German deserter's family at home deprived of rations and separation allowance.
Boche found carrying machine-guns on stretchers to lines.
October 4th. The above facts were given by the Padre last night from notes he had made. He has been in the thick of the fighting and has gone right along with his men all the time.
Yesterday morning rode around with Lawson (Quartermaster) visiting the Ordnance and Army Service Corps (Captain Bateson) dumps. Then to the water head where the water is supplied to this section. Lunch, and after that the Padre, McWilliams and I started out in the ambulance for Vaux—a mass of wreckage. The Padre took us in a garden of a once-château. The grounds were overgrown with weeds, but flowers still struggled out of their old beds. The château was a pile of bricks, beautiful trees were half cut through and left to die. Nothing but two gateposts and a small segment of the outbuildings were left standing. Such wanton destruction is simply appalling to see. About one hundred and fifty shells were dropped on Vaux last night and from the edge of the town one is fairly in sight of the German lines. The Padre lived in the garden during the bombardment, and we saw the dugout that he and his servant had built.
From there we walked down the Mareuil Road, no vehicle or horses are allowed to show themselves on the northern end of the town beyond the cross-road, as the Mareuil Road is in clear view of the enemy. Gun batteries were placed every here and there, carefully camouflaged, as is everything. Two dummy guns stuck out in one place. The gunners live along the roadside in small shelters with sandbag roofs. In the hollow were two six-inch guns, which were firing a salvo of one hundred rounds each at a section of Boche trench which was pushed too near to ours. The target was 7,500 yards away over the crest of a hill. They fired at intervals of about two minutes, first one and then the other. The crash was tremendous. After watching them working for a while till my ears rang, returned to Vaux and then took the ambulance to the A. D. S. on Mareuil sector. This was well fitted up. In the past twenty-four hours under cover of the haze they had run a narrow-gauge track up to it.
Back at five p. m. for tea and then to the Bow Bells. This is a Divisional theatrical troupe, or, as it is officially known, a Divisional Concert Party, of 56th Division. It was wonderfully dramatic, as it was held in a partially demolished barn. They gave a capital show. Good voices. Two of the men were superb in their impersonation of women's parts. The show begins at six p. m. and was simply crowded. Tickets have to be booked up days in advance. We groped our way home as no searchlights can be shown on cars and had dinner at a little after eight. On the way back Very lights were constantly going up from the lines. Think of a first-class performance in a battered village, three miles away from a world war, and you can in fact surmise some of the sensations one has in watching it in a battered barn filled with nearly a thousand men and officers. And they appreciated it like children.
In the evening Padre, Mackenzie and Lawson told stories until one thirty a. m. A bully day—
Our 'phone call is "Pork."
October 5th. Yesterday was comparatively quiet. It blew a hurricane and in the afternoon rained hard. So we loafed about, gossiped, called on some other messes, and in the evening dined with Captain Welsh 2/6 West Yorks. He gave us a bully dinner, and several young officers were there—Captains Humphrey and Baker—they did not look twenty. Humphrey, Welsh said, had a wonderful record for bravery. He had already been decorated.