HEROES WHO ARE COWARDS

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 4289, 23 February 1901, Page 5 (Supplement)

HEROES WHO ARE COWARDS

4 GENERAL’S RECOLLECTIONS OF V.C. MEN. "There is perhaps no man about whom there is so much popular misconception as the hero who covers himself with glory* on the field of battle, said au old general who has seen half a century of fighting, and has himself been recommended for tiro Victoria Cross. "It is usual to picture, him as a man of iron nerve, to whom fear is absolutely*.unknown, a man who is ready to face death with as much equanimity as ho would sit down to his breakfast. There could be no more misleading picture - of the hero, or at least of such heroes as I have known: and my memory takes me back to the First China War, several years before some of our generals of today entered the army. ‘ I have known many of these men intimately, but I have not known, one who has not scoffed at the idea of having no nerves or of being a stranger to fear. One of the bravest men I ever knew, a man whose reckless daring was the talk of the allied armies in the Crimea, and who won the Gross for Valour at Inkerman, said to me onee: ‘Do you know, I really believe I am naturally the biggest coward in the army. I never go into action, without literally trembling all over, and feeling an almost irresistible temptation to bolt. But, 'curiously enough, this feeling all vanishes after the first few minutes, and I forget all about danger. This is my usual experience; but on one occasion, when I won my* Cross, I was in the bluest of funks the whole time, and if it hadn’t been for fear of disgracing myself before my men I almost think I should have turned back. If I showed any courage then it was certainly the courage of cowardice.’ "Of course, this is really the highest form of courage; for the man who knows his danger and faces it resolutely, while every impulse urges him to run away fi om it, is more a hero than the man who does not realise his danger, and has no physical weakness to fight against.

“Another thing I have observed—that the man who performs deeds of valour in the field is usually the last man you would suspect of uncommon courage. I have never known a Victoria Cross or a Distinguished Service Order man . who was not essentially a quiet, unassuming man, without a trace of brag about him . and I have never known a boaster or ‘Swashbuclder 1 who won any laurels iii battle. “In the Crimea positively _ the most unwaxlike man in my regiment was a young subaltern who was little more than a schoolboy. He -was a quiet, alio cat sheepish, kind of boy, who hadn t a word to say for himself, and was the butt of his fellow officers. We all liked him, though; for although we called him ‘Softy,' we recognised that he was a good-hearted kind of chap. "But he certainly looked anything hut a , warrior ; and he made no secret of the fact that he wished himself back again in. the Norfolk rectory with his mother and sisters. “But when the fighting came we soon altered our opinion of Softy,, for the youngster underwent-a complete transformation, and was as fierce and reckless as any young lion, always the first in a charge or- to volunteer for any specially hazardous duty; and when, tie fell at the storming of the Redan, fighting as bravely as any hero ever fought, his last words were, <‘You’ll tell mother, won’t you? SboTl like to hear it. Poor Softy! I can’t think of him now, after nearly fifty years, without the tears coming to my eyes.' “Softy was a very fair type of the hero of war, modest and; diffident, but with an unsuspected reserve of courage which triumphed over every physical disability, and literally converted a seeming coward into a brave man. ' “Yon would scarcely believe that a man whose business it is to kill men. would faint at the sight of blood and yet I have known a Y.C. man do it. We were at mess one day when a- i tfle shot rang out, and soon after an orderly came rushing in with the news that- a sergeant had. shot himself. “We all rushed to the spot, and-the first man to reach it was Uaptain H—a man who , had won his V.C. in the Mutiny, and was looked upon as one of the bravest men. in our army. Pushing aside the little crowd of men wru had suiTOunded the fallen sergeant. Captain H. gave one glance at him as he lay in a pool of blood and, putfm? his hand to his head, he reeled into my arms in a dead faint When .ie came round I asked him why he had been so much’ affected, and he said. Oh, it was the blood that did it. And yet this man had literally lived for more than a year amid blood, and had himself shed more of it than most men, “I think absolutely the most nervous man I ever met \yas a wearer of the bronze Cross. Even among men ne knew his nervousness was often qiute painful, and he would run a mil© rather than face a stranger if he could avoid it He had an especial dread of dogs, and I believe would rather have faced an army than a bull-dog. And yet this man was a Hon in war, was wounded half a dozen times m the Crimea, and won the Cross at the Siege of Sebastopol by sn act of as reckless daring as any in the annals of war.