The Last Lady from Hell Read online

  I made it a point to invite my close band friends out for a crossing. This was cheap thrilling entertainment. Bill Lewis, our drum sergeant, was the only one who seemingly couldn’t get enough of ice boating. Bill, a wonderful fellow, seemed to be comfortable with a high degree of recklessness. The faster, the better for Bill. He was fearless and impervious to the cold. We would be clattering along at a good clip, thirty or better and a gust would catch us lifting the upwind skate off the ice and accelerating us immediately to well over fifty. This burst of speed would prompt Bill into letting loose with an uncontrollable series of whoops and howls. This behavior was well out of character for this normally reserved man and gave me some insight into what lay beneath the surface of my friend.

  I grew to really appreciate this man as a friend and a person. One day we were getting ready to ice boat over to Wolfe Island. We were at the boat ramp at the bottom of Princess Street where there was always a crowd. Skaters, ice boaters and observers would gather at this launch site. The problem with rivers and ice is that the water is moving under the ice and can cause the ice to be deceptively thin in spots while remarkably thick in others.

  We were just about to hoist the sail when a woman near the dock began screaming. The ice had given away and her daughter had broken through. The young girl was clinging to the edge of the hole, but the current was slowly pulling her under.

  A crowd immediately gathered, but no one seemed to know what to do. Bill dashed from the boat across the ice at a sprint, he dove onto his belly and was sliding toward the hole at a good clip. His trajectory was such that he would pass just to the right of the hole and slide right by. As he passed the hole, he reached out with his left hand and grabbed the girl from the water. Bill rolled to his right, which catapulted the youngster over the top of him and clear of danger and they both skid to a stop fifteen feet away for the hole.

  Bill had hardly come to a stop when he was up on his feet. He ran to the girl, snatched her up into his cradling arms and presented her to her astonished and appreciative mother.

  The whole thing happened so fast that most people missed it and Bill didn’t stick around for any praise. He returned to the ice boat and to my slack-jawed stare.

  “What?” he said, as though his heroics were as normal as brushing his teeth.

  Both Bill and Dan McKee knew my older brother Alan and would regularly ask of his whereabouts. This I appreciated more than either would ever know. Under their tough drummer facade, these men were old softies and dependable to the core.

  I had been accepted into pre-med and I was struggling with a heavy workload. Life became a juggling exercise between studies and bagpipe practice. This full schedule allowed for only one or two nights a week when I could escape to The Portsmouth for some socializing. I would savor these moments when I could just relax, no brainwork, no competitive piping, just good friends and beer.

  I recall one evening when our socializing was rudely interrupted. The problem with pubs is that too much beer can bring out the worst in some people. It can provide an excuse for young men with high levels of testosterone to flex their beer muscles, not their brains, and such was the case this night.

  A Queen’s football player had taken a shine to Sheila, but was not getting the response he had expected. So he decided to prove his manhood by trying to pick a fight with Dan McKee.

  It was pure madness. Dan was at least six inches taller and a good fifty pounds heavier. Beer can make a plain girl pretty, a big man smaller, and a small man bigger. Dan ignored the taunts, dismissing this fellow with no more than a sideways glance and a toothy grin. Dan’s nonchalant reaction seemed to frustrate the drunken football player so he persisted with his verbal assaults. Several of his teammates were joining in the fun, spurring him on, which only emboldened the drunkard.

  Finally, Bill Lewis, who had been carefully watching the event unfold, stepped between Dan and the big mouth. Bill moved to within inches of the fellow’s face.

  “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size, Pal?” Bill asked.

  The man took a step back, looked Bill up and down and said, “Well, Buster, it looks like you’re about my–”

  Before another word came out of his mouth, Bill unleashed a haymaker to the drunk’s stomach. The man’s eyes bugged out, he let out a groaning rush of air and sank slowly to the bar room floor gasping for the breath that had been so clearly knocked out of him. Bill stepped over the gasper and began moving toward the man’s friends when Dan’s big hand reached across his chest to stop him.

  “Relax Bill,” Dan said.

  Terry, Sean, and I were closing ranks to help Bill but stopped with Dan’s command.

  “Look fellows,” Dan said to the man’s teammates. “You guys seem like reasonable gents. We came here to enjoy good company and cheap beer, so I’d like to extend an invitation for you to do the same. The next round is on me.”

  They looked at one another, for their allegiance to the gasper was short-lived and the prospect of a free beer was certainly more inviting than that of a pounding. They decided to join us and we ended up making some good friends that night.

  I, however, was still a little rattled after the confrontation. Not being much of a fighter–just an occasional scuffle in the schoolyard–the adrenaline was still pumping through me and my hands were mildly shaking. I was astounded as I watched Dan, Bill and the others laughing and drinking with their new friends. There was no sign of anger or hostility to be found. These men with whom I had the pleasure of associating were very special indeed. Their qualities would be put to the ultimate test in the not too distant future, as would mine.

  PART THREE

  THE REASONS TO JOIN

  The First Canadian Expeditionary Forces, Ypres, Belgium

  [Recreated from historical records]

  In the fall of 1914, with the outbreak of the war in Europe, the British Empire put out a request for help throughout England and all her realm.

