Aug. 25th.
Next morning the Brigade was on the move before daylight, and was told off as part of the main body of the Division, the 14th Brigade forming the rear-guard. We had not had much to eat the night before, or in fact the whole day, and as the rations had not come up during the night, the men had devilish little breakfast—nor we either.
We were told to requisition what we could from the country, but though St André and myself did our best, and rode on ahead of the Brigade, routing out the dwellers of the farmhouses and buying chickens and cheese and oats wherever possible, there was very little to be had.
There were already a great many inhabitants on the road fleeing south-westwards, pitiful crowds of women and old men and children, carrying bundles on their backs, or wheeling babies and more bundles in wheelbarrows, or perambulators, or broken-down carts. Some of the peasant women were wearing their best Sunday gowns of black bombazine and looked very hot and uncomfortable; children with their dolls or pet dogs, old women and men hobbling along, already very tired though the sun had not been up more than an hour or two, and sturdy young mothers carrying an extraordinary quantity of household stuff, trooped along, all of them anxiously asking how far off the Germans were, and whether we could hold them off, or whether they would all be killed by them,—it was a piteous sight. We warned all the people who were still in their cottages to stay there and not to run away, as their houses would only be pillaged if they were not there, but I fear that few took our advice.
It seemed a very long march that day, down the perfectly straight road skirting the Mormal forest and on to Le Cateau. It was, as a matter of fact, only a little over twenty miles, but the hot day, with very little food, was most trying for the men. We had one good rest at Englefontaine, where we bought a lot of food—bread and cheese, and apples and plums, and a little meat—but it was not much. The rest of the road was bare and hot, leading over down-like country past the town of Le Cateau, and on to the heights to the west of it. Many aeroplanes, British, French, and German, were skimming about, and numerous bodies of French cavalry could be seen moving about the downs and the roads in the rear.
We had received orders on the road to occupy part of an entrenched position to the west of Le Cateau, and Weatherby and I rode ahead to look at it and apportion it off as the battalions came up. The trenches, we considered, were quite well sited. They were about 3 feet deep, and had been dug by the inhabitants under, I think, French supervision; but, judging by our subsequent experience, they were nothing like deep enough and placed on much too exposed ground; and the artillery pits were far too close up—though correct according to the then text-books.
I put a few men into the trenches as an observing line, and sent the commanding officers round to study them in case we had to hold them in force on the morrow, and bivouacked the rest of the Brigade half a mile behind them. Although we seemed to have done a good day's work already, it was then only about 3 P.M., for we had started about 3.30 A.M. We got a good deal more food—bully beef and biscuits—here, besides a cart-load of very smelly cheeses and some hams and vegetables and fresh bread, and the men got their stomachs fairly full by sundown.
The 13th Brigade came in a bit later and formed up on our right, but the 14th Brigade, who had been doing rear-guard, did not get in till nightfall, and were much exhausted.
The enemy, however, bar cavalry, had not pressed on in any strength, and we were left fairly well alone during the night.
It began to rain heavily in the evening, and we had a wet dinner in the open. There were various disturbances in the night, especially when some men in the trenches began firing at some probably imaginary Germans; but otherwise all ranks got a fair amount of sleep.