It became imperatively necessary greatly to extend the Canadian lines to the left rear. It was not, of course, practicable to move the 1st Brigade from reserve at a moment's notice, and the line, extended from 5,000 to 9,000 yards, was naturally not the line that had been held by the Allies at five o'clock, and a gap still existed on its left. The new line, of which our recent point of contact with the French formed the apex, ran, quite roughly, as follows:—
Map—Ypres—POSITION ON FRIDAY MORNING
As shown above, it became necessary for Brigadier-general Turner (now Major-General), commanding the 3rd Brigade, to throw back his left flank southward, to protect his rear. In the course of the confusion which followed on the readjustment of the position, the enemy, who had advanced rapidly after his initial successes, took four British 4.7 guns, lent by the 2nd London Division to support the French, in a small wood to the west of the village of St. Julien, two miles in the rear of the original French trenches.
The story of the second battle of Ypres is the story of how the Canadian Division, enormously outnumbered—for they had in front of them at least four divisions, supported by immensely heavy artillery—with a gap still existing, though reduced, in their lines, and with dispositions made hurriedly under the stimulus of critical danger, fought through the day and through the night, and then through another day and night; fought under their officers: until, as happened to so many, these perished, gloriously, and then fought from the impulsion of sheer valour because they came from fighting stock.
The enemy, of course, was aware—whether fully or not may perhaps be doubted—of the advantage his breach in the line had given him, and immediately began to push a formidable series of attacks on the whole of the newly-formed Canadian salient. If it is possible to distinguish, when the attack was everywhere so fierce, it developed with particular intensity at this moment on the apex of the newly-formed line running in the direction of St. Julien.
It has already been stated that four British guns were taken in a wood comparatively early in the evening of April 22nd. The General Officer Commanding the Canadian Division had no intention of allowing the enemy to retain possession of either the wood or the guns without a desperate struggle, and he ordered a counter-attack towards the wood to be made by the 3rd Infantry Brigade under General Turner. This Brigade was then reinforced by the 2nd Battalion under Lieut.-Colonel (now Brigadier-General) Watson and the 3rd (Toronto) Battalion under Lieut.-Colonel Rennie (now also a Brigadier-General), both of the 1st Brigade. The 7th Battalion (British Columbia Regiment), from the 2nd Brigade, had by this time occupied entrenchments in support of the 3rd Brigade. The 10th Battalion of the 2nd Brigade, intercepted on its way up as a working party, was also placed in support of the 3rd Brigade.
The assault upon the wood was launched shortly after midnight of April 22nd-23rd by the 10th Battalion and 16th (Canadian Scottish) Battalion, respectively commanded by Lieut.-Colonel Boyle and Lieut.-Colonel (now Brigadier-General) R. G. E. Leckie. The advance was made under the heaviest machine gun and rifle fire, the wood was reached, and, after a desperate struggle by the light of a misty moon, they took the position at the point of the bayonet.
An officer who took part in the attack describes how the men about him fell under the fire of the machine guns, which, in his phrase, played upon them "like a watering pot." He added quite simply, "I wrote my own life off." But the line never wavered.