Voices of Silence Read online

  The day closed in a wrath of cloud. The gale –

  Like a fierce beast that shuns the light of day,

  Skulking within the jungle till his prey

  Steals forth at dusk to water at the well, –

  Now leapt upon her, howling. Steep and swift,

  The black sea boiled about her sky-flung bows,

  And in the shrouds, the winds in mad carouse

  Screamed: and in the sky’s pall was no rift.

  And it was cold. Oh, bitter cold it was,

  The wind-whipped spray-drops froze before they fell

  And tinkled on the iron decks like hail;

  And every rope and block was cased in glass.

  And ever wild and wilder grew the night.

  Great seas lunged at her, bellowing in wrath,

  Contemptuous, to sweep her from their path.

  And not in all that waste one friendly light.

  Alone, spray-blinded, through the clamorous murk,

  By skill and courage besting the hungry sea,

  Mocking the tempest’s fury, staggered she.

  The storm is foiled: now for the Devil’s work!

  The swinging bows crash down into the trough,

  And with a sudden flame the sea is riven,

  And a dull roar outroars the tempest even.

  Her engine’s pulse is stilled. It is enough.

  Oh, have you ever seen a foundered horse –

  His great heart broken by a task too great

  For his endurance, but unbroken yet

  His spirit – striving to complete his course?

  Falling at last, eyes glazed and nostrils wide,

  And have not ached with pity? Pity now

  A brave ship shattered by a coward blow

  That once had spurned the waters in her pride.

  And can you picture – you who dwell secure

  In sheltered houses, warm and filled with light, –

  The loneliness and terror of that fight

  In shrieking darkness? Feel with them (the sure

  Foundation of their very world destroyed),

  The sluggish lifting of the lifeless hull,

  Wallowing ever deeper till, with a dull

  Half-sob she plunges and the seas are void.

  Yet – Oh be sure, they did not pass alone

  Into the darkness all uncomforted;

  For round them hovered England’s mighty Dead

  To greet them: and a pale poop lanthorn shone

  Lighting them homeward, and a voice rang clear –

  As when he cheered his own devoted band –

  ‘Heaven’s as near by sea as by the land’,

  Sir Humphrey Gilbert hailed them: ‘Be of cheer!’

  N.M.F. Corbett

  To Fritz

  I wish that I could be a Hun, to dive about the sea,

  I wouldn’t go for merchantmen, a man-of-war for me;

  There are lots of proper targets for attacking, little Fritz,

  But you seem to like the merchantmen, and blowing them to bits.

  I suppose it must be easy fruit to get an Iron Cross

  By strafing sail and cargo ships, but don’t you feel the loss

  Of the wonderful excitement when you face a man-of-war,

  And tearing past you overhead the big propellers roar?

  When you know that it’s a case of ‘May the fish run good and true’,

  For if they don’t it’s ten to one it’s R.I.P. for you?

  Although perhaps you can’t be blamed – your motives may be pure –

  You’re rather new to submarines – in fact, an amateur;

  But we’d like to take your job awhile and show you how it’s done,

  And leave you on the long patrol to wait your brother Hun.

  You wouldn’t like the job, my lad – the motors turning slow,

  You wouldn’t like the winter-time – storm and wind and snow,

  You’d find it weary waiting, Fritz – unless your faith is strong –

  Up and down on the long patrol – How long, O Lord, How long?

  We don’t patrol for merchant ships, there’s none but neutrals there,

  Up and down on the old patrol, you can hear the E-boat’s prayer:

  ‘Give us a ten-knot breeze, O Lord, with a clear and blazing sky,

  And help our eyes at the periscope as the High Sea Fleet goes by.’

  John G. Bower

  The Armed Liner

  The dull grey paint of war

  Covering the shining brass and gleaming decks

  That once re-echoed to the steps of youth.

  That was before

  The storms of destiny made ghastly wrecks

  Of Peace, the Right and Truth.

  Impromptu dances, coloured lights and laughter,

  Lovers watching the phosphorescent waves;

  Now gaping guns, a whistling shell; and after

  So many wandering graves.

  H. Smalley Sarson

  The Lusitania

  In a world that is neither night nor day,

  A quiet twilight land,

  With fifty fathoms over you

  And the surge of seas to cover you,

  You rest on the kindly sand.

  Above, the earth is March or May,

  And skies are fair in spring,

  But all the seasons are one with you,

  Summer and winter have done with you,

  And wars, and everything.

  Surely this is a goodly gift,

  To sleep so sound and sure

  That neither spite nor weariness,

  Passion, nor pain, nor dreariness

  Can touch you any more.

  In drifting spume and flying scud,

  When the great tides shoreward sweep,

  The seas that are all in all to you

  Whisper and move and call to you,

  Whisper and call and weep.

