A STORY OF WARFARE.

Hokitika Guardian, 24 January 1918, Page 4

A STORY OF WARFARE.

AFTER ABRAHAM’S HEIGHTS.

Written for the Guardian by

T. Tv V. Scddon.)

(Continued.)

No one slept ou the night of the 4th and sth of October,.but all hands worked with might and main to im-.. prove our position. During the,night the wounded were tended and ■ made as easy as possible, and at dawn we bnried our dead and got our bearings. The West Coasters were well dug in on our (Nelson) left and to our rear, and many a cheery smile hailed one on a visit to their position in the early morning. They had fared well, and true to their West Coast natures were marvellously cheerful. Tn the afternoon, not long after our Australian friends had gone, the Germans began to let ns have some of his pent up hate. There was the Fasschcndaele Ridge right in front of us, and from all sides' in to onr lines came every kind of missile he could hurl. Whizz bangs 5*95, shrieking shells and shrapnel burst close, ana every man kept, well down, knowing the folly of being without cover meant death. A “Dud” landing near to the trench would shake the earth with a sickening thud, and one wondered how near, the next one would be. So the awful time, seeming longer by its very awfulness, wore on, and then suddenly there was a cessation and the anxious time ceased. The Somme ateits worst, and the bombardments at Armentieres, were not to be compared with that, bombardment for intensity. It was furious; it was frightful. If our drnm fire can be worse, then it must be hell in the Hun lines.

We grew cheerful when comparative peace was restored, for word had come up that we should be relieved some time that night. The hour was indefinite, but we knew the relief would come some time, and so with glad hearts we waited and waited. It grew dark and still no relieving party. The Germans, as if t>o add to the tension, began again to bombard ns. The 'second was worse than the first. He seemed, in the dark, to know our exact positions.

We kept' very low hoping against hope that no shell would find onr narrow trenches. Duck still favonred ns, but at last one shell landed in a corner of the trench where three men were. Two of the fellows got badly shaken aud both got shell shock —the other poor chap we never saw again. About half an hour afterwards the relief arrived, and we filed out of that trench and back over the ground we had won. Hone of us remember much about the walk out. It was very dark, the ground uneven, but our engineers had done wonders. We plunged about in mud, fell into craters —everyone too tired to jest or even curse, and at last we won the duck .boards. The rest was easy, but we were so weary j that we took a long, long time to get down to the transport lines. What a cheerful time it was when we got there, and saw the cheerful faces of our cooks. The cookers were in full blast and good hot and steaming stew, thick with beans and beef, was served out to the hungry and tired soldiers. How sweet that stew was! Too tired to tell tales of the great adventure that night, the men slipped quietly off to their allotted places on the ground/ and soon the camp was silent and the soldiers slept like weary, children.

Next da.y tales o£ the attack were' told, experiences exchanged and souvenirs shown w r ith pardonable pride. That night we/left that camp and marched a short distance Then we all tumbled into ’buses. Where were we going we all asked ? Nobody knew, but it didn’t matter, we were going away from the inferno to rest. The ’buses jogged along, and rolled and Bwayed, and the experienced soldiers weary, worn, but used to making the best of every occasion, wexe soon sound asleep. The ’buses pulled up and we tumbled out and marched down a lane. Why, it was the lane leading to one of our old billets, and we were going back to a place we knew. The dogs barked. Madame and the domestics jabbered excitedly in Flemish. There was unbolting of doors, and when they recognised us, there was a stream of questions —How many were killed ? Did we beat the Bosclie P and so on The men soon shook down in ; their billets, and Madame had her stove going, and steaming coffee to warm us after the long cold drive. It was grand, and ever so cheering to lind such a warm welcome awaiting us. We made that farm agaiu our home for some days. On our way to the firing line we had passed the city which this war has made famous. Its name is on everyone’s lips, for round that place the fiercest fights since the beginning of the war have been waged, won and lost, and \ fought again. Here it was that the Canadians, with their great dash and unconquerable courage, taught the Hun his lesson, and here it was month after month that English regiments held on, attacked, day in, and war yard by yard, every bit of the way. Here it was that gas was first used to the dismay of our troops in the early days, and here it was that every sinister scheme for the destruction of life and limb and living place was hurled at the city to bring it to utter ruin. Yes, the Hun has succeeded signally in destroying the buildings, but he has only succeeded in making everyone the more determined to win back, to wrest from him the land about the town, which he overran, and where he had no moral

claim to be. Ypres, tenday, is a city of crumbling bricks. Here and there a wall, a tottering Wall stands out, the mere ghost of a mansion : and here and there the side of a church scorns and breathes defiance at the destructive genius oi the Hun.

The church walls of the great Cathedral are scarcely discernible, but now arc not even a skeleton of the great edifide which stood once for a pattern of • architecture, a sanctity, a peaceful, reposeful spot, Now, with the exception of a few pigeons which* cling to their old 'home, and build their nests and feed

their young in the ruins of a tower, there is no air ot peace. The ruins are a monument of Hunnish hatred and fiendish destructiveness. Can one conceive what retribution, what revenge is sweet tor such callousness, cruelty and wan ton ness ? The famous Cloth Hall once stood there, a building famed for its beauty throughout Europe. The remains of an odd tower still stands defiantly and waits the days of revenge and restoration.

Ypres is a shambles. It is a wonderful sight, but it does not depress or subdue. It is not a city of the dead, for the place has an air of great activity. The paved streets resound with the clatter of much

marching and the traffic of many mules and horses and vehicles travel hurriedly through. No, the fighting spirit of Ypres never died. It still survives and is indeed a real and potent element. To have been on the Western front, at the Somme, m front of Armentieres, at IToegsteert, and not at Ypres, were to miss being at the storm centre of this Great War. . (To be continued).