FullReads

Much is left out of the diary that we would wish to have recorded. There is tantalizing mention of “conversations” with Shepherd–with Roddick–with Chipman–with Armstrong–with Gardner–with Martin–with Moyse. Occasionally there is a note of description: “James Mavor is a kindly genius with much knowledge”; “Tait McKenzie presided ideally” at a Shakespeare dinner; “Stephen Leacock does not keep all the good things for his publisher.” Those who know the life in Montreal may well for themselves supply the details.

IX. Dead in His Prime

John McCrae left the front after the second battle of Ypres, and never returned. On June 1st, 1915, he was posted to No. 3 General Hospital at Boulogne, a most efficient unit organized by McGill University and commanded by that fine soldier Colonel H. S. Birkett, C.B. He was placed in charge of medicine, with the rank of Lieut.-Colonel as from April 17th, 1915, and there he remained until his death.

At first he did not relish the change. His heart was with the guns. He had transferred from the artillery to the medical service as recently as the previous autumn, and embarked a few days afterwards at Quebec, on the 29th of September, arriving at Davenport, October 20th, 1914. Although he was attached as Medical Officer to the 1st Brigade of Artillery, he could not forget that he was no longer a gunner, and in those tumultuous days he was often to be found in the observation post rather than in his dressing station. He had inherited something of the old army superciliousness towards a “non-combatant” service, being unaware that in this war the battle casualties in the medical corps were to be higher than in any other arm of the service. From South Africa he wrote exactly fifteen years before: “I am glad that I am not ‘a medical’ out here. No ‘R.A.M.C.’ or any other ‘M.C.’ for me. There is a big breach, and the medicals are on the far side of it.” On August 7th, 1915, he writes from his hospital post, “I expect to wish often that I had stuck by the artillery.” But he had no choice.

Of this period of his service there is little written record. He merely did his work, and did it well, as he always did what his mind found to do. His health was failing. He suffered from the cold. A year before his death he writes on January 25th, 1917:

The cruel cold is still holding. Everyone is suffering, and the men in the wards in bed cannot keep warm. I know of nothing so absolutely pitiless as weather. Let one wish; let one pray; do what one will; still the same clear sky and no sign,–you know the cold brand of sunshine. For my own part I do not think I have ever been more uncomfortable. Everything is so cold that it hurts to pick it up. To go to bed is a nightmare and to get up a worse one. I have heard of cold weather in Europe, and how the poor suffer,–now I know!

All his life he was a victim of asthma. The first definite attack was in the autumn of 1894, and the following winter it recurred with persistence. For the next five years his letters abound in references to the malady. After coming to Montreal it subsided; but he always felt that the enemy was around the corner. He had frequent periods in bed; but he enjoyed the relief from work and the occasion they afforded for rest and reading.

In January, 1918, minutes begin to appear upon his official file which were of great interest to him, and to us. Colonel Birkett had relinquished command of the unit to resume his duties as Dean of the Medical Faculty of McGill University. He was succeeded by that veteran soldier, Colonel J. M. Elder, C.M.G. At the same time the command of No. 1 General Hospital fell vacant. Lieut.-Colonel McCrae was required for that post; but a higher honour was in store, namely the place of Consultant to the British Armies in the Field. All these events, and the final great event, are best recorded in the austere official correspondence which I am permitted to extract from the files: