Extract from Chapter 2 WHEN THE BUGLES
CALL
(1913 – Carlisle)
By Bob French
August quickly came to an end and September brought
rain and cold winds from the north. The up-roar about the Labour
Platoon winning the combat trophy gradually faded away as something more
important filled the minds of the men of the Second Battalion. The
news that half the men from B Company of the First Battalion of the Royal
Cumberland Fusiliers stationed out in India, had gone down with Cholera
and, according to the Medical Officer’s report, many would not
survive. This meant that the Second Battalion, which existed to
support the First Battalion should reinforcements be needed, had to step in and
fill any gaps. The responsibility of this task fell on the shoulders
of the young Adjutant and with the Chief Clerk and his small staff, had studied
the records of every available man fit enough to be posted to the First
Battalion
Towards the end of September, Sergeant Bateman, having
had a lengthy meeting with Major Wilberforce, going over some of the tactics
used by the labour platoon during battle camp, decided to call a meeting.
“Listen up lads. Ah just had a meeting with
the Training Officer, Major Wilberforce, like. He’s very interested
in what we did to win the combat trophy and wants to sit in on one of our
training sessions.”
He waited for any response to the idea, but his men
remained silent.
“Ah knows how ye feels at how the rest o’ the
battalion is treating you fer winning, but he thinks you can do some real good
if we goes to war like. What do you think lads?”
What does he want to know Sarg?”
“Not sure. We’ll just have ta
wait an see, like.”
The battalion Chief Clerk, Warrant Officer Class 2 (WOII)
Perkins, had informed those who commanded exercise platoons during the annual
combat exercise that they were required to attend a meeting in the CO’s office
at 1400 hours on Monday the 29th September. He also held up the
publication of battalion Daily Routine Orders, until after the meeting ended,
in case there were any changes to the outcome of the battalion battle camp.
Colonel Wessex, accompanied by his
Adjutant, Captain Farrington, entered the battalion conference room just after
1400 hours on Monday afternoon. Before he even sat down, everyone in the room
knew something was amiss by the tone of his voice.
“Good afternoon gentlemen. Now what the
hell is all this nonsense about the wrong team winning the combat
exercise?” No one spoke for nearly a minute. The silence
was broken by Major Myers, the second in command (2IC).
“I have spoken to most of the platoon commanders Sir,
and they feel that the winners, the 13th platoon, cheated and
therefore should forfeit the trophy.
He turned to the officer responsible for organizing
the battalion annual camp; Major Jack Wilberforce DSO. “Just update me on how
the exercise was conducted, please.”
Major Jack Wilberforce was, as well as being the
Officer Commanding (OC) Headquarters Company, was also the Battalion Training
Office. A man blessed with a wealth of experience, having served in
virtually every country occupied by British and Commonwealth forces and had
medals to show for it. But this had cost him his wife and only child, who died
of cholera out in India.
Major Wilberforce glanced down at his notes. “Sir, to
ensure that each platoon was organized on a level playing field, the men from
each rifle company were split up so each exercise platoon was filled with no
more than three men from their original rifle company. This ensured
fairness throughout. Each platoon was commanded by either a SNCO or
a subaltern. Their task was to initially defend their camp and the
pendent from being captured by another platoon, and at the same time, use their
battlefield skills, to raid another platoon and capture their pendent. The
team who captured the most enemy pendants would be declared the winner of the
combat exercise.”
“So, what was the final tally of pendants captured by
the various platoons?”
“Numbers 2nd and 14th platoons,
Sir, took one pendent each, the 4th and 6th platoons,
captured two pendants each. The 9th platoon, three pendants and
the winners with five pendants was the 13th Platoon Sir.”
The Colonel turned to his Chief Clerk. “Mr. Perkins,
you were in charge of the umpire team, did you or any of your team report any
cheating to you during the exercise?”
Warrant Officer, Perkins, who had risen up through the
ranks to be come the Orderly Room Quartermaster Sergeant (ORQMS) and the most
respected man in the battalion, responsible, along side the Adjutant, for running
the administration of the battalion, Stood, then glanced down at his notes.
“Sir, the answer is yes, and no?” Instantly
people around the table started to mutter. Please allow me to explain Sir. The
rules governing the conduct of the annual combat exercise were simple and very
clear. ‘There was to be no violence, no discharge of weapons within
thirty yards of any man, prisoners may be taken but treated with respect and
every person involved in the exercise was to wear a coloured arm band.”
Just then Second Lieutenant Wilberforce jumped up from
his seat and pointed an accusing finger at Mr. Perkins. “The 13th platoon
kept changing their arm bands during the fight. That’s cheating!”
“Sit down Lieutenant Wilberforce! Whatever
next! If you cannot conduct yourself in the proper manner, then I must ask you
to leave. Please carry on Mr. Perkins.”
The Adjutant smiled to himself. Now he knew
who would be ‘duty officer’ covering the two weeks over Christmas and the New
Year period.
Mr. Perkins continued. “The umpire team
inspected the locations of the platoon’s camp for safety and emergency access
routes, in the event of someone being seriously injured.”
“Who knew the location of the platoon camps?”
“No one Sir. I was informed that Major
Wilberforce only released the locations to Sergeant Smith of the transport
section, on the morning of the exercise. Each platoon had to map
read their selves to their location and to be ready by mid-day.
