Great Britain

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXX, Issue 82, 10 July 1916, Page 8

Great Britain

TALES OF THE WOUNDED. FINE SPIRIT OF THE FIGHTERS. i _ MORAL EFFECT OF THE PUSH. Press Association—Copyright, Australian and N.Z. Cable Association. (Received 10.20 a.m.) London, July 9. Captain Dawson, the novelist, in his article on the wounded at the Somme, continues : Some lay for hours, others crawled a mile over the bullet-swept j earth, along the shell-flattened trendies which were floored by corpses, themselves a\ itli unbandaged wounds, |trailing limbs fractured, and pain-' I wracked. Afterwards came the lons and necessarily tiring journey to Southampton. Yet though a tinge of pessimism might have been expected among these men, there was not the slightest sigh depressing their spirit. A wonderful description of the tight is given by one man typical of this spirit. He said: "-My God, sir, but 'twas fine. We've got 'em hoppin' this time. Best show I ever saw. Wouldn't have missed it for the world. A good many or us were pipped, of course, but you should see the stacks of their dead. It isn't figures that count, nor the ground taken. The thing is we know we can beat 'em now. We've sampled their best, their Prussian Guard, and we can beat their best, and they know it." Dawson adds: At all events, our wounded know that while Germany's superb organisation, her massed engines of destruction, and her machinedriven soldiers may win her occasional reprieves, her hour of doom has struck, her end is written as far as this war is concerned. The German high command is satisfied that the penetration of the Sommo is impossible, and the high command is wrong."