CHAPTER VIII
LA BASSÉE DISTRICT
Next day, Boxing Day, December the twenty-sixth, 1914, we once more packed our traps, and, marching viâ Beuvry and Annequin, entered Cambrin. The first four days we were billeted in houses and shops, which had been shelled to pieces, and set to work digging ways through the walls of cellars for means to get out should the house be hit again by a shell during a bombardment. That night a night-attack by the enemy was expected and the usual precautions were taken; it came to nothing. Although this village was in ruins and only about two thousand yards from the enemy's front line, civilians continued to live there.
Between the twenty-sixth of December and the twenty-ninth of December there was "nothing doing": most of the Regiment were employed in the communication trenches, cleaning up and carrying planks to lay on the bottom, some parts of the trenches being deep in mud and water. In the "Old Kent Road," a trench running from the church at Quinchy to the front line was in a really dreadful state: one had to wade through mud and water like whipped cream up to the armpits.
On the twenty-ninth we received a draft of sixty-nine men and three Officers straight from the base. They were sent into the trenches the next day on the Givenchy side of the canal to reinforce the 2nd Royal Sussex. All they had had on leaving the base had been their rations of bully-beef and biscuits, and, on coming out twenty-four hours afterwards, had had to join the Regiment and go into a charge with the Scots Guards on the Quinchy side commonly known as the "Brickfields." In these fields, and about two kilometres from La Bassée, were three huge brick-stacks, around which we built fortifications; these stacks were also very useful for our snipers and observers, who took up positions on the top. On the left of the fields was the railway track, and in rear of that, running parallel to it, was the canal; on the other side of which lay Givenchy.
MAP 5.
On Wednesday, December the thirtieth, we had one Company in the trenches as I have already stated; on Thursday, the thirty-first, report came through that the enemy had broken through the King's Royal Rifles lines. This was late in the afternoon; and two hours afterwards we were called out and taken into Quinchy. On the way there we passed the Black Watch, who were billeted just in front of us; they were preparing to enjoy New Year's Eve. Arriving at Quinchy, I was sent back to find and bring up the other Company from their present trenches to join the Battalion, which I did. They fully expected to be taken back to billets, for they were in a terrible condition, as it had been raining all day long. Therefore I did not mention the place to which we were bound. Fortunately on the way we came across the Medical Officer, who, on seeing the state they were in, most of them suffering badly from rheumatism, would not consent to let them join up, but posted those suffering the least on barricade guard. I then joined the Regiment on the road at Quinchy near the railway track: and, advancing along its side, the Scots Guards taking the right, we succeeded in driving the enemy from the position they had gained earlier that day, and occupied the trenches, where we stayed all next day.