Primary tabs
Transcription
[Page 24]
Should a German Gun open out on some target when things are a little quiet, it is immediately answered by salvos ours giving anything from 10 to 50 to his one. You can then have some idea of what his troops must suffer in the way of shells, and judging by the extracts from letters which we had captured on prisoners in this sphere they are feeling it badly. They declare the English guns never miss and cause the most apalling losses in their ranks, when relieving other troops in the trenches especially. All of their Communication trenches and approaches are known and mapped by our intrepid airmen, and on signals from these or observation baloons our artillery gives them no rest. On sufficiently clear days can be seen dozens of our aeroplanes in flight and they do not hesitate to fly over the enemies lines followed by and dodging the bursting shrapnel and high explosive from his antiaircraft guns. It is a rare thing to see German plane up and rarer to see one over our lines; and when seen they fly at so great a height that they can scarcely be seen. Should a more intrepid one fly low he is at once pursued. The flight of the numerous aeroplanes resembles that of a number of hawks or other large birds. Occasionally one comes crashing to earth. By the side of our Communication trench one lay and its bleached "bones" made a good land mark and guide for me at night time when carrying despatches.
Before dawn we had relieved the battalion in the front line trenches and were left in more peace there by the enemy who presumably imagined our trenches on the crest of the ridge. That day our O/C called for a volunteer to act as a despatch runner between his trenches, the advanced-battalion Headquarters and battalion headquarters, and asked me would I do it. Notwithstanding its danger I preferred to be moving about than sitting in the trench and accepted at once. There were not many messages during that day. In the afternoon the enemy opened up a terrific bombardment which of course, was replied to by our own artillery and the din was terrific. Our trenches were blown in badly in places, but our losses were extraordinarily small
(24)