Chevalier of the Legion of Honour
June—November, 1915
III
FESTUBERT
Chevalier of the Legion of Honour
June—November, 1915
The dark hour came for the 6th Scottish Rifles on June 15th, and in it Captain Lusk found his great opportunity for the service which he was at all times so ready to give. It was for that service that the French Government afterwards honoured him, and for it he is remembered by many in the Regiment and beyond it.
His own account is contained in a letter to Colonel Kay, who was wounded at an early stage of the engagement:—
THURSDAY, JUNE 24, 1915.
DEAR COLONEL,
You must be wearying for news of the Battalion, and I seem to have allowed far too long a time to pass without reporting to you what happened after you left. Truth to tell there has been little inclination to write to anyone these last days, and a real shrinking from having to tell all that must be told. First of all let me say how glad I am to hear that you are getting on well. Colville writes to me to say that you and Hill and he are at the same hospital. We have been anxious about Hill, but later news seems better. I don't know what news you have already had about things, so will you forgive me if I repeat things you already know?
It had been arranged that on the night of the fight Hamilton and I would bring up water in dixies to the reserve trenches after dark, and furnish a carrying party for this from the transport men.
I got together thirty men for this, took both watercarts down to the cross roads in the ruined village of ——[[1]], filled the dixies there, and I reached the reserve trenches with the first lot about 10.45 p.m. How I wished then that we had come earlier, but we had purposely come about one hour later than the usual time. I found the Doctor in his dug-out doing simply splendid work, and it was from him that I learned the state of affairs—how that so many of the Officers had been killed and so many more wounded. The Sergeant-Major was wrestling with an ammunition party, and they were dropping shells pretty thickly round us.