had about the narrowest escape that I had during the whole War. I was looking out of an old German trench with young Cpl. Bright, checking the field of fire of his gun, when a German shell (a 4.2 howitzer shell I think) burst right in front of us. Cpl. Bright was killed at once and I was knocked unconscious for about 20 minutes with two slight wounds. I was told afterwards that the first words I said as I came round were, �Where�s my tin hat (steel helmet)?� Poor Cpl. Bright, he was one of the best of our junior N.C.O.�s and was a great loss to the Company. It was my sad duty to write to his mother, who would also of course have received official news of his death from the War Office. This unlucky episode took place on the 17th April, 1917, on the far side of Lieven, which by then was in our possession. The officer who looked after me and waited for my return to consciousness was Lt. G. M. Doughty, who was himself killed by a shell a few months later. When I went to have an anti-tetanus injection, the M.O. suggested that I go down to a rest camp for a time, but fearing that I might be sent back to another unit I elected to stay where I was, although I was so stiff in every joint and muscle that for days I could hardly get on my horse.
Regarding the operation just described, I have a copy of a letter expressing the appreciation of the Commander-in-Chief to the 6th and 24th Divisions for their able and energetic action, which it is said was of considerable value to the General Plan.
We were soon pulled out of Lieven to prepare for the next assault, which we were told was to be against the Messines Ridge and would take place on the 7th June. I remember that I was sent ahead with a small advance party to prepare assembly trenches for the Company. On the morning of the attack we had a clear view of the some 20 mines that were exploded under the German trenches at dawn. The Germans were literally blown off the Ridge, and I cannot recall that we encountered very strenuous opposition, but we were subjected to rather severe shelling in the evening, some of which was enfilading fire from the north. The Germans with their usual resilience had soon got their artillery regrouped. As assault troops we were not kept in the line for long and were soon preparing for the far tougher task that awaited us in the Ypres district. It is of interest to note that our Divisional Commander at the capture of the Messines Ridge was General Bols, who shortly afterwards was appointed Chief of Staff to Allenby in Palestine. Some years after the War he was appointed Governor of Bermuda, but died before his tenure of office was completed.
For weeks beforehand we had been drenching the enemy lines in the Ypres Sector with shells of every calibre and the Germans could not have been in the slightest doubt as to what was coming. The element of surprise was therefore entirely lacking when we opened the Third Battle of Ypres on the 31st July. We assembled two days before the attack in a large cavern-like dug-out that had been excavated below our jumping-off trenches. The effect of emerging from deep underground into trenches from which one is to go over the top is distinctly unpleasant and tends to increase the feeling of insecurity that one naturally has on such occasions. The task allotted to me was to set up a battery of six guns on a Site inside the German line as soon as this had been captured and to open fire at a certain time with a view to helping the infantry to reach their final objective. I found the place, had the guns erected and laid, and opened fire at the scheduled time. The ensuing hail of bullets must have sorely harassed the Germans and doubtless caused some casualties, but it failed in its primary object, as the infantry battalion concerned found it impossible to advance on to its final objective. This failure to advance is explained by Conan Doyle in his book �The British Campaign in Europe 1914-1918� as follows:- �The 17th (Brigade), advancing with that fine battalion the 3rd Rifle Brigade alone in the front line, carried all before it at first, but found both flanks exposed and was compelled to halt.� I see that the author a few lines earlier refers to the 24th Division as �a famous fighting unit which was the only division able to boast that it had been present at Vimy Ridge, Messines and Ypres-three great battles in the one year.�
Weather conditions during this battle were absolutely atrocious. It started raining shortly before the attack was launched and it continued to rain intermittently for days. The ground, never very dry at the best of times, became one vast morass, and the shell holes, some very large, filled with water. It was said that some of our wounded slid into these holes and were drowned. There was one young officer in our Company, who disappeared during the attack entirely without trace, and it was thought that he may have died in this way. Whether the cause of his disappearance was ever discovered I never heard.
In the afternoon I was sent with one gun to reinforce the newly formed front line. This was not a long journey, but it was a very unpleasant one and quite dangerous, as the Germans, having recovered from the initial shock of the attack were now shelling the area intensively. However, I made contact, selected a site for the gun and was fortunate enough to find an old German concrete dug-out for the gun team as well as one for myself, where I was later joined by one of the Company Commanders of the 3rd Rifle Brigade. There I spent five miserable days, wet through and with practically no sleep. This is the period to which I referred at the end of the 2nd paragraph of this account of my experiences in the War. As I said then, after a hot bath and a good sleep I felt quite well again by the next morning.
