Day 239 - Damvillers to Verdun


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18 December, 2020

15.5 miles (Total: 2378 miles) –31,000 (Total: 5,101,001 steps)

I set off for Verdun carrying my full rucksack for the first time since breaking my arm and dislocating my shoulder six weeks ago. I immediately recognised that it was just too soon—I would position the weight around my waist as tight as I could, but as soon as it slid down and the weight transferred to my shoulder I knew about it!

It was a struggle through the snow over the high ground of Flabas and then down into Beaumont, but on arrival I saw a small gathering serving something hot in a small car park. I decided to seek some shelter and perhaps manage to get a drink to warm up. The gathering turned out to be a meeting of the local amateur radio enthusiasts and they were marking the anniversary of the end of the Battle of Verdun in 2020.

It is a weakness not to be able to speak French and no-one in the gathering spoke English, but it is amazing how much you are able to communicate. After thirty minutes we were exchanging jokes mostly around the British veto at the European Council—they served me coffee and gestured to me if I would like to have some sugar, I responded with a gesture of ‘no’ to which someone said, “Ah, British veto!”

Communication can be conducted in many ways and language is only one part of the process. Indeed sometimes words, even as a politician I must admit, do not carry the full or even the true meaning. Not having the crutch of the spoken word we become much more attentive to gestures, facial expressions and to trying to piece together fragments of words to construct a sentence of meaning. In short you need to work harder to understand and to be understood, but the results are more lasting.  I know, for instance, that my host was from Damvillers, where he was a police officer for many years, but then had an accident and took retirement and it was then that he became involved in the amateur radio group. He has two grandchildren who are in Paris and had considered standing for election at one stage.

I walked on through the forests which had been the scene of such vicious fighting in the First World War and which, when it ended, had left 500,000 young men dead and another 500,000 wounded. As I walked along, I reflected on the death and wanton destruction for absolutely no gain—the front line after the battle remained in exactly the same place as it had before it began. In fact, the entire strategy was not to gain ground, but to ‘bleed the French army white’ by drawing in vast numbers of soldiers and killing them. The German strategy was incomprehensible, judged from this point in history, as the dead and casualties were 500,000 on each side. That the French fell for it, was again incomprehensible.

This was such an important part of the walk, probably the most important since I had walked from Sarajevo to Mostar, in trying to understand why we have such a lust for killing and why apparently sane individuals have conducted it on such an industrial scale.

Gary Streeter called, as he has done a couple of times a week ever since I had set off from Greece. His calls are always a source of encouragement and helpful in processing the experiences and thoughts I was having. I have concluded that the definition of a good friendship is that it brings the best out in both of you. In fact this is the test of all good relationships – marriages  and even business partnerships—do they bring out the best in you and do they enable you to see the best in others? I must confess there are some friends and family who bring out the worst in me, but Gary has always brought out the best and helped me to see the best in others—that is why the friendship has prospered for twenty years and why it has been a constant source of strength and encouragement to us both, but especially to me over the past ten months.

The thoughts of the close bonds of friendship seemed to jar awkwardly with the enmity and scarred landscape that surrounded me.  Then in Bras-sur-Meuse I saw the first of many military cemeteries around Verdun. I wasn’t quite prepared for it and as it came fully into view and small white crosses stood to attention as far as the eye could see, I found myself saying, firstly quietly and then out loud, “No, no, no.” I walked through the lines and then came upon a Muslim grave backing to a Christian grave and only a short distance away a Jewish headstone and I just found tears beginning to roll down my cheeks. I sat there and thought, why? Why didn’t someone stand up with a voice of sanity in the midst of the pointless slaughter?  Where was reason? Where was wisdom? Where was humanity? Where was restraint? Where was proportion? Where was compassion? Where was empathy? The truth is, that they were the first seven casualties of war, in fact they are the first casualties of every war. Where they still exist, they must be taken out and summarily executed and their bodies dumped in an unmarked grave before battle can commence; for if their existence was even rumoured to  be alive, then such terror could never be unleashed.

One Response to Day 239 – Damvillers to Verdun

  1. Amy Cook     says:

    I continue to be amazed at your strength, courage and determination, Michael. Praying for you every day. Blessings to you!



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