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[Page 32]
crossing the plain at intervals. We shipped up to the trenches in the ruins of La Boisselle. This village is nothing but a pile of broken brick & stone. Of the church only a vault now remains & each shell crater marks the grave of a British of German soldier.
On Thursday 17th German planes showed a good deal of activity. One was brought down in flames by one of our Battle-craft in our lines. For the best part of the descent the Hun pilot steered the plane which shot like a comet from a great height. However nearing the earth, the flames evidently overcame him the vessel crashed headlong down.
We remained in supports until the 19th going up on fatigue each evening. Pozieres is desolation in the extreme. Shells of every calibre continually bursting in the ruins add to the destruction caused by the British bombardments. Huge craters of great depth lie between heaps of pounded earth which look like mountains rising among the splintered remains of the wood. Dead, mangled & nothing be about among the ruins broken rifles & equipment.
The communication trench battered out of recognition now is now on a ridge instead of in a hollow & along this one is chased by German "whizz-bangs" & coal boxes. The whole line is strewn with battered corpses, equipment, rifles, rations & water. How anyone ever reaches safety in the front lines is a mystery. Wounded men are forced to struggle miles to safety to the dressing station & with the any serious cases requiring the attendants of the S.B's. it takes about 3 hours to reach Pozieres.
We marched in easy stages to Doullens from Albert on the 20th & left the latter town on the 25th by train arriving at Popeninghe near Ypres on 26th.