The Irish on the Somme Part 11

Thomas Hughes, of the Connaught Rangers, got the V.C. for most conspicuous bravery and determination. The official record adds: "He was wounded in an attack, but returned at once to the firing line after having his wounds dressed. Later, seeing a hostile machine-gun, he dashed out in front of his company, shot the gunner, and single-handed captured the gun. Though again wounded, he brought back three or four prisoners." He was born at Corravoo, near Castleblayney, co. Monaghan, his father being a farmer, and was at the Curragh, employed as a jockey in a racing stable, until, on the outbreak of war, he joined the Connaught Rangers.

"Come on, the Dubs." This slogan was heard at a critical moment during one of the pushes on the Somme in the summer of 1916. It was shouted by Sergeant Robert Downie of the Dublin Fusiliers, and his coolness and resource in danger saved the situation and got him the Victoria Cross. The Dublins have been through many memorable campaigns and battles and have won many honours, but Sergeant Downie is the first of his regiment to win the most prized of all distinctions. The following is the official record of the award--

"For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty in attack.

When most of the officers had become casualties, this non-commissioned officer, utterly regardless of personal danger, moved about under heavy fire and reorganised the attack, which had been temporarily checked. At the critical moment he rushed forward alone, shouting, 'Come on, the Dubs.' This stirring appeal met with immediate response, and the line rushed forward at his call. Sergeant Downie accounted for several of the enemy, and in addition captured a machine-gun, killing the team. Though wounded early in the fight, he remained with his company, and gave valuable a.s.sistance, whilst the position was being consolidated. It was owing to Sergeant Downie's courage and initiative that this important position, which had resisted four or five previous attacks, was won."

Sergeant Downie is twenty-three years of age. He was born in Glasgow of Irish parents, both his father and mother being natives of Laurencetown, co. Down, and received his education at St. Aloysius'

Catholic Schools, Springburn, Glasgow. He is one of a family of sixteen, of whom thirteen are alive. His father was employed for thirty years in the Hydepark Locomotive Works, Glasgow, as an oiler and beltman. After leaving school young Downie served for some time in the same works as his father, and at the age of eighteen he enlisted in the Dublin Fusiliers. He went to France with the Expeditionary Force. He is married, and his wife lives with her two children at Springburn.

A wounded officer of the Dublins thus describes how Downie won the V.C.--

"For coolness and resource under danger, it would be impossible to beat Downie. The ordeal we had to go through that day was one of the most severe we have struck since the present war, and, as you know, the 'Dubs' have been in many tight corners. We had orders to advance against a position that had so far resisted all efforts of our men to take. We knew it had to be taken this time, be the cost what it might. We went over with a good heart.

The men were magnificent. They faced their ordeal without the slightest sign of wavering. The enemy's fire was ploughing through our ranks. We lost heavily. In a short time there was not an officer left capable of giving directions. It was only then that the attack began to falter. At that moment the enemy fire increased its intensity. It was many times worse than any h.e.l.l I have ever heard of. The machine-gun fire of the enemy swept across the ground like great gusts of wind, and the finest troops in the world might have been pardoned for a momentary hesitation in face of such fire. Downie took the situation in.

He ran along the line of sh.e.l.l holes in which the men were sheltering and cried out, 'Come on, the Dubs.'

"The effect was electrical. The men sprang from their cover, and under his leadership dashed to the attack on the enemy position.

Their blood was now up, and there was no stopping them until the goal was reached. The immediate approach to the part of the trench they were attacking was swept by the fire of one machine-gun that galled the attacking party a lot. Downie made straight for that. Using alternately bomb, bayonet, and rifle, he wiped out the entire crew, and captured the gun, which he quickly turned on the enemy. The effect of this daring exploit was soon felt. The enemy resistance weakened, and the Dublin lads were soon in possession of the trench. It was later on, when the attack was being pressed home, that Downie was wounded.

It was severe enough to justify any man in dropping out, but Downie was made of better stuff. He stuck to his men, and for the rest of the day he directed their operations with a skill and energy that defeated repeated attempts of the enemy to win back the lost ground. Throughout the very difficult operations his cheery disposition and his eye for discerning the best thing to do in given circ.u.mstances, were as good as a reinforcement to the hard-pressed Irishmen."

Captain John A. Sinton, Indian Medical Service, was awarded the Victoria Cross, after the action at Shaikh Saad in Mesopotamia. The official record is as follows--

"For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty. Although shot through both arms and through the side he refused to go to hospital, and remained as long as daylight lasted attending to his duties under very heavy fire. In three previous actions Captain Sinton displayed the utmost bravery."

