The New York Times/1918/11/11/Spirit of Victory Fills Haig's Men
SPIRIT OF VICTORY FILLS HAIG'S MEN
They Pursue the Foe With Bands Playing and Rifles Decked with Flags.
BELGIANS CHEER ADVANCE
Crowds Throng the Churches, Singing "Te Deums" for Their Deliverance.
TOURNAI'S WEEKS OF FEAR
Inhabitants Had Cowered in Cellars in Fear of Deadly Gas Bombardment.
By PHILIP GIBBS.
Copyright, 1918, by The New York Times Company.
Special Cable to The New York Times.
WITH THE BRITISH ARMIES.
Nov. 10.—The spirit of victory is in the air. The British troops are following up the retreating enemy with bands playing and are going up the roads with flags on their rifles and on their gun limbers through villages from which the German rear guard had gone only an hour or two before, and where the French and Flemish cheer them as they pass with cries of "Vivent les Anglais!"
It is glorious Autumn weather with a sparkle of gold in the sunlight and the glint of gold on the russet leaves and shining pools along the roads, so that it seems as though Nature rejoiced with man because the horror was being lifted from the world by the ending of this war and was smiling through her tears like the old men we meet, and then women who take our hands telling of their thankfulness.
It is Sunday, and in many churches in France and Belgium and in cathedrals which escaped destruction by a narrow chance, only scathed a little by battles around the town, "Te Deums" are being sung, and people who a week ago crept to church close in the shadow of the walls, afraid of the noise of gunfire around them, and who a day or two ago saw the gray wolves of the German Army still prowling in the streets, though with a hangdog look, are now singing their praises to God because of their deliverance, almost doubting, even yet, that after four years under the hostile yoke they are free—free to speak their minds, free to display the flag of their nation, free of fines and punishment and requisitions and spying and German police and German arrogance, free in their souls and hearts after four years of servitude under hostile rule.
So it was in Tournal today. For three weeks the people there had lived in cellars, listening to the fury of gunfire along the Scheldt Canal and closing in about them. They were afraid of having their old city smashed above their heads and being buried under its ruins. They were afraid of asphyxiating gas creeping down linto their cellars and killing them with its poison fumes.
The Germans had said:
"The English will do this to you. You will all be killed before they come."
But in spite of their fear they would not leave and prayed for the coming of the English.
A month ago more than 10,000 went away from Tournai, but that was behind German bayonets after a rollcall of all able-bodied men, who were forced to go while their women wept for them. A week ago the roar of the bombardment increased and never ceased day or night, and the people became haggard in their cellars because of this awful noise above them. But they were comforted by the knowledge that this British gunfire was not directed on Tournai, and they said:
"The Germans have lied again. We shall not be killed by our friends."
Then, two nights ago, above the noise of the guns there were loud noises—stupendous explosions shaking every stone of their cellars and their vaulted roofs as by an earthquake, and the people of Tournai guessed that the Germans were blowing up the bridges over the Scheldt Canal, and that it was the signal of their retreat.
Civilians Ventured Out on Friday.
They crept out of their houses on Friday morning and went down to the canal dividing one part of the town from the other, where all the houses had had their windows blown out and were badly shattered by the blowing up of the bridges. A few German machine gunners remained hidden in those houses, but presently the last of them came out and went away. One of them turned and said to a woman of Tournai:
"Your friends will soon be here. So much the better, because the war is ended for us. Germany is 'kaput.'"
The men and women waited, and presently they saw an English soldier make his way across the broken girders of a bridge. He was a tall, gallant-looking fellow, and as he stepped on the inner bank of the canal he drew his revolver and held it ready, looking about keenly for an enemy.
But they were friends who rushed at him, shouting: "English! English!" and the women flung their arms about his neck, kissed him and led him into the town with seething crowds about him. One family took him into their house and gave him wine which they had hidden for this day, and raising their glasses cried: "Vivent les Anglais!" as today another family brought out their wine for me and touched my glass with all their glasses and said "Vive l'Angleterre!"
