I went eastward and mounted a pile of rubbish and timber, all blown into shapelessness and reeking with foul odours, and from that shelter looked across to the Passchendaele Ridge and Hill 40 on the west of Zonnebeke and the line of the ridge that goes round to Polygon Wood. It was all blurred, so that I could not see the white ruins of Zonnebeke as I saw them the other day in the sunlight, nor the broken church tower of Passchendaele. It was all veiled in smoke and mist, through which the ridge loomed darkly with a black hump where Broodseinde stands. But clearly through the gloom were the white and yellow cloud-bursts of our shell-fire and the flame of their shell-bursts. It was the most terrible bombardment I have seen, and I saw the fire of the Somme, and of Vimy, and Arras, and Messines. Those were not like this, great as they were in frightfulness. The whole of the Passchendaele Crest was like a series of volcanoes belching up pillars of earth and fire. "It seemed to us," said soldier after soldier who came down from those slopes, "as if no mortal man could live in it, yet there were many who lived despite all the dead."
I saw the living men. Below the big pile of timber and muck on which I stood was a winding path, and other tracks on each side of it between the deep shell-craters, and down these ways came batches of prisoners and the trail of our walking wounded. It was a tragic sight in spite of its proof of victory, and the valour of our men and the spirit of these wounded of ours, who bore their pain with stoic patience and said, when I spoke to them, "It's been a good day; we're doing fine, I think." The Germans were haggard and white-faced men, thin and worn and weary and frightened. Many of them, a large number of them, were wounded. Some of them had masks of dry blood on their faces, and some of them wet blood all down their tunics. They held broken arms from which the sleeves had been cut away, and hobbled painfully on wounded legs. The worst were no worse than some of our own men who came down with them and among them.
It has been a bad defeat for them, and they do not hide their despair. They did not fight stubbornly for the most part, but ran one way or the other as soon as our barrage passed and revealed our men. Our gun-fire had overwhelmed them. In the blockhouses were groups of men who gasped out words of surrender. Here and there they refused to come out till bombs burst outside their steel doors. And here and there they got their machine-guns to work and checked our advance for a time, as at Joist Farm, on the right of our attack, and at a château near Polderhoek, where there has been severe fighting. There was heavy machine-gun fire from a fortified farm ruin to the north of Broodseinde, and again from Kronprinz Farm on the extreme left. The enemy also put down a heavy machine-gun barrage from positions around Passchendaele, but nothing has stopped our men seriously so far.
The New-Zealanders and Australians swept up and beyond the Gravenstafel and Abraham Heights, went through and past the ruins of Zonnebeke village, and with great heroism gained the high ground about Broodseinde, a dominating position giving observation of all the enemy's side of the country. It has been a wonderful battle in the success that surmounted all difficulty, and if we can keep what we have gained it will be a victorious achievement. The weather is bad now and the rain is heavier, with a savage wind blowing. But that is not good for the enemy's plans, and may be in our favour now that the day has gone well. Our English troops share the honour of the day with the Anzacs, and all were splendid.
October 5
The men who were fighting in the great battle yesterday, and after the capture of many strong positions held their ground last night in spite of many German counter-attacks and heavy fire, tell grim tales, which all go to build up the general picture of the most smashing defeat we have inflicted on the enemy.
On one section of the Front, where the Warwicks, Sherwoods, Lancashire Fusiliers and other county troops of the 48th and 11th Divisions fought up to Poelcappelle and its surrounding blockhouses, six enemy battalions in the front line were either taken or killed. The men themselves do not know those figures. They only know that they passed over large numbers of dead and that they took many prisoners.
The New-Zealanders and the Australians on their right, fighting up the Abraham Heights, took over 2000 prisoners, and say that they have never seen so many dead as those who lay shapeless in their tracks. Other Australians fighting for the Broodseinde cross-roads have counted 960 dead Germans on their way. The full figure of the German dead will never be counted by us. They lie on this battle-ground buried and half-buried in the water of shell-holes, in blockhouses blown on top of them, and in dug-outs that have become their tombs. They fought bravely in some places with despairing courage in or about some of the blockhouses which still gave them a chance of resistance, and sometimes worked their machine-guns to the last. Men lying in shell-craters still alive among all their dead used their rifles and sniped our men, knowing that they would have to pay for their shots with their lives. That is courage, and New-Zealanders I met to-day, and English lads, were fair to their enemy, and said Fritz showed great pluck when he had a dog's chance, though many of them ran when we got close to them behind the barrage. It was the barrage that made them break. The Fourth Guards Division seems to have fought well on the line of our first objective, though after that they would not stand firm, and ran or surrendered like the others.
Owing to the coincidence of the simultaneous attack from both sides yesterday morning, and the complete overthrow of the German assault divisions who were about to advance on us, there seems no doubt that some confusion prevailed behind the German lines and on the left and centre of our attack. All their attempts at counter-thrusts were badly planned, and led to further disaster. They did not advance in orderly formation, but straggled up from local reserves and supports, and were smashed in detail by our artillery. So it happened with two battalions who came down the road to Poelcappelle, but withered away. The Lancashire Fusiliers of the 11th Division in that region say the thing was laughable, though it is the comedy of war, and not mirthful in the usual sense. Small groups of Germans wandered up in an aimless way, and were shot down by machine-gun and rifle fire. On the right of the battle-front the enemy's attacks have been more serious and thrust home with grim persistence against the "Koylies," Lincolns, West Kents, and Scottish Borderers of the 5th Division.