0:00:02 > 0:00:03BBC Four Collections,
0:00:04 > 0:00:06specially chosen programmes from the BBC Archive.
0:00:06 > 0:00:09For this collection, Max Hastings has selected interviews
0:00:09 > 0:00:13with Great War veterans filmed in the 1960s.
0:00:13 > 0:00:15More programmes on this theme
0:00:15 > 0:00:17and other BBC Four Collections
0:00:17 > 0:00:19are available on BBC iPlayer.
0:00:48 > 0:00:52Sad is not a soldier's word.
0:00:52 > 0:00:56Browned off, fed up, yes.
0:00:56 > 0:00:58Or he'll moan the clock round.
0:00:58 > 0:01:03But the only time a soldier isreally and deeply sad
0:01:04 > 0:01:08iswhen his line of duty takes him among refugees.
0:01:10 > 0:01:17Those weary, shuffling hordes stumbling down the road.
0:01:19 > 0:01:24Chiefly women, children,the elderly.
0:01:25 > 0:01:29Carrying, pushing, pulling,
0:01:29 > 0:01:33a pram,a wheelbarrow, a farm cart.
0:01:33 > 0:01:37Their world piled high.
0:01:37 > 0:01:42And often,perched on the top, Granny.
0:01:51 > 0:01:56On a brisk November morning, October morning,
0:01:56 > 0:02:00we arrived in the port of Antwerp.
0:02:02 > 0:02:04The people lined the streets.
0:02:04 > 0:02:09They cheered, they waved, they gave us flowers and wine.
0:02:11 > 0:02:14The war was young, and so were we.
0:02:14 > 0:02:19We felt gallant, they felt relieved.
0:02:19 > 0:02:22Out to the trenches, we went.
0:02:22 > 0:02:26We settled, opened reserved ammunition,
0:02:26 > 0:02:29fixed our bayonets and said, "Now let them come."
0:02:31 > 0:02:35Night came, but not the enemy.
0:02:39 > 0:02:43We posted sentries and settled.
0:02:43 > 0:02:45But not for long.
0:02:46 > 0:02:50Heavy rifle fire brokeout on the left, then on the right.
0:02:50 > 0:02:54We manned the firing step and peered over.
0:02:55 > 0:02:59Searchlights from the fort sweptthe front.
0:02:59 > 0:03:00We could see nothing.
0:03:02 > 0:03:05We held our fire and felt neglected.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10Morning came, still no enemy.
0:03:12 > 0:03:18And suddenly high in the sky wasa train-like rumbleand whistle
0:03:18 > 0:03:20followedby an explosion.
0:03:22 > 0:03:24Smoke and flames shotup in the city.
0:03:27 > 0:03:31An old hand said, "Them's howitzer shells.
0:03:31 > 0:03:34"The bastards must be a dozen miles away."
0:03:36 > 0:03:39At intervals through the day,
0:03:39 > 0:03:42theserumbling shells rolled over,
0:03:42 > 0:03:45flames shot up after each explosion.
0:03:48 > 0:03:51Then the oil tanks by the dockside were alight.
0:03:53 > 0:03:56The smoke gathered over the port
0:03:56 > 0:03:59tojoin the autumn mists,
0:03:59 > 0:04:03and the glow from the fires... it looked like hell.
0:04:05 > 0:04:10We could only wait and we felt useless, helpless.
0:04:13 > 0:04:18Suddenly an order came - prepare to move.
0:04:21 > 0:04:25Just at the back of our trench was a deserted farm.
0:04:26 > 0:04:30Odd men had scrounged over into thefarm,
0:04:30 > 0:04:35and as we were about tomove, an officer shouted to me,
0:04:35 > 0:04:37"Sergeant, see the farm's clear!"
0:04:39 > 0:04:41Coming back through an outhouse,
0:04:41 > 0:04:44I saw some pails of milk.
0:04:44 > 0:04:47And I did the most unsoldierly action -
0:04:47 > 0:04:53I emptied my half-full water bottle and filled it full of milk.
