Whatever his alleged failings, George Foot’s tank commander recommended two of his crew for gallantry awards following the first day’s attack, one of them being ‘Gunner Foote’. The adjutant of D Company recorded this in his notebook, but it is hard to predict what the official response might have been, since they had never really got into action.1 However, just a fortnight later George committed an act of such undisputed bravery that it was even reported in The Times.
The occasion for this was an attack on Eaucourt l’Abbaye, where a complex of farm buildings on the site of a medieval monastery had been fortified by the Germans, and now that Flers had fallen, this was the next significant obstacle to the Allied advance on the Somme. An attack was planned for 1 October 1916, supported by the only two tanks from D Company that were still serviceable. One of them was D16 which bore the slightly surprising name of Dracula, in tribute to Bram Stoker’s novel which had appeared less than twenty years before. Dracula had been relatively successful on the first day, entering Flers before being been driven back by artillery fire. During the return journey its commander, Lieutenant Arthur Arnold, was shot in the knee when he left the tank to save a wounded soldier from being crushed under the tracks, and D16 made it home under the command of one of the gunners, Jacob Glaister.2 Both men later received gallantry medals for this, but Arnold was now in hospital in England – though he would return to play a further part in the story of Deborah.
With Arnold gone, Dracula was now under the command of a dashing twenty-two year-old officer called William Jefferson Wakley who was definitely, to use Birks’ phrase, ‘keen to get there’. The son of an engineer, Wakley had finished his apprenticeship as a draughtsman and was studying in London when war broke out. Within six weeks he had enlisted in the infantry as a private, and was commissioned a few months later.3 With his engineering background the tanks had an obvious appeal and he was one of the first to volunteer, but he had not yet commanded a tank in action, having previously been responsible for transporting the machines across the Channel and up to the front line.4 Events show that Gunner Jacob Glaister was still with D16 on 1 October, and that the crew now included George Foot, whose first tank had been incapacitated in High Wood.
The attack on Eaucourt l’Abbaye involved a number of infantry units including 47th (2nd London) Division and the New Zealand Division. It opened with a fiendish twist that was worthy of a horror film: dozens of oil-drums were hurled out of projectors one minute before the infantry went over the top. According to the New Zealand official history, ‘30 projectiles were seen to reach their objective satisfactorily, bursting about 1 second after landing and covering the German trenches with lurid flame and great rings of black smoke’. The troops went in against this hellish backdrop, and despite heavy losses they seized a network of trenches known as the Circus near the abbey itself. ‘The trenches were found packed with corpses, piled in many places one over the other. One or two loathsome groups in the centre of the position lay burned and half eaten away by the oil … Their physique … was strikingly poor, and many of them were mere boys.’5
The Londoners of 47th Division attacked to their left, supported by the two tanks which moved along a parallel system of German trenches, firing as they went. With their assistance, two of the three battalions were able to gain their objectives, but although they passed through the ruins of Eaucourt l’Abbaye, they did not clear the enemy from the tunnels and cellars beneath. The third attacking battalion had been held up by uncut barbed wire, and was now driven back by machine-gun fire from the ruins, leaving some pockets of men behind. Exploiting this setback, German troops now began to infiltrate back into the area.
To make matters worse for the attackers, both tanks became ditched in the churned-up ground and were unable to fight their way forward or to withdraw. Wakley and his crew now faced a dilemma, for although the attacking troops were cut off and desperately needed their support, it was also vital to stop their new weapon falling into enemy hands. The drama was described in a newspaper report by an anonymous correspondent, probably Philip Gibbs, the erstwhile confidant of George Foot’s tank commander. The Times said that ‘the part played by the “Tanks” in the operation was picturesque and gave opportunity for the display of great gallantry. One of them, finding herself unable to proceed, continued for a while to operate as a stationary fortress.’6 The Official History described what happened next: ‘When the Germans counter-attacked south-eastward down the trenches, the tanks being immovable and unsupported, were set on fire and the crews withdrawn.’7
Having abandoned their blazing machines, the crews had to get back across No Man’s Land with the battle still raging around them, and it was not long before the inevitable happened. In the words of a medical report, Second Lieutenant Wakley ‘was struck by some shrapnel casing a handsbreadth above the knee. The casing lodged fracturing the femur obliquely’.8 Anyone who has explored the battlefields of the First World War will have come across jagged shards of metal littering the fields, their edges still sharp after a century in the earth. For all its dispassionate language, the doctor’s report tells us that one such fragment from a shell-case, which would have been redhot from the explosion, had been driven into Wakley’s leg above the knee, smashing the thigh-bone, and was now embedded in his flesh.