Captain Sinton was born in Lisburn, co. Antrim, and is thirty-one years of age. He is a member of a well-known Quaker family. As a boy he went to the Memorial School in Lisburn, named after the heroic Brigadier-General, John Nicholson, of the Indian Mutiny, and afterwards attended the Royal Belfast Academical Inst.i.tution. He had a brilliant career in the Medical School at Queen's University, Belfast.

He took first place at the examination for the Indian Medical Service at the School of Tropical Medicine in Liverpool. He went to India in 1912, and was attached to the 31st Duke of Connaught's Own Lancers at Kohat. At the outbreak of war he transferred to the Dogras, in order to take part in the operations of the Indian Expeditionary Force in the Persian Gulf.

Private Henry Kenny of the Loyal North Lancashire Regiment is another London Irishman, and the third of the name of Kenny who have gained the coveted V.C. The stories of the other two Kennys are told in the first series of _The Irish at the Front_. Private Kenny's father is a native of Limerick, where all his people belonged to, and from where he moved to England with his parents. Private Kenny himself was born in Hackney, London, and enlisted, at the age of eighteen, in 1906. On the outbreak of war he was recalled to the Colours as a reservist, and took part in many famous engagements. The official record of his gallantry is as follows--

"For most conspicuous bravery. Private Kenny went out on six different occasions on one day under a very heavy sh.e.l.l, rifle and machine-gun fire, and each time succeeded in carrying to a place of safety a wounded man who had been lying in the open. He was himself wounded in the neck whilst handing the last man over the parapet."

When Kenny was invalided home on account of the wounds he received in performing the n.o.ble action for which he won the Victoria Cross, he made no reference to his achievement. The sixth man whom he rescued was his own Colonel, and it was while he was bearing his commanding officer into safety that he was himself wounded. On his return home for a holiday after the announcement of the award he visited the House of Commons, and was introduced to Sir E. Carson, Lord and Lady Pirrie, Mr. and Mrs. Redmond, Lord Wimborne and Colonel Churchill, and had tea on the terrace.

There was much rejoicing amongst the pupils and staff of the Royal Hibernian Military School, Phoenix Park, Dublin, when it became known that the greatest honour that can be bestowed upon a soldier--the Victoria Cross--had been won by a former pupil of the school in the person of Private Frederick Jeremiah Edwards, of the Middles.e.x Regiment. There are three Royal Military Schools in the United Kingdom (the Duke of York's School, near London, the Queen Victoria School in Scotland, and the Royal Hibernian School), and naturally there was keen anxiety amongst them as to which would be the first to place a V.C. to its credit in the present war. The Irish school has won, thanks to Private "Jerry" Edwards. He is the second "old boy" of the Hibernian School to win the V.C., the previous occasion on which the distinction was gained being during the Crimean War. Private Edwards was born at Queenstown, co. Cork, the son of a soldier. He entered the Hibernian School at seven years of age. He is spoken of as a bright, intelligent and plucky lad by the schoolmasters, to whom his lively spirits were oftentimes a source of worry--and, perhaps, of trouble for "Jerry." When he was fourteen he left the school to join the Army.

The circ.u.mstances under which he won the V.C. in his twenty-first year are thus officially described--

"For most conspicuous bravery and resource. His part of the line was held up by machine-gun fire, and all officers had become casualties. There was confusion and indication of retirement.

Private Edwards, grasping the situation, on his own initiative dashed out towards the gun, which he knocked out with his bombs.

This very gallant act, coupled with great presence of mind and a total disregard of personal danger, made further advance possible and cleared up a dangerous situation."

A former schoolmate of Private Edwards, and a comrade in the Middles.e.x Regiment, gives the following more specific particulars of the hero's courage and determination in carrying along the wavering men by the force of his example--

"The day our regiment went over there was some wild work. The enemy concentrated on our part of the line a furious fire. There was absolutely no cover for a great part of the way. One by one our officers were picked off. Young Lieutenant ---- was the last to go. As he fell he called to the men to go right on. They did so for a time, but things got worse, and finally the men seemed to lose heart. 'Jerry' Edwards declared that he wasn't going back. He sprang forward into the thick hail of machine-gun bullets, in full view of the taunting Huns on their parapet.

'This way, Die-hards,' he cried, and at the sound of the glorious old nickname the men recovered from their panic.

Gradually order was restored, and the men followed Edwards up to the enemy parapet. This was stormed in a few minutes. Edwards himself bowled over a machine-gun and its crew. He picked up a couple of bombs and threw them. Privates behind him handed up more, and from an exposed position on the enemy parapet he kept raining bombs on the foe. The gun and crew were blown to bits, and the rest of the enemy bolted to their next position. Edwards saw what they were up to, and, leading some of the men by the near cut, he intercepted the flying enemy. Then a great bombing match began. Our lads won, thanks to the way the team was handled by Edwards. Though the position was dangerous for some time afterwards, we held on, and finally consolidated the ground."

