Siegfried Sassoon
Squire nagged and bullied till I went to fight
Under Lord Derby’s Scheme
I died in hell—They called it Passchendaele
My wound was slight,
And I was hobbling back
and then a shell Burst slick upon the duck-boards
so I fell Into the bottomless mud, and lost the light
What happened at Passchendaele?
The Allied assault was launched in the early hours of 31 July 1917. Because of the torrential rain, the British and Canadian troops found themselves fighting not only the Germans but a quagmire of stinking mud that swallowed up men, horses and tanks.
Days into the attack, Ypres suffered the heaviest rain for 30 years. Tanks were immobilised, rifles were clogged up and the shelter usually created by shells turned to swamps. Many men, horses and pack mules drowned in the quagmire.
Wooden boards had been placed down in many areas, particularly behind the lines, to allow men to walk in safety. However a misstep or the need to dive for cover could quite easily bring a man off the wooden boards and onto the mud. Once caught in it, it was often impossible to get back out again. The mud sealed airtight around boots, legs, and bodies and it could require many men to pull a single soldier back out of the mud.
Those who could not be pulled out often had to be left behind to slowly sink into the mud and drown. A soldier of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment recalled:
A party of men passing up to the front line found a man bogged to above the knees. The united efforts of four of them with rifles under his armpits made not the slightest impression, and to dig, even if shovels had been available, was impossible for there was no foothold. Duty compelled them to move on up to the line, and when two days later they passed down that way the wretched man was still there; but only his head was visible and he was raving mad.
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from At the Somme: The Song of the Mud