  Canada was considered under the crown so the Governor General of Canada turned to Sir Sam Hughs, the Minister of Militia, for help. Because Canada had only a militia and not a formal army, Hughs put out an urgent request to all young men to answer the call for help. Although it was a voluntary request it was answered resoundingly with thousands of men ready to protect the Crown.

  Canada rapidly moved to prepare a large flotilla of transports and an enormous quantity of supplies and men. Training camps were set up near Quebec City where the men would receive some basic training, uniforms, equipment–including the notoriously unreliable Ross rifles–and an assignment to a specific unit or branch according to one’s qualifications.

  By September 21, thirty-two merchant ships had been converted into troop and supply transports. Two days later the ships were in port, ready to be loaded with 7679 horses, 70 big guns, 110 motor vehicles, 705 horse-drawn vehicles, 82 bicycles and over 100,000 sacks of flour.

  Nearly thirty thousand men would also be on the ships. They were the First Canadian Expeditionary Force, consisting of 29,070 men and 147 officers. The men had trained for two weeks at Camp Valcartier outside of Quebec City and were ready for orders. The supplies had been steadily coming and all that was needed was to load the massive fleet in some organized manner.

  When one considers the magnitude of such an undertaking, it is easy to understand that there would be some setbacks. In fact, it was suggested that Sir Hughs insistent, hands-on involvement had somewhat delayed the process. Regardless of the minor setbacks, it remains one of the most monumental achievements in Canadian history. Thirty-two ships, over 30,000 men trained and ready, and a massive amount of supplies were ready in less than six weeks from the initial request.

  Among those brave volunteers was Alan MacDonald, the oldest son of the MacDonald family and Ian’s brother. He was an avid rugby player and a fine athlete. He had played in his first year at Queens and was considered one of the fastest and toughest lads on the rugger field.

  Alan had been assigned to Prince
ss Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. At Camp Valcartier, the men were selected for areas that would suit their capabilities. It became obvious to Alan’s superiors that he was remarkably fast and had a good mind for recall. He was placed in the communications corp. During his brief training at Valcartier, he was put through the rigors of military training along with classroom training in the area of communications in a theater of war. He became proficient in hardline telephones, signal light operation and, most importantly, the art of running while transporting information and reading a map of the trenches. Alan knew that his training would continue in England and he was ready for the challenge.

  The word came down for the Canadian Light Infantry to move aboard their assigned ship The Royal George. She was a large vessel, some 525 feet length overall, with a beam of 60 feet. She was owned by the Canadian Northern Steamship Line since 1910 and had plenty of nautical miles behind her. Not a pretty ship, but a sturdy ship. She was to be home to 1,175 troops for the next two weeks.

  In her holds The Royal George carried a combination of ammunition and flour–5,602 sacks of flour to be exact. The men often joked that if she were to be sunk by U-Boats all that would remain would be a giant floating dumpling with 1,175 men stuck to it.

  As funny as that sounded to all aboard, the reality was that German submarines were indeed the single greatest threat to the convoy. Because of this, precautions had been taken by British Admiralty to protect the convoy with an escort of war ships from the “Grand Fleet,” a term used by Brits in reference to their massive array of warships.

  The escort was made up of seven warships: HMS Charybdis, HMS Diana, HMS Eclipse, HMS Glory, HMS Magnificent, HMS Princess Royal, and HMS Talbot. They took up positions along the convoy with the Magnificent in the lead and the Eclipse, Diana and Charybdis leading each of the three columns of transports. The Princess Royal was on the port wing, the Glory on the starboard wing and The Talbot brought up the rear. The convoy and escort was so massive it spanned over twenty-one miles long.

  On October 1, a message was read to the troops aboard each ship just prior to their departure from Gaspe Bay for the crossing.

  “On the eve of your departure from Canada, I wish to congratulate you on having the privilege of taking part, with the other forces of the crown, in fighting for the honor of the King and Empire. You have nobly responded to the call of duty. Canada will know how to appreciate the patriotic spirit that animates you. I have complete confidence that you will do your duty and that Canada will have every reason to be proud of you. You leave these shores with the knowledge that all Canadian hearts beat for you, and that our prayers and best wishes will ever attend you. “May God bless you and bring you home victorious.”

  –F. M. ARTHUR, Governor General of Canada.

  Alan wrote of this event in one of the many letters he sent home. He told his family how excited he was at being involved in this historic undertaking. He described how, as he stood at the rail of the Royal George watching Canadian soil disappear astern and seeing the convoy stretched to the horizon, he couldn’t help the profound sense of pride that came over him.

  With Canada behind the convoy and a vast and dangerous expanse of open water ahead, the safety of the men and ships was in the hands of the escorts. But, not to diminish the escorts contribution, the true reasons that the crossing went without incident were poor communications between British and Canadian Admiralties, poor information forwarded by the German spies, miscalculations by the German military, and just plain luck.

