This village of Hébuterne was well known as being a bad spot. The infantry preferred the trenches to the village cellars. The enemy shelled the village with unwelcome intensity daily and also all the roads leading to it. Our cellar was some fifty yards from a crossing where the roads radiated in five directions. This spot came in for more than its share of shelling. The fact that numerous artillery batteries were located in the immediate neighborhood added to the intensity with which it was bombarded. The road to Hébuterne from Sailly-au-Bois was also shelled regularly and at almost any hour of the day or night one would see wrecked and burned wagons and dead horses lying around in their harness. I have known as many as seventy casualties from one Hun shell at this crossroads.
We had some four big trucks in regular use and these were kept busy every night in taking up rations, tools, timber, etc., to the trenches. On several occasions we had to "get out and get under" to avoid the splinters from shells bursting near. The drivers of these trucks were plucky fellows. It was difficult to excite them. One night at Hébuterne a 5.9-inch shell burst about five feet from one of our trucks. Six men were more or less badly wounded, but luckily no one was killed. They would drive up at the same even speed every night in the pitch-darkness.
Most of the drivers were hit at some time or other, but always came back as soon as they were released from the hospitals, and carried on with their driving again. Not much time was wasted in unloading these trucks. Often it was done under a rain of shrapnel. When their work was completed the drivers would come into our dugout for their customary tot of rum. Almost nightly in coming up on these roads trucks and wagons would be ditched and hold up a long line of traffic behind them. Frequently it happened that a number were filled with 6-inch or 9.2-inch shells, and the waiting on the road to move on whilst the Hun was spattering everything around us with shrapnel was a little trying. There were some 15-inch guns beside the road at Sailly-au-Bois, and these came in for their regular share of attention from enemy batteries.
While we were constructing a number of deep dugouts in Hébuterne and in the trenches around, we found a big chalk cavern in the village. This useful place was discovered by a man accidentally falling down a well. On being pulled out, the wide-awake sapper noticed an opening off the side. The cavern was explored and several entrances opened up. Very useful accommodation was in this way provided for a large number of troops.
On the night of November 12, 1916, I was trying to get some sleep in my cellar at Hébuterne when about two a.m. a motorcycle despatch-rider awakened me and handed me the following message, marked "Secret and Confidential."
Secret. 148th Bde. No. G. 205/14.
O.C., 1/2nd Field Coy. R.E.
O.C., 181st Tunnelling Coy. R.E. √
"Z" Day is to-morrow, THIRTEENTH instant. ZERO hour is FIVE FORTY FIVE A.M.
Acknowledge.
