“We were a happy family,” he says. And “what pleased me as much as their fighting qualities was their good temper and cheerfulness under all circumstances,” and the circumstances were at times appallingly severe. He was himself always cheerful, though his pet dog, an Irish greyhound named Roy, has been described as “a miserable hound.” He encouraged his staff to play “bridge” whenever their work permitted, as a means of taking their minds off the war. All work and no play would have made even a G.S.O.1 a dull boy, and relaxation was not easy to find. He commanded the 4th Battalion Middlesex Regt. at Mons, and was given command of the 10th Brigade on the 17th November 1914. When he first entered the army in 1887, he joined the Royal Scots Fusiliers, and was transferred to the Middlesex Regt. in 1912. We are sorry to say that the “miserable hound,” Roy, who had been with the General since January 1916, cut a tendon and had to be destroyed in Belgium, although he survived the war.
Gen. Hull was not, however, lost to the division, as he returned later. Meanwhile Gen. W. Douglas Smith was given command.
Troops were being massed for the big offensive at Ypres, and the Fifth Army Staff, under Sir Hubert
Gough, had been moved to take command of the greater part of the salient. Sir Herbert Plumer was still there, but on the southern side, and with a reduced army.
* * * * * * *
In July 1917 England reached the summit of her military power in France. There were 52 divisions from the Motherland, 4 from Canada, 5 from Australia, 1 from New Zealand. One might, therefore, expect a year of great results. And so it was, though not perhaps obviously apparent.
Writing of the year as a whole, Sir Douglas Haig says:
“The general conditions of the struggle this year have been very different from those contemplated at the conference of the Allied Commanders held in November 1916. The great general and simultaneous offensive then agreed on did not materialise. Russia, though some of her leaders made a fine effort at one period, not only failed to give the help expected of her, but even failed to prevent the enemy from transferring some forty divisions from her front in exchange for tired ones used up in the Western theatre, or from replacing losses in his divisions on this side by drafts of fresh and well-trained men drawn from divisions in the East.
The combined French and British offensive in the spring was launched before Italy could be ready; and the splendid effort made by Italy at a later period was, unfortunately, followed by developments which resulted in a weakening of the Allied forces in this theatre before the conclusion of our offensive.
In these circumstances the task of the British and French armies has been a far heavier one throughout the year than was originally anticipated, and the