Shapiro: Strong men after battle weep like little children
Their hands shake, and they have to be aided to walk, but they will get all right
By L. S. B. Shapiro, North American Newspaper Alliance
With the British forces in Normandy, France – (July 26, delayed)
This is an ugly story. It may not make pleasant reading and yet it should be written because it is as much a part of the war as a great battle filled with brave incidents.
Indeed, you cannot know what until you have moved, as I did this morning, to a field clearing station behind out advancing battle line between the Odon and Orne Rivers.
The reception tent was empty when two British soldiers were brought in, bolstered by the arms of two ambulance drivers. They were ragged and all one could see on their mud-stained faces were saucer-like eyes staring straight ahead.
One was a slight man who wore spectacles and had blond hair. The other was a dark, rugged man with a fine head and a great pair of shoulders. They seemed not to be wounded, but somehow their legs weren’t working and they were almost carried to canvas chairs in opposite corners of the tent.
Weep like children
There they wept hysterically, and their choking sibs made them sound curiously like nursery children.
An orderly pulled up a chair beside the blond-haired soldier and talked rapidly into his ear, at the same time stroking his back. His sobbing ceased somewhat and the soldier rubbed his hands feverishly over his face, then turned to look at the orderly.
He opened his mouth, but nothing audible came to his lips. Then he put his face into his cupped hands and wept again.
The orderly lifted the soldier’s head and pushed a cigarette between his lips. But before a match could be applied, the cigarette fell to the ground.
Hands shake
Again, the orderly patted his back, lit the cigarette himself and placed it in the soldier’s mouth. The younger puffed feverishly, and smoke drifted out of his nostrils and made him cough. He mumbled some inaudible words and his hands shook so desperately that the orderly grasped them and held them tightly.
On the other side of the tent, the dark, rugged soldier was being helped to his feet by a doctor. Together they began walking toward the exit, the hefty soldier stumbling along like a baby learning how to walk.
The blond, slight man watched them pass and his eyes followed them across the tent and out into the open, and a flicker of a smile played on his quivering lips as though he were amused by such helplessness on the part of the other soldier.
He seemed normal for a moment, then suddenly the cigarette dropped from his lips and his hands pawed at his cheeks and eyes and he wept hysterically.
The doctor returned to the tent and looked at him.
He whispered to me:
Battle exhaustion. The boy has been under shell and mortar fire for six days in exposed positions. We will put them to sleep for a couple of days and they’ll be all right.