After the first soldier had come, there came a small patrol, while the enemy fired some shells into the town and killed some civilians, and after that other British soldiers and staff officers arrived, and today there came marching through the long columns of troops with their guns and field cookers and transport, and they had the welcome of heroes and liked it with the laughter of British soldiers for hero worship.
That was just after the singing of the Te Deum in the Cathedral of Tournai, that Romanesque building with four tall towers, raised when Richard Coeur de Lion and the second Henry of England were living. Many people had gathered in its great nave, and between its round-headed arches, and in the twilight of those gray old stone going up to the rich color of the painted windows of the high choir behind the altar, beyond the forest of tall piers and pointed arches with Gothic sculpture. The scene reminded one of some Dutch painting of the Middle Ages, toned down to noble solemnity.
The Bishop of Tournai was there on his throne, and after high mass, when the Te Deum was sung, he came down the long nave, in procession with priests and acolytes, bearing before him the banner of Belgium. The organ pealed out the national anthem, "La Brabanconne," and all the people sang it from full hearts, and the Bishop, like many of his people, had tears in his eyes.
Then cheers rose strangely in this church, whose bells have rung the tocsin for many wars, and clashed out for joy and peace, and women's voices rose shrill above the deep cheers of the men as they poured out of the cathedral doors.
Then the Highlanders came swinging through in all their war kit with heavy packs—long, lean, hardy men, with the warrior look about them and knees brown as the aprons to their kilts. They came swinging through Tournai to the music of their pipes, heard for the first time by these, into whom it put a new fire of enthusiasm, so that their cheers rose higher. The "Jocks" grinned and answered cheer for cheer with shrill Highland cries, and it was fine to see them pouring out of the funnel of narrow streets with their old Flemish gables, and I wished a painter had been there to record it in color and in spirit for all time.
Fighting on Fields of 1914.
Nov. 8.—In wet weather, and mud, and Autumn mists, our men keep trudging after the retreating Germans east of Valenciennes and the Forest of Mormal, keeping in touch with their rearguards, and hastening their abandonment of villages and woods where they have machine-gun screens.
It is not a walk-over, for the enemy is still losing prisoners, and we still are losing a few men, and here and there, as late as yesterday, the German resistance stiffened at various places, like Eclaibes and Limont Fontaine, to gain time for an orderly retreat. We are within a few thousand yards of Maubeuge, and working toward Mons.
It, indeed, would be an astonishing coincidence if the British Army were to end the war where they began it, at Mons, where the "Old Contemptibles" fought their first big fight, and it looks as though it might happen. These small, rearguard actions, with fights for machine guns, and the stealthy forward movement of the advanced screens, feeling their way through the forest lands of this country beyond Valenciennes, and hearing by the sudden chatter of machine guns that the enemy is close ahead of them, make hard work for the men engaged, and are great adventures, with all the risks of death and wounds.
But now, for our armies as a whole, there is only one all-absorbing interest and thought, and that is to know whether the terms of the armistice have been signed by that party of four men who went over last night into the French lines, with a trumpeter heralding their approach, and a white flag for safe conduct.
They were late, it seems, and by wireless regretted that they had been delayed by transport on their roads, as one might well imagine with a knowledge of what a retreat means in weather like this. They were late, but by this time, one way or another, the fate of Germany must have been settled—for the peace terms, however hard they are, are for the last ditch of war in front of revolution and anarchy.
Soldiers Hope for Quick Ending.
As far as I know our armies, their hope is for a quick ending of this business, for saving of needless bloodshed, for return to normal life, and for all that peace means to men who fought long and hard in exile from their homes, under daily menace of death. On the other hand, if those four plenipotentiaries refuse the terms, our men will fight on again, sure that whatever happens now, the Germans cannot hold them on this front and are bound to break.