  J.L. Crommelin Brown

  Below

  ‘Great credit is due to the engine-room staff.’ Admiral Beatty.

  The man who’s down below

  Sees nothing of the show;

  He’s only got to do his bit and wait:

  With his eye upon the dial,

  It’s a devil of a trial

  Blindly to bear the onsets of his fate.

  Yes, he’s buried in the deep,

  And he can’t have even a peep

  At the things that make the blood run fast and proud:

  His prison walls are thick,

  And a lesser man were sick

  To know he could not mingle with the crowd.

  So, his colour comes and goes,

  And he gives a thought to those

  Who are trusting to his skill and honour bright;

  He reckons he is there,

  And he doesn’t turn a hair,

  Though he knows he’s in the bowels of the fight.

  By the churning of the screw

  He gets a kind o’ clew

  That they’re jinking all they can the submarines;

  For below the water-line

  He can tap the secret sign,

  And he has a pretty inkling what it means.

  He trusts the Bridge above,

  And he thinks but little of

  The dangers that beset him in his den;

  The signals tell him some,

  And he’s sure there’s more to come –

  What, the worst? Well, it happens to all men!

  And so, within his cage,

  Oil-spray and pressure-gauge

  And drone of turbine occupy his mind;

  He doesn’t see the show,

  But this we surely know,

  He’s the bravest man of any you can find!

  John Hogben

  Wet Ships

  ‘. . . And will remain on your Patrol till the 8th December . . .’ (Extract from Orders.)

  The North-East Wind came armed and shod from the ice-locked Baltic shore, />
  The seas rose up in the track he made, and the rollers raced before;

  He sprang on the Wilhelmshaven ships that reeled across the tide.

  ‘Do you cross the sea to-night with me?’ the cold North-Easter cried –

  Along the lines of anchored craft the Admiral’s answer flashed,

  And loud the proud North-Easter laughed, as the second anchors splashed.

  ‘By God! you’re right – you German men, with a three-day gale to blow,

  It is better to wait by your harbour gate than follow where I go!’

  Over the Bight to the open sea the great wind sang as he sheered:

  ‘I rule – I rule the Northern waste – I speak, and the seas are cleared;

  You nations all whose harbours ring the edge of my Northern sea,

  At peace or war, when you hear my voice you shall know no Lord but me.’

  Then into the wind in a cloud of foam and sheets of rattling spray

  Head to the bleak and breaking seas in dingy black and grey,

  Taking it every lurch and roll in tons of icy green

  Came out to her two-year-old patrol – an English submarine.

  The voice of the wind rose up and howled through squalls of driving white:

  ‘You’ll know my power, you English craft, before you make the Bight;

  I rule – I rule this Northern Sea, that I raise and break to foam.

  Whom do you call your Overlord that dares me in my home?

  Over the crest of a lifting sea in bursting shells of spray,

  She showed the flash of her rounded side, as over to port she lay,

  Clanging her answer up the blast that made her wireless sing:

  ‘I serve the Lord of the Seven Seas. Ha! Splendour of God – the King!!’

  Twenty feet of her bow came out, dripping and smooth it sprang,

  Over the valley of green below as her stamping engines rang;

  Then down she fell till the waters rose to meet her straining rails –

  ‘I serve my King, who sends me here to meet your winter gales’.

  (Rank upon rank the seas swept on and broke to let her through,

  While high above her reeling bridge their shattered remnants flew);

  ‘If you blow the stars from the sky to-night, your boast in your teeth I’ll fling,

  I am your master – Overlord and – Dog of the English King!’

  John G. Bower

  The Battle off Jutland

  May 31st, 1916

  The silent fleet that braved the North Sea tempests,

  The submarines, the snow and fog and spray,

  Through sleepless nights and weary months of waiting,

  Spoke with its guns to-day.

  Sir David Beatty’s cruisers did discover

  The presence of a German force at sea;

  Where by the verdict of the British nation

  It had no right to be.

  He first engaged a battle-cruiser squadron,

  Which showed unusual eagerness to fight;

  For in support their naval strength was gathered

  To challenge Britain’s might.

  The only anxious thoughts that troubled Beatty

  Were lest they should escape the British fleet;

  Though fresh divisions soon his foes had doubled,

  He scorned to bid retreat.

  More fiercely raged the fight as other units

  Out of the mists appeared on either side;

  Great German battleships into the conflict

  Were flung to turn the tide.

  On either side proud ships were seen to stagger,

  Then disappear beneath the waves in flame.

  To Beatty by o’erwhelming foes imperiled

  Our super-dreadnoughts came.

  The ‘Warspite’, ‘Valiant’, ‘Barham’ and ‘Malaya’:

  What cheers for hard pressed comrades bravely ring;

  What deeper voices to that stern engagement

  Their mighty weapons bring.

