Chapter IX

ITALY
_Mid-November 1917 to April 1918_

It was in excellent spirits therefore that the move was begun, in spite of the obscurity of the military situation in Italy, and the prospects of immediate fighting of the unpleasant rearguard type. Our cheerfulness was amply justified, and the journey itself proved to be one of the most magnificent holidays the Battalion ever had. It was accomplished in two trains, which followed each other at about twelve hours’ interval: the first containing half Battalion Headquarters (Commanding Officer, Adjutant and Transport Officer), Transport, and A and C Companies; the second containing the other half of Headquarters (second in Command, Assistant Adjutant, Medical Officer and Intelligence Officer), and B and D Companies.

The first half of the Battalion marched out of Tinques at 9 p.m. on November 23, 1917, and entrained at Savy, leaving about midnight. The second half left Tinques at 6 a.m. the next day, and pulled out of Savy about 9 a.m.

The route followed by both trains on the journey was the same, and the following names will indicate the line taken: Arras, Achiet-le-Grand, Albert, Amiens, Dijon, Pierrelatte, Avignon, Marseilles, Nice, Voghera, Piacenza, Bologna, and thence north to the Mantua and Este line.

The total time spent on the journey was six days. The experiences were very much the same in both trains, which ran most of the time within a very few hours of each other; the account of one train’s week will therefore suffice to cover the history of both.

On November 24 the train passed, in bright sunny weather, through the Ancre Valley and Albert, which we had last seen on our way out of the hideous Le Sars sector about a year previously. Thence through Amiens, and on south towards Paris, round which we skirted at dusk.

The train was unusually commodious, there being enough of the usual cattle-trucks for the men to allow of something narrowly approaching comfort, while the officers were three to a compartment, so that if one slept on the floor, all of them could get a comfortable night’s rest. In addition, there were a certain number of flats, which were not needed for our transport vehicles, but which afforded superb observation on sunny days. Comfort became almost a fine art. Every time the train stopped the men seemed to have a meal, as not only did the cooks achieve marvels on the cookers, which were at full blast all the day long, but also there were numerous _halte-repas_, at which hot water was always available, and, often enough, tea or coffee. As for the officers, they lived in that luxury which is only achieved by mess cooks when there is no facility for it. Adequate supplies had, of course, been laid in before we started, and the chances of buying eggs and other things on the journey were frequent. The nights were cold, but the cold was kept out as far as possible by braziers standing on tins in the trucks, and a carefully distributed rum ration.

The second day broke dull and raining, and this continued until evening, but a brisk, cold, sunny morning found us at Pierrelatte in the Rhone valley, and a glorious day followed of fine open country round the Rhone, with sudden sharp cliffs, offshoots of the Maritime Alps, and far-away views of blue-grey mountains, shutting in the rich plain which forms the delta of that great river. And so we passed through a charming landscape, made the more charming by the very friendly faces and the waving handkerchiefs of the inhabitants, to Avignon, with its castle glittering in the sunlight.

It was here that trains began to lose men, as from now onwards stops were always of somewhat doubtful duration. We came into Marseilles that evening, with the streets and harbour glowing with lights below us.

Early next morning (27th) we reached Les Arcques, where the men had breakfast. Then followed the best day of the whole journey. The weather was absolutely perfect, and sitting out on the open flats we rattled along the glorious coast of the French Riviera. Everywhere the people waved to us, cheered and threw us oranges, a compliment which we returned by throwing cigarettes to the French colonial sentries, who grinned and flashed at us their rows of perfect teeth.

By the afternoon we had crossed the frontier, where at Vintimiglia we detrained the men, and took them for a short, sharp march through the town and along the sea-front.

The journey from now onwards became far less interesting. There were interminable stops at out-of-the-way stations; and signs of the disorder in Italy, the result of the Caporetto disaster, became more frequent. At Bologna, where all the officers were very kindly provided with lunch-baskets by the Italian Comando di Tappa, refugees crowded the station, and that most pitiful spectacle was presented of strings of Italian deserters, chained together. It was clear that firmness was to be the order of the day.