This could easily have been fatal, but Wakley was not going to get off that easily. Two or three of his crewmen, including George Foot, pulled him into a shell crater and stayed with him, but it would have been certain death to try to move him by daylight. When night fell the unwounded men could have slipped back to the British lines, but even if they could have carried their officer, it was doubtful if he would have survived being dragged across the uneven ground. They could simply have abandoned him and saved themselves, rationalizing this on the grounds that he would probably have died anyway, but if this thought occurred to them, they dismissed it. Instead, they must have crept out of their shell crater under cover of darkness, dodging the sweeping machine guns and freezing like statues to avoid being picked out under the sickly light of the flares, to gather water-bottles and (one hopes) ampoules of morphine from the dead infantrymen, and to compete with the rats for the food in their haversacks.
The next day a rescue mission was mounted involving some of the crewmen who had made it back to the British lines, including Gunner Jacob Glaister, the hero of Dracula’s first action. Another officer noted that ‘several men [lost] their lives trying to rescue [Wakley]’,9 and it was a miracle Glaister was not among them, for his medal citation says he was ‘very severely wounded in trying to rescue a wounded officer’.10 According to a doctor’s report he was shot ‘through the body, bullet entering right side, leaving left side just under ribs’, but incredibly enough, the bullet passed right through his chest without hitting any vital organs. Having himself been rescued, Glaister was taken to a casualty clearing station and then to hospital in Rouen.11
Meanwhile the situation around the ruins of Eaucourt l’Abbaye remained dangerously confused, and George Foot and the others could only huddle together in the blood-soaked mud of their crater, occasionally loosening the tourniquet which formed a slender lifeline for William Wakley, and praying the Germans did not launch a counter-attack which would result in their capture – or worse. As if this was not enough, the Official History records that ‘Rain set in about 11 A.M. on the 2nd October and continued to fall with little intermission throughout the two following days.’12 Gibbs added a further twist to Wakley’s story: ‘A day later he was wounded again by a bomb, which – amazing as it seems – did not burst, but injured him badly in the ribs, so that he had to endure great suffering out there in the crater.’13 The medical reports make no mention of this further injury, but no-one could argue with the conclusion.
Wakley and Foot remained in No Man’s Land for three days and nights, until on 4 October the adjutant of D Company noted ‘Wakley brought in’.14 George Foot’s local paper said he ‘eventually [got] his officer back into the British lines’,15 but in reality it seems the Germans simply decided they had exacted a high enough price for Eaucourt l’Abbaye and pulled back to their next defensive position, allowing the attackers to move forward and occupy the devastated area. The Times report, sent from headquarters on 4 October, said ‘it was impossible to get [the officer] away until this morning’s attack had succeeded’.16
So their dreadful vigil came to an end, and George Foot’s courage was rewarded with a Distinguished Conduct Medal, the highest award for so-called ‘other ranks’ apart from the Victoria Cross (which was reserved for the greatest acts of bravery). The citation stated: ‘For conspicuous gallantry in action. He displayed great courage and determination fighting with his tank. Later, he remained for 30 hours with a wounded officer under very heavy fire.’17
For Glaister and Wakley, an even bigger battle was now beginning as they struggled to recover from their injuries. Glaister was evacuated to hospital in Dublin where he remained for nine weeks, making a good recovery and bathing in the best wishes of his comrades.18 Among them was his first commander, Lieutenant Arthur Arnold, who wrote from his own hospital bed: ‘Too bad that “Dracula” had to be fired in the end. It seems to be the ultimate end of a good many of the Tanks. I am still in bed & my knee is proving a very tedious job. However I believe it will get all right & I hope we may eventually have another dust-up together with the Bosche [sic].’19