The finest quality in gallantry is that which impels a soldier to leave a place of safety voluntarily, and, though he is not under the excitement of battle, to plunge with cool calculation into some danger which he knows and has estimated to its full extent. For a deed of valour of that character the Victoria Cross was given to Private William Young, East Lancashire Regiment. The official record says--

"On seeing that his sergeant had been wounded he left his trench to attend to him under very heavy fire. The wounded non-commissioned officer requested Private Young to get under cover, but he refused, and was almost immediately very seriously wounded by having both jaws shattered. Notwithstanding his terrible injuries, Private Young continued endeavouring to effect the rescue upon which he had set his mind, and eventually succeeded with the aid of another soldier. He then went unaided to the dressing-station, where it was discovered that he had also been wounded by a rifle bullet in the chest. The great fort.i.tude, determination, courage, and devotion to duty displayed by this soldier could hardly be surpa.s.sed."

Private Young was born in Glasgow of Irish parents, and joined the East Lancashire Regiment in May 1899, when about twenty-one years of age. He was transferred to the Army Reserve in August 1902, and joined Section D, Army Reserve, in May 1911. He responded to the mobilisation call on August 5, 1914, and went to France on September 14, going all through the fighting until wounded at the battle of Ypres in November 1914, by a bullet in the thigh. Returning to the Front, he was "ga.s.sed," and the resulting injuries to his eyes laid him up for three weeks in hospital. On going back to the trenches the second time he performed his heroic deed on December 22, 1915.

Young's home was at Preston, where he had a wife and nine children, the youngest of whom was born while the father was at the war. In the following letter to his wife Private Young told how the news of his distinction was received by him in a military hospital in England, where he underwent an operation for the complete removal of his lower jaw and the fitting of an artificial one in its place.

"Of course, long enough before you get this letter you will see by the papers that I have received the greatest honour that any Britisher can get, namely, the V.C., and, of course, I am naturally very proud of the great honour, both for my sake and the sake of you and the kiddies and the good old regiment I have the honour to belong to, and the old proud town of Preston. I was shaving when the news came through, and the matron and sisters, nurses and patients have the hands wrung off me, and I can see I could do with another pair of hands. There are telegrams coming every two or three minutes, so I have a busy time in front of me. I have another soldier from Lancashire helping me to answer them."

Young's indomitable spirit was finely evidenced in a second letter to his wife--

"I feel all right, seeing what I have gone through; in fact it was the grace of G.o.d, careful nursing, and a grand const.i.tution that pulled me through.... You know the old saying, 'Fools rush in where Angels dare not tread,' and if I was in the same place to-morrow I would do exactly the same thing. I knew that if I went over the wife and the kiddies would be well looked after. I am very glad to say that the sergeant I carried out is all right, and I expect in about a fortnight's time he will be at home on sick leave with his young wife, as he only got married just after the war broke out, so you see it's an ill wind that blows n.o.body good."

Young was able in April 1916 to visit Preston, where he was given a public welcome. But he had to return to hospital again, and died in August 1916. A local fund was raised, and so generously responded to that it was possible to invest a sum of over 500 for the family.

Captain Henry Kelly of the Duke of Wellington's West Riding Regiment got the V.C. for deeds which are thus officially described--

"For most conspicuous bravery in attack. He twice rallied his company under the heaviest fire, and finally led the only three available men into the enemy trench, and there remained bombing until two of them had become casualties and enemy reinforcements had arrived. He then carried his company sergeant-major, who had been wounded, back to our trenches, a distance of seventy yards, and subsequently three other soldiers. He set a fine example of gallantry and endurance."

Captain Kelly was born in Manchester of Irish parentage. His father was from Wicklow and his mother from Limerick. He is twenty-eight years of age, and joined the Manchester "Pals" with his younger brother on September 4, 1914. He was promoted to the rank of Sergeant-Major two months later, and in the following May was gazetted Second Lieutenant to the West Riding Regiment. Prior to joining the Army he was employed at the General Post Office in Manchester as a sorting clerk and telegraphist. He was a prominent member of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and also of the city branch of the United Irish League. He could speak the Irish language before he ever spent a holiday in Ireland. A detailed account of the circ.u.mstances in which Captain Kelly won the V.C. is given by a soldier in his company--

"The enemy had pounded us unmercifully with their big guns, and the strain put on our men was so great that they began to waver.

Captain Kelly sprang forward and urged his men to the attack under a blistering hot fire. They responded with cheers, and under his direction they held a very exposed position for hours.

