LITMIR.BIZ

      Published by Good Press, 2019

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      EAN 4064066203399

Table of Contents

       CHAPTER I. ON THE XIth CORPS FRONT. (October to December 1916.)

       CHAPTER II. FRED KARNO'S ARMY. (January to April 1917.)

       CHAPTER III. BEFORE THE FIRST BATTLE. (March and April 1917.)

       CHAPTER IV. THE FIRST BATTLE OF BULLECOURT. (April 11, 1917.)

       CHAPTER V. THE SECOND BATTLE OF BULLECOURT. (May 3, 1917.)

       CHAPTER VI. REST AND TRAINING. (May and June 1917.)

       CHAPTER VII. THE THIRD BATTLE OF YPRES​—​PREPARATIONS. (July 1917.)

       CHAPTER VIII. THE THIRD BATTLE OF YPRES​—​ST JULIEN. (August 1917.)

       CHAPTER IX. THE THIRD BATTLE OF YPRES​—​THE POELCAPELLE ROAD. (September and October 1917.)

       CHAPTER X. THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI​—​FLESQUIERES. (November 4th to 20th, 1917.)

       CHAPTER XI. THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI​—​BOURLON WOOD. (November 21st to 23rd, 1917.)

       CHAPTER XII. THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI​—​GOUZEAUCOURT. (November 24th to December 1st, 1917.)

       CHAPTER XIII. HAVRINCOURT TO HARROW. (December 1st, 1917, to January 31st, 1918.)

       CHAPTER XIV. THE CARRIER TANKS. (January 31st to August 1st, 1918.)

       CHAPTER XV. THE BATTLE OF AMIENS. (August 1st to August 27th, 1918.)

       CHAPTER XVI. THE HINDENBURG LINE. (August 27th to October 8th, 1918.)

       CHAPTER XVII. THE SECOND BATTLE OF LE CATEAU. (October 9th to October 30th, 1918.)

       CHAPTER XVIII. THE END OF THE WAR. (October 31st, 1918, to January 12th, 1919.)

CHAPTER I.

       ON THE XIth CORPS FRONT.

       (October to December 1916.)

       Table of Contents

      The village of Locon lies five miles out from Bethune, on the Estaires road. Now it is broken by the war: in October 1916 it was as comfortable and quiet a village as any four miles behind the line. If you had entered it at dusk, when the flashes of the guns begin to show, and passed by the square and the church and that trap for despatch-riders where the chemin-de-fer vicinal crosses to the left of the road from the right, you would have come to a scrap of orchard on your left where the British cavalrymen are buried who fell in 1914. Perhaps you would not have noticed the graves, because they were overgrown and the wood of the crosses was coloured green with lichen. Beyond the orchard was a farm with a garden in front, full of common flowers, and a flagged path to the door.

      Inside there is a cheerful little low room. A photograph of the Prince of Wales, a sacred picture, and an out-of-date calendar, presented by the 'Petit Parisien,' decorate the walls. Maman, a dear gnarled old woman​—​old from the fields​—​stands with folded arms by the glittering stove which projects into the centre of the room. She never would sit down except to eat and sew, but would always stand by her stove. Papa sits comfortably, with legs straight out, smoking a pipe of caporal and reading the 'Telegramme.' Julienne, pretty like a sparrow, with quick brown eyes, jerky movements, and fuzzy hair, the flapper from the big grocer's at La Gorgue, for once is quiet and mends Hamond's socks. In a moment she will flirt like a kitten or quarrel with Louie, a spoilt and altogether unpleasant boy, who at last is going to school. The stalwart girl of seventeen, Adrienne, is sewing laundry marks on Louie's linen. It is warm and cosy.

      The coffee is ready. The little bowls are set out on the table. The moment has come. From behind a curtain Hamond produces, with the solemnity of ritual, a battered water-bottle. He looks at Papa, who gravely nods, and a few drops from the water-bottle are poured into each steaming bowl of coffee. The fragrance is ineffable, for it is genuine old Jamaica. …

      We talk of the son, a cuirassier, and when he will come on leave; of the Iron Corps who are down on the Somme; of how the men of the Nord cannot be matched by those of the Midi, who, it is rumoured, nearly lost the day at Verdun; of Mme. X. at Gonnehem, who pretends to be truly a Parisienne, but is only a carpenter's daughter out of Richebourg St. Vaast; of the oddities and benevolence of M. le Maire. Adrienne discusses learnedly the merits of the Divisions who have been billeted in the village. She knows their names and numbers from the time the Lahore Division came in 1914.1 We wonder what are these heavy armoured motor-cars of a new type that have been a little successful on the Somme. And we have our family jokes. "Peronne est prise," we inform Maman, and make an April fool of her​—​while, if the line is disturbed and there is an outbreak of machine-gun fire or the guns are noisy, we mutter, "Les Boches attaquent!" and look for refuge under the table.

      In April of last year, when the Boche attacked in very truth, Maman may have remembered our joke. Then they piled their mattresses, their saucepans, their linen, and some furniture on the big waggon, and set out for Hinges​—​Bethune was shelled and full of gas. I wonder if they took with them the photograph of the Prince of Wales? There was bitter fighting in Locon, and we must afterwards have shelled it, because it came to be in the German lines. …

      Hamond knew the Front from the marshes of Fleurbaix to the craters of Givenchy better than any man in France. He had been in one sector of it or another since the first November of the war. So, when one of the companies of the XIth Corps Cyclist Battalion, which I commanded, was ordered to reinforce a battalion of the 5th Division in the line at Givenchy and another of my companies to repair the old British line by Festubert, and to work on the "islands,"2 I determined to move from my dismal headquarters in a damp farm near Gonnehem and billet myself at Locon. It was the more convenient, as Hamond, who commanded the Motor Machine-Gun Battery of the Corps, was carrying out indirect fire from positions near Givenchy.

      We lived in comfort, thanks to Maman and Starman, Hamond's servant. I would come in at night, saying I was

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