Cocks letter diary, 1916-1919 / Verner Cocks - Page 559

[Page 559]

Paschendaele Ridge,
France

9/10/17

Dear Mother,

It is about three weeks since I wrote any letters and during that time such a lot has been happening that it has been impossible to do anything in that line. As a coincidence I have received more mail in that time than I generally would have in three months.   However I have been sending field cards to everyone so you can tell them that real was hasn't left any time for letter writing.

I have received Nos. 50, 51, 52 from you, one from Myra & Dad & parcels dated 4/7/17 & Myra's letter to Dick Gates I am holding for a while as Dick has been wounded but will be back soon.   Before I forget I would like you to send to Mrs. S.J. Brown 15 Shepherd Street Ashfield one of my photos to keep for her son Harry in our unit.   He is a great friend of mine & a bosker chap.   He is having one sent to you to keep for me.   At present he is away ill.   He was one of our squad bearers in the last stunt which I will tell you of later & carried till he couldn't do any more, got a touch of pains & had to go back.   He put up a great example and when writing I would like you to tell his mother what a great deal we think of him for it.   Such things as this go unnoticed in the military.   He could have had a job out of the trenches too but volunteered to come up with the boys.

Last time I wrote we were out resting but the day after we suddenly left and with full packs up started a long march.   That day we did 20 miles arrived at a little village at 7 p.m. & billeted in a barn.   Next morning off again got lost several times and eventually landed at another little village at 8 p.m.  after having travelled 22 miles.   Slept in some hay again & off the next morning early but only had about 6 miles to do & finished fresh.   50 miles was not a bad march with full pack & most of our chaps did it.   Many of the infantry were left along the roadside & our cars had much to do picking them up.

22/9/27
 €‹Nothing doing - waiting for orders - was about to start a cricket match against the officers & N.C.O's when orders came and we had to get ready to leave at once in lorries.   The lorries did not turn up till 9 a.m. the next morning so we went up then into the line passing through a famous town which is now bricks only "'eaps & 'eaps of 'em".   You couldn't credit the destruction.   Not one house in all the town & it is a pretty big one - has a roof and what remains of a couple of the famous buildings is unrecognisable with the pictures.   This town has suffered dozens of bombardments & still Fritz drops a few long distance shots into it besides bombs of a night.   We passed right through this and through about 4 miles of desolate and shell torn country thence on foot into the line - not trenches just shell holes   There were many pillboxes about and we made our home in one of them.   They are as safe as a bank built of reinforced concrete about 6' thick.   One I saw was a beauty - 60 yds long in the form of a corridor giving entrance to ten or twelve rooms capable of accomodating 30 men - fitted with bunks & electric light throughout.   It had sustained several direct hits but was still intact.   From the side facing our original trenches it is unnoticeable having been covered with sods of grass & mud.   Our little pillbox was particularly safely built in the same fashion but it stunk something frightfully.   From it to one near bye was an underground passage where the former occupants had been bombed and left to rot.   The entrance being covered by boards & rubbish.   We lived & slept in the stench for a day and then shifted our R.A.P. to another part of the line.   We wandered round the country looking for a suitable pillbox but each was filled with dead bodies & you couldn't get near them.   At last we struck one full of rubbish but no bodies.   We cleaned it out - it wasn't very dirty but there was much German equipment in it - rifles overcoats and other stuff left there in their hurry to get away.   Got a few souvenirs in the form of buttons - belt buckles & shoulder straps.   It was a fine dugout filled with beds but blown in in one part which we patched up with sand-bags - the roof was covered with bits of hair etc.  from which we deduce that our boys in their advance threw in a couple of bombs & passed on.   After having a sleep we looked round to see where we were.   Half a mile from the front line our immediate surroundings were about as vile & gruesome as one could imagine.   All around were dead bodies - all Fritzs about a month old - the ground was pretty swampy and the shellholes we washed in also contained one of these souvenirs.