500 of the Best Cockney War Stories. Various

      After a retreat in May 1915 we saw, lying between our fresh position and the German lines, an English soldier whom we took to be dead.

      Later, however, we advanced again, and discovered that the man was not dead, but badly wounded.

      On being asked who he was, he replied in a very weak voice, "I fink I must be the blinkin' umpire." —W. King (late Royal Fusiliers), 94 Manor Grove, Richmond, Surrey.

      Little "Ginger" was the life and soul of our platoon until he was wounded on the Somme in 1918.

      As he was carried off to the dressing-station he waved his hand feebly over the side of the stretcher and whispered, "Don't tell 'Aig! He'd worry somethin' shockin'." —G. E. Morris (late Royal Fusiliers), 368 Ivydale Road, Peckham Rye, S.E.15.

      During a most unpleasant night bombing raid on the transport lines at Haillecourt the occupants of a Nissen hut were waiting for the next crash when out of the darkness and silence came the Cockney voice of a lorry driver saying to his mate, "'Well,' I sez to 'er, I sez, 'You do as you like, and I can't say no fairer than that, can I?'" —F. R. Jelley, Upland Road, Sutton, Surrey.

      I was on the Italian front in June 1918, and our battery was being strafed by the Austrians with huge armour-piercing shells, which made a noise like an express train coming at you, and exploded with a deafening roar.

      An O.K. had just registered on one of our guns, blowing the wheels and masses of rock sky-high. A party of about twenty Austrian prisoners, in charge of a single Cockney, were passing our position at the time, and the effect of the explosion on the prisoners was startling. They scattered in all directions, vainly pursued by the Cockney, who reminded me of a sheep-dog trying to get his flock together.

      At last he paused. "You windy lot o' blighters," he shouted as he spat on the ground in evident disgust, "afraid of yer own bloomin' shells!" —S. Curtis, 20 Palace Road, Upper Norwood, S.E.19.

      In July 1918, at a casualty clearing station occupying temporary quarters in the old College of St. Vincent at ruined Senlis we dealt with 7,000 wounded in eight days. One night when we were more busy than usual an ambulance car brought up a load of gas-blinded men.

      A little man whose voice proclaimed the city of his birth – arm broken and face blistered with mustard gas, though he alone of the party could see – jumped out, looked around, and then whispered in my ear, "All serene, guv'nor, leave 'em to me."

      He turned towards the car and shouted inside, "Dalston Junction, change here for Hackney, Bow, and Poplar."

      Then gently helping each man to alight, he placed them in a line with right hand on the shoulder of the man in front, took his position forward and led them all in, calling softly as he advanced, "Slow march, left, left, I had a good job and I left it." —Henry T. Lowde (late 63rd C.C.S., R.A.M.C.), 101 Stanhope Gardens, Harringay, N.4.

      We were in the Passchendaele sector in 1917, and all who were there know there were no trenches – just shell-holes half-filled with water.

      Jerry had been strafing us for two days without a stop and of our platoon of twenty-three men only seven came out alive. As we were coming down the duckboard track after being relieved Jerry started to put over a barrage. We had to dive for the best cover we could get.

      Three of us jumped into a large shell-hole, up to our necks in water. As the shells dropped around us we kept ducking our heads under the water.

      Bert Norton, one of us – a Cockney – said: "Strike, we're like the little ducks in 'Yde Park – keep going under."

      After another shell had burst and we had just come up to breathe Bert chimed in again with: "Blimey, mustn't it be awful to have to get your living by ducking?" —J. A. Wood, 185 Dalston Lane, E.8.

      It was in No Man's Land, and a party of New Zealand troops were making for shelter in a disabled British tank to avoid the downpour of shrapnel. They were about to swarm into the tank when the head of a London Tommy popped out of an aperture, and he exclaimed, "Blimey. Hop it! This is a waiting room, not a blinkin' bee-hive." —A. E. Wragg, 1 Downs Road, Beckenham, Kent.

      We arrived at the Cambrai front in 1917 – just a small bunch of Cockneys – and were attached to the Welsh Brigade of Artillery, being told to report to B.H.Q. up the sunken road in front of Bapaume.

      En route our escort of Welshmen were telling us of the "terrible" shelling up the line. It was no leg pulling, for we quickly found out for ourselves that it was hot and furious.

      Down we all went for cover as best we could, except one Cockney who stood as one spellbound watching the bursting of the shells. One of the Welshmen yelled out, "Drop down, Cockie!" The Cockney turned round, to the wonderment and amusement of the rest, with the retort, "Blimey! Get away with yer, you're windy. I've only just come out!" —Driver W. H. Allen (attached 1st Glamorgan R.H.A.), 8 Maiden Crescent, Kentish Town, N.W.1.

      During severe fighting in Delville Wood in August 1916 our regiment (the East Surreys) was cut off for about three days and was reduced to a mere handful of men, but still we kept up our joking and spirits.

      A young Cockney, who was an adept at rhyming slang, rolled over, dead as I thought, for blood was streaming from his neck and head. But he sat up again and, wiping his hand across his forehead, exclaimed: "Strike me pink! One on the top of my loaf of bread (head), and one in the bushel and peck (neck)." Then, slinging over a Mills bomb, he shouted: "'Ere, Fritz, my thanks for a Blighty ticket." —A. Dennis, 9 Somers Road, Brixton Hill, S.W.2.

      The day after the Canadians attacked Vimy Ridge my battalion of the Royal Fusiliers advanced from Bully Grenay to a château on the outskirts of Lieven under heavy shell fire.

      At the back of the château a street led to the main road to the town. There, despite the bombardment, we found a Cockney Tommy of the Buffs playing "Tipperary" on a piano which had been blown out of a house into the road.

      We joined in – until a shell took the top off the château, when we scattered! —L. A. Utton, 184 Coteford Street, Tooting, S.W.

      We had reached the district in "Mespot" reputed to be the Garden of Eden. One evening I was making my way with six men to relieve the guard on some ammunition barges lying by the bank of the Tigris.

      We had approached to within about one hundred yards of these, when the Turks started sending over some "long-rangers." The sixth shell scored a direct hit on the centre barge, and within a few seconds the whole lot went up in what seemed like the greatest explosion of all time. Apart from being knocked over with the shock, we escaped injury, with the exception of a Cockney in our company.

      Most of his clothing, except his boots, had been stripped from his body, and his back was bleeding. Slowly he struggled to his hands and knees, and surveying his nakedness, said: "Now where's that blinkin' fig tree?" —F. Dennis, 19 Crewdson Road, Brixton, S.W.

      A forward observation officer of the Artillery was on duty keeping watch on Watling Crater, Vimy Ridge, towards the end of 1916.

      The observation post was the remains of a house, very much battered. The officer had to crawl up what had once been a large fireplace, where he had the protection of the only piece of wall that remained standing.

      He was engrossed on his task when the arrival of a "Minnie" shook the foundations of the place, and down he came in a shower of bricks and mortar with his shrapnel helmet not at the regimental angle.

      A couple of Cockney Tommies had also made a dive for the shelter of this pile of bricks and were crouching down, when the officer crawled from the fireplace. "Quick, Joe," said one of the Cockneys, "'ang up yer socks – 'ere comes ole Santa Claus!" —A. J. Robinson (late Sergeant, R.F.A.), 21 Clowders Road, Catford, S.E.6.