  Another cloud loomed dark o’er the horizon,

  Like growing storm, ’Twas Jellicoe’s grand fleet;

  Before its deadly hail and wrathful thunders

  The German ships retreat.

  Darkness shut down with mist upon the ocean:

  Such dreadful night the sea had never known;

  But in the wild mêlée the British triumph,

  The foe is overthrown.

  G.B. Warren

  War Chant of the Harbour-Huns

  In 1914

  Our country’s pride,

  Sea-Huns we are;

  Our time we bide –

  Then woe betide

  The British tar!

  The foeman’s fate

  And doom are sealed;

  Within our gate

  We lie in wait.

  Britain shall yield!

  Hail to the Day!

  Let them come forth –

  Hun mines shall slay

  Their hated prey

  In righteous wrath!

  Then shall we sail

  To Britain’s shore;

  The fist of mail

  Shall make her quail

  And death outpour!

  Till even she

  Proclaim our worth,

  And we shall be

  Lords of the sea

  And of the earth!

  In 1916

  By luck, again

  Safe back to port!

  The heaving main

  Strewn with our slain,

  The battle fought.

  In peril’s throes

  Home course we shaped;

  A mist arose

  And from our foes

  We just escaped.

  Once more we hide

  At anchor here,

  While they with pride

  The ocean ride

  Both far and near.

  The longed for Day –

  A bubble burst!

  Our land’s dismay

  We did allay,

  Nor told the worst.

  In victory’s guise

  Was failure clad;

  So through deft lies

  Our nation wise

  Is falsely glad.

  Once more, with hate,

  Britain to brave

  We watch and wait.

  By cursed fate

  She rules the wave.

  How Tirpitz Won the Battle off Jutland

  Von Tirpitz was an admiral, his beard flew bold and free,

  He called up all his captains and ‘My gallant lads’, quoth he,

  ‘The day has come, ten thousand “Hochs”, and though I stay at home

  My spirit will be with you. Now prepare to brave the foam!’

  The captains tried with one accord to raise a pleasant grin,

  Yet each one wondered when and how the trouble would begin;

  Their ships they put in dry dock, had the barnacles removed,

  While by the aid of countless ‘steins’ the outlook they improved.

  ‘What ho, my merry mariners!’ said Tirp. one day in May,

  ‘Art ready now to sweep the sea and end Britannia’s day?

  Has each of you his Iron Cross, and flannel next his skin?’

  With one accord they answered ‘Ja!’ ‘Gut! now we can begin!’

  So Tirpitz crept unto the gate, and peered out o’er the sea,

  While gravely muttering in his beard, ‘I’d rather you than me!’

  ‘The coast is clear’, he shouted back, ‘make haste, ‘The Day’ is here!’

  Then shut the gate behind them, and consoled himself with beer.

  When on his homeward way he paused, this master of the gales,

  And drove into his statue half a ton of six inch nails;

  ‘Hoch! hoch!’ quoth he, ‘now I must go and write up my report

  Of this, our greatest victory, and lessons it has taught.’

  So he and Wolff sat down to think, and soon on
e came to see

  The mighty German fleet had won a glorious victory,

  So ‘Wire the news around at once, the time is getting short,

  The world must have our story ere our ships get back to port.’

  Then back went Tirp. to Kiel again, and peeping through the gate

  He saw some ships returning in a mighty flurried state,

  ‘What’s this?’ he cried, behind his beard his face was turning pale,

  And straightway to this statue went and drove another nail.

  ‘Ho! ho! my gallant lads’, quoth he, ‘why make such frantic haste?

  You come as though by devils chased, and little time to waste.’

  The pale and shaky captains muttered through their chattering teeth,

  ‘We’ve won a great big vic’try, all the foe is underneath.’

  ‘If that is so,’ quoth Tirpitz, ‘why this frantic need to haste,

  Why not remain and glut on joys of which you’ve had a taste,

  Why leave the field of victory whose laurels wreath your hair?’

  ‘Well, to be honest ’twas because the British fleet was there.’

  ‘Oh well!’ said Tirp., ‘the glorious news is speeding on its way,

  And ’twill be known the whole world o’er ere breaks another day;

  If we can’t win by ships and guns we can at least by tales.’

  And then into his statue drove another ton of nails.

  A British Boy

  John Travers Cornwell, 1st Class Boy on H.M.S. Chester, 31st May 1916. (See Admiral Jellicoe’s dispatch, published in newspapers, 7th July 1916.)

  For God and king, for country and for right,

  The sons of Britain’s far-extending sway

  Flock to the flag, the patriot’s debt to pay

  For freedom’s gift, against satanic might!

  And thus, where all were heroes in the fight

  Against a foe who long had sought ‘the Day’,

  A boy stands nobly in the blinding spray

  Of sea and shot – one more example bright!

  Erstwhile some said the spirit of our race