Remember

Remember

The mud from under me squelched as the dark and foggy sky held high above us, clouding our view of the enemy, and breaking our spirits. It’s been days since we’ve seen any sunlight and the mist from the artillery has not been helping our moral, nor has the constant booming of the exploding shells and the drilling sounds of the machine guns on the other trench. Half of our unit has been having morale problems, seven having shellshock, others deserting and getting shot by our commanding officer, a tall proud man that was Oxford educated, although the war seems to be getting to him, as he is making desperate charges at the enemy. I walked through the small, crowded muddy ditch we call a battle line, feeling the soggy puddles and the slippery ground slide and sway under my standard issue boots. I felt the cool wood and metal of my Lee Enfield rifle slung over my shoulder, and its bayonet in a pouch on my right leg. I noticed a friend of mine, a cockney from another regiment called Charlie; he was sitting there, stroking his rifle, looking as though he had seen death itself. Most of the people here have that look, some have it all the time, but the last I would have thought to get it would be Charlie, in the start of the war he was using the officer’s staff car as his gas cooker and got into a lot of trouble from the officers when he began questioning their orders to send people over the top. I spoke to him softly “Morning Charlie, are you alright?” I know he’s not, no one here has been or will be again, not while the war raged on around us Charlie spoke, stuttering, terrified “We...we’re going over... going to die, all of us.”

I sat down beside him, feeling the cool mud creep onto my trousers, and covering my boot heels. “Look, Charlie, we’ll be going over but, we’ll be fine. The General says we’ve got enough soldiers and we can win against them, all we have to do is walk to the other end and shoot.” I knew it wasn’t as simple as that, but that’s our job, be slow walking targets for the machine guns, the rifles, the gas, the mines and barbed wire. Over the top is where many of my friends are from my regiment, some of them I’ve known since school. None of us ever thought it would be this harsh in the war, we were taken in by the propaganda making it look like the war was easy, it would be over by Christmas and it would be a good time, we didn’t know it would be disease, blood and death. We were young, foolish and impressionable; it was to defend our country we were told, to save good old England in her hour of need.

An officer in a nice clean uniform walked over to us, his moustache much like Kitchener’s from the posters. “Alright Lads” he shouted “get ready we’re going over soon.” The ladders to climb out of the trench were being set up as troops from the dugout are marching outside, looking terrified, I heard some of them speak with confidence, so I assume they’re new recruits, One of them in particular spoke quite excitedly “I can’t wait to get over, and shoot some of the enemy. I’ve some stories back home about them, they sound utterly...” Before he could finish I stood up and interrupted “you know that’s just propaganda to get you to join up, stuff they say to make you want to fight, otherwise you wouldn’t be here.” He looked at me in from the line of soldiers he was in and replied “how can you be sure, have you fought any?” I held myself back, hesitating, I Know he has every right to know what’s most likely going to be the end of him but if he doesn’t go then the officer would force him up there or worse still, he may try to run away, people in the trenches get shot for deserting. So I make my reply simple “It doesn’t take a genius to guess that the enemy are much like us, youthful and impressionable, being made to believe that they are defending their country.”

The officer walks back and stands near the ladder “Be quiet and get in line!” he shouts at me and Charlie, we calmly walk in line, the mud still slippery, and the sky still grey. I feel rain drops hit my tin hat, the clunks sounding like the impending bullets that will be fired at us over that trench.

The artillery barrage starts up and the sound of the shells exploding sends ringing in my ears, despite the fact that they are exploding only several feet away from us. After the barrage finally stops, all the officers in turn begin to whistle, at first it is really faint coming from a distance, then Officer by officer it gets louder and louder. It might be the final sound we hear. I heard the rattling sound of machine gun fire as regiment by regiment are sent up, and being cut down by the enemy faster than they could be sent up. I stand uneasy as we are the last group to go; as I hear cries come over the other side, in the seconds that follow I do a final equipment check, placing my bayonet on my rifle end, and prepping it for battle. I also mentally acknowledge my gasmask and grenades which are in pouches strapped to my uniform. Then the shrieking scream of our whistle is sounded and one by one we go up the ladder. One of us is shot from a distance by a sniper and falls before he gets out of the trench, bullet hole in his head, blood leaving it slowly. I am the last to leave as even Charlie was coaxed out of the trench, I walk up to the wooden ladder and slowly begin to climb. The last thing I saw was Charlie’s face sideways in the mud, bullets in his chest, blood leaving his mouth, fear in his eyes, his face and hands pale and covered in mud. Then I felt pain in my chest, the world around me went dark as I fell to the ground, the final sound in this world is of war as Charlie’s face is still seen in my mind’s eye.