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The pain was martyrizing, like that of men tied to burning
fagots for conscience' sake. In one battalion of the 49th (West
Riding) Division there were over four hundred cases in that winter of
'15. Other battalions in the Ypres salient suffered as much.
It was not until the end of the winter, when oil was taken up to the
trenches and rubbing drill was ordered, two or three times a day, that
the malady of trench-foot was reduced, and at last almost eliminated.
The spirit of the men fought against all that misery, resisted it, and
would not be beaten by it.
A sergeant of the West Riding Division was badly wounded as he stood
thigh-high in water. A bomb or a trench-mortar smashed one of his legs
into a pulp of bloody flesh and splintered bone. Word was passed down
to the field ambulance, and a surgeon came up, splashed to the neck in
mud, with his instruments held high. The operation was done in the
water, red with the blood of the wounded man, who was then brought
down, less a leg, to the field hospital.


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