Later, things looked black once more. So he up again and called on his lads to hold fast for all they were worth. To show his contempt for the danger to which we were exposed he led the way towards another position. He decided to have a cut in at the enemy's trench. He got hold of a non-com, and two privates belonging to the bombing section. With these he entered the enemy trench and started to bomb the Boches out. They got a good way along, driving before them an enemy more than big enough to eat up the whole company. Then Fritz was reinforced, and under the direction of a very brave officer the enemy began to push our party back. The two privates were knocked out, and Captain Kelly had to make for home. He picked up the sergeant-major and carried him out of the German trench. The enemy had many a pot shot at him, and the sh.e.l.l fire continued as well. It is a miracle how he escaped. The Boches were close on his heels. The captain just laid down his burden for a few minutes and threw a bomb or two at them. They skulked back. Then he picked up his burden and came marching back to us. All the way he was under heavy fire. After taking a look round to see how things were shaping he found that three of our chaps were out in the open, wounded. Immediately he set off to find them. One by one he carried them into safety, in spite of the furious fire kept up by the enemy."

Australia is proud of Private Martin O'Meara, V.C., of the Australian Infantry. So also is Tipperary. He comes of an old Tipperary family, and has well sustained the splendid traditions of the fighting race.

The official record of the award of the V.C. is as follows--

"For most conspicuous bravery. During four days of very heavy fighting he repeatedly went out and brought in wounded officers and men from 'No Man's Land' under intense artillery and machine-gun fire. He also volunteered and carried up ammunition and bombs through a heavy barrage to a portion of the trenches which was being heavily sh.e.l.led at the time. He showed throughout an utter contempt of danger and undoubtedly saved many lives."

Private O'Meara, V.C., is thirty-two years of age. He is the youngest son of Mr. Thomas O'Meara, Rathcabbin, Birr, and is one of a family of nine children. Before he left Ireland, in 1911, Private O'Meara worked as a tree-feller, and in Australia he continued to labour in the woods, being engaged in making railway sleepers at Collie in West Australia. In the August of 1915 he answered the call to arms, and entered the Blackboy Training Camp as a member of the 12th reinforcements of the Australian Infantry. Before embarking from Australia a friend vouches that O'Meara said: "As I am going I will do the best I can to bring back the Victoria Cross." To achieve the highest award in the British Army was evidently strongly before his mind. He was two months in France before going up to the trenches, where he remained five days in all, covering himself with glory and winning the V.C. in this short period.

Private O'Meara got a fortnight's leave in October 1916--two months after he had won the V.C.--and availed himself of it to visit his native place. The modesty of the man is to be seen in the mode of his home-coming. His family expected him, but did not know the exact date of his arrival. He got off the train at Birr Station and walked home--about five miles--in the darkness, along the disused Birr and Portumna railway line, which pa.s.ses close to his home. No one recognised him at the station or along the way. He opened the door and walked in, surprising his brother and sister inside. At the end of his leave he returned almost as quietly as he had come. A fund to make him a presentation was raised locally, and a considerable sum was invested in War stock, and a gold watch was bought. Advantage was taken of the presence of General Hickie, commanding an Irish Division, on a short visit from France to his home at Selvoir, North Tipperary, to have him present the gold watch to O'Meara. But O'Meara, like the genuine fighting man that he is, had immediately volunteered for active service on his return to London from home, after recovering from his wounds, and it was found exceedingly difficult to get into touch with him. In fact, but for the interest taken by General Hickie it would have been impossible. Ultimately his exact whereabouts were learned through the War Office, and arrangements were made for his return.

Even so, O'Meara could not get home in time for the presentation, and it was made to his brothers and sisters. Physically, he is a fine type of manhood, and in disposition is most lovable.

CHAPTER XVI

RELATIONS BETWEEN ENEMY TRENCHES

IRISH KINDLINESS AND GERMAN GUILE

In the trenches one evening a battalion of the Leinster Regiment held a "kailee" (_ceilidh_), or Irish sing-song, at which there was a spirited rendering of the humorous old ballad, "Bryan O'Lynn," sung to an infectiously rollicking tune. The opening verse runs--

"Bryan O'Lynn had no breeches to wear, So he bought a sheep-skin to make him a pair, With the woolly side out, and the skinny side in, Faix, 'tis pleasant and cool, says Brian O'Lynn."

The swing of the tune took the fancy of the Germans in their trenches, less than fifty yards away. With a "rumpty-tum-tumty-tum-tumty-tum-tum,"

they loudly hummed the air of the end of each verse, all unknowing that the Leinsters, singing at the top of their voices, gave the words a topical application--