Asia in Flanders Fields

Indians and Chinese on the Western Front, 1914–1920

Dominiek Dendooven

• Publisher: Pen and Sword Military
• Year: 2023
• eBook ISBN: 9781526763341
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Asian History
• Index: History

The First World War brought peoples from five continents to support the British and French Allies on the Western Front. Many were from colonial territories in the British and French empires, and the largest contingents were Indians and Chinese - some 140,000. It is a story of the encounter with the European 'other', including the civilian European local populations, often marred by racism, discrimination and zenophobia both inside and outside the military command, but also lightened by moving and enduring 'human' social relationships. The vital contribution to the Alles and the huge sacrifices involved were scarcely recognised at the Paris Peace Conference in 1918 or the post-war victory celebrations and this led to resentment - see huge media coverage in 2021. The effect of the European 'other' experience enhanced Asian political awareness and self-confidence, and stimulated anti-imperialism and proto-nationalism. This is a vivid and original contribution to imperial decline from the First World War. and the originality of the work is enhanced by rare sources culled from original documents and 'local' European fieldwork - in French, German and Flemish.

Part I

India on the Western Front

In 1916 the Belgian author Cyriel Buysse visited the front in Flanders and in a cemetery with mainly North-African graves he contemplated:

Later, when all is over, Belgian and French women will come to pray on the graves of their fallen husbands and sons; but who will ever kneel beside the abandoned grave of Mohamed or of Ibrahim in Flemish soil?’.1

The names of Mohamed and Ibrahim in this quote could easily be replaced by those of Muhamad and Sharif, to mention just two names from the Indian plot at Grootebeek British Cemetery near Ypres. Indeed, for decades the presence of non-European rank and file, including from India, on the Western Front had been ignored to the point that it was entirely forgotten but for a very small group of specialists. That has all considerably changed in recent times.

Throughout this book I will use the historical term (British) India, and not the term South Asia, which is often used in Anglo-Saxon academia. I assume that the reader is shrewd enough not to confuse the present Republic of India with the historical polity of (British) India that was much larger and included Pakistan and Bangladesh. Moreover, most descriptions of ‘South Asia’ seem not to include Burma while it did belong for most of its territory to British India.

In this part of the book I do more than just offer a synthesis of the Indian military presence in Europe during the First World War. Contrary to earlier publications on the Indian involvement in the war, I also give due attention to the workers of the Indian Labour Corps, and to the interaction with the local population. More than a military historical approach, I emphasize the socio-cultural aspects of the Indians’ residence in Europe. This provides the necessary background for a proper interpretation of meetings with the local population or reports of how the war was experienced

For the Indian Labour Corps, I describe the origin of the workers, their recruitment, the composition of the corps and the nature of their work at the front on the basis of new archive material. In order to know how the local population in Flanders and northern France thought about the Indians, I mainly use eyewitness accounts published in French and Dutch.

To gauge how Europe, the Europeans and the war in Europe were experienced by the Indian troops, I mainly rely on the extensive collection of the ‘Reports of the censor of Indian mail’ kept in the British Library. The nature of these documents and how to interpret them is highly problematic: what we have is a selection of translations of letters made by a British officer and his staff. They were written in a number of Indian languages and thus had to be translated into English – a translation that unquestionably was not faultless. With these examples and his reports, the censor wanted to demonstrate certain facts regarding the morale of the troops – so we can only wonder how much they are representative. Without any doubt the soldiers subjected themselves to a form of auto-censorship, certainly once they realised their letters were read by the authorities. The letters are more than often not quoted in full. Moreover, due to the high level of illiteracy among the Indian rank and file a large majority has been dictated to a scribe who might or might not have embellished or patched up the letters according to his taste. That these letters were in many cases written to be read aloud in family or village gatherings, undoubtedly influenced their wording. And, last but not least, for a correct interpretation of a letter, one needs to be acquainted with both sender and addressee, their relationship but also the context and cultural background.

Still, the extracts of letters are not just all there is. There are other rather unsuspected sources that give us direct access to the sepoys themselves and remarkably enough, they are to be found in Germany. The presence of Indians on the Western Front and by consequence in the German prisoner-of-war camps not only fascinated many in Germany, but it also offered a window of opportunity to many officials in the Reich. Propaganda-wise the Indian presence could be used not only to denounce British imperialism but also the ‘immoral’ use of ‘barbarian’ troops against a civilised opponent. There were also attempts to convince the Indians in the trenches (and in particular the Muslims among them) to come over to the German side to join the struggle against the British. After all, Germany was an ally of the Ottoman Empire, and the highest religious authority of the Caliphate had called Muslims across the world for jihad against the ennemy. Hence, the existence of Prisoners-of-War (POW) camp magazines entitled El Dschihad and Hindostan.