The German commanders are anxious to maintain their fighting pride to the end. It is not an easy thing to do when many of their divisions are broken to pieces, and when entire regiments consist of a few hundred men or less, as in the case of the 15th Reserve Infantry Regiment, which counted only thirty-five men after fighting in Flanders, and then had 500 drafts of returned wounded. It is not an easy thing to do, with the certain knowledge of defeat among all their men, with revolution threatened at home, with thousands of desertions, and a state almost of revolt within ranks; but regimental and battalion commanders are still trying to goad their men into resistance, so that the German Army may keep up a show before the world to the bitter end.
Spurring German Morale.
On the last day of last month the following order was issued by the headquarters of the 23d Reserve Division, and it is interesting in its psychology:
"English prisoners have expressed surprise that the German soldier now offers so little resistance. Is this is so, it will be easy for them to carry the battle, at a not far distant date, only German soil, and attain a decision. A French officer is of the opinion that an incomprehensible, almost diseased indifference has laid hold of the whole German Army. * * * I am convinced that this battalion will be driven by these statements, which are a disgrace to us, to show the enemy that in us there still lives the old, unbroken, German fighting spirit which for four years has defied all onslaughts on the western front."
There is not one British soldier who under-rates the courage of the German soldier or his wonderful fighting qualities. Even now, hard pressed as he has been, he is conducting his retreat in a skillful way, preventing his front from being utterly broken, carrying away much of his material, and saving many of his guns, while his rearguard machine gunners offer stubborn resistance. But that is not good enough now to save his armies. After four years of slaughter, with enormous losses and all their hopes of victory gone, the courage of picked and stubborn men is not enough to rally the rank and file who have a clear vision of their doom, and dread the menace that is creeping closer to them. There is a frightful hatred in their hearts for the leaders who duped them with false promised, and made all their sacrifices vain, and brought the hate of the world upon them. The worst among them are afraid now of their own villainies, and the best among them are ashamed and sick of the atrocious things done by official command. They are under fear of punishment from the gods and from men, and chagrined by the thought of the retribution which will be exacted from their race. If the armistice is not signed today or tomorrow there may be a momentary rally of men, called upon to die in the last ditches, with some pride of manhood, but there will be no rally which will last until the revolution begins, and the four plenipotentiaries have had that thought behind them on their journey.
A General German Retirement.
Nov. 7.—Our very gallant men, who have gone so long and so far along the road to victory, which now seems just ahead at the turn of the road—that seems too good to be true, like a mirage which eludes men as they walk—are still pursuing an enemy in retreat.
They are well on the other side of the Sambre, to the east of the Forest of Mormal, through the villages of Carignies and Marbaix and Dompierre, and are fighting about Beval, where yesterday evening heavy counterattacks were repulsed with grade losses to the Germans. The enemy is retiring behind a screen of rearguards, who here and there are trying to check our troops by machine-gun fire from the villages and woods and railway embankments; but nothing can hide from us the truth that it is a general retirement on a wide front by exhausted men whose divisions and battalions have been shattered so that only weak remnants can be gathered for this last show of resistance.
In the north, along our Second Army front, about Tournai, the line of the Scheldt is still held by machine gunners beyond the canal and floods, but they now are at the pivot of the salient, which is sharply increasing every day, so that it is only a question of time when they must get out of that pocket. Tournai must be ours before long, and then all the enemy's line will have to landslide as far as north of Ghent. There, with water in front of them and lines of machine guns well placed, and with a well-hindering rearguard garrison, it makes it difficult for the Belgians to enter that fine old city of theirs where thousands of people are awaiting liberation, and even now this could only be done by tragic loss of life. The Belgians would not spare themselves that price if it were worth while, but things are happening behind the lines on the Belgian front, as on ours, which may make more sacrifice unnecessary.
News came to us last night over the wires that Germany was sending plenipotentiaries to ask for the terms of armistice from Marshal Foch, and those men were coming over under a white flag, knowing through President Wilson what those terms were, and what surrender they would have to make of all their pride. Last night when that news came among British officers in touch with headquarters, they drew a sudden breath and said:
"Then it is the end. The last battle has been fought. It is too wonderful to believe."
