Soldier sickened by his own act of battlefield brutality
THE Herald's edition of January 1, 1915 contained a gruesome account of how a soldier from Milngavie killed a German at Ypres. Private James Rutherford, who was home recovering from his own wounds, told a Herald reporter how he had bayoneted the German in the head.
Private Rutherford, aged 27, of the 1st Scots Guards, was himself sickened by the deed and admitted that even after months of combat he lacked the nerve to pull the blade out of the German's skull.
Abandoning his rifle, James ran off in search of another weapon when he was himself felled by shrapnel which tore into his right leg, left ankle and back. James lay on the battlefield in agony for 10 hours before being discovered and taken to hospital.
The Herald said that in publishing James's story, it was seeking to give readers an idea of what life was really like for the men in those far-off trenches. Today we take for granted the satellite pictures that show us instantly what is happening in places like Chechnya and Kosovo. But 85 years ago news travelled much more slowly. The Herald, which was already calling the five-month old conflict "the Great War'', said that folks in Milngavie knew very little about the grim events unfolding in France and Belgium.
"We have never been there ourselves,'' said the paper, "and we have just to take whatever information we can get as it is scattered through a hundred different channels. This information - scanty for a long time, not always correct, the rumour of one day contradicted the next - remains undigested, chaotic, blurred, in the mind of the man in the street. He knows dimly that great battles have been fought; where they were fought, how they were fought, what were the ultimate results, he gropes still to discover.
"One day he spells out of the scanty and dry report an uneasy feeling that our forces have had a check; the next day he spells out the hint of a success, and his spirits rise. He knows that our troops, somewhere in masterly retreat, somewhere in splendid advance, have lived up to the highest traditions of their bulldog obstinacy in self-defence, their irresistible courage in attack. But the picture still remains blurred, disconnected, chaotic.''
But the Herald went on to say that in interviewing Private Rutherford it was giving its readers the authentic story of the war as seen through the eyes of someone who had seen it in all its horror.
The paper said that Pte Rutherford's story was "stripped of all artificiality by the imprint of the shells over his body, the breakdown of his nervous system, and the fallen instep of his left foot. The veil is lifted, and we now see the tragedy of it all as the wounded soldier describes what he has come through.''
Pte Rutherford was one of three Milngavie men in the Scots Guards. One had been killed in action, the other was still at the front.
AT the time of giving the interview, Pte Rutherford would have been unaware of the unofficial truce between British and German troops on that first Christmas Day of the war, when the men left their trenches to sing carols together and play football in no man's land.
Since August Pte Rutherford had fought in the great battles at Mons, the Marne and the Aisne, ending up at Ypres where the Herald said the fiercest fighting of the war so far had taken place.
"When this stage of the conversation was reached our informant became more interesting, as the incidents were more vivid in his memory, and the details more harrowing. It was here that they were up against the Prussian Guards, the "crack'' German regiment, and for a considerable time the opposing armies were entrenched within 25 or 30 yards of one another.
"Bullets were flying over the top like rain, and one day so hot did the attack become and so accurate did the German artillery find the range that the trench the Scotsmen were in was blown in on the top of them, many being buried alive. 'If hell is any worse than yon,' remarked Mr Rutherford passionately, 'I hope I will never see it. When you are out there you don't know whether it is yourself that is shaking or the ground.'
THE soldier went on to give an example of the wanton destruction caused by the war.
"Not far way from the Scots trenches was a farmhouse standing peacefully within its own yard, with the cows all grazing round about, but going anywhere because of the lack of control - the place having been deserted. Even the canary was left whistling in its cage, and the dog was chained to its kennel, in the farmyard.
"This beautiful picture of a rural scene was most touchingly described by Mr Rutherford, but, he added, 'then came a big shell and the poor canary, the dog, and the whole farm were blown to atoms. The Germans don't care a brass farthing for anything. They even bombard hospitals and hospital trains whenever any of these chance to come within their range. The atrocities they have committed are too horrible to talk about.''
Pte Rutherford backed up his claim about the Germans shelling hospitals by saying that the one he was taken to after being wounded at Ypres was flattened the following evening. Fortunately for him he had already been transferred to another hospital prior to being shipped home to Milngavie where he was convalescing at his in-laws' home at 18 Douglas Street.
THE Herald said that for two weeks after being wounded, Rutherford was deaf and his black hair had turned grey as a result of the nervous strain of life in the trenches which were often flooded up to the men's' knees.
"As can readily be imagined from the above the life of the soldier in warfare, and especially in this war, is no sinecure. Pte Rutherford, like the majority of the men in the fighting line, never had his clothes off from August to November - a sufficient testimony of the grim nature of the struggle! Under such conditions their comfort was greatly impaired, and the long marches from one place to another must have been a severe test to the endurance of the men. The longest journey which Pte Rutherford had was from St Nazaine to Hazebruck when his company were four days and four nights in an open train. He had no desire to purchase a return ticket!
"When it is mentioned that each man had to carry with him 350 rounds of ammunition, besides his kit, and rifle, which weighs over 9lbs, one can easily imagine what sort of condition a company of men will be at the end of, say, a 12 or even 20 mile march over heavy roads, rough fields, and high hills. Yet, withal, there is a cheerfulness and daring about the British soldier that enables him to face the greatest obstacles, and it is no doubt the exercise of this indomitable spirit and pluck that is having such an important bearing on the retreating operations of the Germans on the west front at present.''
Pte Rutherford paid tribute to the bravery and generosity of the French and Belgian women who would brave shellfire to bring the Scots wine, cigarettes and food, refusing all offers of payment.
"After what he had been through,'' concluded the Herald, "Pte Rutherford has no desire to return to the front, and we don't wonder at him. His period of convalescence finishes on the 4th January but owing to the condition of his left foot he will not be fit for the firing line for some time to come.''
What became of Private Rutherford? His name does not appear on the Milngavie war memorial, so he presumably survived "the war to end all wars.''
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