To hell with dignity!

We spent the winter of, the RCR’s did, of ‘17 and ‘18 doing trench duty, in and out. One instant I remember, after we always stood to in the morning, just before daylight. And then after that, you went in the dugout, one thing and another, and the snipers took over. They worked in pairs, had periscopes and a steel plate with a hole in it and all special sights. I guess if a German got in their sights, why, it was goodbye, but we didn’t pay much attention to them fellows. They had their own business. But one morning, McPhee, he didn’t belong to 8th Platoon, he asked me if I wanted to go out to the canteen with him. Of course, I knew that would be to carry the officers’ liquor in. But everybody wanted chocolate bars. I had to make a list of who give me money and one thing or another. So we got out of the communication trench on a road that run parallel with the front line trenches. We knew it was within artillery range, but they would hardly bother a couple of guys walking along. But then three guys down ahead started a conversation in the middle of the road and McPhee says, “Golly, that’ll be five. That’ll be worth a shot.” We just got near them and two shells whistled overhead and exploded and those three guys vanished quicker than a wink, but we were left on the road. So McPhee made this speech. He said, “Close, it’s undignified for an officer to run it says in the rule book, but to hell with dignity,” and he took off. It kept me going to keep up to him for two hundred yards. However, they didn’t shoot at us, and we eventually got to the canteen and I got the chocolate bars and carried three bottles of liquor back. That was a nice pleasant episode compared to doing in the trenches, but I always remembered the race we had.