CHARMED LIFE OF A PIPER.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 218, 20 October 1916, Page 2

CHARMED LIFE OF A PIPER.

“The pluckiest thing I saw,” a wounded officer told a representative, 11 was a piper of the Tyneside Scottish playing his company over the parapet in the attack on the German trenches near Albert. The Tynesiders were on our right, and as their officers gave the signal to advance I saw the piper—l think he was a pipe-majon—jump out of the trench and march straight over No Man’s Land towards the German lines. The tremendous rattle of the machine-gun and rifle fire which the enemy at once opened on us drovned the sound of his pipes, but it was obvious that he was playing as if he would burst the bag, and just faintly through the din we heard the mighty shout his comrades gave as they swarmed over the trench after him. "How he escaped death I can’t understand, for the ground was literally ploughed up by a hail of bullets. But he seemed to bear a charmed life, and the last glimpse I had of him as we, too, dashed out, showed him still standing erect, playing furiously, and quite regardless- of the flying bullets and of the men dropping all around him.”

The same officer told of the gallantry of his commanding officer, who led his cheering men to the capture of both the first and second line trenches. Three times in quick succession he was struck by flying bullets, but still led the attack, and it was not until he received his fifth wound, from a piece of shrapnel, that the indomitable commander gave in and allowed himself to be carried to the rear. "The behaviour of the men was magnificent,” he adds. "All through the night they were as cheerful and merry as a pack of schoolboys, singing comic songs and whistling. George Kobey’s song ‘Another little drink wouldn’t do us any harm,’ seemed to be the first favourite in their repertoire. No, we did not sing ‘Tipperary.’ That’s been quietly and decently buried at the front. ’ ’