Gassed Shell (Severe) is my second composition that explores my family’s connection to World War One. The piece is dedicated to my grandfather Andrew Maddocks – ‘Pop’ to his family – who was wounded by mustard gas at the Battle of Passchendaele in Ypres, Belgium on November 1st, 1917. He was a 22 year-old Gunner with the Second Australian Division’s V2A Heavy Trench Mortar Battery at the time. The title of the work comes from an entry describing his wounds in his casualty record.

The text of Gassed Shell (Severe) intertwines entries from the V2A Heavy Trench Mortar Battery unit diary and Andrew’s personal war record, with Wilfred Owen’s sublime anti-war poem ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’. Owen’s verse begins by describing the mundanity of everyday trench life before moving to the terror and confusion of a gas attack. In the final stanza of the poem, Owen directly challenges the reader, declaring that if one was able to see first-hand the horrendous effects of mustard gas, there would be no support for sending young men to their slaughter. He concludes by deriding the ancient Latin phrase ‘Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori’ as ‘the old Lie’. (This roughly translates as ‘It is sweet and fitting to die for your country’).

Like so many men who fought, Andrew’s experiences at the Great War changed him. The man who returned to Australia in 1919 was an avowed anti-monarchist and trade unionist, and he steadfastly maintained these views throughout his long life; despite the ongoing effects of mustard gas, he managed to live until just six months shy of his hundredth birthday.

Although Pop was not the sort of person to dwell on the past, as the years went by, his grandchildren began to ask him about his wartime experiences. He seemed happy enough to reflect upon his time at the Western Front, and I recall Pop describing life amongst the mud and duckboards of Ypres, and the sheer futility of war. His presence loomed large within our family, although this was something that he appeared to not give too much thought. His role in the Great War only served to solidify his position as the benevolent, gruff and revered patriarch.

My grandfather’s story is common to so many Australian families; indeed to any family affected by the terrible scourge of war. Yet his story is also extremely personal and important to our family. This piece is my small way of paying tribute to him and his memory.

Text:

War diary entry for 2nd Australian Division, V2A Trench Mortar Battery:

Ypres, October 30th, 1917.

No 3630 Sgt Taylor R.H., V2A Battery killed in action. 1 officer rank evacuated sick. 21 other ranks returned to billets in Ypres, reported heavy bombardment with gas shells and high explosives.
—
Dulce Et Decorum Est: (Wilfred Owen)

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,

Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs

And towards our distant rest began to trudge.

Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots

But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;

Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots

Of disappointed shells that dropped behind. [1]

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys! — An ecstasy of fumbling,

Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And floundering like a man in fire or lime.–

Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light

As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
—
War diary entry for 2nd Australian Division, V2A Trench Mortar Battery:

Ypres, November 1st, 1917.

30 ranks were attached to various batteries of 5th Field Artillery Brigade for fatigue duty – building dugouts, forward gun position etc. 30 ranks evacuated gassed. Enemy shelling batteries with shells of large calibre during the day and firing large quantities of gas shells during the night.
—
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,

And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,

His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,–

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory,

The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est

Pro patria mori.
—
Entry in Casualty Record – Active Service:

Belgium, November 1st, 1917

Gunner 1667 Andrew Maddocks – wounded in action (gas).