On October 23, 1914, about a hundred Germans had been compelled to take cover behind a mill and a small house. The house was rushed by a small force of the Camerons, who compelled the Germans to hold up their hands until a sufficiently strong guard arrived to take them to the rear.
From the picture by F. Matania. By permission of The Sphere.
It was on the 23rd October that Drummer William Kenny won the Victoria Cross for various deeds of gallantry, which will be related later on.
On the 24th, when the Germans were across the Yser, and the Belgians were preparing to open the sluices,[66] the enemy struck hard against the Allied line all the way from Dixmude to La Bassée. At 6 a.m. part of the 7th Infantry Division, which was holding a position near Gheluvelt, was very violently attacked. Mr. C. Underwood, an interpreter with this division, gives us a vivid picture of the terrible straits in which his brigade found itself, and of the arrival of reinforcements in the very nick of time.
"We got a message from headquarters," he writes in Blackwood's Magazine, "saying that we must hold out at all costs, as reinforcements were coming up as quickly as possible to our support. A corporal in charge of prisoners said that the Wiltshire Regiment had suffered terribly, as also the Scots Fusiliers, both having been badly peppered with 'Jack Johnsons,' which had buried many of them alive in their trenches.
"At 7 a.m. next morning (the 24th) Captain Drysdale came up to me and asked me to hurry up two battalions which were expected every minute from the First Army Corps. The position was most critical, as we had not one man left to support the firing line, which was being very hardly pressed, and might give way at any moment. At last, then, the long-expected supports were arriving. Our men had behaved like heroes all. This was the seventh day since we engaged the Germans, one division extending over an unheard-of front of eight miles, and holding up what I understood from one of our prisoners yesterday to be a force of three army corps—that is, 15,000 to 20,000 British against 150,000 Germans! The ordeal of the last three days had been terrible. These brave fellows actually had no sleep for seven days, and had never left the trenches, fighting night and day, sticking to them until they were literally blown out of them or buried alive. They were now becoming pieces of wood, sleeping standing up, and firing almost mechanically, with the slightest support from our guns, which were now outclassed....
"Having got on to the road, I found the Northumberland Hussars,[67] who had evidently been brought up with the idea of their taking possession of the trenches if the supports were not up in time. In ten minutes I sighted the head of a battalion swinging up the road, and ran down as directed to hurry them up. Found them to be the Highland Light Infantry and King's Own Scottish Borderers. I told the commanding officer the position, and he doubled them round the wood to the trenches which our fellows were holding with their last gasp."
On this day, 24th October, the point of the salient gave way. The gallant Wiltshires were driven in, and the Germans pushed into a wood west of Becelaere, where there was much desperate fighting for days to come. The Warwicks were ordered to make a counter-attack, in the course of which they lost 105 officers and men, including their colonel. He had been wounded in the foot three days before, but he nevertheless led his men in the charge with fiery courage. His horse was shot under him, but he found another, which was also shot, and this time Colonel Loring rose no more. In those dread days of struggle no regiment played a more heroic part than the Warwicks; they emerged from the ordeal a mere ghost of their former strength.
It was noticeable at this time that the Germans, though they repeatedly pierced our line, did not follow up the advantage which they had gained. Perhaps this was due to the rawness of the troops; perhaps to the fact that they were weary with much fighting; but more probably to bad leadership, for even the famous Prussian Guard, in later assaults, more than once came to a standstill after it had broken the British line. Whatever the reason may have been, the Allies had cause to be thankful that the enemy failed to "make good."
On the evening of the 25th the 20th Brigade of the 7th Division, which was then holding a position to the south of Gheluvelt, was forced to retire. The Germans broke through our lines, and the 2nd Scots Guards, after repelling the enemy, were pushed back with terrible losses. Thanks, however, to a splendid charge by the 7th Cavalry Brigade, the situation was saved. In these operations Lord Innes Ker, who led the advance guard, won great distinction. Meanwhile the Third Corps, resting on Armentières had been very hard pressed, and had been forced to fall back to a position of less risk.