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[Page 16]
We stayed near Corbie till the barrage started, then we began to advance. The trip to our starting point was not without it's excitement. Fritz planes were very busy and at one halt, when the troops were all smoking, he came in our direction at a great pace. But nothing extraordinary happened.
We stayed on the right of the village of Villers Brettonneux for a few hours, and moved on again. We knew that it was going successfully as there were no enemy guns firing, and that was a great comfort to us too. Our big guns had been brought right up under the Huns' noses on the night before so they had no need to move forward then.
There were crowds of prisoners everywhere, and the troops spent a good deal of time in souveniring them. All of the prisoners were sure that they had lost the war, and that we would go right on to Berlin.
Just before we moved off, there was a little excitement. We were all sitting about talking, when there was a terrific explosion just behind us. A big shell of a new 'toute suite' variety had landed about 20 yards off. There had been absolutely no sound of it's approach at all. Naturally we all had the wind up about some more coming unannounced, but the next went further off and we heard the report of the gun first, then the shell hurtling overhead. They were fired [at] long intervals and all over the country. So we knew that he had one gun still.
We moved from there to a ravine on the right of Warfusee Abancourt and stayed there for dinner. Then we wnt onto a position near Bayonvillers. We got good shelters there, just vacated by the Hun. From priso[n]ers and wounded we go[t] news of the Hun canteens captured, Red Cross trains, 11" guns etc. Later we a[lso] heard of the box of new Iron Crosses captured in a big village further ahead.
While here I tried to see the 2nd Battalion but had no luck. We stayed there for a night and then went back to Thilloy near Corbie. Just before we moved, a squadron or two of Hun planes came over and gave us a lively half hour or so. At Thilloy we were in a Chateau, but we made ourselves quite comfortable under a tarpaulin out in the grounds.
I'll tell you the rest later on,
Jim