Moira Welch

Professor Fansler
HIS 114
4/17/16

Generals Die in Be: A True War Horror Story

Generals Die in Bed written by Charles Yale Harrison tells the dramatic and downright

ferocious story of what it is like to be an 18 year old American machine gunner fighting for the

Canadian army, fighting on the front lines of World War I. The assassination of Arch Duke

Franz Ferdinand of Austria in June of 1914 by a Serbian nationalist sparked what would later

become one of the bloodiest battles fought up until that time. The conflict pitted the Central

Powers of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire against the Allied Powers of

Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy and Japan (the Allies would later be joined by the United

States in 1917). Set in first person perspective from that of Harrison, the tale defines the

narrative of war. Generals Die in Bed proves to be “the most haunting book about WWI” and

continues to dominate discussion of the moral implications of war and the ethical impacts of

such on the world. The men of Generals Die in Bed become entirely dehumanized, as the result

of the inhumane conditions of fighting; continuous abuse from that of superior ranking officers,

the enemy, and “comrades”; and the loss of morality or ethical decision making.

Frist we must establish the exact nature of dehumanization as “a withdrawal or failure to

extend recognition of the ‘others’ human qualities (in total) and all the rights and respects it

elicits, thus reducing the targeted individual or group to a conceptualization that posits them as

being less than human” (Byrd, 5). Dustin Byrd in his 2013 scholarly article titled “Neither Man

nor Beast: Dehumanization in Direct and Systemic Violence”, outlines five components of

dehumanization: first, the withdrawal of recognition of others as humans; second, the feeling of

aggression toward the objectified human; third, what operates “behind the scenes” or “identitiy
thinking” meaning who is making them think this way; fouth, the fear of the other as a threat;

fifth, I will be using such notions in relation to the account of Harrison and his description of

the battlefront.

Throughout the story Harrison includes description of a bounty of enemies. The

Germans, aka “Minnies”, the lice, the rats, the commanding officers, and the trenches themselves

all take on the shape of the enemy. According to Linda Salisbury in “Generals Die in Bed A

Story from the Treches” book review, “His fictionalized account of experiences in the vermin-

filled trenches of Europe does not glorify the experience ”. Of such, the most practically

dangerous proves to be the German troops who relentlessly bombard the Allied front line with

mortar shells, machine gun fire, and the continuous threat of a sniper shooting. Harrison

describes one nightly battle in which the members of his squad are ordered “over the top” of the

trench:

Suddenly our guns rear open. The German lone becomes alive with red shell bursts. The

fury of our cannons grows wilder and wilder. Fireworks signals leap into the air behind

the German trenches. The guns maul each other’s lines. Machine guns sweep No Man’s

Land. We crouch in the corner of the bay waiting… The bombardemtn swells and

seethes. The air overhead whistles, drones, and shrieks. We are smashing their lines and

batteries. The reply is weak. Their guns are nearly silenced. As far as one can see to the

left and right the night flickers with gun flashes (Harrison, 102-103).

Each enemy in Harrison’s tale is cast as an epic terror in which all manners of death must be

placed upon such. The German’s, although forced to fight under similar brutal conditions

directed so by similarly tyrannical commanders, ought to die so that they (Harrison and
comrades) may live. Tis the ethic of war- kill more of your enemny than allow your comrades to

die.

Hatred grows between commanding officers and the general ranks, yet even more still

between the general ranks and the Tsars, Kings, and High Commanders from each country who

continued the power struggle at great costs to humanity. The vermin and lice who take up

occupancy in the trenches and on their bodies prove a malicious enemy too. The rats feast on the

remains of comrades and cadavers; the lice feast on the living spreading disease and Lice Fever

to millions of men. Yet more dangerous still than the opposing side, the commanders, and the

vermin, were the trenches themselves. The dank, deep, muddy pits of misery smelling of fear,

sweat, blood, vomit, excrement, explosives, and cadavers were lined on all sides with rupturing,

rusty, barbed wire. They provide only minor sanctuary from the gunfire and bombing- cave-ins

from mortar shells buried troops, and forced them to crawl on hands and knees and remain

continuously hunched to avoid sniper fire. The men of Harrison’s troop served the trench cycle

of six days in reserves near light artillery, six days in supports, and six days in the front trenches,

then rest for five to six days. The endless cycle of the morning rifle fire otherwise known as