I heard those words this morning again in Valenciennes among Generals and staff officers gathered there in the Place d'Armes.
"It must mean the end of the war. Surely it is the end at least. Who would every have believed it?"
And one man, standing near me, said very gravely:
"Thank God!"
And another, who was a younger man, laughed with a queer break in his voice, and raised a big bouquet of flowers, given to him by the townspeople, and gave a little dance and said:
"Back to peace again, and not too quick for me. * * * Back to life."
Another Valenciennes Celebration.
In Valenciennes, where on the first day of its liberation I walked through empty streets past windows from which no face looked out, with the rush of shells overhead, and the tumult of great gunfire all round, and the rat-tat-tat of machine gunfire in the streets, somewhere on my right, there was today a ceremony which seemed to be in celebration of this spirit of peace which is like a shining light before the eyes of all our soldiers. There men who had saved the city came in with their Generals to receive thanks from representatives of the people.
All told, there are only 5,000 people left in Valenciennes, for all the rest of its inhabitants were forces to leave by the enemy, who, on the very last day, as I have written before, summoned the remaining manhood to depart, and would have compelled them to go if we had now stormed the gates in time to save them. So there were not vast crowds to see the enemy and review, and most of the streets were still and empty, and many of the houses deserted, beyond the ruins of the railway station, flung into fantastic wreckage, but in the spacious Place d'Armes, in old high-gabled houses, on each side of the Hotel de Ville, with its richly carved frontage, above its wide flight of steps, many of the the remaining 5,000 gathered or crowded at windows and balconies which bore traces of recent bombardment, and on the roofs of buildings pierced here and there by shells.
It was only last Saturday that happened. It was only five days ago—the morning I went in—that the bodies of German soldiers were lying in their blood on these cobblestones, and that one of the priests of Valenciennes, burying a child, was mortally wounded by the side of that small, open grave, and that two other citizens were killed as they ran toward the waterlogged cellars, where women and children crouched with the floods rising about them. But five says made a difference in Valenciennes, and today for these people there it was a time of thanksgiving and pageantry.
Rainbow of Allied Colors.
Colors of many flags were displayed down their streets and fluttered above their gables and their balconies, draped with the Tricolor and Union Jack and Stars and Stripes. Old citizens wore their tall hats, saved up for this day, and girls had taken their lace from hiding places where the Germans had not found it and wore it around their necks and wrists for the honor of this day. Old women in black bonnets sat in the centre of the window places and clapped their hands, their wrinkled, hard-working old hands, to every British soldier who passed—and there were thousands who passed.
It was glorious to see them march by and to know, perhaps, that these fighting men, these square-jawed boys of ours who have gone through the fires of war unscathed, may have fought their last battle and gained the final victory. They were troops of our First Army, commanded by General Sir Henry Horne, and were the English divisions who, with the Canadians, were the first in their entry of the city to share the honor of the battle of Valenciennes, which was hard fought by the enemy and ourselves.
The army commander drove in with his corps and divisional generals, among whom was Sir William Curries, commanding the Canadian troops. The Prince of Wales was with Sir Henry Horne and took part in the inspection of troops. Flowers were showered on all these generals—great bouquets which they handed to their aids, who help them with a touch of embarrassment in their English way.
Nobody heard a word of the speeches of tribute of the councillors of Valenciennes to the glory of the British and Canadian troops who rescued their people from their servitude under the ruthless enemy, and the answer of Sir Henry Horne, expressing the pride of his soldiers in the rescue of that fair old city, and their admiration for the courage of its people. Every word was overwhelmed by cheering. Then the pipers of the Highlanders Division, whose fighting I have helped to record through many years of heroic endurance, played a tune, and the music of those pipes was loud in the square of Valenciennes and will echo in the hearts of its people through many centuries of history and in old traditions. There was the march past and thousands of bayonets shone above the steel helmets of the men; and they were heroes who went by, and they had the tribute of heroes from those they had saved.