By Gregory Clark, June 4, 1921.

Lord Byng, then Sir Julian, was popular with the Canadians as corps commander insofar as general officers were capable of being known to the troops.

For brigadiers were rare enough birds in the select company of the old tin hats, let alone corps commanders.

But Sir Julian inspected us a few times – few enough, indeed, to win the real gratitude of the muddy trench hounds. He dropped in unexpectedly on us at our work or play. He popped without warning into billets or training field, saw us as we were, not as we pretended to be on carefully preened parades for him.

And to us, he appeared a real general. He seemed so entirely at his ease. Generals as a class were usually a fiercely tailored and starched lot, sitting their horses just so, uttering certain set clipped remarks, as if they were playing a part.

Sir Julian struck us as a man accustomed to his part. His uniform didn’t seem to distress him. He wore it easily, loosely, as if he had had it for years. He wore amazing grey- green canvas leggings! Yes, sir. Astonishing. No other general of our acquaintance could have dared forego the rich, shining knee boots of generalhood. But Sir Julian not only wore outrageous canvas leggings, but he carried an absurd little stick instead of the massive riding-crop of his high estate. And frequently – tell it not in G. H. Q – frequently he had one or more of his tunic buttons undone.

That made him a figure of interest to the rank and file. He came one day before the Vimy show to inspect us near Lillers. We were doing the tapes. And a watchful eye was kept for the party of horsemen or the red-flagged grey motor car that would advise us of his approach.

But around a copse, on foot, came a small party of brass hats and caught us unawares. The usual stiff group of immaculate red tabs, but at the head of them a tall, long-legged, easy figure who walked as though he were accustomed (like us, egad, poor gravel crushers), to walk.

This was Sir Julian, our leader. He came and walked along our platoons. Our buttons blazed. Not a button, not a strap was out of place. We scarcely breathed as the great corps commander strode close before us. But picture our rapture and relief when we noted that three of the august tunic buttons were undone.

Did he stop and tick our buttons? Did he examine our chins, or ask us to show him our iron rations? No. In a rather high voice, he asked the company commander –

“What are you doing?”

And when he was told –

“Let’s see you do it,” he said.

And we galumphed gaily over the mimic attack on the tapes, at our ease before a general who was at his ease and had three buttons undone. And when the sham attack ended on a hill-top, we looked back, and the corps commander waved his little stick to us and went on to other battalions in the next stubble field.

So we had a hunch that this man knew what he was doing with us. He didn’t seem highty-tighty. We began to appreciate the fact that we were getting a remarkably thorough training for this Vimy show. We noted the plenty of maps, air photos and intelligence reports that were showered upon us, even down to the humble lance-jack and section commander. We had a feeling of confidence, which was half the battle of Vimy Ridge.

And word was whispered down to us from colonel to captain, sergeant and buck, that this was the ingenious hand of Sir Julian. His good name followed him after he left the Canadians; and in that fateful March, 1918, when we heard Byng’s Third Army was on our right, we felt no alarm.

He started the Corps School in 1916, which proved the most invaluable liaison between divisions. For in those early days, the First Division did not altogether love the Second, and the Third Division was an unknown infant. Sir Julian dealt with this as soon as he took command of the corps. The Corps School brought officers and N.C.O.’s from all divisions together, put them to sleep together in tents, had them eat and live together in huts. And lo, the little antagonisms vanished.

He got his point of view on Jack Canuck at first hand. At Houdain, on the outskirts of which was his headquarters in the Chateau of Ranchicourt, he came suddenly one morning into the barn in which I was superintending a fatigue party cleaning the billet.

Hs asked numerous questions about us, our regiment, where from, how billets should be cleaned, what offenses the different members of the fatigue party had committed to win this distinction, had we been long out in France, what had we for breakfast, were we married, any children, had we been shooting lately, what was that man limping for, did many of the men get drunk ever, how old is that man there?

I had no idea who my inquisitor was. His red tabs confused me. But his perfectly easy, friendly manner set me at rest, in spite of the presence of another brass-hat, who stood stiffly and importantly at the door of the barn. Some brigade officer or other, I said —

When I described my friend to my seniors at mess that noon, I was horrified to learn it was without question the corps commander. Lumme, a lieutenant-general! But, as Ortheris1 said, I was a recruity then.

Editor’s Note:

  1. In the collection of short stories “Soldiers Three” by Rudyard Kipling, the cockney soldier Ortheris expresses deep contempt for recruits (“recruities”) who whine about their rights. ↩︎