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Description
ink 2007,
This is the story and poem by Lieutenant Edmund Blunden near Menin Road September 1917…

(from A Storm in Flanders by Winston Groom)

” Blunden’s headquarters party actually occupied a pair of pillboxes, about thirty yards apart. During a lull in the shelling next day, Blunden ran over to the one in which the main headquarters and the medical team were located. An officer friend who had just rejoined the headquarters staff from leave in London, “as though defying this extreme fury of warfare, was in an almost smiling mood,” invited Blunden to “dinner.” Not long after Blunden returned to his own pillbox, some of his telephone linesmen managed to reconnect his pillbox with another one forward, closer to the fighting.
“I was called upon the telephone,” Blunden said.
“I say, hasn’t something happened at your headquarters?”
“Not that I know off – All right, I believe,” Blunden replied.
“Yes, I’m afraid something’s wrong; will you find out?”
Blunden sent his servant scurrying over to the other pillbox, and he soon returned, “wild-eyed, straining. ‘Don’t go over, sir; it’s awful. A shell came into the door.’ He added more details after a moment or two. The doctor and those with him had been killed”
Later, Blunden would write a poem in which the event was central.

The Welcome

He’d scarcely come from leave and London,
Still was carrying a leather case,
When he surprised headquarters pillbox
And sat down sweating in the filthy place.

He was a tall, lean, pale-looked creature,
With nerves that seldom ceased to wince;
Past war had long preyed on his nature,
And war had doubled in horror since.

There was a lull, the adjutant even
came to my hole: You cheerful sinner,
If nothing happens till half-past seven,
Come over then, we’re going to have dinner.

But he went with his fierce red head;
We were sourly canvassing his jauntiness, when
Something happened at headquarters pillbox.
“Don’t go there,” cried one of my men.

The shell had struck right into the doorway,
The smoke lazily floated away;
There were six men in that concrete doorway,
Now a black muckheap blocked the way.

Inside one who had scarcely shaken
The air of England out of his lungs
Was alive, and sane; it shall be spoken
While any of those who were there have tongues. "

For March MGWAT in Great War Forum.

Description
ink 2007,
This is the story and poem by Lieutenant Edmund Blunden near Menin Road September 1917…

(from A Storm in Flanders by Winston Groom)

” Blunden’s headquarters party actually occupied a pair of pillboxes, about thirty yards apart. During a lull in the shelling next day, Blunden ran over to the one in which the main headquarters and the medical team were located. An officer friend who had just rejoined the headquarters staff from leave in London, “as though defying this extreme fury of warfare, was in an almost smiling mood,” invited Blunden to “dinner.” Not long after Blunden returned to his own pillbox, some of his telephone linesmen managed to reconnect his pillbox with another one forward, closer to the fighting.
“I was called upon the telephone,” Blunden said.
“I say, hasn’t something happened at your headquarters?”
“Not that I know off – All right, I believe,” Blunden replied.
“Yes, I’m afraid something’s wrong; will you find out?”
Blunden sent his servant scurrying over to the other pillbox, and he soon returned, “wild-eyed, straining. ‘Don’t go over, sir; it’s awful. A shell came into the door.’ He added more details after a moment or two. The doctor and those with him had been killed”
Later, Blunden would write a poem in which the event was central.

The Welcome

He’d scarcely come from leave and London,
Still was carrying a leather case,
When he surprised headquarters pillbox
And sat down sweating in the filthy place.

He was a tall, lean, pale-looked creature,
With nerves that seldom ceased to wince;
Past war had long preyed on his nature,
And war had doubled in horror since.

There was a lull, the adjutant even
came to my hole: You cheerful sinner,
If nothing happens till half-past seven,
Come over then, we’re going to have dinner.

But he went with his fierce red head;
We were sourly canvassing his jauntiness, when
Something happened at headquarters pillbox.
“Don’t go there,” cried one of my men.

The shell had struck right into the doorway,
The smoke lazily floated away;
There were six men in that concrete doorway,
Now a black muckheap blocked the way.

Inside one who had scarcely shaken
The air of England out of his lungs
Was alive, and sane; it shall be spoken
While any of those who were there have tongues. "

For March MGWAT in Great War Forum.