The Front

By robspace54

Downton Abbey is the creative property of Carnival / Masterpiece. The story here is, if anything, a tribute to the characters, situations, and timeline of DA. I claim no ownership of anything, merely my over active imagination.

Note: This is an altered version of my original story to try and align it with Series 1 and 2 canon. I apologize for any confusion in doing so, but I (and perhaps you) may find it slightly better for the reading. RS

Chapter 1 – Dugout

Mud. Cold, smelly and sticky mud and it was everywhere. In his ears, his mouth, and in his underwear. He shivered in his sodden trousers and wool sweater under the Burberry and uniform jacket. Impossible to stay dry in these conditions. He spat mud from his mouth and wiped his lips. He was tired; oh, so tired as he sat slumped on a ration box.

He heard his aide clattering about at the tiny stove, fueled with broken bits of ammo cases and fractured duckboards. "Sir. Tea."

"No thank you, William. You drink it," Captain Matthew Crawley told his batman. "You have it."

"Can't sir. It's the last. You need it more than I." William Mason said. The boy was a farmer's son, then second footman at Downton Abbey, and now his aide. The teenager prodded his charge. "You should drink it up, sir."

Matthew looked up at William, standing over his superior, back just as straight as ever. "Private Mason, you look like you are waiting table at Downton. No white gloves though."

"Yes sir." He held out the tin mug. "Drink." He pried Matthew's fingers apart, pushed the warm cup into his superior's hands and folded the fingers tenderly around it. "Now sir."

"Whatever would I do without you?" Matthew asked. "I'd starve, or freeze, or…"

William pressed his shoulder. "No sir. Don't think like that now! What would your mother say if she heard you talking like that?"

Matthew put the cup to his lips, feeling grit in his mouth, but he drank it anyway. He closed his eyes as the warm liquid filled his mouth and as he swallowed the weak, yet sweet brew, he felt a little human once more. It even washed most of the taste of mud away. Mud that was composed of dirt, water, clay, shell fragments, wood, rotted cloth, and the atoms of pulverized men. He knew the last was true as he'd seen it happen. A shell came in, a tremendous boom, and where a British soldier had been there was nothing; just another smoking shell hole with a few tattered bits that used to be a man.

But at least that was a clean death. No mustard gas, that blinded or made a man cough up his lungs, or a bullet that spared the soldier long enough so he could lie there and watch his blood pump all away, or a shell fragment to slice open a belly or lop off an arm or leg. And the screams along with the smells, they would last in his head. Screams of pain, cries to God, or the name of a loved one. Those screams echoed at night when he tried to sleep. Oddly the most common last word of the gravely wounded British soldier, if they could speak, was 'mum,' as so many were so young. He squirmed at the futility and waste of it all. Matthew felt at times that he and his men were merely to be tossed at the enemy, as expendable as what must have been the millions of bullets already fired.

Death to Matthew now smelled like cordite, mud, blood, vomit and excrement. How many men had he lost by now? He'd have to ask Mason who kept the tally. Far too many good men blown to bits, or shot; either killed outright, or invalided away from the front. Some missing arms or legs, hands, eyes and ears, or sanity. And those bloody machine guns! Their rate of fire was hundreds of rounds a minute that could kill or cripple an entire company in an instant. And still the orders came from the rear; hold, advance, retreat, over the top men! It was senseless he knew.

But they must hang on, in spite of the artillery, grenades, night patrols, and the rats. The trenches were filled with the vermin. Sometimes at night, if the moon was up, you could see them, hordes of them, feeding on the dead in No Man's Land. And when there were no dead to eat, they came into the dugouts, bit the men, ate their bread and curled up with them, stealing what little warmth they had from their bodies.

November, he sighed. The battle had started in the spring and Lord only knew how much longer it would go on. There was ice in the shell holes two days ago, and the men, especially those with trench foot, were hobbling about in the icy muck that filled the bottoms of every trench. Winter was coming along with more rain and mud and much more death, he knew. The generals must have their own ideas, he thought, about this battle but Matthew called it Hell or at least a major gateway to it.

He shivered again and peered out the tattered canvas that covered the door of the dugout at the narrow trench outside; the trench that served as home, refuge, and strongpoint. His dugout was built into the forward side of the deepest trench, and was tall enough to stand up in. It provided cover from plunging fire, snipers, and shell fragments. The Duke of Manchester's Own had held this position for three weeks, and were likely to be in position for days and days longer, until relieved. Even then they'd only be pulled back a few hundred yards, still well within enemy artillery range. The Hun had their position well sighted in, and only after the sappers had taken out three German 75s, limiting offensive fire to those little mortars, did they get some relief from the pounding they took last week. Mortars had smaller bombs, with a lot less punch, but their high angle of fire could drop the eggs straight down their throats.

