Young Tommy by Michael Muia

‘Stand to, stand to!’ comes the growling whisper of the sergeant as he hurries along the line. I know it’s still dark as my eyes remain closed, a knot of dread involuntarily grips my insides. My body knows what today holds.

I hear the groan and hushed protest as men and boys from my pals battalion return from their broken slumber, trying to eke out the final warm embrace with loved ones. Dreams so vivid and real they conquer this nightmare we have found ourselves in.

I can feel my body protest the day, aching leg muscles and shoulders have become a normal feeling. What heaven it will be. I reach down to my left and feel the familiar touch of a walnut stock. Zeus’s Thunder is the name I’ve given my Lee Enfield rifle, deadly in my hands. My forefinger finds the tally score I’ve etched into the butt. I caress it - thirty-six - I don’t need to count them, I already know. My sodden 1902 pattern service dress is heavy and the thick woollen material clings to my body like a parasite clinging to a host. It resists me as I sit up onto my elbows.

‘My lord, my elbows hurt too’, I mutter to myself as I lean back and rest my torso against the mud walls I’ve carved out of this trench to make my bed space. The dense, clay-bound mud of northern France is unforgiving and saps the energy out of the most robust individual. I know this because I’ve dug a lot here.

I hear quick footsteps splashing up the trench; the returning sergeant glances in at me.

‘Come on, George boy, fifteen minutes till go time’

‘Aye sarnt, I’m moving’, I say, swinging my legs out of my earthly coffin and poking my head out. I glance down and see the rippling blackness shimmer in the dying moonlight,

‘It’s risen again’, I say to nobody listening. I flick my gaze along the trench, looking left and right as I stretch the tightness out of my neck. I can see movement, men emerging from their ‘graves’ in various states of dress. Some are stretching and some just sit and ponder like they are fishing on the river bank with not a care in the world. If only we were fishing. It reminds me of a story I’ve heard of the dead coming back to life and climbing out of their tombs ravenous for living flesh. I know some men won’t be rising today, a stark reminder of life here. Not two days have passed since Pat Mcgavie, and Cyril ‘Two times’, a foul-mouthed young’un, we gave him the moniker Two Times by his insistence on saying everything twice.

‘Hey up old man, old man’, he would say to me

‘Hey up yourself! Old man? I’m only old enough to be your brother laddie!’ I would reply.

‘Not likely…likely!’ he would laugh. He and Pat got into a commotion over a tin of bully beef; in the exchange both men stood up, silhouetting themselves above the safety of the trench. The crack of the round could be heard after Pat’s body had crumpled to the ground. Cyril frozen by shock, stood stock still like an ancient oak tree in a forest, as the Hun cycled his rifle, reloaded and sent Cyril on his way to join the back of the queue for his meeting with Saint Peter. We were told a few hours later that Cyril was only fourteen. Maybe I was old enough to be his father.

A noise snaps me back into the moment - a young Tommy, I think his name is Jim. A battlefield replacement, still wet behind the ears. Yet to be tested over here, his kit still fresh and unblemished and unaware of the horrors over yonder. I look at him and see that he’s unsure of what to be doing. Grabbing my webbing and bandoliers and slinging Zeus’s Thunder over my arm like I’m an aristocrat about to shoot a defenceless pheasant out of the sky, I move closer to him. I notice he is trembling.

‘Jim isn’t it?’ I ask

‘J..J..J.. James’, he blurts

‘All right Jim, charge that rifle, grab some three-o-three’s if you need ‘um, bring that bayonet and don’t forget to drink some water’, I tell him from experience

I see him fumble in his bandolier for some rounds to fill his magazine. His hands are shaking. I reach out and the grab the rifle. He holds onto it and pulls it towards me, bringing him with it. His grip relents and his eyes lock with mine. His eyes are bloodshot, he’s been crying.

‘Don’t you worry, my lad, not nothin’ to worry about’, I confidently lie. I tell myself this same thing over and over, like a Buddhist chanting the Tiratana, a mantra I’ve been reciting since Ypres in 1914. I grab a handful of rounds and skilfully load the magazine, not taking my eyes away from the young Tommy. I can tell this impresses him.

‘You been over the top before my lad?’

‘N…N… No, I only got here 4 days ago’. He looks sheepish as he thinks I don’t recall. I do recall. I’ve given up getting to know anybody else; I have grieved over friends these past two years, more than many a man would grieve in a thousand lifetimes.

‘I know lad, stick with me and we won’t go far wrong. Do as I do, and you’ll see tomorrow’, I lie again.

Men begin to make their way towards the junction of the communication trench. I wonder if the Huns know we’re coming today. If they don’t, they soon will.

‘Come on Jim boy! Time to go’, I say, handing his rifle back to him. I turn and move off towards the junction, slipping on my webbing like a favourite jacket and instinctively reaching for the pouches and checking the clasps are fixed in place. I hear him follow on; glancing back I see him doing the same. Do as I do, that’s what I’d told him.

Hunger pangs my stomach. No breakfast for us today, I’ve got a tin of bully beef left that will do nicely for lunch, I reassure myself.