From Bologna we went northwards, crossing the river Po, and the two trains reached their respective destinations. The first arrived at Bevilacqua at 7 p.m. on November 29. Here the most hopeless confusion reigned, owing to the entire absence of any R.T.O. or orders of any sort. Endless interviews with the magnificent station-master took place, but as he could understand neither English nor French, and we were none of us able to speak Italian, the interviews were entirely fruitless. Eventually, however, having dispatched an officer to the R.T.O. at the previous station, we received orders to billet in Bevilacqua for the night, and were presented with an Italian interpreter.

The second train reached Este at 8 a.m. on November 30, where the remainder of the day and that night were spent. Orders were received to march next day to Agugliaro, where the two halves of the Battalion joined hands. For the next four days we marched every day and all day, billeting during the nights in the villages of Bosco di Nanto, Villafranca and Marsango, and eventually reaching Villa del’ Conte on December 8. Lorry transport was very scarce during these marches, and the greatest difficulties were experienced in moving our 1,800 blankets from place to place. Our troubles in this respect were increased by having to move an unusually large number of valises, as we were at this time in possession of no less than forty-three officers. Twelve of these officers, however, were now dispatched to the base, and this relieved the congestion considerably.

Our arrival in Italy had been of a very different character from the one we had pictured. There was no dramatic deployment from the train to stem the Austrian onrush; as, indeed, there appeared at this time to be very little onrush to stem. The Italians were evidently making a firm stand on the Piave, a stand which became all the firmer as the knowledge grew that elements of the French and British Armies were at their backs in case of need.

Throughout the week spent in Villa del’ Conte the Battalion was at two hours’ notice to move to support the Italian army; but in spite of expecting hourly to receive such orders, nothing momentous occurred until the 14th, when we were moved some twelve miles to the village of S. Croce Bigolina, which lies about six miles west of Cittadella.

That this village rivalled in popularity the much-beloved village of Beauval in France, is astonishing and almost unaccountable. The billets were bad, crowded and scattered. There were no shops. Footballs were scarce, and grounds still scarcer. On the other hand, the inhabitants were most friendly, if not entirely honest, and the weather was perfect. It must surely have been those heavenly blue skies which entered into our souls and made us think so well of S. Croce.

The Division now formed part of the XIXth Corps, which was in reserve to the Italian Army, holding the line astride the Brenta valley in front of Valstagna.

Here a formidable attack by the enemy was confidently expected, as although the original onrush was being successfully stemmed by the Italian forces and those portions of the French and our own which were now in the line, it was thought very probable that the enemy, by using the remainder of the reserves collected from the Russian front, might try to increase the weight of their attack and break through from the mountains into the plains. In the event of this attack being delivered, the Division had orders to hold a reserve line in the mountains, which lay about Conco, Rubbio and Campolungo.

Thorough reconnaissances of this line were therefore most necessary, and some of us were sent on almost daily excursions in a F.I.A.T. lorry to that coldest of all bleak spots, Rubbio. The journey occupied some two and a half hours, along one of the most amazingly constructed roads in the country. Hewn for the most part out of solid rock, the road climbed 1,800 feet from our billets to Rubbio, zigzagging up the mountain, with a cliff on one side and a sheer drop of about 100 feet on the other.

The difference in the atmosphere between S. Croce and Rubbio was almost paralysing, and few of us will forget the frigid sensation and biting wind that assailed us on getting out of the lorry at the last-named village.

The line consisted of a rock-hewn fire-trench, sited on the forward slopes of a succession of hills or, rather, mountains. Communication with this line would have been most difficult, had we occupied it, for mule-tracks were rare, and none too good when found. To our relief, however, no enemy attack developed, and we were left in peace at S. Croce, where the Battalion spent its third Christmas away from home. In spite of these continual visits to Rubbio and constant hard field training, we had not allowed the time to slip by without a thought for Christmas festivities, and when the day arrived every man was able to eat turkey and plum pudding to his tummy’s content, helping it down with more than sufficient _vino_.

This latter, nasty as it really was, had become a most popular tipple, and orderly room had for some time past been much troubled by its existence. It was not so much that it was a potent beverage, as that the men were unaccustomed to it, and thought that it could be treated in the same manner as the French wine. Only when a number of men found themselves in the throes of no less than twenty-eight days’ field punishment No. 1 was _vino_ shown the respect to which it had proved itself entitled.

