CHAPTER IX

THE IRISH BRIGADE

"EVERYWHERE AND ALWAYS FAITHFUL"

Pride and sorrow struggle for mastery at the spectacle of troops returning to camp from the battle, their appearance telling of the intolerable strain which this war imposes, even in the case of victory, upon the human faculties. The thought of it alone is painful to the feelings of any one who has the least imagination. They are all begrimed and careworn, and many have the distraught look of those who have seen and suffered terrible things. So the Irish Brigade came back from Guillamont and Guinchy, on the Somme, in the early days of September 1916, what time the Empire was resounding with the fame of their exploits. On a Sunday they carried Guillamont with a rush; on the following Saturday they literally pounced upon Guinchy, and in between they lay in open trenches under continuous shell fire.

I saw the Irish Brigade before they left for the Front, and noted in the ranks the many finely shaped heads and thoughtful faces of poets and leaders of men, interspersed with the lithe frames of athletes and the resolute, hard-bitten countenances of born fighters. At first I was moved to sorrow at the thought of the pass to which civilisation has come that the best use which could be made of all this superb youth and manhood in its valiancy was to send it forth into the devouring jaws of war. Then I perceived that something like a radiance shimmered about the marching ranks. It came, I noticed, both from their muscular strength and their martial ardour, for the flush of battle already mantled their cheeks, and its light was in their dancing eyes; and at once I understood that if I saw but the mound surmounted by the little wooden cross in France, and in Ireland the desolate hearthstone, they, with the wider and more aspiring imagination of youth, rejoiced that they were going out to fight in liberty's defence, and saw only their bayonets triumphantly agleam in the fury of the engagement. Careless and gay, they captured the two villages on the Somme in a ding-dong, helter-skelter fashion. They maintained the reputation of the Irish infantry as "the finest missile troops in the British Army" (so they are described by Colonel Repington, the renowned military correspondent of _The Times_), by the spirit and dash of their charge, their eagerness to get quickly into touch with the foe, and the energy and dexterity with which they wield that weapon which finally decides the issue of battles--the bayonet.

As they emerged out of the cloud of smoke on the Somme, and marched back to camp in much diminished numbers--caked with mud, powdered with grey dust, very tired--across the ground their valour had won and their grit maintained against fierce counter attacks, they displayed quite another phase of the Irish nature--its melancholy and its mysticism. The piper that led them back began to play some old Irish rhapsodies having that wonderful blending of joy and grief which makes these airs so haunting. That was well. For the men were in so extreme a stage of exhaustion, physical and mental, that they lurched and reeled, and were overwhelmed with distress at missing many beloved comrades that fought with them, and officers that led them only a few days before. Then they heard the pipes, and their hearts were uplifted by the strains, plaintive and yearning, defiant and challenging, which expresses in music the history of their race. They seemed, indeed, to have caught even some of the jaunty, boastful swagger of the piper, as he strode before them, blowing into his reeds and working the bag with his left elbow.

The General of the Brigade watched his troops go by, and in his eyes they were all the grander for the horrid disarray of their torn, muddy and bloody uniforms, and their haggard faces blackened with sweat and smoke and soil. "I am proud of you," he called out in a voice surging with emotion. "Ye did damned well, boys." A handful of men, once a company, was led by a sergeant. Every officer was gone. "Bravo, Dublins!" exclaimed the General; but for the moment his heart was heavy within him as he recalled to mind the dashing, gallant young lads, so hearty and joyous, buried now round about the ruins of the villages from which the Germans had been driven at the bayonet-point by the splendid rank and file at whose head they fell. Quickly the thoughts of the General came back to the survivors. "Ireland is proud of you, boys," he cried in exultant tones. He knew that would stir them. Ireland is their glory; and they lifted up their heads a little more as they caught the import of their Commander's words.

This Irish Brigade, officially known as the Irish Division, was the outcome of the meeting in Dublin addressed by Mr. Asquith, shortly after the outbreak of the war, in the course of his tour of the country as Prime Minister to explain the origins and aims of the conflict. Lord Wimborne, the Viceroy, presided. The Lord Mayor of Dublin and mayors of most of the chief towns of Ireland, the chairmen of county councils and representatives of all shades of political and religious opinions were present. Mr. John Redmond proposed, at the meeting, the formation of an Irish Brigade. While "Irish Division" sounds meaningless to young Irishmen, "Irish Brigade" at once arouses thrilling memories of the battlefields of Europe during the eighteenth century. For a hundred years, from the fall of the Stuarts to the French Revolution, there was an Irish Brigade in the service of France. It was regularly recruited from Ireland through that long span of time, though to join it was a penal offence. As the young men stole secretly away to France in smuggling crafts from the west of Ireland, they were popularly known as "the wild geese." "Everywhere and always Faithful" was the motto bestowed on the Brigade by the King of France. That being so, there was a hearty response to the call for a new Irish Brigade to serve again in France, and for causes more worthy than the old.

