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Updated: June 7, 2025
I had, while filming, been making mental notes as to the section which Fritz did not "strafe," and that place, by all that's wonderful, was the actual thing he was undoubtedly trying for the road. By hugging the bank-side, along which here and there I could spot a few funk-holes, I managed to get into the chalk-pit.
So much was this the case, that, on the night of the 4th August, C.Q.M. Serjeants Gorse and Gilding were ordered to bring all available men from the stores at Poperinghe to help hold the line a most unpleasant journey because the Boche, always fond of celebrating anniversaries, commemorated the declaration of war with a "strafe" of special magnitude.
I thought, "Bosche is certainly going to get it." I reached my destination about 2.30. What a "strafe" there was going on! The concussion of what I afterwards found out was our 15-inch howitzers was terrible.
They were summoned by telephone at all hours. They toiled in the grey light of early dawn. They sweated at noonday. Soaked and dripping they bent their backs to their burdens in storm and rain. They went long hours without food. They lived under conditions of great discomfort. It was everybody's business to curse and "strafe" them. I do not remember that any one ever gave them a word of praise.
I heard the New-Year's chorus when I went to see the last of the year across the battlefields. Our guns did not let it die in silence. It went into the tomb of the past, with all its tragic memories, to thunderous salvos, carrying death with them. The "heavies" were indulging in a special strafe this New Year's eve.
"That certainly looks a most excellent point, sir," I said. "What is the distance from Bosche lines?" "About 150 yards. They 'strafe' it considerably, from what I am told; but, of course, you will have to take your chance, the same as all my other officers." "That is unavoidable, sir. The nature of my work does not permit me to be in very comfortable places, if I am to get the best results."
He absolutely streaked along back to D.H.Q., stopping on the way very much against his will to deliver a message from Major Buckle to the Duke of Wellington's who were in support. He gave in his report, such as it was, to Colonel Romer, and was praised. Moral: Be called away by some pressing engagement before the captain calls for volunteers. May Gott strafe thoroughly all interfering sergeants!
In February, 1915, he announced his submarine blockade of England with the consent of the Kaiser, but without the approval of the Foreign Office. By this time the cry, "Gott strafe England," had become the most popular battle shout in Germany. The von Tirpitz blockade announcement made this battlecry real. It made him the national hero.
Dide says that in Germany preoccupation with the idea of injustice is a cause of war, and Chapman also remarks that Germany had gone mad thinking of her wrongs. That jealousy and fear are in general the substratum of national hatred is deeply impressed upon one in studying the psychology of Germany. All the hate motive of the late war might well be found in Germany's prayer "Gott strafe England."
"The best of luck." The whistles sounded. Almost immediately, as if by some uncanny means the distant gunners saw that the infantry were in motion, the strafe ceased. Overhead the seaplane still circled. The bomb-dropping part of their task completed the airmen lingered to watch the advance, and if occasion offered to assist the storming troops by means of their Lewis gun.
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