It is just a fortnight to-day since the German warships came up out of the mist, bombarded Hartlepool, wrecked many of the houses, killed a lot of defenceless women, children and men, and then tore away into the mist as hard as they could steam. Our own warships nearly got up with them, and if it had not been for the mist, never one of those vessels which were so valiant in bombarding helpless towns would have got back to Germany.

A great deal of confusion has been caused in telling the story of the raids on the Hartlepools, the two places being hopelessly mixed up. They are, as a matter of fact, quite separate towns, with separate mayors and corporations.

Hartlepool itself, where we now are, is on the coast, facing the sea; West Hartlepool is two miles inland. Both towns were bombarded, but it is hereabouts that most of the damage by shells was done, and many children and grown-up people killed. It was just over there, too, that eight Territorials were standing on the front, watching the firing, when a shell struck them and killed seven of the men and wounded the eighth.[2]

It was soon after eight o’clock in the morning when we rushed out of our billets into the streets, and, looking seaward, we saw warships firing.

In our billets we had heard the booming of guns, and supposing that it was our own warships practising or fighting, we had hurried out to see the fun. A few seconds was enough to tell us that there was no fun in it, but that this was a bombardment in deadly earnest by the enemy.

The German ships were easily visible from the shore, and did not seem to be very far away—about two miles. They were firing rapidly, and there was a deafening noise as the shells screamed and burst—the crashing of the explosions, the smashing of immense numbers of window-panes by the concussion, and the thudding of the shells and fragments against walls and buildings.

Coming so unexpectedly, the bombardment caused intense excitement and commotion, and men, women and children rushed into the streets to see what was happening—the worst thing they could do, because the splinters of shell, horrible jagged fragments, were flying all about and killing and maiming the people they struck. A number of little children who had rushed into the streets, as children will, were killed or wounded.

As soon as we realised what was happening, we rushed back and got our rifles and hurried into the street again, and did what we could; but rifles were absolutely useless against warships, and the incessant bursting of shells and the scattering of fragments and bullets made it most dangerous to be in the open.

Shells were striking and bursting everywhere, wrecking houses, ploughing into the ground, and battering the concrete front of the promenade.

The houses hereabouts, overlooking the sea, were big and easy targets for the Germans, who blazed away like madmen, though they must have been in terror all the time when they thought that their cannonading was sure to fetch British warships up. How thankful they must have felt for that protecting mist!

The Hartlepool Rovers’ Football Ground is very near the sea and the lighthouse, and it came under heavy fire. One of our men, Sapper Liddle, was near the wall of the ground when a shell burst and mortally wounded him, injuring him terribly. It was not possible to get at him and bring him into hospital for a long time, but when he was brought here everything that was humanly possible was done for him. He lingered for a few hours, then died.

Meanwhile, death and destruction were being dealt out all around us, and the land batteries were making such reply as they could to the Germans’ heavy guns. This reply was a very plucky performance, for Hartlepool is not a fortified place in anything like the real meaning of the word, and our light guns were no match for the weapons of the German battle-cruisers.

As it happened, no damage was done to the guns; but fearful mischief was caused to buildings near us. A shell struck the Baptist Chapel fair and square on the front, and drove a hole in it big enough for the passage of a horse and cart; then it wrecked the inside and went out at the other end of the chapel, again making a huge hole.

House after house was struck and shattered, in some cases people being buried in the ruins. Some of the houses are very old, and pretty well collapsed when a shell struck them and burst.

While the bombardment was in progress we were doing our best, but that could not be much. There was not much cause for laughter, but I remember that a shell came and burst near us, and made us see the humour of a little incident. The explosion itself did no actual damage, but the concussion and force of it were so violent that a sapper was jerked up into the air and came down with a crash. He picked himself up and scuttled as hard as he could make for shelter.

The firing was so sudden and so fierce that it was begun and finished almost before it was possible to realise that it had taken place. Most of the men of Hartlepool were at work when the bombardment started, and some of them were killed at their work, or as they were rushing home to see to their wives and children, while some were killed as they fled for safety.

The streets were crowded with fugitives during the bombardment, and it was owing to this that so many people were killed and wounded. The shells burst among them with awful results.

While the Germans were firing point-blank at the buildings facing the sea, and deliberately killing inoffensive people, they were also bombarding West Hartlepool, and doing their best to blow up the gasworks, destroy the big shipbuilding yards there, and set fire to the immense stacks of timber which are stored in the yards.

People were killed who were five or six miles from the guns of the warships, and in one street alone in West Hartlepool seven persons, mostly women, were killed. Several babies were killed in their homes, and little children were killed as they played in the streets.

A good deal has been said about the number of shells that were fired from the German warships, and some people had put down a pretty low total; but from what I saw, I should think that certainly five hundred shells of all sorts were fired by these valiant Germans, who knew that they were perfectly safe so far as the shore was concerned, and took mighty good care not to be caught by British ships of their own size and power; but that will surely come later, and the men of the North will get their own back.