0:04:55 > 0:04:59We soon got orders to move to theright and onto the road.
0:04:59 > 0:05:04We thought, "Ah, they won't come to us - we're going after them."
0:05:04 > 0:05:09Reaching the road, instead of turning left, to the enemy,
0:05:09 > 0:05:11we turned right to the city.
0:05:12 > 0:05:17And we had received the most deadening, soul-racking order
0:05:17 > 0:05:21a soldier canreceive - retreat.
0:05:21 > 0:05:24We picked our way throughthe burning buildings,
0:05:24 > 0:05:29past the flaming oil tanks to the floating bridge,
0:05:29 > 0:05:33the pontoon bridge the engineers had built
0:05:33 > 0:05:36for us to cross and then destroy.
0:05:37 > 0:05:44Each side of the...bridge stood the hordes of refugees.
0:05:44 > 0:05:49Every kind - children, women,nuns, priests.
0:05:52 > 0:05:54This was the bridge of sighs.
0:05:54 > 0:05:58They had been stopped so we could cross.
0:05:58 > 0:06:01The flare from the burning homes lit their faces,
0:06:01 > 0:06:03expressionless and hopeless.
0:06:03 > 0:06:05We were ashamed.
0:06:06 > 0:06:10An officer called to me, "Sergeant, shout, 'Break step'!"
0:06:10 > 0:06:13It should have been break hearts.
0:06:15 > 0:06:18We were soon across in the opencountry.
0:06:18 > 0:06:23Hard pressed on down the road each side of us the citizens of Antwerp.
0:06:26 > 0:06:31After a few miles, we arrived at a Belgian village,
0:06:31 > 0:06:34marched into the cobbled square.
0:06:34 > 0:06:39The orders were, "Rest where youstand, be ready for any alarm."
0:06:41 > 0:06:44Just by was the church.
0:06:44 > 0:06:49Straw had been placed all around it with dark forms lying on it.
0:06:49 > 0:06:52My pal and I moved to the straw and were about to settle
0:06:52 > 0:06:55when we noticed two young women.
0:06:55 > 0:06:58With a mumbled apology, we were moving away
0:06:58 > 0:07:03when a good English voice - good English - said, "Don't go, please."
0:07:03 > 0:07:07We squatted down.
0:07:07 > 0:07:11And I saw that one of the young woman was nursing a whimpering baby.
0:07:13 > 0:07:16For something to say, I said, "Is your baby all right?"
0:07:16 > 0:07:18With a sad smile, she said,
0:07:18 > 0:07:23"It is not my baby. I don't even know its mother."
0:07:23 > 0:07:26She said, "We are tired and hungry."
0:07:26 > 0:07:29My pal and I emptied our haversacks.
0:07:29 > 0:07:32Two tins of sardines and Army biscuits.
0:07:32 > 0:07:36She sighed. She said, "The baby needs milk."
0:07:36 > 0:07:40"Milk!" I swung my water bottle round.
0:07:40 > 0:07:43I think even the baby was surprised.
0:07:45 > 0:07:49Quite soon, we fell inand marched away.
0:07:49 > 0:07:54The British government had losta water bottle,
0:07:54 > 0:07:57but a baby had found a meal.
0:07:59 > 0:08:00MAN: We'll cut.
0:08:09 > 0:08:13There was a jumping-off trench which was halfway across no-man's-land.
0:08:13 > 0:08:16A brigade of us had to go out and line this trench,
0:08:16 > 0:08:18so we were halfway there.
0:08:18 > 0:08:24But waiting, we got assembled about one or two o'clock in the morning.
0:08:24 > 0:08:29Then we had to wait till zero hour, which was a quarter to six.
0:08:29 > 0:08:36And I remember those lads standingthere, dead silent,
0:08:36 > 0:08:38we couldn't make a noise.
0:08:38 > 0:08:42The fellow standing next to you, he was your best friend, you loved him.
0:08:42 > 0:08:45You perhaps didn't know him the day before.
0:08:45 > 0:08:48And then, an hour to go, they were the longest, those hours,
0:08:48 > 0:08:50and the shortest hours in life.