Glaister, who had been a builder before the war, also received a message of congratulations and a gold watch from Whitehaven Town Council, of which his father was a member. His reply indicates that what we would now regard as public-school values were not restricted to the officer class: ‘It is very difficult to give you any idea as to our experiences, but with regard to Myself I only did my duty and what is expected of every man, viz., to play the game straight. I still have trouble with my wounds, but hope to be strong and well again in a month or two.’20
Another letter arrived from Major Frank Summers, the commanding officer of D Company, who wrote: ‘You must try & get posted back to this Company – as we shall all be pleased & proud to have you back with us.’21 But when Jacob Glaister returned to duty in December 1916 he went to G Battalion and was based in the depot at Bovington, and although he remained in the Tank Corps for the rest of the war, he never had the chance of another dust-up with the Boche.22
For Wakley, the situation was far more grave. Following his rescue he immediately underwent an operation to remove the shrapnel from his leg at a field hospital behind the lines, and from there he was taken to a base hospital in Le Havre. By 18 October he was back in London, at an officers’ hospital in Mayfair, but not surprisingly his shattered leg had become infected in the filthy conditions of the battlefield, and a medical report noted ‘the wound is freely suppurating’ (in other words, inflamed and oozing pus), while Wakley himself had a high temperature and was ‘much run down’. The fracture was wired in an attempt to reunite the smashed bone, but by now Wakley had contracted septicaemia, a severe blood infection which was untreatable without antibiotics, and for several weeks his life hung in the balance. By the New Year, doctors realized they had no choice but to amputate his left leg at the hip joint.23
This drastic remedy proved surprisingly effective, and in April 1917 the hospital’s medical director reported that ‘the stump is now quite ready for the artificial limb which Mr Wakley is anxious to obtain as quickly as possible as he is very desirous of again undertaking duty. Mr Wakley was most severely wounded … He made an outstanding recovery. He has been a most courageous patient and is altogether a very deserving case.’ This letter helped persuade the government to pay for the artificial limb, and by August Wakley was back at work, using his skills as a draughtsman to prepare technical drawings at the War Office.24 He remained there until the end of the war, when he complained that ‘even the light duty I am now employed on is a severe strain’, and was placed on the retired list with an annual pension.25
There we must leave him, except to note that his disability did not dampen his energies in other respects, for in 1921 the High Court granted a decree nisi to Major Cecil Huntingdon Digges La Touche of the Indian Army, divorcing his wife Evelyn on the grounds of adultery with CaptainWakley.26 The court heard that Major La Touche had ‘received a letter from her in which she said that she had been unfaithful to him, and that she had stayed at an hotel in Notting-hill-gate under the name of Wakley. Evidence was given by the manager of the hotel that a Captain and Mrs. Wakley had stayed there together as man and wife.’27 The divorce left the couple free to marry, and their union was both productive and long-lasting, though the unhappy major – who had previously been invalided home from the fighting in Mesopotamia – died the following year in Lahore, in what is now Pakistan.28
It was not an era that paid much attention to the mental suffering of those traumatized by war, unless it manifested itself in the syndrome known as shell shock, and Wakley, Glaister and Foot were left to come to terms as best they could with their ordeal in No Man’s Land. Being physically unhurt, George Foot would have simply returned to his unit, to take his place in another crew when a vacancy occurred. His combination of intelligence, dependability and courage marked him out as officer material, but he does not even seem to have been promoted even to NCO; one document lists him as a lance-corporal, but the Tank Corps invariably referred to him by the basic rank of gunner. His family wonder if this was related to his disciplinary record, but the authorities probably felt he needed to gain greater maturity and authority before joining the ranks of the ‘temporary gentlemen’. However, he was not yet twenty years old, and as we would say nowadays without thinking, he had time on his side.