The Night Before The Battle of Passchendaele

* Sensitive content - death of an animal mentioned, not shown, and some swear words

Rain fell without mercy on the low, clay-soaked fields of the Ypres Salient in Belgium.

East of the battered town of Ypres, where the village of Passchendaele lay just beyond the next low ridge, the British soldiers knew a battle was coming. On the night of the twenty-eighth of July the battery commander ordered the section forward into position. Second Lieutenant Hardie and his men spent the better part of two nights and a day hauling the eighteen-pounders through the Belgian mud, laying timber under the wheels, and stacking shells. By the evening of the thirtieth of July, the guns stood set — unlimbered, protected, and sighted — while horses still struggled through the impossible mud from the wagon lines with their last loads of ammunition.

Ten o’clock in the evening – 30th July 1917

Hardie’s section had their two eighteen-pounders as ready as the Belgian mud would allow. The guns stood on their hastily laid timber platforms, wheels already half-sunk in the muck.

Hardie glanced at his watch. Ten o’clock — nine back home. He wondered whether it was raining as hard in England as it was here in the Ypres Salient, where for more than a fortnight, the guns had roared without cease. Every man knew a major action was coming; only the exact hour had remained hidden until that afternoon.

The sealed orders arrived just after three. Zero hour was set for three-fifty the next morning. When Hardie read them, his first reaction was a short, hysterical bark of laughter. Advancing guns, horses, and men through this churned swamp was nearly impossible. Yet the directive had come from Field Marshal Haig himself. It would be done.

His top Number One, Bombardier Ellis, watched the young officer closely as he received the papers. From Hardie’s expression, Ellis already knew what was coming. Hours later he pulled the tarpaulin tighter over the gun sights and barrel and hunkered down with what would be his last cup of tea for a while.

Further back at the wagon lines, Farrier-Sergeant Hargreaves checked on the horses. He could still feel the exhausted trembling in Bessie, his favourite mare, after the last brutal pull. He was almost relieved the waiting would soon be over.

In the flooded aid post, Private Mullins, a former Latin teacher, slipped his own notebook of poems into a waxed envelope and carefully tucked it with his small, battered copy of Rupert Brooke’s 1914 and Other Poems beside it, close against his heart, and went to check his instruments again.

Hardie walked quietly among his men, stopping beside Bombardier Ellis. “Number One, draw a full rum ration for the section. One good tot each. Tell the lads it’s with my compliments.”

Ellis nodded. “Very good, sir.”

As Ellis began measuring out the rum, Hardie looked out into the darkness toward the wagon lines. “Poor sods,” he muttered. “Those horses are going to have a hell of a night dragging the limbers forward in this.” He turned back to Ellis. “Anything more we can do for them?”

Ellis shook his head. “Farrier-Sergeant Harris knows his business, sir. They’ll manage.”

Rum was measured out into tin mugs. Its sharp scent cut through the rain and mud for a brief moment. Some men drank in silence, others muttered thanks or made grim jokes. For a little while the chill in their bones eased.

Hardie took his own tot, then retreated to his dugout. He had perhaps ten minutes he could call his own.

Dropping into the ditch beside the gun pit, he ducked under the wood planks and sagging tarpaulin, careful not to spill the precious rum he was cradling against his chest as if it were the last drink on earth. The moment he was inside the cramped dugout he set the tin mug down on the ammunition box, lifted off his steel helmet, the wet metal cold against his fingers, and laid it down. For the first time in hours his head felt light.

He lit the stub of a candle, dragged his valise away from the dripping water, and wiped it with his sleeve. Only then did he sit. He lit a damp cigarette and drew deeply, watching the smoke curl upward as if trying to escape the rain.

Only after that first long pull did he reach for the mug and take his first sip. The liquor burned its way down his throat and made his eyes water. Rum had never been his drink of choice.

Not like the Sauternes the elderly château owner had offered him last winter, in the weeks after the Somme. The old Comte had poured the 1900 Château d’Yquem with great ceremony, patted him on the back, and said, “Savourez-le, Lieutenant. C’est du liquide d’or.”

It truly had been liquid gold.

Sighing, Hardie tossed back the last of the rough rum, stubbed out his cigarette, and rose to his feet. Smiling at his own foolishness, he placed the empty tin cup under the drip. Triumph of hope over experience, he thought wryly.

He pulled his trench coat tighter, the gabardine heavy with mud and wet. Beneath it, his Sam Browne belt pressed uncomfortably across his shoulder and waist. He settled his cold, heavy steel helmet back on his head. He snuffed out the candle.

Time to go back to war.

Eleven o’clock in the evening, July 30th, 1917

Bombardier Ellis wiped rain from his eyes with the back of a filthy hand. The tin mug in his grip felt heavier than it should. Forty-three years old, regular army since 1900, he had survived the three big battles — Neuve Chapelle, the Somme, and Arras. Pray to God he made it through this one.

He handed the last tot to young Williams, who had been shaking since the sealed orders arrived. “Get that down you, lad. Warm you up a bit, that will.” He clinked his tin cup against the boy’s trembling one. “Cheers, mate.”

Ellis watched the lad’s desperate swallow, then glanced toward the dugout where Lieutenant Hardie had disappeared. The boy officer was all right, as subalterns went — didn’t panic, didn’t pretend he knew everything. Still, Ellis had seen too many good ones die in the first minutes of an attack. He checked the tarpaulin over the breech for the third time, then ran his fingers along the elevation screw out of habit. The gun was as ready as mud and British engineering would allow.