0:08:52 > 0:08:57An infantryman in the front line, he's got a cold, deep fear,
0:08:57 > 0:08:59an experienced infantryman.
0:08:59 > 0:09:01Then five minutes to go.
0:09:01 > 0:09:06And then zero hour, and all hell lets loose.
0:09:06 > 0:09:10There's our barrage, the Germans' barrage, and over the top we go.
0:09:10 > 0:09:15As soon as you get over the top, fear has left you, and it's terror.
0:09:19 > 0:09:23You don't...look, you see.
0:09:23 > 0:09:26You don'thear, you listen.
0:09:28 > 0:09:31Your nose is filled with fumesand death.
0:09:31 > 0:09:33You taste the top of your mouth.
0:09:35 > 0:09:38Your weapon and you are one.
0:09:38 > 0:09:41A hunter, you're back to the jungle.
0:09:41 > 0:09:46The veneer of civilisation hasdropped away.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49And you see the line of men,
0:09:49 > 0:09:51the flare of the shells
0:09:51 > 0:09:55and the mist of dawn, November dawn.
0:09:55 > 0:09:58And the fumes from the shells comingout of the bursting shell,
0:09:59 > 0:10:01which gives it a dirtyorange colour.
0:10:04 > 0:10:06Then you see this line.
0:10:06 > 0:10:10Then a gap, closing, and you go on.
0:10:10 > 0:10:13You come into the front line, the Germans' front line.
0:10:13 > 0:10:16What's that on the left?
0:10:16 > 0:10:18You can see figures rising from the ground.
0:10:18 > 0:10:20Somebody's gottheir hands up.
0:10:21 > 0:10:24We'd kept well up to the barrage, in my part of the line,
0:10:24 > 0:10:27so the Germans were down in the dug-outs.
0:10:27 > 0:10:29The bombers attended to them, and we went on.
0:10:29 > 0:10:32We soon crossed the second line.
0:10:32 > 0:10:35And then we came to the third line,
0:10:35 > 0:10:39which wasn'toccupied by the Germans at all.
0:10:39 > 0:10:42So we rested there a bit, we had to rest for so long.
0:10:43 > 0:10:47I discovered my battalion was down to...just under 300.
0:10:47 > 0:10:52And out of 20 officers, one - captain.
0:10:52 > 0:10:55Very good chap, but he'd never been in a battle before.
0:10:55 > 0:10:57This was his first experience.
0:10:58 > 0:11:01I was the sergeant major of the line.
0:11:04 > 0:11:06I knew what had to be done.
0:11:06 > 0:11:10But could I tell him to do it? And could he do it if I told him?
0:11:11 > 0:11:14It wasn't for me to do it,
0:11:14 > 0:11:16and I felt very lonely.
0:11:16 > 0:11:20I looked over my shoulder, and my colonel was coming along.
0:11:20 > 0:11:23The colonel always stays back, until he gets orders,
0:11:23 > 0:11:26but he'd broken his orders and come forward.
0:11:26 > 0:11:30Friberg. He said, "Hello, Tobin, how are you?"
0:11:30 > 0:11:32I said, "I'm all right, sir."
0:11:32 > 0:11:37He said, "We'll get a VC today." Might as well. He got his...!
0:11:37 > 0:11:40Then he gathered all the oddments up,
0:11:40 > 0:11:44and away we went to takethe next objective.
0:11:44 > 0:11:47The final objective was the village, Beaucourt.
0:11:47 > 0:11:49We hadn't sufficient men to take that,
0:11:49 > 0:11:54so we dug in and waited till some reinforcements came up.
0:11:56 > 0:11:59The colonel sent me out on battle patrol.
0:12:01 > 0:12:06Battle patrol is just 20 or 30 men,
0:12:06 > 0:12:08and you go ahead of your trench.
0:12:10 > 0:12:16You're really there to hold up acounterattack as long as you can.
0:12:16 > 0:12:19That's the posh way of putting it.
