HEROES OF YPRES

Hokitika Guardian, 10 September 1927, Page 4

HEROES OF YPRES

(By H. AY. AYilson.)

To-morrow the Alenin Gate will be inaugurated by King Albert to the memory of the British dead who fell in the four years of furious "battle nround Ypres and whose, bodies were never recovered. Tho names of all these are graven on the gate so that they may bo held in lasting remembance and affection

The authors of a new and moving account of the noble deeds of the British Army are already well known to a wide public by their book “The Immortal Salient,” which is now in its fourth edition. The two books are indispensable guides to he tfighting and terrain on which it took place, prepared with all imaginable care, with the fullest information, and written in the right spirit. Tho extraordinary importance of the Alenin Road in the epic struggle for A'pres is shown by the fact that 36 pages are devoted to it. “The name,” say the authors, “has in its very sound tho tone of a deep bell pealing a fateful noto. It calls to us to remember one of those dramatic fiehicvenients that in - the light of every day are reckoning impossibilities. . . . Tho spear-point of the German Army in October 1914 was broken on the Alenin Bond and the weapon was withdrawn.”

I Near the road was Polygon" Wood, where in 1914 the struggle raged most desperately. ‘‘Rain had fallen heavily and the ground was a quagmire, so that many rifles were choked with mud and could not be cleaned for lack of rifle-oil. Sections of the trenches had been destroyed, and in part the men had to wade knee-deep in water and were chilled to the bone. Jt was impossible to get any warmth. Fires could not be lit. Hot drink was unobtainable. Wounded men had to be dragged out of deep slime and there were no dug-outs of any kind.” Yet that wood was held, though the British guns, for want of shells, wero unable to give the devoted British infantry any adequate support. On this road of death was Hell-Fire Corner, which well deserved its grim name, as the German artillery continually swept, it. Hero it was that the transport of the 42nd Division covered itself with glory: ‘•The •enemy shells set fire to a great ammunition dump. Amid continued bombardment and with the explosives going off in terrific outbursts the divisional transport loaded up by the depot and got all the teams and wagons away in safety.” Nor .Was this an exceptional incident ;

"It is in the repetition again and again of supreme heroism, the endurance again and again of supremo trial, the sacrifice again and again in supreme agony That the wondei lies. . . . Tho a filleting phrase “Practically annihilated’ 1 occurs so consUntl? that it has been difficult to avoid it.” Honour, then, to the troops who held the Salient and to tho dead, who in holding it laid down their lives.