"The Red Watch": With the First Canadian Division in Flanders

by John Allister Currie

The poisonous gasses affected the brain as well as the lungs. Then we realized the full enormity of the gas attack of the enemy. It was not a gas that would knock a man out that they were giving us, but a poisonous gas that would kill.

It was half past six o'clock before the German infantry again tried to force our redoubts.

The gas, shell fire, enfilading fire and machine gun fire they fancied had again done their work, and they ventured out of their trenches and charged against the centre of our line. They broke through between some redoubts in Captain McLaren's line, but the men rallied and drove them out again with the bayonet. The "chop chop" of the Ross rifle told us that there was still plenty of fight in the front line.

The Royal Highlanders on our left and the "Buffs" were attacked at the same time. The German machine guns in the farmhouse were playing havoc with the men in the shallow "dig ins" which they had made the previous night, but the Highlanders held on like grim death. Shells filled with asphyxiating gas were fired at us, and whole squads of men in the supporting trenches were wiped out at each salvo, which consisted usually of four huge shells.

A message from Major Osborne stated that there was a possibility of a shortage of ammunition and he asked for orders and supports. I was sorry to have to tell him that the 48th were to "hold on to the last, and if ammunition gave out to use the bayonet, to hold the redoubts to the end. If the Germans broke through to drive them out with the bayonet."

Orders were issued that the wounded were to get first aid, but were not to be carried out. We needed every rifle and man, and could no longer spare stretcher bearers.

Help was expected, but it was just as dangerous to retire as to hold the forts. We were holding the enemy back and any minute the British might come.

I do not know whether my message got through to him, but I do know that he and his fellow officers carried out the orders.

The Automatic Colt 45, which all the Canadian officers carried, is a good weapon at close quarters. Its bullet would stop an ox, but there is a limit to the rounds that can be fired. In a hard close scuffle, there is nothing like a stout rifle and a long sharp bayonet. I picked one up that had been dropped by a wounded man. It was an excellent weapon, better at close quarters than my claymore. The knowledge learned in the old Toronto Fencing Club of how to lunge and parry was to stand me in good stead during that awful morning. The arme blanche is not to be despised, and when you are at it hand to hand you are relieved from shell fire.

I afterwards gave the rifle to Sergeant Coe, the bravest of many brave men, who carried it when he fell at the head of his platoon in the immortal charge on the orchard at Festubert.