Summary
Chapter 13 begins with a description of the arrival of spring. Topthorn gains some of his strength back as the weather warms, and Joey notes that the season itself is peaceful, with few battles facing the horses. Still, he, Topthorn, and the two Haflingers find themselves performing tedious work pulling the artillery wagons—although the burden is lightened, somewhat, by the presence of a new friend. This companion is a soldier known as "Crazy Old Friedrich," a belittling nickname that appears to hide Friedrich's true character.
Friedrich confides in the horses, explaining that he finds the entire war irrational and bizarre. He also explains that he is a respected butcher in his hometown, Schleiden. As the war progresses, Friedrich forms a special bond with Topthorn; the German soldier does not neglect Joey by any means, but Friedrich's pride in the other horse is unmistakable. He even tells the two animals that, if he is hated to die away from home, then he would like to die beside Topthorn.
As Joey notes at the beginning of Chapter 14, the hostilities intensify once more and the horses return to battle when autumn arrives. Joey, Topthorn, and Friedrich find themselves in the company of a group of resting soldiers. Two of these men, Rudi and Karl, spend time admiring Topthorn. Friedrich then takes the horses to a river to refresh themselves; unfortunately, on the way back from the river, Joey notices that Topthorn's movements have become sluggish and unsteady.
Joey watches as Topthorn collapses. The incapacitated horse looks once at his friend and then his movements subside. Friedrich is overcome by this sad turn of events, distressed both by the death of his cherished horse and by the destructive absurdity that he perceives in the war. A veterinarian comes to inspect Topthorn; the large horse is pronounced dead from over-work, poor nourishment, and heart failure. Joey and his companions are not given long to mourn: a bombardment begins. Shells fall in the vicinity of Joey and the soldiers, yet Joey is unwilling to leave Topthorn. Friedrich attempts and mostly fails to drag Joey away, and then tries to run off and join the other soldiers in some sheltering woods. He is killed before he can reach this destination.
Chapter 15 finds Joey standing near the corpses of his two friends, fearing the sensation of loneliness that would come if he were to leave them. Although he stays in place until dawn, he is eventually frightened off when a tank—the first that Joey has seen in action—appears. Joey cannot escape the gunfire and explosions that have broken out. The terrain is also treacherous, full of pits that must be avoided. It is Joey's misfortune to fall into one of these pits and, in trying to get out, to snag one of his legs on barbed wire. Injured, tired, and disoriented, Joey hears the voices of English soldiers and tries to seek solitude—only to find himself in the deadly war zone known as "No Man's Land."
As Chapter 16 opens, Joey is still stranded in No Man's Land, with trenches, barbed wire, and soldiers flanking him on either side. However, the fighting itself comes to a halt. Both the German and the English soldiers have noticed Joey; they wave white cloths, signaling a temporary truce, and send representatives to save Joey from peril. The German representative is an older soldier who reminds Joey of Friedrich, while the English representative is a small and energetic Welshman. They reach Joey at roughly the same time. These two men are capable of negotiating (since the German knows some English) and decide that the flip of a coin will determine which side takes ownership of the horse. The Welshman wins the coin toss; the two men then part on amicable terms, convinced that straightforward communication could solve problems such as the brutal war that they are fighting.
Chapter 17 depicts Joey's transfer from the front lines to a veterinary hospital. He is weary, hungry, covered with mud, and (due to his injured leg) in some pain. A gruff officer notices Joey's condition and sends Joey off with a young man, who will make sure that the new arrival is cleaned and cared for. Though still somewhat disoriented, Joey listens to what this young man is saying and learns that his caretaker, in fact, is Albert. The young man reveals—in the course of a conversation with another enlisted man, David—that he had joined the veterinary corps in order to find Joey. David had remained skeptical that Albert would succeed, but as Joey is cleaned, the two men realize that they may be in luck. As the mud disappears, Joey's distinctive white markings are revealed. Albert, astonished, uses one further measure—a distinctive owl whistle call—to test and confirm Joey's identity. Finally, Joey and his master have been reunited.
Analysis
Even in the midst of one of the most trying segments of his time at war, Joey finds a new friend among his human handlers. This man, Friedrich, is something of an outsider among the soldiers. Still, he develops a firm bond with the two horses, whom he describes as "the only rational creatures I've met in this stupid war" (97). Such comments call attention to the fundamental absurdity of the war; in fact, Friedrich's entire demeanor is that of a man living in absurd times. True to this idea, he has accepted his identity as "Crazy Old Friedrich," even though his kindly, peaceful personality proves him to be anything but crazy.
Readers may sympathize with Friedrich's perspective even more after Topthorn's death. This demise is not entirely unexpected: there have been signs all along that Topthorn has been weakening, even as Joey has remained relatively strong. It is also possible to take the death of Heine, another grand and powerful horse, as an event that foreshadows Topthorn's own demise from over-work. Yet these facts do not blunt the force of Friedrich's negative sentiments on war: war is a process that destroys figures of nobility and beauty such as Topthorn.
Friedrich's death follows Topthorn's in extremely quick succession, offering a very different comment on the pointlessness of war. The good-natured German is killed not during battle, but rather at a time when he poses a threat to nobody and, in fact, is trying to keep Joey out of harm's way. With this death, and with the events that follow, War Horse explores the rapidity with which those involved in the war effort can turn into unsuspecting victims. Joey's case, here, is especially striking. Abandoned by the troops and deprived of his friends, he finds himself wandering a war zone where his presence serves no purpose nor threat—and yet, he still is hounded by danger.
Unlikely though Joey's odds of survival in No Man's Land may seem, he is saved by the same impulse that has sustained him in other harrowing times—basic human decency. When the two soldiers move to rescue Joey, they offer the strongest proof in the novel that affection for horses transcends national and cultural differences. These men also return to a theme that the departed Friedrich raised: the belief that war is a matter of inhumane absurdity. As the German soldier who assists Joey notes, people who communicate can arrive at arrangements by which "no one loses any pride, yes? And everyone will be happy" (118). It is unknown whether either soldier survives, and it is improbable that saving Joey caused the combat to truly abate: as the German also observes, "In an hour, maybe, or two . . . we will be trying our best again each other to kill" (119). Still, the scene of Joey's rescue is a reminder that War Horse is an optimistic book: one that seeks to offer hope for human goodness even while recording moments of brutality.
Hope of a different kind emerges when Joey, against all odds, is reunited with Albert. This scene may seem improbable and wildly coincidental in a book that has mostly detailed warfare in a hyper-realistic manner—one that was doing so only pages ago in the nightmarish descriptions of No Man's Land. Still, it is a scene that is on-message, indicating that some of the worst aspects of human nature—the savagery of a war brought about by distant political calculations—are not all-powerful. Friendship has sustained Joey and may get him home to England. In fact, there is still much suspense left in War Horse: despite their reunion, Joey and Albert may not survive the final few months of a war that has already claimed so many admirable characters.
