In these pages I give to the public, for what they are worth, my own personal impressions of the people and things I saw and with whom I came into contact. I hope I have revealed the late Colonel Best-Dunkley to the public just as he was—as he appeared to me and as he appeared to others. I believe that in this I am doing right. "Paint me in my true colours!" exclaimed Cromwell to Lely. That is all that any hero—and Best-Dunkley was certainly a hero—can conscientiously ask. And I am sure it was all Best-Dunkley himself would ever have asked. He was a brilliant young man, endowed with a remarkable personality. It is right that his memory should be preserved; and if his memory is to be preserved it must be the memory of the Best-Dunkley we knew.
The battalion which Best-Dunkley commanded has, since his death, achieved great things and acquired great fame under the still more brilliant leadership of his successor, Colonel Brighten; but we must never forget that it was Best-Dunkley who led it on the glorious day of Ypres and that it was the tradition which he inspired which has been one of the strongest elements of esprit de corps in the 2/5th Lancashire Fusiliers. All who served under Best-Dunkley remember the fact with a certain amount of pride, however unfavourably his personality may have impressed itself upon them at the time—for "All times are good when old!"
I am fully aware of the many imperfections of this book; but if it succeeds at all in vividly recalling to those who were in the Ypres Salient in 1917 the atmosphere of that time, and if it should encourage others to risk a similar venture, I shall feel amply rewarded.
FOOTNOTE:
[1] Quoted with Mr. Moult's permission.
CONTENTS
| CHAPTER | PAGE | |
| Foreword | [vii] | |
| I | Off to the Front | [1] |
| II | The Prison | [26] |
| III | Enter Best-Dunkley | [49] |
| IV | Millain | [57] |
| V | The March | [63] |
| VI | The General's Speech | [77] |
| VII | The Vale of Acquin | [81] |
| VIII | Back to the Salient | [103] |
| IX | Bilge Trench | [113] |
| X | The Ramparts | [128] |
| XI | Mustard Oil | [136] |
| XII | The City and the Trenches | [146] |
| XIII | Relief | [164] |
| XIV | Watou | [168] |
| XV | The Days Before | [179] |
| XVI | The Battle of Ypres | [187] |
| APPENDICES | ||
| I | Murray and Allenby | [227] |
| II | The Infantry at Minden | [229] |
| III | General Rawlinson and Ostend | [230] |
| IV | Edward III and the Order of the Garter | [231] |
| V | Goldfish Château | [233] |