Stories and Letters from the Trenches — John Shaqi
Stories and Letters from the TrenchesVarious
History
Stories and Letters from the Trenches
Various
World War, 1914-1918 -- Anecdotes
"I must write you just one story that came to me at the ambulance
just before Christmas, even though it is a little late. We had
a French soldier brought in frightfully wounded. He came from
the region around St. Mihiel. One leg had to be amputated, and,
besides that, he had half a dozen other wounds. His dog came with
him--hunting dog of some kind. This dog had saved his master's life.
They were in the trenches together, when a shell burst in such a
way as to collapse the whole trench. Every one in it was killed or
buried in the collapse, and this dog dug and dug until he got his
master's face free, so that he could breathe, and then he sat by him
until some reinforcements came and dug them all out. Every one was
dead but this man. We have both the dog and the man with us. The dog
has a little house all to himself in the court, and he has blankets
and lots of petting, and every day he is allowed to be with his
master for a little while."
* * * * *
"I am very tired to-night. For some time now I've had charge of
the dental cases, in addition to my regular work. Just now I have
nine of them. They are the men who have fractures of the upper or
lower jaws besides other wounds. The American dentists here are
doing wonderful work--some of the most brilliant that is done in
any department. Such deformities you never saw. The whole front of
one man's face is gone, and how we are going to build him a new one
I don't see, but as soon as he is ready we'll begin grafting and
plastic work generally. One of these men is a black boy, the saddest
figure in the whole hospital to me. His identification tag was lost
in transit. He doesn't read or write or speak a word of French and
none of our Senegalesi, Moroccans, Algerians, or Tunisians can
talk to him. He is utterly alone and lost. In the course of time
the Government will place him, but it will be a long process. His
wound is ghastly. The bullet hit his front teeth, but as his lips
must have been drawn back in a snarl or laugh at the time, no wound
appears there. The whole of his left upper and lower teeth were
blown out, upper and lower jaw fractured and literally his whole
left cheek blown away. You can put your fingers right into his mouth
from just in front of his ear and see the inner side of his lips. It
is awful taking care of him, but he is as patient as some poor dog
who knows you are trying to help him.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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