosions as successive compartments of hydrogen ignited.

Slowly the nose of the ship came down, the gondola flattening its length among the dead trees. Now scores of men were leaping to the ground and running from the ship. The great rigid gas bag was collapsing over the wreck of the gondola.

Suddenly the whole ship disappeared in a great white flash. The running men burst into flames and fell writhing to the ground, and all around dead trees burst into flame.

Casca stood staring in the direction of the flames, reflecting that just yesterday he had been flying in a similar, though very much smaller balloon. And as he watched the Germans frying in their tracks, he thought grimly that, no doubt, he would soon be flying in one again.

Although the British Army had been using hydrogen and hot air balloons for observation purposes since 1884, when they had been introduced into the African campaigns, there was no organized system for utilization of the information that was gathered. Balloon observers identified objectives and passed the relevant map coordinates to gunners by carrier pigeon. The observers also spotted where artillery shells were falling and corrected the gunners' aim with pigeon-carried messages. Artillery officers, however, had little faith in such information and tended to vary it according to information from other sources or through their own intuition.

The difficulties of aerial navigation were considerable, particularly in terrain such as the rolling river valleys of this part of France. There were no dramatically significant landmarks. Farms, roads, rivers, villages, churches were all of similar size, and when viewed from a height were virtually identical.

The speed of a balloon in flight was almost impossible to calculate, so that, once out of sight of their own lines, balloon observers were forced to operate almost entirely by guesswork, although they called it dead reckoning.

Because of these problems, headquarters staff generally discounted or ignored strategic information supplied by the aeronauts on the basis that it could be dangerous to act on information that was of dubious accuracy. But Major Cartwright was convinced of the value of the aerial information and had come up with the idea that it could best be validated by the same observer walking over the ground and confirming or modifying the data.

So shortly after dark Casca found himself in company with six other men crossing no-man's-land, heading for the German lines which were now about five miles distant. Sergeant George was in charge of the party and, for once, was not wearing a kilt but a conventional uniform like the others. All of them were smeared from head to foot in black mud, their faces and hands blackened with soot. Cockney Dave and Hugh Edwards had volunteered to come along, and two more Welsh miners and a Highlander made up the team. For his new responsibilities and in recognition of his service, Casca was promoted to corporal.

There was a fine September moon and their progress was easy enough for the first mile or so. They made their way across the pockmarked landscape skirting shell craters and wading across numerous small streams. They came to the Vesle River at a point where it was crossed by a broad road running east to the city of Rheims. They were still more than a mile from the Aisne River and the troops that Casca had spotted from the air, but there was a large force of Germans on the bridge and, Casca guessed, other detachments patrolling the adjacent area.

Casca had easily persuaded Major Cartwright to open up the
armory, and each man was well provided with ammunition and carrying half a dozen Mills bombs. They were also carrying several sticks of dynamite, and Sergeant George readily agreed that the bridge made a tempting target for demolition.

However, whether to take it or not was another matter.

Casca was irked by the lack of a specific objective. To blow up the bridge would certainly impede the German advance, and the surprise attack within their own lines would no doubt disturb and demoralize the German troops and confuse their high command. But this war was being run from London, and should Whitehall order a British attack, the destruction of the bridge would severely impede their own offensive.

After much discussion it was decided to plant the explosives while they had the opportunity and to postpone the demolition decision until their return.

Their first objective was to confirm the disposition of the large concentration of enemy troops that Casca had spotted from the air. So it was agreed that no matter what happened, Casca would continue in that direction, alone if necessary. The others split into two groups, Hugh and the two Welshmen to enter the riverbed to the east and work their way upstream to the foundation of the bridge while George and the other two moved beyond the bridge to come downstream to the northern end of the bridge. If either party were spotted, the other would create a diversion and then both would retreat for the British lines while Casca went on to reconnoiter alone.

"It's hardly high strategy," George chuckled, "but it should serve the trick."

The early Autumn weather came to their assistance. The moon clouded over, a chill wind sprang up, and the men on duty on the bridge withdrew to their hut and fire on the north bank.

Both parties made it to the bridge undetected and planted their charges, running a fast-burning fuse up the southern bank. They also lashed Mills bombs to the charges and ran lines from these to the bank. They found Casca in the agreed spot on the far bank and resumed their movement northward toward the Aisne.

They had not gone very far before they heard movement ahead. They guessed a dozen or so Germans on a routine patrol and went to the ground in some of the abundant craters until the enemy had passed out of earshot. Sure that they were in safe territory, the Germans were making no attempt at concealment or any real effort to observe. They talked and joked as they moved and would have been easy pickings had not discretion been of much greater import.

The
Tommies split up again, this time into three groups: George and the Highlander in the lead, Casca and Cockney Dave following, and Hugh Edwards and the others bringing up the rear.

More German patrols appeared, but they were easily avoided, and the
Tommies were soon back together by a small knoll in a bend on the south bank of the Aisne.

Casca spread out a military map and ran over the information he had gathered from the air. Working from the bend in the river, he rattled off the various objectives, describing the field hospital, the artillery positions, trenches, and the places where he had seen the large numbers of men moving field pieces and mule wagons.

