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[Page 129]
see lots of huns racing about on the next rise. So we started firing and our No 1 threw the gun down and himself alongside it, and put a burst or two over, he must have got the range exactly for one could see them raceing and jumping into cover everywhere. One Fritz must have left his equipement behind for he jumped out and got hold of it and dragged it in, like dragging a rabbit by the ears. In the gully between us and Fritz some of his guns were fireing for we could hear the wheeze quite plain. We had gone too far ahead and too quickly, for the tank was just coming out of the main street behind us so we hid in a hollow for fear it might see us and mistake us for Fritz. But it only came about 60 yds up the road and then turn around and went back, we weren't sorry either. We had gone a bit too far to the right and were called over to the left to dig in. Two of us were allotted to a shellhole and commenced to dig and we came a thud, for the bottom of the shellhole had been filled at one time with some dirty stinking rubbish and we had to dig through it, occasionally a machine gun put a burst over us and some bullets flicked the dirt I had just thrown out, we fired an odd shot from our rifles in reply. One of our own 60 pounders kept dropping a shell behind us in the hedge, Aeroplanes came overhead whistling like hawks; burn those red flares, said the Captain, for them to see, they're looking for us. We set fire to the red ground flares, but I dont think that they could have seen them judging by what happened next day. By sunset we had dug in and soon after were told to go into an old trench in an orchard just at the rear and our place would be taken by others. I was glad too as I was thirsty having by mistake brought away an empty bottle in mistake for a full one.
The trenches we were in were old 1915 ones and had all