With the exception of some snow falling at the beginning of January, the weather continued perfect, and we considered our Italian campaign one of the better things in life, to which the only drawbacks were no E.F.C., a most irregular mail, and a succession of the very coldest church parades in a field at Villa Jonoch.

Unfortunately, all good things come to an end at some time, and this particular one ended on January 24, 1918, when the Battalion took an affectionate farewell of the natives of S. Croce and marched off towards the Piave, though it was not until a month later that we arrived there.

The billeting area in which we found ourselves, after two days’ marching, was really far better than the one we had just left, though the general atmosphere was perhaps not quite so friendly. D Company, at first, revelled in being the sole British occupants of the village of Casacorba, while Battalion Headquarters and the remaining three companies had to content themselves with the rather inferior billets of Albaredo. Later, however, sufficient accommodation was found in Casacorba and the adjoining village of Viciliese to house the whole Battalion, and Albaredo was evacuated.

Our stay here was chiefly notable for a most virulent attack of “outposts” which seized the higher command, and the question whether it is better to fight the post or the piquet line was more than thoroughly debated. Suitable antidotes were soon found in the shape of plenty of football for the men, and a very limited allotment of Rome leave for the officers.

A further move was made on February 14 to Paese, which lies some six miles west of Treviso. This area had been very much troubled by constant bombing raids, carried out by the Austrian and German airmen at night; in fact, the hospital in our village had been hit a few days prior to our arrival, but during our occupation of Paese no further bombing of the village took place, although Treviso continued an almost nightly target, with the result that large numbers of civilians were evacuating it, and the place was becoming a town of ruins.

The knowledge that we were to take over the line on the Piave had now become common property, and on February 27 the Battalion relieved the 21st Battalion Manchester Regiment, 91st Brigade, 7th Division, in support positions on the Montello.

A few days later (March 3) we took over the front line, which for the most part consisted of a series of trench-posts, situated at intervals of 40 or 50 yards along the banks of the river. Our right included the village of Nervesa, and the posts here were dug out of the asphalt promenade on which the fashion of Italy besported itself in times of peace. The breadth of the Piave in front of us was at least half a mile, and consisted of numerous channels, dotted with islands, some of which, lying about 50 yards from our bank, we occupied, but the flimsy character of the bridges leading on to them made their occupation uncertain.

The current of the river varied according to the channels. In the main channel it ran at a rate of at least ten miles an hour in time of flood, and never dropped below three and a half miles an hour at summer level.

During our fortnight’s stay here the river became one broad, rushing torrent, owing to the heavy rains, and any attempt on the part of a patrol to cross the river was generally out of the question; but on one night, after the river had gone down considerably, a patrol did succeed in getting across, though it should be described as a feat of endurance rather than a military accomplishment, as the men were so cold when they reached the other side that it is doubtful whether they could have used their arms had this been required of them.

The river, being unfordable at this time, deprived us of any means of getting at close quarters and really making our first acquaintance with a new enemy.

His shooting, so far as artillery was concerned, was decidedly good, and on more than one occasion he troubled us not a little with it. Nervesa was naturally his most popular target, and about the time of our departure he was rapidly demolishing it, chiefly by means of incendiary shells, with which he was most successful in setting the largest houses on fire.

We had not been in the sector a week before rumours of our being moved reached us. These rumours proved correct, and on March 14 the Division was relieved by the Italians. Preparations to ensure a really well-organised relief have no doubt been made by all units during the war, but whether any relief was ever prepared with such hyper-efficiency as this particular one may be doubted. Certainly “eyewash” never figured more prominently, or with so little effect; but our friends the Italians were not nearly so much impressed as had been intended, and our relief by the 163rd Italian regiment proved to be quite a normal proceeding, the greatest good-feeling existing on both sides.

The French, who had been on our left in the M. Tomba sector, were also withdrawn from the line about this time, and it became clear that both armies were intended to take over a new sector in the mountains in the neighbourhood of the Asiago plateau.

The march westward was commenced on the 15th, and after a series of long treks on exceedingly hot days, interspersed with a few days’ rest at Piombino, Borgoricco, S. Georgio dell’ Pertiche and Busiago Vecchia, we eventually reached S. Urbano on April 3. This village, charmingly situated amongst the foothills which lie between Vicenza and Verona, harboured us for just two weeks, while preparations were made for equipping ourselves suitably for mountain warfare.