Stand To, sentry duty, rationed mealtime grub, inspection and chores, supply and maintenance,

patrolling No Man’s Land, and daily boredom bore at soldier mental capacity and lead to

depression and despair. The abysmal, despondent trench life became the greatest, most

dangerous enemy of all.

The young men of the trenches were kept in check and mentally stable by memories and

accounts of happier times. Tales of women and various exploits become the cruches of sanity to

those forced to continue the long drawn out fight. According to Salisbury in her 2002 review of

the novel, “Missing normal life and women, the soldiers eagerly memorize every detail of
Brownie’s two-week marriage prior to service.” The men cling to whatever old hopes and

dreams they once felt, because their future shows only continuous fighting of the enemy, whther

that be the lice, rats, “minnies”, mud, or the mind.

The proprietors of hatred amoung the men fighting on either side proves to be the high

commanding officers, generals, and government officials, who in the eyes of the soldiers, drag

out the winner-less war to no end. Harrison decribes on page 101 once account of such abuses,

following a long trek across enemy territory:

“Renaud whimpers. ‘I cannot go on. I have a pain here.’ Clark passes as we rest. ‘I will

have to fall out, sir’ the recuit says. Clark turns on him with a cold smile. ‘Cold feet, eh’

he says, and walks on. It is time to fall in. Renaud cannot get to his feet. Clark walks

over to him. ‘Fall in there, you’ he orders. The recuit begins to cry. The company is

drawn up, waiting. Renaud does not move. He lies by the ede of the raod with his hand

pressed to his side. Clark stands over the prostrate recruit. ‘Get up!’ The recruit does

not move. The officer takes him by the scruff of the neck and hauls him to his feet. ‘You

yellow-livered little bastard. Fall in.’”

As the war drags on the morality of the men downwardly spirals. How could it not when

forced to fight and die in the conditions they were forced to? Harrison tells of one account where

his group came across a German sniper on trek through the woods: “Broadbent raises his rifle to

his shoulder and shoots into the shattered branches… his hands are folded in the gesture which

pleads for pity. ‘Drei Kinder- three children’ he shrieks. We are on top of him. Broadbent runs

his bayonet into the kneeling one’s throat. (105)” Zero remorse. Zero regard for the children

and family of the surrendering man- he is the enemy and therefore he must die. In times of

continuous battle life and death decision must be made in half seconds regardless of whose life is
lost. When comrades are shot or wounded they are left to die in order for one’s own life to be

saved, as Harrison describes through Fry’s death on page 113; “’Save me’, he screams into my

face. ‘Don’t leave me here alone.’ I shake him off and run towards the woods with Broadbent.”

The soldiers fight for their country; the soldiers fight for each other; the soldiers fight for

their generals; and the soldiers fight for their lives. The generals fight for their nation, and the

nation fights for power, yet in the end, each is left powerless. The endless fighting dragged on

and on for four years, until the armistice in November of 1918. Technically speaking the Allied

forced ‘won’, however nether side emerged victorious. The war that claimed the lives eight and

a half million soldiers also claimed the lives of almost 2 million civilians left Europe in ruins and

governments in shambles. An entire generation of young men’s live had been claimed- nearly

eight and a half million, along with nearly 2 million European civilian lives. Therefore, the

question is not who/what were the soldiers ‘fighting for’, but rather to what length will one go to

achieve power? And what is the purpose of any war? Such are the questions lingering in the

mind and souls of the soldier described by Harrison.