I was not in at the raid, but heard details of it afterward. The boche rained his gas shells into the selected area and at the same time prevented reinforcements from getting up by putting down a so-called box barrage with explosive shells round the trenches to be attacked.
Our men were taken completely by surprise. Many of them were badly gassed, all were temporarily blinded; and then after a short interval the boche came in. He timed his arrival so that most of the gas had disappeared. Then there was some very fierce fighting—so fierce that a number of our men died afterward because of the exertion following on the breathing of the K-gas.
But gassed and blinded men, however brave, cannot fight successfully against others fresh and unaffected, and the enemy captured a number of prisoners and two Lewis guns.
Curiously enough, during the Somme Battle a few months later we did in properly the regiment which had carried out the raid and captured the official report of the commander of the raiding party. In this report he said: “... the men of the Royal Irish Rifles created a fine impression both as regards their physique and their mode of repelling an assault. Had it not been for the use of the gas shells it would have been impossible to clear the section of trench attacked.”
Rather a fine tribute—and one thoroughly deserved!
Of course surprises of this kind cannot be pulled off twice, but occurrences like this and the bombardment at Vermelles let us see that the enemy intended to develop his gas-shell industry much more than we had anticipated, and our protective measures were taken in hand so as to meet future eventualities. In fact it was about this time that the box respirator was being hurriedly developed so as to protect us against any further devilment that Fritz might send along.
CHAPTER V
Summer of 1916 the highwater mark of the German gas cloud—Their improved methods—The need of speed and secrecy—Gas as a rat exterminator—Causes of Allied casualties—Germans killed with their own gas—Gas masks for horses and mules—Reduced Allied casualties—Humorous incidents.
The great time for the German gas troops was undoubtedly 1916, and from April to August of that year they carried out five big cloud gas attacks on the British alone, not counting several on the French Front and a number against the Russians.
During the interval from the December attack of the previous year they had obviously been thinking hard and preparing lots of gas, for the new attacks showed several fresh features both as regards extent and tactics. Along the lines of making the gas more poisonous, using greater quantities and higher concentration and the springing of surprises, everything was done to make the gas cloud an even more deadly affair than it had been in previous shows. That our own casualties were much less than before, and that the boche in at least one case had a lot more killed by his own gas than we had, were very satisfactory results of all the labour and research as far as we were concerned.