My Company Commander told me that after this action I had been recommended for the immediate award of the Military Cross, but that a great many recommendations had been received and that it had not been found possible to send mine forward. I was, however, recommended again towards the end of the year and received the award in the New Year�s Honours for 1918.
The Division suffered heavy casualties in this battle, and I heard it said that our Brigade (the 17th) lost 50% of its total strength, but I think that this was probably too high an estimate. In any case we could no longer be regarded as an assault division and for about 6 weeks we were employed in line-holding, for two weeks of which I was on leave in England. Conditions on the leave trains in France were bad, as not only did the accomodation leave much to be desired, but the trains were extremely slow and very cold in winter, as they were completely unheated. When, however, one reached Dover or Folkestone and was able to sink into a seat on a Pullman train and order a drink, the contrast was very pleasant indeed.
In connection with this line-holding period, I remember two incidents especially. I was occupying a concrete dug-out in a former German strong-point shown on our maps as Stirling Castle, and one night the Germans, correctly surmising that we would make use of their old dug-outs, started to shell them heavily. The shells were so large and burst so close to my dug-out that the stump of candle that I had was blown out three times by the concussion. I patiently relighted it each time and was thankful that the Germans built such good dug-outs. On another occasion I was on my rounds in the same area, and passing a fair-sized dug-out, I looked in and saw about half a dozen British soldiers seated on a low bench round the walls of the dug-out. They had their box respirators on and were holding their rifles with the butts on the floor, rather as if they were about to leave, but as I looked again I saw that they were all apparently dead. I have sometimes wondered since whether I was perhaps mistaken, but I feel sure I was not. How then did these men die? Was it from gas or concussion or from some other cause? I was unable to investigate then and now of course I shall never know. I remember that when years later I took my sons, John and David, to see the waxworks at Madame Tussauds, I was at once reminded of that grim scene at �Stirling Castle�, although I naturally did not say so.
About the middle of September, the Division was pulled out of the Ypres sector, which I never saw again, and after a period for rest and refitting we were sent to the most southern part of the British line, where it joined the French. This was the district from which the Germans had retired earlier in the year to take up a new line and which they had systematically laid waste. Every building was blown up, the wells were polluted and even the fruit trees cut down. Our part of the line was not held by a continuous line of trenches, but by a series of strong points, and this made it difficult for me to visit my guns by day. I used, therefore, to pay my visits at night and to sleep for part of the day. One morning, I had just woken up when I saw a very large rat fall from the roof of the dug-out on to the floor, and there it was, crouched in a far corner looking at me with its beady eyes. I had suffered a great deal from rats in the trenches and I was very annoyed at the intrusion of this one. I therefore took up my loaded revolver, which was lying on a table beside me, and had a shot at it. It was the best shot that I have ever made with a revolver. The heavy bullet hit the rat in the neck and it never moved again. A short time later my batman came in and removed it holding it up by the tail, and I heard him call out to some men outside that he thought he would put it in the soup.
The British and German lines were not very close in this sector and in one part they were nearly a mile apart. The infantry used to send out large fighting patrols at night, and as the Germans did the same, there were occasional clashes, but on the whole the sector was a quiet one and we spent a tolerable winter, although a rather boring one, as there was little for us to do when we were out of the line, except to ride about the countryside.
The Brigadier-General commanding the 17th Brigade issued a stirring Christmas and New Year message to the Brigade, one paragraph of which read as follows:- �It has been a very hard year, and great demands have been made on all of you, and the magnificent way in which those demands have been met and accomplished, not only in your many battles, but also during all the most trying times you have been holding the Line, is worthy of the highest traditions of the British Army, and could not have been equalled.� High praise indeed.
The 1st January, 1918, was a red letter day for me, as I started fourteen days leave in England and during that leave Marjorie and I became engaged, and also I read of my award while travelling up to London on the leave train. Altogether it was quite a good leave.
Early in the year, as the result of an important reorganization made in the Machine Gun Corps, our 3 Brigade Companies were formed into a Battalion and were in future known as the 24th Machine Gun Battalion. The three Companies in question were the 17th (our own), the 72nd and the 73rd. One effect of the change was to make us Divisional instead of Brigade troops. On the whole, we would have preferred to remain as we were. I should add that the 17th Company became �A� Company, the 72nd �B� Company and the 73rd �C� Company of the new Battalion.
With the collapse of the Russians the Germans began to move their divisions from the Eastern to the Western Front, and this process had been going on for months. It soon became evident that they were preparing for a big offensive and also that the blow
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