Boutillerie Sector
The Headquarters at Wye Farm were in a sense commodious, but hardly of a description to inspire much confidence in a new arrival. Imagine an ordinary block of farm buildings with barn and cowshed attached. Knock holes in the roof till all the tiles and most of the beams are down; put one layer of sand-bags to protect the ceiling of the first floor in the house itself, and add sand-bag walls where walls of the usual description have ceased to exist, and you will have a fair idea of the Battalion Headquarters. There was one small sand-bag "bivvy" leading out of the orderly-room, late a stable for a couple of horses; and the regimental aid post was situated in a small brick outbuilding beyond the cemetery. In front of the house was a double duck-board track, which wandered round the corner into the farmyard behind. The Officers' Mess consisted of a low room with a fine fireplace; and the Commanding Officer's sleeping room was of reasonable size, and contained R.E. bunks for the Commanding Officer and Second-in-Command. Here we were introduced to the Second-in-Command, the Adjutant, and other Headquarters' officers of the battalion we were relieving; and then, under the guidance of the Adjutant, we set off to have a look at the line. All the way from Fleurbaix, and, in fact, the whole time we were going round the sector, the enemy preserved an entire and complete silence, due perhaps to the inoffensive nature of our particular opponents, or more probably to their rather harrowing and costly experience of the night before.
City Avenue, the communication trench we were to use, had one branch, which started from Wye Farm through a hole in the wall at the back of the farm. As in most communication trenches in that part of the world, the track rests on "A" frames to keep it above water level. Down this track we moved, experiencing for the first time the impression of the endless duck-board beneath one's feet and a few yards of trench, with an occasional glimpse of bushes or rank weeds, as the only prospect before the eye. The air was damp, and strange stale odours filled the nostrils. Everything was symptomatic of death and decay. Water and mud predominated, and everything looked dreary and unkempt to the last degree.
The support line round Hudson Bay looked fairly bright, with quite reasonable "bivvies," but the mud was there; and now empty tins and refuse of every sort began to add to the wretched aspect of the place.
As we neared the front line in the left sector—we were now in Bay Avenue—water and mud became still more plentiful, the ground even more bare, and the general sense of desolation even more pronounced. Suddenly we found ourselves in the front line—a sand-bag breastwork, looking old and weather-beaten, with a duck-walk running along it and a sudden descent of two or three feet to a continuous chain of pools of green and stagnant water. A few sand-bag "bivvies" among the traverses, an occasional roof consisting of a single sheet of corrugated iron—here was "home" for the next eight days. Whichever way you looked along the line you saw the same endless bays and traverses, most of them more or less fallen in; the same pools of evil-smelling water; the same stretches of shell-churned ground; the same old litter of tins and débris. If you turned your gaze backwards towards Wye Farm, in search of something less desolate and inhuman, the scene was hardly more inspiring. Overgrown bushes, stunted willows and mud, ill concealed by discoloured grass, were all that met the eye; and the landscape was only broken by the irregular lines of trenches which showed up in the distance like Brobdingnagian mole runs.
We visited the scene of the raiding party's exit from the line, and the smears of recent blood on the duck-boards and the pieces of field-dressing lying about similarly stained told their own story. We also heard how our advance party, who left us in Woking, had been initiated during the last few days into the mysteries of trench warfare. We then returned to Battalion Headquarters, where all the details of trench routine were gone into and explained with great clearness and precision.
No one could have been more kind and helpful than those New Zealanders, from the Commanding Officer downwards. They knew we were totally inexperienced, and they did everything possible to instruct us in the short time available. Their name became a synonym in the battalion for gallantry and courtesy, both of which qualities we had full opportunity of estimating.
As the weather was misty, and showed every sign of remaining so, it was arranged that the relief should take place on the next day (February 22nd) in daylight, commencing at 7.30 a.m. In the afternoon Company Commanders and selected N.C.Os. arrived to visit their areas, and their New Zealand opposite numbers proved as helpful and instructive as the Battalion Headquarters staff had been.
That night in Fleurbaix was quiet enough, and it was hard to realize how close we were to the war. The village, in fact, was only a mile or two from the British front line. As one looked from the windows, Véry lights could be seen shooting up into the sky, while the rattle of desultory machine-gun fire rang clear in the stillness of the night. Billets, on the whole, were good, the houses we used being but slightly damaged; but the draughts through the broken panes, and the subdued light caused by opaque coverings, did not make for comfort, as that word was understood by those whose idea of billets was a snug room in Blackpool or Margate.