EXPERIENCE WITH RED CROSS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 226, 12 June 1918, Page 3

EXPERIENCE WITH RED CROSS

STORES AND BUILDINGS BURNED. Writing to a friend in Auckland, Mr. Prod. W.'Hnybittle, of Wellington, who lias been driving an ambulance in France (luring the past three years, gives some impressions of the. German oitensivo in March. Air. llaybittle \yns near Bapaumc wl en the attack was started. '"Ihere was liltle linio to do anylliing. For three weeks Uioy had not returned our fire in any strength, and were busy spotting rur pun emplacements. Then suddenly hell ! was let loose. They had our positions I splendidly, and any gun not knocked out I was of little u?e, as so few were left. Then down came the Germans in massed formation, and om - boys could only meet them at terrible numerical odds with mnchino and Lewis guns and rifles, i'or they had no big gun support. All the stores wen I up in the air in Binoke. We of the Pied Cross have fine outfits of stores, for we supply the surrounding casualty clearing stations and advanced dressing pas's. Those in the area of Bapaumc lo St. Oiientin had to be abandoned. The stores buildings, kinemn huts, etc.. were all set alight, and then wo withdrew. Ambulances had to bolt to Albert, only to scatter two days after to Doullens, for the Bochy nmv has the . city where the virgin hung so long suspended from the cathedral spire; the %uro has just dropped to the ground. "Wo lost oijc driver killed, and Wood--1 ward, a splendid driver, who was last to leave, was nipped by the. Boche, and heaven knows where ho and his ambulance are now. It was a wild time. Tho New Zealanders are now down from Armei'tieres, helping to defend Amiens, and they have already put up some very gallant work. We' are all very confident, and not at all downhearted." During tho, fjuiet period before the opening of the battle, Mr. Haybittlft visited the greater part of the British front. "Last week I motored a good way up the line with Lieutenant Strattoii, who conducted the performances n< the Royal Artillery Band at the Auckland Exhibition in 1913-14," he writes. "Ho with the fnmous band had come from London to play the men of tho Royal Artillery into tho firing-line. I have just passed through somu Stirling scenes while up the lin-.Miispccting motorambulance convoys' and stores, scattered from Dunkirk to Peronne over 200 miles of front. I took the opportunity to sea and walk over all the old and terrible Ancre and Somme battlefields above Albert, and before hue reaches Bapaume. Of villages, woods, copses or verdure nothing whatever remains, and the only indication to guide you in passing what was once a town is the inevitable British signboard, 'This is Pozieres,' "This is Beaumont Hamel,' and so on. I pfissod through La Boiselle. Le Sars, Courcelette, TMopvol, Marlinpuich, Warlinomirt, Flers, Comblcs, Givincliy, Beaucourt, ■.■tc, and stayed at Bapaume and Peronne. I then went right up to our front lines near Cnmlirai at a village called Flosquleres, v one and a half miles from the Bodies who were at Marcoing. "Going north, after the push, I visited Sonchez—nothing left—got three miles from Lens, ran into Bethuno and spent a day at what was the lovely city _ of Arras on the Scnrpe. once containing 27,000 people, now only 700 find refugo there. Nearly every kiilcling, although standing, is but a shell-all ruin and desolation. I reckon Ihero arn not 20, that on tho city's rebuilding, will bo able to stand; all , others must be razed to the ground—poor Arras,' and the. wonderful twelfth century cathedral nnd thirteenth century splendid Hotel de Ville, both' 'finis. J Wo' called at Armentieres, Hazelbrouci, Poporin.she, Praven, then into desolated, but world-renowned Ypres. Hero we stayed a day, and with tin hat and gas masks cautiously wended our way into Hooge, St. Julicn, Menin Road, Pil'kem Ridge, which dominated Ypres for so long, Messines, end Dickebusch, then on the Ypres Canal to Boesinghe and Bixschoote. After running down to Dunkirk, a very busy seaport, but subject to persistent bombing, with. tho lovely medieval cathedral a ruin, for a -lain, shell plunged into its- ritnls, wo, returned to Staples, via Calais ami Boulogne. Tt was a wfuiderful chance to see practically the whole of out- line."