I cannot say anything about the actual defences, or what the military did; but the few troops who were here did their best, and a couple of destroyers bore a brave part in the affair.

A shell fell in the lines of the Royal Engineers, and several dropped in the lines of the 18th Service Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry.

It was very quickly known, as I have mentioned, that seven out of eight men of the Durhams, who were watching the firing—thinking, like everybody else, that it was some sort of battle practice, till they learned the real truth—had been killed by the explosion of a shell, and that the eighth man had been wounded; but there were several other cases of men being wounded which were not known about until later, because of the great difficulties of discovering the men amongst the ruins which the shell-fire had caused.

From the moment the bombardment began there was an awful commotion, and the noise grew until it was simply deafening. The whole town literally shook, and while the firing lasted there was a tremendous and continuous vibration—everything shivered and rattled. One shell struck the wall of the football ground, which faces the sea; not far away a hole was dug in the ground by one of the very first of the shells that were fired; the fine old church of St. Hilda was damaged, and the side of the rectory was simply peppered by a bursting shell.

In the particular place where I and my chums were, the shells were coming in a shower, and doing enormous mischief. We could see that plainly enough. But it was not until later, when the German warships had steamed away as hard as they could go, that we knew how great the damage had been, and how many lives had been lost and people wounded.

The German ships fired from one side to begin with, then they turned round and continued the bombardment from the other side, so they must have been ready loaded all round. The size of the shots varied from the 12-inch shells, perfect monsters, to the small ones which came so fast and did so much havoc. The fact that some of the huge shells were found unexploded after the bombardment proves that ships of great size took part in the raid.

Some time after the firing began I felt a blow on my thigh, and fell to the ground, helpless, though I did not know at the time what had happened. At last, when the firing—which continued for about forty minutes—ceased, stretcher-bearers and volunteer ambulance workers set about collecting the wounded, and I was picked up and brought to the hospital here.

It was then found that I had been struck on the thigh by part of the cap of a shell, and that I had sustained a compound fracture. The piece of metal was still sticking in me—you can see it later. It was taken out, and I was promptly and most kindly looked after, as were all our men who had been wounded and were brought in. Poor Liddle, as I have told you, was not discovered for some time; then he was found and brought here, and died late at night, in spite of all the efforts that were made to save him. He had a real soldier’s funeral—just as had the rest of the soldiers who had been killed.

As soon as the bombardment was over the people set to work to collect the dead as well as save the wounded, and both were heavy tasks; but there

were many willing hands. Even in half-an-hour a wonderful difference had been made in the streets, and those people who had been rushing towards the country for safety began to return. They brought in reports of losses which had been suffered in the outskirts through shells; but, as I have said, the worst cases of all were just about here.

One house was completely demolished, and the father, mother, and half-a-dozen children were killed, so that home and family were wiped out in an instant. One part of the Old Town is so utterly destroyed that it is called “Louvain,” and if you look at the houses there you will find that they are just heaps of rubbish and ruins, with beds and furniture and so on, buried.

Shells had exploded in the streets, in houses, fields, at the gasworks, in shipyards—anywhere and everywhere—and one big thing stuck itself in a house and is kept as a relic. Another crashed through four railway waggons, and another shell, which travelled low on the ground, went through several sets of the steel metals on the railway, which shows the fearful penetrative power of the projectile.

If the Germans had had their way, no doubt this place would have been wiped out altogether. They made a dead set at the gasworks, but did not do a great deal of mischief there, though it meant that that night a lot of people had to burn candles instead of gas. And though more than a hundred people were killed, and the Germans fondly supposed that they had struck terror into the place, they had done nothing of the sort.

The residents were soon clearing up the ruins and settling down again as if nothing had happened. The most pitiful of all the tasks was that of dealing with the dead and wounded children, and the remembrance of the sad sights will be the best of all inspirations for some of our fellows when the day comes on which they will get their own back from the Germans.

It was not long before we learned that at about the same time as we were being shelled at Hartlepool, German warships had appeared off the entirely undefended places of Whitby and Scarborough. They call these old fishing ports fortified, but that is an absolute untruth, and they know it. But the Germans were out to kill and destroy, and they did both in a manner which showed that they had made calculations to a minute, and that their spies had been long at work.

At Scarborough the raiders did a lot of damage before they ran away. They had prepared one of their boasted surprises for us, and we got it; but that was nothing to the surprise we gave them on Christmas morning at Cuxhaven—a real fortified place—and nothing, I hope and believe, to the surprises that our Navy has in store for the German naval runaways.

You ask how long shall I be in hospital.

That is hard to tell; but I have been here two weeks already, and I suppose that I shall be here for at least six weeks longer.

I keep the piece of shell which struck me, in a bit of brown paper in the cupboard near the head of the bed. I cannot rise to get it myself, but if you will open the little door you will find it. It’s the sort of thing which caused such havoc in the Hartlepools when the German warships came and bombarded us.