  Rear-admiral Wemyss was in charge of the 12th cruiser squadron, of which HMS Charybdis (flag), Talbot, Eclipse, and Diana were a part. But when the Canadian Minister saw only four cruisers to protect 32 ships he made the statement that the convoy was inadequately protected and that the departure would be put on hold. Instead, the news went out that the crossing was cancelled.

  When the rear-admiral later explained that the escort was, in fact, made up of seven warships, the others waiting offshore, the Minister gave permission for the departure and the convoy left port on October 3.

  This information, however, never reached the British authorities. On October 6, the British Admiralty sent word to Canada asking about the disposition of the fleet and the decision of the Minister. One can only imagine the surprise at Whitehall on learning that the fleet had been underway for three days. If Whitehall knew nothing of the fleet movement, then the German spies definitely knew nothing, a great advantage to the convoys safety.

  On October 8, the German Admiralty was informed by agents working in New York that a massive troop transport of twenty-three ships had left Canada on October 2 escorted by eight warships, a remarkably accurate account. The German military made an inaccurate assumption that the troops were battle ready and that the destination would be Boulogne, France and the Western Front. They rapidly dispatched their submarines to go to Boulogne and lay in wait to ambush the troop carriers that never came. On October 12, as the fleet neared British waters, all 30,000 men were called topside. The Princess Royal, a lion class battle cruiser, had dropped back to the aft of the convoy and then was called to action. Her bow rose up as her massive engines gave her full power, water was thrashed wildly to each side as she jumped to her battle speed of 25 knots. She flew up the center of the convoy with her band on deck playing “Oh Canada” and “The Maple Leaf Forever” Thirty-thousand men exploded into cheers as the British showed their appreciation for the sacrifices these men were about to make.

  The original destination of disembarkation for the convoy was Devonport but because German U-boats had been spotted in the channel, the fleet went to Portsmouth in the southwest of Great Britain. The troops were dispersed to four main training camps: Tid-worth, Kitchener’s, Woodwich Common, and 1st East Surrey. The men would spend several months preparing for the difficult task of trench warfare. Then in early April, the First Canadian Division of the Canadian Expeditionary forces was sent to Belgium.

  The German Army had pounded through Belgium en route to France, leaving in its path unimaginable death and destruction. When the German war machine collided with the French Army, it was stopped by France’s unexpected intense resistance. The French still retained some of the Napoleonic fighting ability that had made that country a formidable military power many years earlier.

  And along with their alley, Great Britain, the French had not only stopped Germany, but had, in fact, pushed the Germans back into Belgium.

  This created what is called a salient or bulge in the western front which was referred to as The Ypres Salient.

  This area had special significance to both sides, it represented a success for the allies and a failure for the Germans and because of this there was almost continuous fighting through the war.

  There were three major battles at Ypres, however, between these major events constant skirmishing was common. On 17 April this was the area to which the British Expeditionary Forces, or B.E.F., sent the Canadian troops. The Ypres Salient had been experiencing a lull in the fighting and it seemed a good spot for the untested newcomers. There were no major movements of troops by either side, so no large scale battle was expected. And, since the 1st Battle of Ypres had exhausted both sides in a costly and bloody stalemate, this period of relative calm was very much welcome.

  For these new men the trenches were a brief novelty, but very soon they learned that if the basic rules aren’t followed it could result in deadly consequences. Every day the Germans would lob several obligatory shells into the trenches or spray the trench tops with machine gun fire. This action would immediately be answered with British shells and gunfire. The April rains turned the Ypres Salient front into a mud-filled hellhole. Life in the trenches, horrific as it was, now became even worse with a constant routine of emptying and repairing the water-filled ditches.

  The trench systems were an early answer to the high volume of artillery delivered by both sides in the first six months of the war. To march an army across open fields toward a barrage of artil
lery and machine gun fire, the other main weapon of the Great War, would be complete suicide. Trenches were the only reasonable solution. Most trench systems included supply trenches, advanced trenches, and entanglement trenches. The entanglement trench was heavily fortified with barbed wire, meant to slow the advances of an opposing army. It was very effective and was widely used by both German and Allied forces.

  The Canadians were being provided with hands-on training in trench life with a minimum of risk. They worked in the mud and water repairing the dugouts, bunkers, trench walls and even repairing the barb wire entanglements. Only occasionally would they form into small raiding parties and attack the Germans under cover of night. They would have to pass through the advanced trenches and through gaps in the barb wire so as to cross “No Man’s Land,” the area of shell-hole pocked land that separated the Allied and German advanced lines. It was a muddy, lifeless patch of dirt strewn with the dead and parts of the dead from a year’s worth of slaughter.

  The stink of death was overwhelming and unforgettable. Unfortunately, smell is a sense that can trigger memories, good and bad. The simple stench of a rotting animal on the side of the road years later could be enough to awaken horrific memories in anyone who might have been there. The smell was inescapable and left a prominent impression on these young men.

  THE SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES, 24 APRIL, 1915

  Little stacks of sandbags,

  Little lumps of clay,

  Make our bloody trenches,

  In which we work and play.

  Alan Macdonald kept his head down. The entrenchments were not always that deep nor were the parapets that high. If one stood up to straight, the chances of having your head blown off were better than good.