For German academia, the presence of non-European POWs was an occasion to conduct scientific research on or with these men. One of the results, besides hundreds of photographs, is a corpus of some 200 sound recordings on which the prisoners sing songs or tell stories, often reflecting on their own life. The Berlin based research institute Zentrum Moderner Orient has in the past few years taken the subject of Indian POWs during the First World War to their heart, resulting in several publications. Their focus, however, was mainly on the Inderlager [Indian camp] in Zossen-Wünsdorf where for most of the war the Indian prisoners were concentrated.

While I do take into account the sources originating from that camp such as the sound recordings, I will equally enlarge the scope of the captivity experience by including unknown sources from much nearer to the front such as a publication made by the German Army Headquarters in Lille for their soldiers at the front. This will enable me to include in the assesment of the Indian POW’s experiences the highy traumatic, transitional period of the capture and its immediate aftermath, including the first encounters with that other European group the Indians became acquainted with: the Germans.

My approach ties in with that of Santanu Das, arguably the central figure in scholarship on Indian experiences in the First World War. Throughout his numerous publications, Das’ purpose it is to make a synthesis with a strong sensorial emphasis (body, gender, sexuality and affect), taking into account the broadest possible range of sources, not only the British reports of the censor and the German sound recordings but also objects, photographs, monuments and personal items that recently emerged in India and other countries. With his background in English literature studies, Santanu Das has a particular interest in (Indian) literary products related to the First World War, of which Mulk Raj Anand’s Across The Black Waters from 1939 deserves specific mention.

What I will ultimately add to the existing historiography of India in the First world War, based partly on new sources, is an assessment of the experiences of not only Indian soldiers but also Indian labourers on the Western Front and this against the backdrop of meetings with the European ‘Other’. What I aim to present in this part of the book is how cultural encounters in Europe had an impact on the ordinary Indian’s (self) image. I will examine the nature of meetings between European civilians and the Indian military and how they were seen and thus experienced by the local inhabitants and vice versa. This approach is new as it concerns not only the sepoys, but also the labourers, and as it takes into account the local inhabitants. It will draw from a wide variety of sources, both published and unpublished, of which the reports of the censor with their excerpts of Indian letters, the German sound recordings and interviews with the local inhabitants in Flanders and northern France stand out.

Chapter 1

The Indian Army Corps and the Indian Cavalry Regiments

The fighting is of five kinds. First, there are the aeroplanes which move about dropping bombs and causing great havoc. They are like the great bird of Vishnu in the sky. Next is the battle of the cannon which is earth-splitting. Then there is the fighting on the sea, of which the fashion is this: that the ships remain concealed in the parts of the sea and then, watching their opportunity, the English fire at the Germans and the Germans at the English … . In the fighting with rifles the bullets fall fast like hail.1

Thus a wounded Garhwali tried to explain the industralised war to his brother. For the Indians the war in Europe was a brutal acquaintance with modern warfare, and some of the new technologies were difficult to cope with. In the beginning every airplane was fired at, irrespective of whether it was a German or an allied plane. It could not be believed such a flying monster could have other than bad intentions. Yet, as with all new devices encountered, after some time the novelty wore off, and the Indian rank and file would barely look up when airplanes flew past.

Soldiering in late colonial India was generally not the occupation of the very poorest and most military were from the middle peasantry. It will be their voices we will be mainly hearing in the following pages. As these men usually served for five to seven years (though some served much longer), the bond with family and village was seldom entirely severed, which partly explains the high number of letters sent home, and as they usually served their entire time with the same regiment, a strong emotional attachment with the unit was common. The Indian Expeditionary Force A (IEF A) that was sent to Europe, better known on the Western Front as the Indian Army Corps, was composed of two Infantry Divisions and two Cavalry Divisions. Due to the martial races theory the vast majority of the men came from the north and northwest of the subcontinent: the then provinces of Punjab, North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and the United Provinces (UP), as well as from the independent kingdom of Nepal. The closer one’s home was to the cooler climes of the Himalayas the more apt one was seen to be recruited as a soldier. The Garhwali, for instance, lived and live in the Himalayas bordering Tibet. Urban populations were usually not tapped for recruits, nor the western-educated, the latter for fear of their potential for political opposition.

However, all this only applied to the military – not to militarised civilian labour. Therefore a separate chapter will be devoted to these lesser known Indian Labourers. One thing, however, both labour and military had in common was that their composition was multi-racial, multi-religious and multi-lingual.

The cultural-ethnic composition of the Indian Army Corps must have broadly reflected that of the Indian Army which in 1914 consisted of 40 per cent Muslims, 30 per cent Hindus, 19 per cent Sikhs, 10 per cent Gurkhas and 1 per cent others. Some 50 per cent of all Indian military personnel was recruited in the Punjab. Regarding the age structure of the Indian Army Corps, no absolute nor even relative figures are available. Yet, as a sepoy could serve for up to twenty-five years, we can presume that compared to the European armies, many were relatively older. And, hailing from a colony where child labour was common, some could be extremely young, not in the least among the camp followers who did menial work. During his inspections Walter Lawrence, the Indian Civil Service (ICS) mandarin responsible for the Indian hospitals in England, encountered two boys of twelve years old who were brought out as syces and even a child of ten that had arrived in France as a bellows blower.