We approach the men, apart from the splashing of the water under foot there is no sound. We all know what we’ve got to do.

‘You ready George boy?’ I hear coming from over my shoulder. I spin around and start to walk backwards recognising the familiar voice.

‘Good day for it don’t you reckon Ed?’ I have known Edward Shimble since late 1914. A ferocious man who was a docker before the war. A short, stocky guy with jet black hair and eyes as blue as the base of a flame and arms so thick they look like the barrel of an artillery gun. Ed is a stalwart of this battalion and example to all of us of how we should be, unyielding and uncompromising in the face of the enemy.

‘Always a good day to thump fritz!’ he says, his blue eyes dancing with anticipation. Not a flicker of apprehension. I turn back around, glancing at the young Tommy as I do so. He’s still on my coat tails, a good sign.

We splash our way along the communication trench, that connects the rear of the line to the front. The mass of men slows its pace as we reach the frontline. The air changes here. I notice the sun heaving its glow towards the horizon, not long to go now. I know the pace will quicken shortly and before we can think about it we will be in the action. I know that if we linger here longer than necessary the men’s courage will begin to waiver. I’ve seen it happen before. I hit the junction, turn left and know the ladder I need to get to. I catch the whiff of putrefaction, merging as a ball in the back of my throat. I resist the urge to gag, but the young Tommy can’t help it. I hear him wretch and lace the ground with last night’s rations.

‘Dew, get it up Jim lad! We’ve all done it’. I know he won’t be the only one vomiting, even the battle hardened are susceptible. I pass several ladders with men perched half way up; they have canvass hoods that cover their heads and drape across their soldiers. Periscopes stick out of the top; it’s too dangerous to expose yourself above the parapet, just ask Pat and Cyril. I tap the sentry’s boot to let him know I’m passing him. A trick we’d learnt along the way, it keeps a man from getting tunnel vision and going crazy looking across the seventy-five yards of hell that spans the gap between us and the Huns.

My mind flicks to the enemy, who’ve been here for years. The Kaiser and his generals anticipated the movement of the Allies long before the Allies themselves. Beaumont-Hamel, nestled along the River Somme, is where we find ourselves. Fritz knows this place well and has prepared accordingly; their trenches are deep and strong with sandbags and machine guns along a fifteen mile stretch. This is a trench system that is decisively dangerous, strewn with snipers and barbed wire that coils out into no mans land like a deadly snake waiting to sink its venomous fangs into an unsuspecting prey. I check my rear pouch for the reassuring touch of the steel wire cutters.

I reach my ladder, I know I only have a few minutes before the action begins. I pull out my canteen, glug my water and look up to the breaking day. I don’t dwell on home for now is not the time. Jim has stopped behind me, he’s digging around for his canteen. Good boy. ‘It’s going to be quick lad’, I tell him as men shuffle passed, some making eye contact and nodding and others away in their thoughts. It’s not a time for sentiment but Ed grips my shoulder as he draws near.

‘I’ll see you over there in a bit Georgie boy’

‘Aye no bother lad’, I return. I watch him settle against the ladder twenty yards from me.

I hear a distant deep booming sound like a bass drum beating the rhythm for marching troops; I know what it is. I grip the young Tommy and pull him in so close that my lips are nearly touching his ear.

‘Stay close to me, don’t stop and never run in a straight line’, I tell him, the sense of urgency in my voice hammering home the reality that we’re about to go over the top. I notice the Sergeant pacing the line, his arm by his side, I notice the barrel of his revolver. Then I see the hammer cocked back, reminding the meek amongst us of our duty.

‘And whatever you do, don’t stay he….’ The noise of the artillery round travelling through the air drowns out my words. It sounds like a steam train rushing past my ear, the rounds are the size of a man and twice as heavy, and thud into the area in front of us. The explosion sucks the oxygen out of my body and makes my eyes shake in their sockets, like a cheap baby’s rattle. Above the force of the increasing cadence of the life-sapping explosions I can feel the young Tommy tremble. Don’t linger here, lad.

I unsling my rifle, work the action of the bolt and chamber a round. I kiss Zeus’s Thunder, and begin to creep up the ladder. The young Tommy remains stock still with shoulders hunched over. I kick him like I would a stubborn Shire. He snaps back to his reality and looks at me, eyes crazed with fear. He’s mouthing something, but I can’t make it out. The deafening crescendo of explosions has been replaced by the sound of wet fingers dragging along a pane of glass; this I know, is the sound dying men make. It’s working. I know it’s time, the explosions stop, and I hear the faint blast of an officer’s whistle. Time to go. I kick hard up the ladder and roll over the breach of the trench. I don’t check to see if Jim is following me, too late to worry about that.

I regain my feet and move quickly, my putties slopping through the dense clay. I bend at the waist and keep my head up. I see the mist of the artillery barrage move

silently in front of me. The sun has betrayed us. I can see through the mist to the Huns’ heads moving quickly from left to right in their trench across the churned, cratered sanctum of no man’s land, where men go and never return. They’re not all dead. I hear the rounds buzzing passed me like a swarm of angry bees. I hope that young Tommy hasn’t done what I’ve done.