0:12:19 > 0:12:23But you are there to do as muchdamage as you can
0:12:23 > 0:12:26and to warn the front line so they...getting ready.
0:12:26 > 0:12:30However, there was no counterattack that night.
0:12:30 > 0:12:33So we came back from the battlepatrol all right.
0:12:33 > 0:12:36One of our men went out and he came back in great glee.
0:12:37 > 0:12:39He been to the back of the village, somehow or other,
0:12:39 > 0:12:42and he was a Glasgow Irishman, a real lad.
0:12:43 > 0:12:45And he'd seen a wagon going along.
0:12:45 > 0:12:47It was the Germans bringingthe rations up,
0:12:47 > 0:12:49so he climbed over the back,
0:12:49 > 0:12:52bayoneted the driver and pinched the...mail.
0:12:52 > 0:12:56So he brought it back to the line,
0:12:56 > 0:12:58and we had schnapps,
0:12:59 > 0:13:02and in the mailbag was a box of cigars
0:13:02 > 0:13:05coming up for the German commander.
0:13:05 > 0:13:07Friberg sent it back to our general.
0:13:14 > 0:13:17Passchendaele wasthe infantryman's graveyard.
0:13:17 > 0:13:19We called it the slaughterhouse.
0:13:19 > 0:13:22And even the most seasoned veteran felt he'd be lucky
0:13:22 > 0:13:25if he got there and came back.
0:13:25 > 0:13:28There was no chance of getting woundedand getting a Blighty
0:13:28 > 0:13:30at Passchendaele.
0:13:30 > 0:13:32You'd either get through or die.
0:13:32 > 0:13:35Because if you were wounded and you slipped off the duckboards,
0:13:35 > 0:13:37you just sank into the mud.
0:13:38 > 0:13:41I don't know how far the duckboards extended,
0:13:41 > 0:13:44because it was such slowgoing up to the front.
0:13:44 > 0:13:49Must have been hundreds and hundreds of yards and it zigzagged about.
0:13:49 > 0:13:51But each side was a sea of mud.
0:13:51 > 0:13:53And you stumbled and slid along.
0:13:53 > 0:13:58If you slipped, you wentup to the waist possibly.
0:13:58 > 0:14:02Not only that, but in everypool, you'd fall in
0:14:02 > 0:14:07with decomposed bodies of humans andmules,
0:14:07 > 0:14:09or mules and perhaps both.
0:14:11 > 0:14:14And if you were wounded and slipped off,
0:14:14 > 0:14:17well, then, that was the end of you.
0:14:17 > 0:14:19And when you got up there, there wasno front line,
0:14:19 > 0:14:21there was no line at all.
0:14:21 > 0:14:27Just a series of posts, scraped in the mud.
0:14:27 > 0:14:32Here a machine gun's crew, there a few riflemen.
0:14:32 > 0:14:34Further on a Lewis gun's crew.
0:14:34 > 0:14:36And in some cases,
0:14:36 > 0:14:41the battle depth of your battalion was a thousand yards.
0:14:41 > 0:14:43These posts bobbing about.
0:14:44 > 0:14:48You couldn't get to any of them in daylight,
0:14:48 > 0:14:51because you were under enemy observation the whole time.
0:14:51 > 0:14:53You couldn't get food, nor rations,
0:14:53 > 0:14:56nor ammunition or anything up in thedaylight,
0:14:56 > 0:15:01cos these duckboards were attacked by the Germans,
0:15:01 > 0:15:03shelling them the whole time.
0:15:03 > 0:15:06And in most places, if shells start dropping,
0:15:06 > 0:15:09you run to the right or run to theleft to get some cover.
0:15:09 > 0:15:11But if you're on the duckboard, you couldn't run.
0:15:11 > 0:15:13There was mud to your right and mud to your left,
0:15:13 > 0:15:15and you had to face it and go on.
0:15:18 > 0:15:21The men, the relief was...hopeless.
0:15:21 > 0:15:24A battalion came from an ordinarytrench as a battalion,
0:15:24 > 0:15:27but the men struggled back in twosandthrees,
0:15:27 > 0:15:29and some of them a day late.