It is estimated a total of some 138,000 Indian soldiers and labourers were deployed in Europe: up to 90,000 combatants (and camp followers) and little less than 50,000 labourers. More than 14,000 wounded Indians were sent to various hospitals in Britain in 1914–15 (out of a total of 50,000 Indian wounded) and some 1,000 were at one point held captive in a German camp. Most of the latter were taken prisoner, but British sources suspect little over ninety to have been deserters. At least five sepoys were shot for cowardice.

While the military performances by the Indian Army Corps have been sufficiently described elsewhere, it is useful to point out some facts that had an important impact on the circumstances of their deployment in Western Europe. The Indian Army was deployed in France and Flanders not because it was wanted but because it was badly needed. In August 1914 Prime Minister Asquith felt strongly that it was undesirable to send ‘native troops’ to Europe and his cabinet was generally also averse to it. However, it was Kitchener who forced the decision and summoned the sepoys to Europe, telling the General Staff in Simla on 27 August 1914: ‘We are in a tight place [and] are employing every source’.2 When they finally arrived, at the dire moments of the First Battle of Ypres, the Indians were rushed into the frontline.

It is important to point out, however, that the Lahore Division was not deployed in full. The Indian units were considered ‘reservoirs of men’ deployed by the British when and where they needed manpower most urgently. Battalions, half-battalions and even companies were used separately to support various British divisions, while the Indian troops had at least expected to stay together. On 29 October 1914 General Willcocks wrote in his diary:

Where is my Lahore Division? Sirhind Brigade: left in Egypt, Ferozopore Brigade: somewhere in the north, divided in three or four pieces, Jullundur Brigade: the Manchesters in the south with the 5th division, the 47th Sikhs half with the one or the other British division, for the other half somewhere else. The 59th and 15th Sikhs: in the trenches …’.3

It is obvious that this was not favourable for co-ordination or for the morale of the Indian troops. Yet, their deployment had been vital for saving the new-born Ypres Salient for the allies as in the words of John Charteris ‘they filled a gap in the line when we had no other troops to put in’. From 23 October 1914 to the end of First Ypres, the Indian Corps held around twelve miles, or 34 per cent of the British Expeditionary Force’s line! Their exploits, however, came at a high cost: the 57th Wilde’s Rifles suffered nearly 300 casualties in the last week of October 1914 alone. By the end of the First Battle of Ypres the average strength of Indian Army battalions was less than 550. It had been 764-strong upon arrival in France.

After the First Battle of Ypres (19 October–22 November 1914) and the Battle of La Bassée (10 October–2 November 1914), the Indian divisions were involved in both defensive and offensive operations around their sector of Neuve Chapelle. Besides ‘normal’ trench warfare including raids and defensive actions, they took part in British offensives such as the Battle of Neuve Chapelle (10–12 March 1915), the Battle of Aubers Ridge (9 May 1915), the Battle of Festubert (15–25 May 1915) and the Battle of Loos (25 September–8 October 1915). Only once were they rushed north of the border, once again for a major defensive operation, when they took part in the Second Battle of Ypres (22 April–25 May 1915). The first year of the war was pretty much a period of trial and error, both for the British and for the Indian Army. The Indians would get acquainted with war on an industrial scale, including the use of gas at Second Ypres and deep mines at Aubers Ridge, and would bear the brunt of the first major British offensive of the war (i.e. the Battle of Neuve-Chapelle).

The encounter of the Indian rank and file with killing in an industrialised manner was probably never so brutal as during the Second Battle of Ypres. Initiated with the first major gas attack in world history on 22 April 1915, the German troops had been able to advance their frontline for several miles north of Ypres. Two days later, the Lahore division was moved north and on 26 April it attacked with French North-African troops to their left. During this attack which happened in disadvantegous circumstances, the Germans discharged chlorine gas. This unfruitful attack in which Indian military for the first time were involved in chemical warfare, was to be repeated the following days, be it without the emittance of gas.

The casualty figures of the Indian Army Corps units at the Second Battle of Ypres were appalling. The 40th Pathans lost 320 men, the 47th Sikhs 348 (out of 444!), the 129th Baluchis lost 231, the 57th lost 275, … . All in all, the Lahore Division lost nearly 30 per cent of the men engaged on 26 and 27th April 1915. Less than one month later, after the Battle of Aubers Ridge and just before the end of the Battle of Festubert, the Indian Corps’ total number of Indian troops had fallen to about 7,000 while it had been 15,000 in mid-October 1914 (with only two of its three brigades present!).

When they had left India, the sepoys initially had little information or knowledge about where they were going. Many believed they were on their way to what they ca...

Table of contents

• cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface: a Personal Quest
• Introduction
• Part I: India on the Western Front
• Part II: The Chinese Labour Corps
• Conclusion
• Acknowledgements
• Bibliography
• Notes
• Plate