steenstraete
(may 25, 1915)
by dr. duwez, army surgeon to the regiment of grenadiers
at steenstraete, the upheaval, the absolute destruction of everything is formidable. the very places where the houses stood are only recognisable by the heaps of broken bricks of their foundations. there was not much left when we arrived in the sector, but, at present, there is not even one stone upon another. everywhere there are craters hollowed out, and these are so close together that they run into each other. in one of these, a german corpse could be seen, standing up, buried up to his waist and headless. pieces of uniforms were visible in the beaten soil, and, as the ground gave way, one saw a face under one's feet, the shape of which was vaguely outlined and the mouth, with its white teeth, was open like a rat hole.
we saw what had been the brewery with its huge cellars. it had fallen completely in. we could only recognise the road by its torn-up pavement and its twisted rails. of all steenstraete, there is nothing left, it has been razed to the ground. the bridge is nothing but a wretched heap of old iron.
the steenstraete bridge! names and sites, like[pg 338] people, acquire their titles of nobility. at present, the algerian sharp-shooters are guarding the bridge. in order to go forward, we had to disturb the sentinels who were lost in thought near their battlements. we had to climb over the sleeping soldiers, too. some of them had hollowed out alcoves in the earth and they were almost buried in them. others had stretched their tents out on the stakes and they were sleeping in the square of shade which this afforded. they rather blocked the way for the patrol's rounds. their greenish yellow uniform was almost the colour of the ground. here and there, the red of a chéchia cap gave relief to the colouring. bayonets could be seen everywhere, glittering in the sunshine. they had a crapouillot, a bomb-thrower and a german machine-gun, all this among the battery, together with sacks of earth, dry mud, and the ruins of walls which formed the trenches. the crapouillot seemed to be crouching down, whilst the machine-gun and the bomb-thrower stretched their necks forward in the direction of the enemy. here and there, the green and yellow bags, which the germans had left behind them, reminded us of the recent occupation. it was a tranquil moment, for the cannon was silent.
under the ardent sun, with the dry mud colour which pervaded everything, the outlines of the algerian sharp-shooters, their bronzed complexions and their eagle-like profiles reminded one of an oriental street.
one can have no idea of modern warfare without having seen the ground all torn up by shells and hollowed out in all directions by trenches, with the old communication passages of the germans cutting ours perpendicularly. houses, the road, gardens,[pg 339] fields are all mixed up in one mass of ruin and broken earth. it is no use expecting to find here that comfort which embellishes calmer war zones; it is useless to look for tombs all regularly arranged and covered with grass, each one with a cross, on which the dead man's name is written in white letters.
here and there, in this region, a rusty bayonet emerges, and on it is a tattered military cap. two sticks joined together to form a cross may also be seen now and then, but that is all. and yet, under this ground, there are heaps and heaps of dead bodies buried haphazard. the sharp-shooters have taken some of them for consolidating their parapet. cellars fell in burying their occupants. on every side there are whiffs of strong odours. the ground moves under our feet and whenever one treads in muddy puddles, this odour is still stronger. the wind of death has passed. everything is destroyed here, and even the grass does not grow again in such spots.