0:15:29 > 0:15:32They hadn't been found,they hadn't been told they'd been relieved.
0:15:32 > 0:15:36Possibly, they didn't know they were there.
0:15:36 > 0:15:38I've seen men coming out covered in mud,
0:15:38 > 0:15:42they just scraped the mud from their eyes. They had in their hands
0:15:42 > 0:15:46what looked like a muddy bough off a tree - it was the Lewis gun.
0:15:48 > 0:15:53The only thought was the Germans were in a better position as we were.
0:15:53 > 0:15:57In fact, we had a case where onelittle party of men wastrying
0:15:57 > 0:16:01to make their hole morecomfortable, scooping it out,
0:16:01 > 0:16:04and some hundreds of yards away, the Germans were doing the same.
0:16:04 > 0:16:08They're both in their misery,not taking any damn notice of each other.
0:16:09 > 0:16:11And...
0:16:13 > 0:16:17..we used to get browned off, fed up, as we called it, in our war.
0:16:17 > 0:16:22Because if we heardwe were going back to Passchendaelea second time,
0:16:22 > 0:16:25that was always the horror of an infantryman...
0:16:25 > 0:16:29who wanted to go to that sector again?
0:16:29 > 0:16:32Because you couldn't use the guns up there, you see.
0:16:32 > 0:16:35I've seen them make a road to tryand get some guns up there.
0:16:35 > 0:16:3818-pounder shells,
0:16:38 > 0:16:39beautiful new shells,
0:16:39 > 0:16:43and they were swimming in the mud tryingto get a base to get a gun up.
0:16:46 > 0:16:49We didn't have any gasthere in our stay in the line.
0:16:49 > 0:16:51But everything else.
0:16:54 > 0:16:56Mules, you couldn'tget any rations up on the mules.
0:16:56 > 0:16:58They tried it,
0:16:58 > 0:17:01and the mules either got the wind up and jumped in the mud,
0:17:02 > 0:17:04and that was the end of the mule and your rations, you see.
0:17:05 > 0:17:09Really, a man... We used to try and regiment up for 48 hours,
0:17:09 > 0:17:12they couldn't keep the men up there any longer.
0:17:12 > 0:17:13And one time we went up,
0:17:13 > 0:17:16conditions were so bad they gave the men a double tot of rum,
0:17:16 > 0:17:17which was rather exceptional,
0:17:17 > 0:17:20and every NCO from a Lance Corporal upwardscarried
0:17:20 > 0:17:23a bottle of rum in his hip to help troops on the way.
0:17:27 > 0:17:29I was always... I thought
0:17:29 > 0:17:32the battalioncommandershad the greatest worry at Passchendaele,
0:17:32 > 0:17:37because it was one of the fronts where...their flanks were in the air.
0:17:37 > 0:17:39The battalion commander, and our battalion commander,
0:17:39 > 0:17:41had to wander miles to try and get in touch
0:17:41 > 0:17:43with the Canadians on the right.
0:17:43 > 0:17:47Of course, the horror of that sort of caper was there were pillboxes
0:17:47 > 0:17:50scattered about which the Germanshad made.
0:17:50 > 0:17:52These had to be approached verycarefully,
0:17:52 > 0:17:55because you didn't quite know whether we were in the pillbox
0:17:55 > 0:17:56or the Germans were in the pillbox,
0:17:56 > 0:18:01and very often, you go in, they were full of dead...both Germans and us.
0:18:01 > 0:18:04Wounded that had crawled inand died.
0:18:04 > 0:18:06The horrors of Passchendaele.
0:18:08 > 0:18:09MAN: And cut.
0:18:20 > 0:18:24Mybattalion had withdrawn around the Ruhr,
0:18:24 > 0:18:28and now, for days, it wasan infantryman's battle.
0:18:30 > 0:18:34Even our division of artillery joined us as infantry.
0:18:34 > 0:18:38Often firing alongside of us over open sights.
