The Times Great War Letters: Correspondence during the First World War. James Owen
WHERE PROTEST IS DUE
11 May 1915
SIR,—THE SINKING OF the Lusitania, involving the cruel murder of hundreds of helpless and innocent non-combatants, affords those Germans who are naturalized British citizens holding prominent positions in this country an opportunity of performing an act which, even in the opinion of many who bear them no particular ill-will, is long overdue. We are in the tenth month of a war which has from the beginning been carried on by Germany with almost unspeakable treachery and vileness; but up to the present time not a single one of the distinguished Germans in our midst has thought fit to make a public avowal of his disagreement with the deliberate policy of barbarism pursued by the German Powers or to utter a word of indignation and disclaimer. Surely the moment has arrived when these gentlemen, in their own interests, if for no higher reason, should break silence and individually or collectively raise their voices against the infamous deeds which are being perpetrated by Germany. I venture to suggest that they might with propriety band together and present a loyal address to the King embracing an expression of their detestation of Germany’s methods of warfare; but perhaps this may be better left to their own discretion and good feeling. What I would emphasize, however, is that continued silence on their part lays them open to the supposition that, thinking that the fate of England is hanging in the balance, they are—to use the common phrase—sitting on the gate. A word of warning, therefore, is neither gratuitous nor unfriendly. The temper of this country, slow to rouse, is becoming an ugly one. The gate may fall from its hinges.
Your obedient servant,
ARTHUR PINERO
The British liner Lusitania had been sunk on May 7 off the coast of Ireland by a U-boat. Among the 1,200 who died were 128 neutral Americans. Despite official denials, the vessel had been carrying munitions.
MOBILIZE THE NATION
25 May 1915
HOW TO GET MEN AND SHELLS
SIR,—I HAVE JUST returned from the front, where I have spent the last month in giving what help I could to our chaplains and troops in Northern France and Flanders. It was the most glorious month I have ever spent, and I want, if I can, to pass on to others a few of the impressions which were burnt into my soul during that time—for the days are critical.
I had never doubted that the spirit of our troops was as fine as men told us it was, but I never realized how fine it was until I had lived in it and with it. It beggars description; it is amazing. It is all the more so when you realize, as you do when you are up at the front, that this spirit is there in spite of the fact that the men who show it feel it in their bones that somehow the nation is not backing them as the nation could and should. That, I am convinced, is the feeling right through the Army in France and Flanders; and the reason for it is not far to seek.
AT THE FRONT
After fighting desperately day and night for days and weeks, with frightful losses, the men who are left are dog tired and need a rest. When they are “pulled out” to get this rest, and after three days are sent back into the firing line again, the only conclusion they can draw is that there are not enough troops available to take their places. When battalion after battalion of infantry—and, as was recently the case in the Ypres salient, regiment after regiment of cavalry, too—have to sit in trenches day after day and night after night, being pounded by high explosives from enemy guns, with no guns behind them capable of keeping down the enemy’s fire, then the conclusion they draw is obvious—namely, that the nation has failed to provide sufficient guns of ammunition to meet those of the enemy. When night after night and day after day, the men in the trenches know that for every one hand grenade or rifle grenade or trench mortar bomb which they throw at the enemy they will get back in answer anything from five to 10, then the conclusion they draw is also obvious—namely, that the nation does not somehow realize the situation, or, if it does, has not made it its business to supply what is necessary. Man for man they know that they have nothing to fear either from German infantry or cavalry; they have proved it again and again. But they know also that it is little short of murder for a nation to ask men, however full of the right spirit, to face an enemy amply equipped with big guns and the right kind of ammunition, unless they are at last equipped with equally effective munitions of war.
There can be only one impression left on the minds of men in such a case, and that is, that somehow or other the nation does not know the truth, does not understand, and is not backing them, for, knowing the old country as they do, they have no doubt that if Germany can produce these things we can, if we will. And yet, in spite of it all, they carry on, they keep cheery, they do their best, they die gaily. The fact is that as a nation we are just gambling on this spirit. We know it to be there; we recognize it as the finest thing in the world; we believe it is unconquerable, whatever happens. So it is; but it will not win the war alone. It is this spirit, backed by guns and high explosives—legitimate munitions of war—which is going to smash this enemy of ours, and nothing else. Let no one think that we are going to do it by descending to the level of the German Imperial Staff and using any sort of gas. This talk of reprisals by gas (perhaps next we shall near of reprisals by poisoning water supplies!) is simply another method of chloroforming the nation and blinding its eyes to the real issue—the adequate supply of big guns and high explosive shells and other legitimate munitions of war.
THE SOLDIER’S QUESTION
And these munitions of war have to be made, not by the men at the front who are doing the fighting, but here in the British Isles. The men at the front know this; they know that the making of munitions of war, the making of clothes and equipment, the provision of food and of the thousand and one other things necessary to an army in the field—all these are just as much an integral part of the business as theirs is. And then they ask (I have heard them myself—wounded men in hospitals and whole men on the field), “Why should I, who enlisted under a voluntary system, because my part of the job is to loose of the ammunition my next-door neighbour at home has made, be compelled to do so under the extreme penalty of death for disobedience to orders or desertion from my job, while my neighbour at home is allowed to chuck his job with impunity whenever he wants to? Why should I be punished for refusing to go into the trenches because my pay is not raised a penny an hour, and the other fellow be allowed to strike and then be cajoled into going back to work by the special visit of a Cabinet Minister and the promise of extra pay? Why should I have to stick it out, night after night and day after day, in water and mud up to my knees, when the other fellow (who is only doing another part of the same job) can make his own conditions as to hours of work?”
Why, indeed? Why should any one of us who claims citizenship in the Empire, when the Empire is fighting for its very existence, be free to do what we like at such a time? That is the question I asked myself as I came away one evening from visiting a private soldier who had fought through the first three or four months of the war and had then deserted (his excuse was drink) and was to be shot, and was shot, and rightly too, at 5.30 the next morning. Why, indeed? That is what the men at the front are asking.
The news which they will have read these last few days will have put fresh heart into them all. For nine solid months they have been wondering why on earth the nation has not done what it has at last been decided to do—viz., to form a National Government. And now what? Is this National Government going to be the real thing or not? Is it going to be merely a combination of representatives of existing political parties on some sort of basis of numbers in the House of Commons? Is the cloven hoof of party politics still going to be found in it, or is it going to be a Government composed of the very best men whom the nation can produce, irrespective altogether of politics and parties? Is it still going to keep half an eye on votes, or is it going to get on with the one and only thing which matters