Just as the Ulster Division was composed of Unionists and Protestants, the Irish Division was recruited mainly from the Nationalist and Catholic sections of the population. The Nationalist Volunteers, supporters of the policy and aims of the Irish Parliamentary Party, provided most of the rank and file. Like another Irish Division, the first of Ireland's distinctive contributions to the New Armies, which perished in the ill-starred expedition to Gallipoli, the Irish Division was composed of the youth of Ireland at its highest and best--clean of soul and strong of body, possessing in the fullest measure all the brightest qualities of the race, the intellectual and spiritual, not less than the political and humorous.

One of the first to join was Mr. William Redmond, M.P. for East Clare, younger brother of the Irish Leader, though he was well over the military age. He was appointed Captain in the Royal Irish Regiment--the premier Irish regiment--in which he had served thirty-three years previously, before his election to the House of Commons. Speaking at an early recruiting meeting, he said that, should circumstances so demand, he would say to his countrymen "Come" instead of "Go." He was as good as his word. For his services at the Front he was promoted to the rank of Major, and has been mentioned by Field-Marshal Haig in despatches. Other nationalist Members of Parliament who were officers of the Brigade were Captain W. Archer Redmond, Dublin Fusiliers, son of Mr. John Redmond, Captain Stephen Gwynn, well known as a man of letters, who joined the Connaught Rangers as a private and was promoted to the rank of Captain in the battalion; Captain J.L. Esmonde, Dublin Fusiliers, and Captain D.D. Sheehan, Munster Fusiliers, who also gave his two boys to the Brigade. General Sir Lawrence Parsons, son of the Earl of Rosse--scion of a distinguished Irish family resident for centuries at Birr, King's Co.--was appointed to the command of the Division.

Sir Francis Vane, an eminent Irish soldier of Nationalist sympathies, who was appointed by the War Office to supervise the recruiting for the Division, says that never in his life did he witness so extraordinary a scene as that presented at Buttevant and Fermoy, co. Cork, where the men first assembled in September and October 1914. "It reminded me," he says, "of the pages of Charles Lever in the variety of Irish types answering to the call. There were old men and young sportsmen, students, car drivers, farm labourers, Members of Parliament, poets, _litterateurs_, all crowding into barracks which were totally incapable of housing decently the half of them." They were dressed in all sorts of clothes, from the khaki, red and blue of the Services, to "the latest emanation of the old clo' merchants." That curious assortment of all types and classes was the rough material out of which was fashioned, by training and discipline, a superb military instrument. The soldierly essentials were there in abundance. Within two years they came successfully through ordeals that would have tried the nerves of the toughest veterans of the Old Guard of Napoleon.

In the course of 1915 the Division was removed to camps at Aldershot to complete their training. The men were visited there, in November, by Cardinal Bourne, Archbishop of Westminster, who gave them his benediction, and said he was sure they would do their duty at the Front "as good children of Ireland and good sons of the Catholic Church." Early in December they were reviewed by the Queen. It was originally arranged that the review should be held by the King, but his Majesty, on a visit to the Front, had been flung from his horse, and was not sufficiently recovered from the accident to be able to be present. Among those in the reserved enclosure surrounding the saluting-base that day were Mr. John Dillon, M.P., and Mr. T.P. O'Connor, M.P. In the march past the Queen they were led off by the South Irish Horse, a body of Yeomanry. Each of the three infantry brigades was headed by one of the Irish wolfhounds which Mr. John Redmond presented to the Division as mascots. At the conclusion of the review her Majesty sent for General Parsons and the three Brigadier-Generals, and congratulated them upon the appearance and efficiency of the troops.