Each man took one of the objectives and in turn slipped off into the darkness to confirm its existence. Within an hour they were all back at the knoll except for Cockney Dave who had been told to find the hospital. They waited another half hour, then Casca proposed that he go look for him.

"You can't be spared, Cass," Sergeant George answered in a whisper. "You're the key to all this information."

"But I know exactly where the hospital is. I can find it in minutes – anybody else might be blundering around for hours."

"Aye, I daresay ye can find the hospital, but finding the boy might be another matter. Maybe the Germans have found him. I'm sorry, Cass, but what we've got now is too valuable to lose. I wouldn't risk another man after him if he were me own brother.

Casca couldn't argue. The moon had come out again, and it might well be foolhardy to go looking for a man who might already be a prisoner.

They waited another five minutes, and George had just given the order to move back when Hugh spoke. "There's somebody crossing the river," he said, "a ways upstream. Can I go look?"

Sergeant George agreed reluctantly. "But whatever ye find, come right back."

Hugh slipped quietly away and they waited. In a few minutes Casca heard a movement. He eased back his rifle bolt and closed it gently, the hammer cocked behind the round in the breech. There was a low whistle, and Sergeant George answered. A moment later they heard Hugh's voice, quiet but urgent. "Don't shoot, it's us." And a minute later he and Dave were climbing the knoll.

Dave grinned sheepishly in the moonlight. "Sorry, mates. I've never been out in the country alone before. It ain't like Lunnon, is it? Not a bleedin' gaslight nor a street sign anywhere. And no bobbies to ask the way, either."

Casca had to stifle a laugh.

"Did you find a hospital?" George demanded.

"Oh yeah," the Cockney replied, "that part was easy.
It's right where Cass said it would be. Gettin' back 'ere was the part that flummoxed me."

"Let's go get that bridge," George said, and they moved off in three parties as they had come.

Casca was relieved that Sergeant George had decided to destroy the bridge. He endorsed the decision but was even more relieved that he didn't have to make it himself.

"
Och, mon," George had laughed at his concern. "It's only a wee bridge. It won't win or lose the war either way. I've seen a bit too much of high strategy to care too much for it. Strategy is the name the high command gives to whatever happens to work – and not too much that comes out of the high command does work. If it don't work, they call it faulty tactics, and blame it on bad decision making in the field. If it turns out that we need the bridge, then it's just too bad. After what I've seen tonight, I sure don't want the Jerries using it against us." He broke into a low chuckle. "And, boy, won't they be surprised when it blows. That makes this whole caper worthwhile."

When they got to the river, it was bathed in bright moonlight. The clouds had blown away, the wind had died, and now there were a dozen or so German soldiers strolling back and forth on the bridge. There were more Germans by the fire on the north bank and, no doubt, more inside the guard hut and still more patrolling the area. If the decision had not already been made, Casca would have been for abandoning the attempt, crossing farther downstream, and heading for home.

As it was, they proceeded according to the set plan.

Casca and Dave moved directly on the bridge, approaching as close to the guard hut as they dared. Then they waited. In the still night they could hear every footfall on the bridge and the conversation of the men by the fire.

A sudden explosion around the river bend upstream was followed by a furious fusillade of rifle fire and then another explosion.

The Germans on the bridge
came running back to the north bank. Those around the fire leapt to their feet and scurried about for their arms. Another four or five men stumbled sleepily out of the hut. A sergeant shouted orders, and most of the men set off at a run in the direction of the shots. As they reached the bend in the river, a similar eruption came from downstream. The running men came to a startled halt. The sergeant who had stayed at the bridge screamed at them and they ran on. He bellowed at the men around him, and they ran off in the direction of the new outburst.

Casca and Dave smiled at each other as they pulled the pins from two Mills bombs. Casca lobbed his toward the sergeant. Dave bowled his underarm down the slope toward the shots.

There were two loud detonations and bright orange flashes, and the sergeant and the fire disappeared.

Casca and Dave charged straight at the bridge. The single soldier left standing fired at them, but his shot went wide, and he was still working the bolt of his rifle when Casca's bayonet opened his gut.

"Messy fucking way to kill," he grumbled as he jerked the bayonet free, and the German fell into the puddle of his own blood and intestines.

They ran across the bridge and raced along the bank. Casca found the fuses and lit them while Dave was running for the lines to the Mills bombs.

"Forget the grenades," Casca shouted, and the two of them turned and ran up the steep bank.

At the top, they stopped to look back.

Upstream the startled Germans were looking back toward the now deserted bridge while just a few yards beyond them, out of sight around the river bend, George and his two Tommies were splashing across the stream. Downstream another bunch of confused soldiers were also staring at the bridge while Hugh and his mate were rushing into the river.

Casca and Dave opened fire on both groups. The range was rather long, but their fire added to the confusion of the leaderless troops. Both parties ran back toward the bridge. They arrived in time to be blown into the air with the stones and steel.

The Tommies abandoned all caution and ran, whooping and shouting for their own distant lines.

There was no pursuit. They ran until they were out of breath and then huddled in a shell crater to rest. Before dawn they were calling to the sentries in their own lines, and by daybreak headquarters had fully confirmed details of the enemy positions as well as a report on the demolition of the bridge.