"Because I'm the gravedigger of the Regiment!"
PRISONER CHATTER, PEPPER HILL.
December 15, 1916.
Night falls—victorious day—success along the whole line——I go by foot along the road from Louvemont, something I have not done since the first days of the battle of Verdun. The German prisoners and wounded, in their field-gray uniforms, dirty with mud, descend the hill in little groups, their arms raised.
Some of them approach our men, saying:
"War finished—War finished!"
"I believe you're telling tales," was the reply of a poilu.
BRAS, PEPPER HILL.
December 16, 1916.
I assisted yesterday the second attacking party, at Pepper Hill.
I have just passed the night at Froideterre,[28] which has been well named—At dawn the sound of the battle diminished. On leaving the shelter where I had been installed, I saw, a few steps away, an airplane, its tail in the air, that I had noticed the night before——
At Brigade Headquarters I was asked to interrogate two young German officers who had been captured on the backbone of Pepper Hill——