Shortly afterwards the Division left for the Front, under the command of Major-General William Bernard Hickie, C.B., an Irishman and a Catholic, who has had a very brilliant military career. Born on May 21, 1865, the eldest son of the late Colonel J.F. Hickie of Slevoyre, Borrisokane, co. Tipperary, he was educated at Oscott and Sandhurst. At the age of nineteen he joined his father's old regiment, the 1st battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, of which in due course he became Colonel. In the South African War he served on the Staff, in command of a mounted infantry corps and of a mobile column. On his return home he became Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General to the 8th Division. In 1912 he was appointed Assistant Quartermaster-General of the Irish Command. On the outbreak of the war General Hickie became Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General of the Second Army, and is stated to have particularly distinguished himself maintaining good order during the retreat from Mons. The Irish Brigade was most fortunate in having such a man as Commander. Thoroughly understanding the Irish character, its weak points as well as its strong ones--its good-humoured and careless disposition; its impatience often of the restraints and servitude of military life; its eagerness always for a fight or any sort of enterprise with a spice of danger in it--he was able to get the most out of his men. One of his happy thoughts was the institution of a system of rewards in the Division apart from but supplementary to the usual military honours. Any company officer or man who, in the opinion of the commander of his regiment, has given proof of exceptional good conduct and devotion to duty in the field, is presented by General Hickie with a Parchment Certificate at a parade. The certificate has been specially prepared in Ireland, having the words "The Irish Brigade" in Gaelic letters enwreathed with shamrocks at the top, setting out the name of the recipient, the nature and date of his achievement, and the signature of the General. The men send these certificates home, where they are preserved as precious mementoes. An Honours Book of the Irish Brigade is also kept in which these presentations and the military honours won are recorded.

The first experience which the Irish Brigade had of the trenches was in the Loos-Hullock line. It is the most desolate of the war-stricken regions, one bare, black, open plain, where everything has been blown to pieces and levelled to the ground, save here and there some wire entanglements; where there is no sign of human life, except when parties of the thousands upon thousands of combatants who burrow beneath its surface, emerge in the darkness of the night for stealthy raids on each other's positions. The front line trenches of both sides run close together. At one point they are no more than sixteen yards apart. They are notoriously of the worst type, nothing more, indeed, than shallow and slimy drains, badly provided with dug-outs, and much exposed to fire. Under such conditions the craving of the body for food and rest could be satisfied only at the bare point of existence.

Major William Redmond, in a letter to Dr. Fogarty, Bishop of Killaloe, dated February 3, 1916, says: "Our first spell in the trenches was for twelve days, and in that time we had no change of clothing, just stayed as we were all the time. The shelling was terrific, and the Division suffered some losses. The day before we came out the enemy began to celebrate the Kaiser's birthday, January 27, and we were shelled without ceasing for twenty-four hours. The men of our Division behaved very well, and received good reports; so the General said." Testimony to the excellent way in which the Irishmen passed through the ordeal comes from quite independent and impartial sources. Here, for example, is an extract from a letter written by the Rev. H.J. Collins, chaplain to a battalion of the Black Watch--

"Our Division had the privilege of introducing the Irish battalions to the trenches, when they arrived out here; and they were our guests for a week or so before taking over on their own account. They made a great impression on our lads by their cheerfulness and their eagerness to be 'up and at' the Hun. The Connaughts arrived one evening just as our line was being heavily shelled, and although they were our visitors they at once took charge of the situation. They had never been in the trenches in their lives before; they were experiencing shell fire for the first time; and before they had had time to get their packs off and settle down, one impatient sergeant was over the parapet, crying out in a rich and musical brogue: 'Come on, the Connaughts!'"

As is well known, the men of one regiment are not greatly disposed to praise those of another. In fact, some bitter regimental feuds exist in the British Army, or used to among the old Regulars. It is, therefore, all the more remarkable to find in the _Glasgow Herald_ of February 24, 1916, a letter signed "Jock," proclaiming in the warmest terms the fine qualities of the new Irish soldiers. "Your readers may like to hear that we Scotsmen, who have been tried and not found wanting, have a great admiration for the new Irish Division that came out some time ago," says "Jock." "We have lived in the trenches side by side with them, and find them as keen as a hollow-ground and as ardent as a young lover. At a recent attack when the Germans were advancing the excitement became unbearable, and one sergeant got up on the parapet with the shout of: 'Come on, bhoys, get at them.' One of them, too, was heard to grumble, 'Here we've been in th' trinches fur two weeks an' niver wance over th' paradise.' It is to be feared they will outvie even the kilts."

Yet during this instructional period, when the various battalions of the Brigade were attached to other regiments for preliminary practice in the trenches, some high military honours were won. Sergeant J. Tierney, of the Leinster Regiment; Lance-Corporal A. Donagh, and Private P.F. Duffy, of the Connaught Rangers, gained the Distinguished Conduct Medal. Donagh and Duffy, in response to a call for volunteers, undertook to carry messages forward under heavy fire, as all telephone communication had been cut. The task was one of extreme danger, but the men succeeded in accomplishing it unhurt, and were awarded the D.C.M. for their coolness and bravery. Corporal Timoney, of the Munster Fusiliers, was especially mentioned in Army Orders for an act of courage in picking up and throwing away a live Mills-grenade which had fallen among some men under instruction. By this act he undoubtedly saved the lives of several men, and if it had happened in the field instead of at practice he would have been eligible for recommendation for a higher honour.