Bullets and “Footer”
We are a light-hearted lot, and so are our officers. We dug out for them a kind of a subterranean mess-room, where they took their meals. One fellow decorated it with some cigarette cards and pictures he cut out of a French paper. The food they get is not exactly what would be supplied to them at the Hotel Cecil. A jollier and kinder lot you would not meet in a day’s march. One officer, who was well stocked with cigarettes, divided among his men, and we were able to repay him for his kindness by digging him out from his mess-room. A number of shells tore up the turf, and the roof and sides fell in like a castle built of cards, burying him and two others. They were in a nice pickle, but we got them out safe and sound. During the time we were in these trenches nearly 500 shells burst over and around us, but, as the protection was so good, not a single chap was killed, and less than a dozen were wounded. When we were able to get into the open air once more and stretch our legs, it was then we realized what we had been subjected to, for the ground was literally strewn with burst shells. If all goes well we are going to have a football match to-morrow, as I have selected a team from our lot to play the Borderers, who are always swanking what they can do: Pte. Harris, West Kent Regiment.