Practice attacks were delivered on all the neighbouring hills, and several days were spent by officers in reconnoitring the line on the Asiago plateau.

Our transport was increased by the arrival of some twenty-five additional pack-mules, and although these threatened to displace all our heavy draught horses, G.S. waggons and cookers, we were eventually allowed to retain them all.

On April 17 the Battalion started on its move to the mountain line, halting for nights at Grumo, S. Maria (just east of Thiene) and Mare, which lies at the foot of the mountains that guard the Venetian plain from the North and rise from a series of low foothills, almost sheer, to a height of 4,000 feet. Military roads zigzagged their endless, wearisome way backwards and forwards, and hardly discoverable tracks led up in slippery, stony twists to the summit.

The day of our first journey to the top (April 23) gave us an excellent taste of the changed conditions before us. The ascent was made in single file up one of these mule-tracks, and occupied some four and a half hours; the system of progression adopted being twenty minutes’ climbing and ten minutes’ halting.

The actual climb to within a few hundred feet of the top was made in bright sunshine. Then abruptly came the change. The sun was clouded over, cold air seemed to come from nowhere, and a slight drizzle began to fall. In such conditions the climb was finished, and the road past Tattenham Corner, with a slight dip in the crest line, followed. A little farther on was a small level space, perhaps 600 yards long and half as many wide, between the masses of rough rock piled up on either side. In this space and round the edge of it nestled the hutment camp of Granezza. Here, and in offshoots of this little plateau, were concentrated two battalions of Infantry, Divisional Headquarters, Brigade Headquarters, a cinema, canteens, dumps, and all the other paraphernalia of a Division in the field.

A more depressing spot than this was when we arrived can hardly be imagined. The drizzle continued to fall, the road was a mass of mud, water dripped and oozed from the wooden huts, whose tarred-felt roofs were covered with dead branches as camouflage. Isolated fir trees, stripped of all their lower branches, stood here and there around the camp, gaunt and miserable, like sentries on a rainy night in the line. Dirty patches of unthawed snow lay among the rocks, and a motley collection of wet and muddy soldiers—English, French and Italian—flowed backwards and forwards along the grey, sticky road.

This, however, was Granezza in one of its worst moods. The next day, though different, was little better, for rain which was falling in the morning changed by mid-day to a full-dress snowstorm, accompanied by thunder and lightning. Snow fell for two or three more days, and all our time and energy were concentrated on clearing roads and tracks. But this was the last of the snow, and was succeeded by a period of bright sunshine, alternating with violent thunderstorms, which gradually changed to the glorious weather of August, September and October. During these months the sun shone all day, there was very little rain, and the heat was not sufficient to be uncomfortable by day nor the cold by night. The particular charm of this glorious weather lay in the fact that we had been assured that on the plateau there were only twenty-five fine days in the year, of which seventeen had already passed.

With the improvement in the weather came equally a difference in the country, which had at first seemed so desolate. The area taken over by the British troops was divided by nature into two sectors, each of which was held by a Division. Two roughly parallel roads, about four kilometres apart, led to the front line, each feeding one Division’s front. These roads were joined laterally by two other parallel roads, the one about two and a half, the other about six kilometres, behind the line. All intervening spaces were filled with rough rocky mountains, devoid of trees on the south side, but thickly wooded on the north side. The country gradually fell away towards the front line, which ran rather more than 1,000 feet below the level of Granezza. The line itself, cut partly in solid rock and partly in chalk, ran for the most part just inside the trees, which here stop short on the edge of the Asiago plateau. The plateau, about four kilometres wide, consists of undulating grassy land, treeless, but dotted here and there with farmhouses and tiny villages, all more or less damaged by shell-fire. About a kilometre off lay the Austrian front line, well out in the open, and away behind it the mountains rose up in a tremendous barrier 6,000 feet high, protecting the Val Sugana. To all of us it seemed a position that no troops in the world could capture, and we little guessed during the long months that we faced those mountains, that in the end we should ourselves successfully attack and overcome them.