AT PASSCHENDAELE RIDGE.

Taihape Daily Times, 28 December 1917, Page 6

AT PASSCHENDAELE RIDGE.

The following'interesting letter, has been received by a Taihape resident from Private C. Jeayes, who was in the employ of the Taihape Daily Times proprictarywhen he enlisted. The incidents he mentions arc connected with the attack on the Passchendaele Ridge, where the New Zealanders played so

glorious a part. The letter is dated October 27th. and the writer says:—You ■will have seen by the papers that we have been having a go at Fritz, and it was some stunt, to; as a matter of fact, the I was in was in the reserve, so wc did not take quite so active a part in it as the others did. This stunt went off all right, Fritz being chased out everywhere, and a good numebr of prisoners taken In the second stunt it was our turn to go over and do the work, and we did have a time of it,’too. We started off one night from the subsidiary lino, with just about as much gear in the way of bombs, grenades, and ammunition as we could struggle under on our way to the front line, so as to be ready for the attack next morning. The going wasn’t so bad at first, as going goes over here; but after that we had to cross a swamp for about a mile, and almost every few steps we were getting bogged, sinking to our knees in the mud, when, of course, wo were helpless, and had to be dragged out of the bog by our mates. Sometimes those who were dragging the others out would get bogged, too, and then they all had to be dragged out. We crossed the swamp eventuhlly, but it took a lot of the ginger out of us. We dug in there for a couple of hours, and then started off again for the final assembly place. It was bitterly cold, and raining most of the time, and when we arrived at our destination we were just about

as wet and miserable as we could pos-

sibly be, and smothered in mud to the waist, with a plentiful supply on the rest ox us. There were still a couple of hours to go to zero time, which was about 0 a.m., so' we dug in again, and wet and all as everybody was, and Fritz shelling us a fair bit, I know I for one one went to sleep. About 5.30 we roused out. Our colonel had been killed by a shell just a while before, and we also lost the officer commanding our

company, also, by shell, before we

started to movee. The Otago boys were _~out in front of us, they being the first sand second waves, while we (the Canter burys) were the third wave, Just about 6 a.m. the guns began to roar, and for

a time the noise was terrific, but it did not last long. From what I hear the

gnus became bogged after firing a few rounds, and had to cease fire while they were hauled back into posit-on. This was jolly hard uuck, and it undoubtedly cost us a good number of men, and, perhaps we may have even taken our objectives if they had not failed us.-. However, I’ll go back to the time the- barrage started. As the guns began to speak, so the Otago boys were on their feet and moving across the swamp towards the hill which they were to take. Scon our turn came, and the Canterbury’s started off. Fritz w T as raining shells on us for all he was worth and men were dropping everywhere, but we pushed on. Otago ahead of us were getting it pretty -warm, and as they started to go up the hill they were met by a heavy machine gun fire from the pillboxes, and were almost wiped out. Luckily, there was an old trench bandy, 'and the Canterbury’s dropped in here. The fire from the guns was dying down now, perhaps for the reason I have given; but there was nothing else for it, we had to try and get that hill, even without the artillery. So over we went, with the machine guns knocking the boys down everywhere, and pushed right up to the Hhus ’ barbed wire, but here again the artillery had failed —the wire was not battered down, and we could get no further, so avc dug in right under their very noses. Wc stayed there all that day, completely held up. In the afternoon our guns started to shell Fritz, but the the distance between our trenches and the enemy’s was so short that the shells were as great a danger, to us as to them, so we evacuated th'e place as soon as it got dark. It beats me, even now why Fritz allowed us to get out of those trenches without firing a shot at us. He could have mown us down with his machine gunsc without losing a man himself, but we got back without anything like that taking pl&ce. It w'as awful to hear the cries of the wounded all night long, as they lay out there in the rain and mud. After a short spell we started out to get our wounded, and for the next two days and nights we were all doing stretcher work. It took six men to carry a stretcher, and even then there were times when we all got bogged in the mud and had to call on other stretcher hearers to give us a hand to get out. Each stretcher had to be carried perhaps two miles, all the time up to our knees in mud, and when we got into a shell hole it was up to our waists. One chap I helped to carry down, seeing how avc were struggling, offered to get down and .walk, but, of ; urse , he could never have done L. Another chap was a Tommy, Avith i bullet through his stomach and ' igh, who had lain out there five da; r, having ijjecji in a previous attack. Le got all cf our wounded beak eventually, but

by the time it was finished we were, pretty nearly all stretcher cases ourselves from exhaustion; but we carried on until the third night after the attack, when we were relieved ,and came back to the subsidiary line. That’s the story of our scrap, and now wc arc in a quiet little place a good distance from the sound of the guns and shells. Bert Knox got a bullet through his thigh, and I went round to find out how he was getting on. They told me ho was carried out all right, though he lay out in the rain the whole night. When I knew he was hit I was afraid that he might have been sniped after being wounded, as the Huns are particularly dirty that way, and killed many of our chaps as they lay wounded, or in trying to reach the dressing station: I saw two slightly wmunded chaps assisting a rather badly wounded man back, and the snipers dropped the three of them, and then fired three or or four more shots as they lay there to make sure they were dead. This just shows you what absolute rotters the Huns are. I have been very fortunate so far, not having received even a scratch. It is really marvellous how a chap goes through it vrd misses ill bullets, shrapnel and jsimUs Iha ' 3 not •. mn J. Trebilcock (a Taihape boy who was in the employ of Mr J. R. Cuhib igchemist, previous to enlisting), as he is in another oittalion; but I ha T .e ,been told he came through all Tight.