At 3 10 a.m. on the 7th the Messines battle started with a literal earthquake—19 mines being blown up at once, the barrage starting at the same time on our front among others. The enemy shelled us for about half an hour, by which time he found out that we were bluffing him and stopped. Our casualties were five killed, Second Lieutenant Agostini and 10 others wounded.
On the 8th the enemy shelled the roads with 5.9’s and gas shells in the early morning, our guns doing wire cutting with the 106 fuse, a very sensitive fuse which bursts on graze without burying itself; a good many “shorts” fell on our trenches due to defective ammunition, which was just as dangerous to the gunners as to us, as muzzle-bursts were not infrequent. A gunner Officer going round the line was at a loss for words when he saw a shell case, which had fallen short, stuck up over a dugout with the inscription, “A present from the R.F.A.!” Sergeant Thompson was killed by a nosecap from one of these “shorts,” and during the day four men were wounded.
Oblique Aeroplane Photograph Showing Trench Lines at YPRES. Taken April 23rd, 1917.
In the afternoon A and C Companies relieved B and D in the front line.
At 11 9 p.m. the 39th Division on our left sent over gas from Projectors; we caught some of the retaliation on POTIJZE ROAD—5.9’s and gas shells.
On the 9th we had a fairly quiet morning, but the artillery livened up in the afternoon; the 1/4th KING’S OWN carried out a successful raid on our front, bagging six unwounded prisoners, who seemed glad to be taken. The enemy was taken by surprise in mid-relief. We had six men wounded during the day.
Things remained lively during the next two days, five men being wounded, but on the 11th the blessed word “Relief” was whispered. Imagine the joy of men who had never had their clothes off for nearly three weeks—more, in some cases. The relieving Battalion, the 1/9th King’s Liverpool Regiment, did not arrive till after 3 a.m., so relief had to be carried out in daylight in very small parties, but it went off without a casualty, and we marched to a canvas camp behind YPRES, where we rested till noon on the 12th, when we marched by Companies to POPERINGHE, leaving by train at 2 45 p.m. and reaching ESQUELBECQ at 4 45 p.m.; here we were joined by part of the transport, and after dinner had been eaten we marched on to BOLLEZEELE, where we occupied our old billets.
The next three days were spent in cleaning up, bathing, and a little training.
On the 16th the Brigade marched via Watten to BOISDINGHEM; it was a broiling day and the sky was like brass, and as the march started at 9 a.m., when the sun was high up, and was mostly uphill, a large number of men were affected with sunstroke and fell out, but the 9th Wing R.F.C. were very good to us and lent us lurries to bring in the stragglers. Here we found the accommodation poor and totally inadequate, but we crowded in somehow, many preferring to bivouac in the open fields rather than occupy the buildings allotted to them: the village lay on the top of the downs not many miles from our old area HOULLE, almost out of the sound of the guns. About this time the Diarist, reviewing recent events, writes:—