Colonel
Wessex,
the CO had asked Mr. Perkins, the Battalion Chief Clerk and chief umpire to the
annual combat exercise of the Royal Cumberland Fusiliers to comment on what he
saw during the exercise during a special meeting called by the CO..
“Who commanded the 13th platoon?”
The Adjutant slipped a sheet of paper in front of his
CO, who nodded his thanks.
“Sergeant Bateman.” He looked up as
Sergeant Bateman quickly stood, and came to attention.
“Sir.”
“Please sit-down Sergeant Bateman. Kindly
tell me what strategy you used to achieve such an outstanding result?
Geordy Bateman made it his business to listen to what
was going on about him, but never getting involved or volunteer for
anything. He had survived this long in the battalion and saw no
reason to change his approach on military life.
“Well Sir. The first thing I needed to do, was to find
out where the other platoons were, see. That were easy cos the labour platoon
was responsible for dropping off all the tentage and furniture for each platoon
in the woods. Then I needed to know how each platoon was made up, so I detailed
a couple of men to sit in the bushes around each of the camps. Within an hour I
knew who were the strongest and who were not, see. Our arm band was
red Sir, but Jonesy, sorry Sir, Private Jones, was detailed to collect the arm
bands for the exercise and deliver them to the training office. Once
we knew the colours, we asked Mrs. Hempworth, in the regimental tailor’s shop,
if she could run up six of each colour, for the lads like, Sir.”
“Sorry Sergeant, you keep saying ‘we’. Are
you implying that the planning behind all this was a shared responsibility?”
“Ay Sir. Me and the lads sat down and talked it all
through. Once we’d decided how we were going to do something, we
shared it with everyone.”
“So, there was no command structure at
all. You just sat down, talked about it, then got on and did it?”
“Ay Sir. We took out those we felt were
weak, then moved our location…..” He was interrupted by everyone in the room
complaining that he had cheated but Bateman carried on.
“Look, there’s nothing in the rules to say we had to
stay in one place Sir. So we hid until the exercise was over. We
captured five pendants and never lost our own Sir on account that we kept
moving our camp.”
The room fell into total silence as those officers and
SNCO around the table tried to understand the simplicity of what Sergeant
Bateman and the 13th Platoon had achieved.
The CO looked at Major Myers. “Christopher, can you
see where the 13th platoon has cheated? It appears
to me that this platoon has obviously read a different training manual on the
conduct of modern infantry tactics.”
All Major Myers could do was to nod to his CO.
“Tell me Sergeant Hills, you commanded the first
platoon. Looking at the make up your platoon it consisted of men
from the lead rifle platoons of B Company, yet you failed to capture any
pendants, in fact you appear to have lost yours to the 13th platoon. Explain
please.”
“They tricked us Sir. They positioned themselves in
between us and the 2nd platoon, then open fire on the both of
us. I thought we were under attack from a superior force and
deployed the men accordingly. It took nearly half an hour before we
drove the 2nd platoon off. When we returned to our
camp, we found that during the fire fight, the 13th had
withdrawn, then sneaked in behind us and took our pendant. Our camp guards were
all tied up. When I questioned them, they informed me that the
invaders were all wearing blue arm bands, the same arm bands as my platoon. Sir.”
Colonel Wessex struggled to keep a stern
face, as he glanced down at the sheet of paper, then looked up. “Lieutenant
Wilberforce. You commanded the 10th platoon. You
appear to have lost your pendant early on in the exercise. Please
explain.”
“Sir, we were attacked at dawn and of course, I stood
the men to. Then the enemy seemed to change their approach and seem
to be coming at us from all sides. Half way through the attack, the
left flank of my defence line seemed to fall back without my
orders. Shortly after that, the men on my flank turned and joined
the men of the left flank and charge off into the bush. I thought
they were chasing the enemy away. Once the shooting had stopped, I managed to
get the situation under control and started to question the men about their
conduct. It would appear a man wearing a second lieutenant’s jacket
and wearing one of our arm bands had strolled into my lines prior to the attack,
then during the fire fight, ordered the men to leave their positions and chase
the enemy away to the west. Whilst the men were chasing this
mysterious enemy, this so-called officer had strolled into my headquarters
(HQ), ordered the guard to hand over the pendant, claiming that I needed it as
a rallying flag for the men, then left, Sir.”
“How did you know this person was not an officer?”
Second Lieutenant Wilberforce grinned at his colonel.
“Well Sir, when I questioned the men. One told me that the officer
was wearing an officer’s tunic that was too small for him and a dirty pair of
plimsoles, and another thought he had seen the man before working as part of
the kitchen fatigue party back at barracks. I made the assumption
that this imposter was from the labour platoon Sir.”
The Colonel shook his head slowly as he looked down at
the sheet of paper. “So Lieutenant Wilberforce, let me understand what happened.
Your sentries failed to pick up the dawn intruder.”
“No Sir, the sentry did confront him and was satisfied
that he was one of our platoon and let him pass.”
“Did your sentry ask him for the password, which
should have been in use from the start of the exercise?”
Wilberforce stared at his Colonel, but said nothing.
“And once the attack had started, you then stood-too
your men, not before, which is the customary way of protecting your position?”
“Yes Sir.” The grin on Lieutenant Wilberforce’s face was slowly changing to fear.
“Then it would appear your left and rear flank all
charged off into the woods, leaving no one to protect your rear?”
Wilberforce hung his head and said nothing.
(To be
Continued)
Copyright
Bob French
