How Lieutenant Leach and Sergeant Hogan recaptured a Trench from the Germans.
(From the picture by F. Matania. By permission of The Sphere.)
"At nine o'clock I called up the communication trench, and asked how far the enemy had got, and found they were occupying three of the four traverses.[75] When I went up again by myself two hours later, I found the Germans were occupying all the four traverses. Well, I thought, if we leave it much longer they will be down the communication trenches into the main trench.
"The same evening we heard we were to be relieved by the Gurkhas, and I felt it would be rather bad on my part to leave the recovery of the trench to them. I therefore determined about two o'clock to regain the trench before dark. Calling for volunteers, Sergeant Hogan and ten others came forward, and we began to crawl up the communication trench. I fired anywhere with my revolver, only exposing my hand, with the intention of pushing back the enemy along the trench as far as we could. The idea was to force them to run back to their own trenches, so that we could shoot them down as they went.
"All along the trench we crawled over dead and wounded Germans, so you see my revolver had been doing some execution. When we got to the left traverse I was surprised to hear an English voice round the corner shout, 'Don't shoot, sir.' I chanced this being a bit of treachery, and was surprised to see one of my own men coming round the corner. He had been captured in the morning rush, and he said a wounded German officer round the corner had asked him to tell me that they wanted to surrender.
"I went round the corner, and found sixteen Germans on their knees with their hands up, shouting, 'Mercy.' I told the officer that he and his men had got to go into the main trench. This they did after they had taken off their equipment, holding up their hands as they went. About twenty wounded Germans crawled in with them. . . . Was I surprised when I heard I had been awarded the Victoria Cross? Yes, I was. I was mentioned in dispatches, and there I thought the matter had ended."
Sergeant Hogan, when interviewed, showed the same pleasing modesty as Drummer Kenny. "I only did," he said, "what others would have done, and what others have done."
A few further details as to this remarkable feat may be added. The following account is taken from the Manchester Guardian:—"Lieutenant Leach and Sergeant Hogan left the main trench with ten men, and, crawling along the communicating trench, they established themselves at a point where the trench, which had been captured by the Germans that same morning, turned sharply at right angles. Leach and Hogan then advanced. The aim of the two men was to drive the Germans back along the narrow trench to the opposite end, from which there was no exit. Leach and Hogan commenced from their corner. Leach, being armed with a revolver, could reach his hand round the corner and shoot along the sections without exposing his body; whilst the German soldiers, armed only with rifles, could not fire without exposing part of their bodies.
"While Leach was shooting along the section Hogan watched the parapet to ward off attacks from above, as the Germans might crawl over from the section attacked and shoot them down from above or take them in the rear. Leach had now to fire with his left hand. When the section had been cleared by the two men, they took their stand at the next corner, and repeated the manoeuvre. As they advanced, section by section, Hogan put his hat on the end of his rifle and raised it above the parapet, to indicate to his platoon how far progress had been made, so that his comrades would not fire at that part of the trench that had been retaken." This went on, corner after corner being captured, until the two men heard one of their comrades who had been made prisoner that morning cry out, as described above by Lieutenant Leach.
Lieutenant James Anson Otho Brooke, 2nd Gordon Highlanders. This officer received the Victoria Cross for conspicuous bravery and great ability near Gheluvelt on 29th October, when he led two attacks on the German trenches under heavy rifle and machine-gun fire, and regained a lost trench at a very critical moment. By his marked coolness and alertness he prevented the enemy from breaking through our line[76] at a time when a general counter-attack could not have been made. Lieutenant Brooke made the supreme sacrifice that day: he gave his life to save his fellows.