In the brief lull between gusts of rain he heard the horses screaming again from the wagon lines. High, desperate sounds that cut through the constant drum of water. Ellis’s jaw tightened. He had grown up on a farm in Kent. He knew what it cost to ask animals to do the impossible.

He took his own rum in one swig, the burn chasing the chill for a few heartbeats. Then he corked the jar and stored it carefully under cover. Saved for the next battle, he thought grimly.

Two in the morning - July 31st 1917

Farrier-Sergeant Hargreaves pressed his forehead against the sodden neck of the new horse, a big bay gelding brought forward to replace Bessie, The colt’s flanks still trembled from the last cruel haul through the worsening mud.

“Easy… easy,” he murmured, the same words he had used with Bessie only hours earlier. Bessie now lay somewhere back along the rutted road; her leg shattered after slipping into a flooded crater. He had shot her himself.

“Tomorrer’s dinner,” cracked a nearby soldier, already unbuckling the harness.

Hargreaves rounded on him. “Shut your gob, you shit-hole. She were worth ten of you.” His voice cracked. He loved all his horses, but Bessie had been special — willing to the end.

He checked the new harness again, tightening straps that would soon drag more limbers loaded with shells through ground that swallowed horses up to their withers. Around him other farriers worked in silence, their lanterns hooded against the wet. Steam rose from the exhausted horses despite the rain, their coats dark with sweat and mud. The air reeked of wet horse, fear, and acrid sweat-soaked wool.

Hargreaves ran a hand down the bay’s foreleg, feeling for heat or swelling. Nothing yet. A flash of anger ran through him at his ‘yet’. He would do the best he could for his horses, but his heart lurched with pain for what he knew was coming.

Then he straightened, patted the bay’s shoulder, and led him forward into the darkness. There was still work to do before three-fifty.

Twenty past three

Private Mullins sat on an upturned ammunition box inside the flooded aid post, trying to keep his boots out of the rising water. His notebook, protected by the waxed envelope, rested against his heart beside the worn copy of Rupert Brooke.

He had tried to write earlier, but the words would not come. Instead, he read again the lines from “The Soldier,” words he had once memorized, but now needed to see on the page. The candle flame flickered wildly in the darkness.

If I should die, think only this of me: That there’s some corner of a foreign field That is for ever England.

The sentiment had once moved him deeply. Now it felt like stupid, foolish, romantic folly. There were no fields here — only stinking mud and shit and corpses. The beauty of the lines offered little comfort now. He turned instead to “The Old Vicarage, Grantchester” and read the closing lines. The longing for home hit him like a physical blow.

He’d spent the last few hours working with the orderlies, laying out dressings, morphine ampoules, and tourniquets. Mullins closed his eyes and tried to fix the faces of his section in his mind — Hardie, Ellis, Hargreaves, young Williams. He might not see them alive and whole again after today. He tried not to think about his own chances.

He slipped the book back inside his tunic, buttoned it carefully, and stood. The rain on the tarpaulin above rattled like distant rifle fire.

Three Forty-five...

Rain fell in silver needles though the gun flashes, turning the Salient into one vast, sucking swamp. Standing there, watch in hand, Hardie felt the patrol memory rise before him again — the flooded shell crater, the marching Germans, young Williams breaking, his hard slap across the man’s face. He’d got them all back alive. He would not break now. He studied his Number One, methodically checking his gun. Hardie shouted Ellis’s name through the rain and the bombardier looked up. Going against military protocol, Hardie stood to attention and saluted.

Bombardier Ellis mirrored the gesture at once. He watched 2nd Lt. Hardie through the rain. Second Lieutenants rarely lasted long. They always seemed among the first to die. Still, this one, he hoped, had a chance.

Further back, Driver Hargreaves returned from the wagon lines leading another fresh horse. He still carried the grief of Bessie’s death. He thought of the mare’s neck warm under his hand and wondered how many more good creatures would die before sunrise.

And Mullins, standing quietly near the aid post with his sodden notebook tucked inside his tunic, watched the men of his section and found Rupert Brooke’s “The Soldier” returning to him. “If I should die...” He sent up a whispered prayer and turned back to getting ready for the coming wounded.

Three-forty-eight … Three-fifty…

The rain continued in its relentless fall.

Lieutenant Hardie now stood twenty yards back from his two sinking guns, luminous watch shielded from the wet. The second hand swept around the dial with terrible slowness. He closed his eyes for a heartbeat. Fear again. It came as a flash of his nightmares — the German soldier charging at him with fixed bayonet...

No.

He slammed the memory shut, grabbed his whistle, and blew two short blasts. Heads snapped his way. All eyes locked on him. At three forty-nine he raised his voice above the rain and made the windmill signal.

“Load!”

Shells slammed into the breeches. Breech blocks clanged shut. Layers made final adjustments.

Four seconds later, the two Number Ones flung an arm high, pumped a double fist, and called out:

“Number One Ready!”

“Number Two Ready!”

At exactly three-forty-nine and thirty seconds, Hardie blew his whistle again, raised his right arm straight into the air and held it here. No reply was needed.

He kept his eyes fixed on the glowing second hand.

Ten seconds.

Five.

Three.

One.

As the second hand clicked to three-fifty, he slashed his arm downward and shouted, his voice cutting sharp through the rain.

“Section! FIRE!”

The two eighteen-pounders roared in unison. Along the entire line, thousands more answered. The night shattered into flame and thunder.

The Battle of Passchendaele had begun.