Jerome in World War One

I recently went on a tour of WW1 Battlefields, and that, naturally, got me thinking about the time that JKJ spent out there. When I returned, I re-read his autobiography, to see again what he had to say on the matter. His chapter of about twenty pages on ‘The War’ makes excellent reading…and I thought I would share my favourite extracts here…

Jerome was in his fifties when the war broke out. Although he was too old to enlist, he thought he might be able to go out as an entertainer (‘raconteur’). Although that application got nowhere, he eventually managed to sign up as an ambulance driver in the French Army, and served in the Verdun area from the autumn of 1916.

“The French army didn’t quite know what to make of us. Young recruits, in the dark, assumed us to be Field Marshals.”

“The cross country roads in France are designed upon the same principle as the maze at Hampton Court”

“The cockroaches were having a bad time. They fell into the stews and no one took the trouble to pull them out.”

“Fuel [firewood] was our difficulty. The news that a shelled village had been evacuated by its inhabitants flew like wildfire. It was a question of who could get there first and drag out the timbers from the shattered houses. Green wood was no good but in the dug-outs it was the only thing to be had. They say there’s no smoke without fire. It is not true. You can have a dug-out so full of smoke you have to light a match to find the fire. If it’s only French matches you have, it may take a boxfull.”

“A pity the common soldiers could not have been left to make the peace. There might have been no need for Leagues of Nations.”

“During the actual fighting, Hague Conventions and Geneva Regulations get mislaid. The guns were eating up ammunition faster than the tramways could supply them, and the ambulances did not always go up empty. Doubtless the German Red Cross drivers had likewise their blind eye.”… “Those who talk about war being a game ought to be made to go out and play it. They’d find their little book of rules not much use.”

“The French cigarettes that one bought at the canteen were ten per cent poison and the rest dirt. The pain would go out of a wounded soldier’s face when you offered him an English cigarette”

“One had no brain for any but the very lightest literature. Small books printed on soft paper, the leaves of which could be torn out easily, were the most popular.”

“I came back cured of any sneaking regard I may have ever had for war…Compared with modern soldiering, a street scavenger’s job is an exhilarating occupation.”