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I did not see the joke at first; but on application to that autocratic beggar Quartermaster King was his tally he fully explained things to me in that witheringly sarcastic manner peculiar to sergeant-majors and quarter-blokes. "'Defaulter's milk? echoed he. 'Why, you lop-eared leper, you've got corpuscular fool wrote as plain as a motor lorry number all over your ugly face.
Night after night would repose at Regimental Head-quarters be interrupted by repetitious and in many cases inconsistent orders, the only purpose of which appeared to be, to remind drowsy Adjutants and swearing Sergeant-Majors that the Commanding General of Division still ruled at Division Head-quarters, and that he was most alive between the hours of nine and twelve at night.
The waiter when he brought it up paused mysteriously, and then, in a discreet whisper to Williams, said he supposed we were sergeant-majors, as none under that rank could be served with wine. Gunner Williams smilingly reassured him, and Driver Childers did his best to look like a sergeant-major, with, I fear, indifferent success.
In the midst of many graves, identified only by numbers, a black cross recalls the memory of Mundy, one of our gallant Company Sergeant-Majors. On the 30th December 1915 I left Alexandria for the Dardanelles on the Arcadian, Sir Ian Hamilton's old ship, once most luxurious of steam yachts but destined to be torpedoed on the 15th April 1917 in these same waters.
"We have spent the day 'under company arrangements': a series of inspections in the field outside the barn. "At 5.30 Colonel Best-Dunkley wished to see all officers and sergeant-majors at Headquarters Mess. When we got there we adjourned to Battalion Orderly Room. He kept us until after 7, discussing various matters of routine.
There is, or was in my time, a soldiers' proverb, 'As nasty as a new-made corporal, With one exception the sergeant-majors were good fellows and popular with their men. I shall not give the name of the exception, for he may be still alive; but he was commonly known as 'The Pig, and he deserved his title.
At this distance of time I can write dispassionately; but for many years I had recollections of petty tyrannies which made my blood boil. There was a lanky youth, four or five months older in the regiment than myself, who was related to one of the sergeant-majors, and who was, of course, booked by his relative for promotion.
Three sergeant-majors had fallen out on the way, two very bad indeed; officers had fallen out; and men wearing ribbons of the D.C.M. and the M.M., heroes of Gallipoli and the Somme, men who had never been beaten by a route march before, were lying along the country roads; so there must have been some reason for it! The Transport made us some tea, which we enjoyed immensely.
There are the tales of the sergeant-major and the sergeants, the corporals and the "lance-jacks." Sergeant-majors, sergeants, and corporals are not romantic figures. If you think of them at all, you probably think of rumjars and profanity. Yet they are the very backbone of the Army.
Faithfull, another disciple from the A.S.C., whom also we got to like very much, was now in command of D Company; Clutsom commanded C, and Young, who had seen long service with the 48th Division, B Company; Jones still led A. Time had wrought changes among the Sergeant-Majors of the Companies.
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