I fixed up my camera, and, when all was ready, a rough bridge was hastily made of several planks lashed together to bridge gaps in the fallen stonework, and I filmed the first troops to cross the Somme during the great German retreat.
The light was now failing, so, packing up my apparatus, and waving farewells to the C.O., I turned back again. B—— joined me; the day had been a great one for us, and we mutually agreed that it was a fitting sequel to the first British battle that had ever been filmed which I took at Beaumont Hamel on July 1st, 1916.
Weary in body, but very much alive mentally, we returned via Villers-Carbonel to our car.
On my way back I wondered how the cat and her kittens were getting on.
The black cat had certainly brought me luck.
CHAPTER XXVII
the germans in retreat
The Enemy Destroy Everything as They Go—Clearing Away the Débris of the Battlefield—And Repairing the Damage Done by the Huns—An Enormous Mine Crater—A Reception by French Peasants—"Les Anglais! Les Anglais!" Stuck on the Road to Bovincourt.