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[Page 31]
the day we had quietly marked off and taken the bearings of. There was a quarter moon and clear dry weather. At about 9 o'colck all was ready. The covering party of eight with two bombs each, five rifles with fixed bayonets carried at the trail, and one Lewis gun quietly climbed the parapet of the short piece of trench in which we were, crept in single file into No Man's Land, skirting the dege of the patch of wheat just in front. They were to form the covering party to the raiders. They had to keep down any aggressive of counter movements on the enemy's parts and to cover the retreat of the raiders if it became necessary. They took up a position about 100 yds away from where they deemed the enemy's position would be, lay down and waited for the attackers who, after a stiff "nip" of rum each, crept straight across towards their objective. Two of the attacking party of fifteen detached themselves from the rest making a detour to the right flank. Their job was to watch this flank from being cut off by a possible prowling Fritz patrol; warning their comrades of any such attempt by firing their rifles or throwing their grenades. For my own part I was with a comrade on the Listening post on account of seniority & continuous service in the line with my boy. The officer in charge rejected my off to accompany the party. They passed our listening post, was a shell hole on the corner of the patch of wheat crop; and proceeded to crawl along the depression or dead ground, which, flanking the wheat crop ran parallel to the position taken up by the waiting firing party. Then when they had crept opposite the enemy post and abrest