An integral part of our visit to the Somme was our billet. Yes, that's what we called it. Don't snigger. Look at the picture. The whole place was redolent of the Great War, from the rifle, complete with fixed bayonet, hanging ready from a beam to the recruiting posters on the bedroom walls (I dropped off to sleep under "Women of Britain say go!") It did occur to me that if any of my companions were to have a bad dream after all our battlefield visits it might make for an interesting scenario. Sleepwalker with bayonet wipes out party of pensioners - that sort of thing.
The rooms were basic, with just about enough room to swing a very short-tailed cat. Ours didn't have any en-suite frills, but we had the advantage of being next door to the shower-room/WC. Another room had en-suite facilities, while yet another - under the roof - had a basin and WC but no shower. Downstairs, at the back of the kitchen (very French) there was a loo and shower - and a wonderfully hot towel rail. It also had a mouse. We sang as we entered, to give it time to vamoose.
Our bedroom door had warped, so that closing it required either great effort or a loud slam. After winning a prize for the loudest door-slam-in-the-middle-of-the-night I made Mr B get up and shut the door quietly after a 2am expedition. He wasn't very pleased. But we had to shut the door because of the strange smell which emanated from the cellar and seemed to be related to the central heating.
And then there were the cockerels. One night, having eaten too much cheese (and croissant, and butter, to say nothing of the smoked eel and the rabbit with prunes and a goat's cheese salad at lunchtime) I was awake at 2am. And that is when the most thuggish cockerel decided to start. His raucous crowing went on till 7am, and I heard every last tonsil-tearing moment (do cockerels have tonsils?) Several inebriated plans were hatched to do away with these birds, but they live still, as does their less noisy but still irritating friend along the road.
Seriously, though, Snowden House in Longueval was great. The atmosphere was terrific and we loved it - especially the night we lit the log fire and the candles and sat talking for hours. The wisteria at the back door was in full bloom, and in the garden to the front there was an extraordinary pile of shell cases and lead shot, just sitting there. We were ten minutes' walk from Delville Wood, and at the crossroads there was a new Pipers' Memorial - stark reminders of the hellish battle that was fought just up the road. Somehow this mix of the lovely and the awful seemed just right for the trip we were part of.
On another note: I did in fact write a poem when we were there, but it's not going to appear for a bit. I'll flag it up when I'm ready.
Showing posts with label Somme. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Somme. Show all posts
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
Songs and Sacrifice
I find myself almost unable to start blogging about the Somme trip which has just ended. The emotions roused by contemplating the sheer numbers of dead, the ubiquity of the cemeteries - these contrast with memories of laughter, company and singing and my first reaction is to feel discomfiture. Where do I start? And then I reflect that the men who went into battle and died in their thousands sang those self-same songs, and that they enjoyed each other's company and laughed at the daft jokes of their pals, and I think: just start.
So this is where I begin, with the things which hit me first. The songs, for example. When I printed out the guide to the trip, complete with WW1 song words, I thought I'd never sing along on the bus. I couldn't imagine doing anything at once so naive and so insensitive. But I was wrong. For after walking through the rows of graves - the photo is of the first we saw, near Ypres - and travelling by coach through the map of the Western Front, it seemed somehow fitting to sing, to recall how the soldiers would keep their spirits up. And we raised the roof, that first night in the village of Longueval where ten of us were billeted.
That first evening, after dinner, four of us walked up the road to Delville Wood cemetery. The sun was setting, red behind the dark trees, and it became harder to read the inscriptions on the stones. But one of them caught my eye. Private G.A. Pain of the London Regiment, Royal Fusiliers, was 16 years old when he died on 19 September, 1916. He would be sitting his Highers right now - or maybe just his Standard Grades. He died in a battle for the wood which is described as one of the most hellish on the Somme, and I couldn't begin to imagine what reserves of courage he called on. Maybe he didn't. Maybe he simply realised that, once there, there was nothing else to do but go with his mates and last as long as he could.
It was dark by the time we walked back to the billet - and that seemed right.
So this is where I begin, with the things which hit me first. The songs, for example. When I printed out the guide to the trip, complete with WW1 song words, I thought I'd never sing along on the bus. I couldn't imagine doing anything at once so naive and so insensitive. But I was wrong. For after walking through the rows of graves - the photo is of the first we saw, near Ypres - and travelling by coach through the map of the Western Front, it seemed somehow fitting to sing, to recall how the soldiers would keep their spirits up. And we raised the roof, that first night in the village of Longueval where ten of us were billeted.
That first evening, after dinner, four of us walked up the road to Delville Wood cemetery. The sun was setting, red behind the dark trees, and it became harder to read the inscriptions on the stones. But one of them caught my eye. Private G.A. Pain of the London Regiment, Royal Fusiliers, was 16 years old when he died on 19 September, 1916. He would be sitting his Highers right now - or maybe just his Standard Grades. He died in a battle for the wood which is described as one of the most hellish on the Somme, and I couldn't begin to imagine what reserves of courage he called on. Maybe he didn't. Maybe he simply realised that, once there, there was nothing else to do but go with his mates and last as long as he could.
It was dark by the time we walked back to the billet - and that seemed right.
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