Primary tabs
Transcription
[page 86]
169
(5).
trades, and what is better still they can work with a minimum of tools which, perhaps, is just as well otherwise the work would never be done. Rough carpenters, sheet iron workers, tylers etc. turned to with a will and within four days we had the village looking trim and capable of giving shelter of sorts to two Battalions of men.
The enemy has destroyed all wells before leaving either by blowing them in, by poisoning, of by filling them up with stable refuse, so it became necessary to provide our own water supply. Well sinkers were found in the ranks and even divining rod experts were forthcoming. These latter possessed a special facination and before long everybody from the Colonel to the cooks was running round with bits of forked stick. As a matter of fact it was obvious that water could be found anywhere in that district but nevertheless the divining rod experts claimed a win when the spots they chose yielded water at 7 or 8 feet, and the Battalion marvelled at their prowess.
All sunken roads, quaries, reserve trenches etc. in this district were honeycombed with large dugouts so it was evident that here were the enemy's main camps (if you can call series of dugouts,camps) from which he worked the areas over which he had recently come. Surface camps he never used, all his men being kept underground. Most of his dugouts had been destroyed by blowing in before he left, but here and there were found fine commodious underground structures which had either escaped his notice or in which the charges inserted had failed to explode.
All this district had been the scene of under fighting in the olden days, in fact this is said to be the tenth time that Bapaume has been beseiged but never of course had it