0:18:38 > 0:18:42Our major general and his brigadiers were with us,
0:18:42 > 0:18:45controlling the troops like Wellington might.
0:18:47 > 0:18:50It was leapfrog in reverse.
0:18:50 > 0:18:55Battalion went through battalion, company through company.
0:18:55 > 0:18:58But always a company, always a battalion,
0:18:58 > 0:19:02standing facing the enemy, ready to fight.
0:19:03 > 0:19:09And so we came back to theSomme battlefields.
0:19:09 > 0:19:12Our general formed us in a square, his flanks in the air,
0:19:12 > 0:19:14he put out flanking battalions.
0:19:16 > 0:19:21In some six hours we came back over these old battlefields
0:19:21 > 0:19:23that had taken two years.
0:19:23 > 0:19:28On the 26th of March we dropped into a trench.
0:19:29 > 0:19:32It was a trench we knew.
0:19:32 > 0:19:33We knew of old.
0:19:35 > 0:19:40We had startedretreating, 21st of March 1918.
0:19:40 > 0:19:46We were back in the trench that wehad attacked from,
0:19:46 > 0:19:50on the 13th of November 1916.
0:19:52 > 0:19:58In that trench came up FieldMarshall Haig's famous message,
0:19:58 > 0:20:01"Backs to the wall.
0:20:01 > 0:20:05"Every man will stand and fight and fall. No more retreating."
0:20:08 > 0:20:13But still we had a little joy in our hearts, the infantrymen,
0:20:13 > 0:20:19because although we had not won, we had not been beaten.
0:20:21 > 0:20:23The only lead in our hearts...
0:20:24 > 0:20:29..wasthe thought that we were back to the old trench ding-dong.
0:20:31 > 0:20:32No signs of an end.
0:20:35 > 0:20:39And so the weeksand months went on.
0:20:39 > 0:20:40April, May.
0:20:42 > 0:20:45We even did one or two smallattacks.
0:20:45 > 0:20:49The German attacks grew fewer and weaker.
0:20:51 > 0:20:54When we were out on the line,
0:20:54 > 0:20:56we used to stand by the road
0:20:56 > 0:21:01and watch the fresh, strong,plump
0:21:01 > 0:21:05new American battalions swing by.
0:21:05 > 0:21:08They waved and laughed and shouted.
0:21:08 > 0:21:12Our boys stood by the side of the road and grinned back.
0:21:12 > 0:21:15But we wondered, did they know?
0:21:16 > 0:21:19Could they do it?
0:21:19 > 0:21:21Would they do it?
0:21:21 > 0:21:23We were pleased to see them.
0:21:25 > 0:21:28And then, it must have been July orAugust,
0:21:28 > 0:21:30I saw the first sunshine.
0:21:33 > 0:21:35We'd had rest at a bivouac camp.
0:21:37 > 0:21:39A rough notice board hadbeen put up.
0:21:40 > 0:21:44I heard some giggling, some twittering, some laughing.
0:21:44 > 0:21:48It was like a horde of sparrows. I looked across.
0:21:49 > 0:21:53There were dozens of infantrymen, crowded round the board.
0:21:55 > 0:21:56They were laughingand giggling
0:21:56 > 0:21:58and passing and chatting back to each other.
0:21:58 > 0:22:01Those that could read the notice were passing it on,
0:22:01 > 0:22:02what was on the board.
0:22:02 > 0:22:06It was almost like a Gilbertand Sullivan comedy production.
0:22:09 > 0:22:11The notice read...
0:22:12 > 0:22:15..thatin the south theFrench and the Americans
0:22:16 > 0:22:17had drivenback the enemy.
0:22:17 > 0:22:19Goodness knows high many miles,
0:22:19 > 0:22:22God knows how many prisoners and guns had been captured.
0:22:25 > 0:22:27We were happy.
0:22:27 > 0:22:30It was the firstsunshine since 1914.
0:22:32 > 0:22:37And in our war-weary hearts we knew that it was not the end.
0:22:37 > 0:22:41But we knew it was the beginning of the end.
0:22:43 > 0:22:44MAN: And cut.