Sunday was fine and hot, and all denominations had Church Parades. On Monday the Ninth Division marched through—what a fine lot they looked, and how we envied them “their cookers.” Why hadn’t we got cookers? And the old galling comparisons between the treatment of the Territorial Force and Kitchener’s Army were rubbed in once more. It is all dead now, but we had something to grouse at. On Tuesday, the 18th, we paraded at 8 p.m. for a night march, through VIEUX BERQUIN and NEUF BERQUIN to LA GORGUE, a suburb of ESTAIRES, where we arrived about 4 a.m. Not for months afterwards did most of us learn that we, the 51st Division, had been moved up by General French to be in reserve for the Second Battle of LA BASSEE.
The town was full of troops. Our men were billeted in breweries and factories; B and A Companies were in a shell-riddled Girls’ School; the Officers had difficulty in finding even a floor to sleep on, but at last most of them gravitated to one estaminet, where they fed on what they could get, and slept. An unforgettable incident rises to the mind. Lieutenant——, having disposed himself for slumber on three chairs and fallen asleep, tried to turn over and so rolled off—in one piece—on to the floor, where he lay immovable, only remarking, in injured tones: “I’m fed up with this —— War!”
On the 19th, the 2/5th Lancashire Fusiliers left us and went to ST. OMER, and 18 of our men were sent to the Tunnelling Company R.E.; this is mentioned because it was our first separation—we had been together, in the same sections even, with practically no change for months.
On the 20th we marched to billets in farms on the east side of LOCON; when we got there we found them occupied by a Battalion of the Grenadier Guards, who had been in action the night before and lost their Colonel, Sergt.-Major, and 67 other Ranks, so we formed up in a field opposite a large 18th century farm with a moat round it and stayed there all day; in the evening the Guards moved out and marched off with that inimitable swing of theirs, and we took over their billets—untouched farms within three miles of the line. Here we were close to the lair of a 9in. Howitzer—the only one on that front, it was said—which had been shelling the Hun all day.
The next day we set to work with zeal to clean up and put the sanitation right—covering middens to prevent flies breeding, building incinerators, and fixing up a water supply; we rather specialised in sanitation even in those days, when most people seemed rather to scoff at it. Late at night the 5th Gordons arrived and bivouacked in the field opposite.
On the 23rd, a very hot day, sanitary work continued, and surveys of the billeting area were carried out by Officers, and afterwards combined into a composite map; the next day Second Lieutenant Sutherland, of the 2nd Leicesters, two N.C.O.’s, and 11 men reported, to instruct us in trench work—needless to say we were keen for anything they could teach us, as we were eagerly looking forward to our first tour in the line. Yes, Reader, you may think this is a figure of speech, but it is not—we really were, and we sharpened our bayonets with zest on the old lady’s grindstone, and thought she must be a German spy because she tried to stop us!
All the same, we expected to stay where we were for a few weeks, and were a bit surprised to learn, after a lecture on trench work by Captain Burton, 39th Gharwalis (we were in the Indian Corps), that we were to go into the line on the 25th. We assembled on the road by Battalion Headquarters at 7 p.m. and marched to a Cemetery, where we were met by an Officer of the 1/7th Black Watch. He reported that the trenches we were to occupy were being shelled by the enemy, so we halted till 10 p.m., when we moved forward by platoons at 100 yards’ distance.
It is quite impossible to try to convey in print the impression of one’s first march up to the line: one remembers the dark, strange road, broken trees, loose telephone wires, a long halt in a battered village, then on through interminable miles of breastworks manned by Canadians, crawling cautiously along in single file and breathless silence—then a halt, and platoons are sent off down various alleys, to find at the end a trench full of Scotsmen anxiously awaiting relief. The right of the Battalion rested on the QUINQUE RUE, the left on the road from RUE DE L’EPINETTE to FERME COUR D’AVOUE; A and D Companies and Machine Gun Section occupied the front line, No. 2 platoon having an advanced post about 200 yards in front of the main line; C was in support and B in reserve. The fire trench had only recently been built, and the forward bit had 18in. of water in it; no wire had been put up. The support trench was an old German trench about 300 yards to the left rear of the fire trench, while the reserve trench was again 200 yards behind the latter. The parapets were revetted with, and in some cases entirely built of, sandbags; dugouts—very sketchy—were built in the parados! The trenches were nowhere more than two feet deep, the rest of the cover being above ground; there were narrow communication trenches. Every house in the neighbourhood was in utter ruin, and the ground was a mass of shell holes. Equipment, rifles, ammunition, clothing, tins, both our own and enemy, were strewn everywhere, and dozens of bodies—chiefly of Scots Guards and Germans—lay about as they had fallen in the May Battle of Festubert; the stench was awful. Some old German trenches, not occupied by us, were interesting as showing the elaborate way they had dug themselves in. One dugout was a room about 15ft. square, with doors and a window, lined throughout with wood planking covered with cloth, and furnished with leather-covered chairs and a table; in one a quantity of feminine underclothing was found—what it was doing there could only be guessed.
Most of the above description is taken from the Adjutant’s journal, written at the time; all we saw that night was mud and sandbags. The Platoon which took over the forward trench had to wait for the Scots to climb out at the back, and then stepped down about two feet and found themselves in a good foot of muddy water. There was nothing for it but to wait till dawn; when it came we found ourselves in a shallow ditch, with only two rows of sandbags in front. Immediately to our front was a huge pile of black, red, and yellow sandbags, where the Germans had blocked and strengthened an old communication trench leading into our lines; their main line was further off—from 200 to 400 yards; behind us and in front were the dead bodies, also in our own parapet and under the duckboards of the communication trench, which was soon dubbed “Bluebottle Alley,” for as soon as the sun rose clouds of the loathsome insects filled the air and buzzed round our heads. To our front we could see in the distance the spire of VIOLAINES Church, and on our right was a new parapet, very high and thick, surrounding CANADIAN ORCHARD. We were puzzled and annoyed for some days by sniping from that direction, till one early morning we saw a Hun crawling from under that same parapet towards his own lines, but a rifle shot fired from a rifle which had belonged to one of the Scots Guards settled his hash and avenged the late owner of the rifle.
On the 26th we were shelled intermittently all day, and two men were wounded, our first casualties; in the evening two platoons were sent out and extended from the right of No. 2 Platoon at P 11 and started a trench to connect up with the Canadians. On the 27th we were again shelled intermittently, but no appreciable damage was done and we improved our positions greatly. We did not realise then that we had been put in to finish the consolidation of newly-taken ground—a pretty stiff beginning for raw troops. The night was exceptionally quiet—there was less shelling than usual and very little sniping; during the morning our fire trenches were shelled somewhat severely with shrapnel, and again in the afternoon, six men being wounded. As soon as it got dark, working parties went out to get on with the new trench to the right of P 11; the existing forward trench was strengthened and the R.E. put a footbridge across the ditch on our right front; it was very dark and there were no interruptions.