Matthew had a close call last night when a mortar round dropped straight into the trench as he was relieving himself into the privy can outside the dugout. He'd heard the high pitched whistle following the sharp cough of the mortar as it spat the shell, just four hundred yards away across No Man's Land. He'd frozen in fear, thinking that this was it - the end - with the shell screaming louder as it fell right on top of him.

His fiancé's pale face, Lavinia Swire, flashed through his mind, and he hoped that the explosive round would leave no evidence on his dead and blasted body that he'd died with his old man in his hand. He didn't even have his tin hat on, so he leaned into the oozing side of the trench, mud coming through the fascines that braced the wall. At least his face might be recognizable after razor sharp steel splinters tore him apart. The noise made by the falling shell was the last sound he would hear. Involuntarily, he said one word. "Mary," came out.

The shell dropped right beside him with a loud squelch into the deep mud at the bottom of the trench. He looked down and saw the guidance fins on the tail quivering from the impact. He breathed again and once more, as his troopers stuck their heads out of holes and dugouts in the trench.

"Jesus!" one said, looking up from the fresh mortar round at the shaking young officer. The soldier laughed when he saw what Captain Crawley was doing. "Blimey, Cap. Almost copped it as you was taking a leak!"

Matthew stuffed his privates back into his trousers and buttoned them up. "Sergeant!" he yelled, his voice cracking.

A splashing in the gloom and a strong smell told him Sergeant Cropper had arrived as he detected the man's tobacco dip. Where he got the snuff was a wonder.

"Sir! Where's your helmet, sir?" Cropper asked.

Matthew grabbed the man's Burberry. "Don't. Don't take another step. Look down."

Cropper's eye's drifted down to the muck in the trench.

"Mortar bomb, Sergeant! A dud. Get the Engineers to dispose of it, would you?" Matthew whispered. Then he'd stepped as smartly as possible back into the dugout and only then slumped to the ground.

William had heard the commotion and was roused by the thump as Matthew's head hit the grimy floorboards. The aide sprang up and knelt over Matthew. "Sir! Sir!" he shook the young officer who lay as if dead.

"I'm all right," Matthew groaned. "Nothing…" he gulped. "Nothing happened."

"Nothing?" He hauled Matthew upright and brushed him off.

Matthew grabbed William to steady himself. "William, however will we tell them, back at home, what we've seen here? Done here?"

William smiled grimly at Matthew last night and only nodded, then gently laid the quivering young officer down on a cot and wrapped him in a dirty blanket.

Now William was pouring the absolute last of the tea into the captain's mug, not hours later.

A messenger splashed through the muck outside and pulled the canvas aside. "Sir? Captain Crawley? Message from regimental headquarters, sir." The man saluted as Matthew stood and returned it. The soldier held out a dispatch. "Orders sir."

Matthew took the envelope in one hand. "What's your name private?" he asked the boy who was tall and broad but his face looked very young.

"Somers, sir."

"How old are you son?" the Captain asked.

"Seventeen, sir. Well… I hope you don't tell sir."

"They took a seventeen year old? I am appalled!" He knew that the age of volunteers had gone down. But seventeen?

"No sir. I joined last year. For King and Country, sir!"

"But that would have made you…"

"Sixteen, sir. I'm big for my age."

Matthew turned to William with his mouth agape. "Has it come to this?" He looked the boy up and down. He held out the tin mug, to the messenger, holding the precious last of the tea. "You need this. Drink it."

The child took the cup and drank. "Ah. Just like my mum makes back home. Thank you sir."

Matthew clapped the soldier on the back. "Glad you enjoyed it." Matthew shot his cuffs and straightened his uniform jacket. If Somers, a mere boy, was able to serve, then by God he would as well. He tapped the dispatch with a dirty finger. "Let's see what headquarters has in store for us," he muttered resignedly, opened the flap and pulled out a typed sheet.

Author's note:

The conditions described here as undergone by soldiers in the trenches of the Great War are true, for both sides.

Fascines – A woven wicker matt that was used to reinforce the sides of trenches and fortifications to prevent collapse.