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Page 5
"Things had moved so fast that by the time the troops were ready
to advance against the village the artillery had not finished its
work. So, while the Lincolns and the Berks assembled the prisoners
who were trooping out of the trenches in all directions, the
infantry on whom devolved the honor of capturing the village,
waited. One saw them standing out in the open, laughing and
cracking jokes amid the terrific din made by the huge howitzer
shells screeching overhead and bursting in the village, the rattle
of machine guns all along the line, and the popping of rifles. Over
to the right where the Garhwalis had been working with the bayonet,
men were shouting hoarsely and wounded were groaning as the
stretcher-bearers, all heedless of bullets, moved swiftly to and
fro over the shell-torn ground.
"There was bloody work in the village of Neuve Chapelle. The
capture of a place at the Bayonet point is generally a grim
business, in which instant, unconditional surrender is the only
means by which bloodshed, a deal of bloodshed, can be prevented. If
there is individual resistance here and there the attacking
troops cannot discriminate. They must go through, slaying as they
go such as oppose them (the Germans have a monopoly of the
finishing-off of wounded men), otherwise the enemy's resistance
would not be broken, and the assailants would be sniped and
enfiladed from hastily prepared strongholds at half a dozen
different points.
[Illustration: CHARGING ON GERMAN TRENCHES IN GAS MASKS
Each British soldier carried two gas-proof helmets. At the first alarm
of gas the helmet was instantly adjusted, for breathing even a whiff of
the yellow cloud meant death or serious injury. This picture shows the
earlier type before the respirator mask was devised to keep up with
Germany's development of gas warfare.]
"The village was a sight that the men say they will never forget.
It looked as if an earthquake had struck it. The published
photographs do not give any idea of the indescribable mass of ruins
to which our guns reduced it. The chaos is so utter that the very
line of the streets is all but obliterated.
"It was indeed a scene of desolation into which the Rifle
Brigade--the first regiment to enter the village, I believe--raced
headlong. Of the church only the bare shell remained, the interior
lost to view beneath a gigantic mound of d�bris. The little
churchyard was devastated, the very dead plucked from their graves,
broken coffins and ancient bones scattered about amid the fresher
dead, the slain of that morning--gray-green forms asprawl athwart
the tombs. Of all that once fair village but two things remained
intact--two great crucifixes reared aloft, one in the churchyard,
the other over against the ch�teau. From the cross, that is the
emblem of our faith, the figure of Christ, yet intact though all
pitted with bullet marks, looked down in mute agony on the slain in
the village.
"The din and confusion were indescribable. Through the thick pall
of shell smoke Germans were seen on all sides, some emerging half
dazed from cellars and dugouts, their hands above their heads,
others dodging round the shattered houses, others firing from the
windows, from behind carts, even from behind the overturned
tombstones. Machine guns were firing from the houses on the
outskirts, rapping out their nerve-racking note above the noise of
the rifles.
"Just outside the village there was a scene of tremendous
enthusiasm. The Rifle Brigade, smeared with dust and blood, fell in
with the Third Gurkhas with whom they had been brigaded in India.
The little brown men were dirty but radiant. Kukri in hand they had
very thoroughly gone through some houses at the cross-roads on the
Rue du Bois and silenced a party of Germans who were making
themselves a nuisance there with some machine guns. Riflemen and
Gurkhas cheered themselves hoarse."
Unfortunately for the complete success of the brilliant attack a great
delay was caused by the failure of the artillery that was to have
cleared the barbed wire entanglements for the Twenty-third Brigade, and
because of the unlooked for destruction of the British field telephone
system by shell and rifle fire. The check of the Twenty-third Brigade
banked other commands back of it, and the Twenty-fifth Brigade was
obliged to fight at right angles to the line of battle. The Germans
quickly rallied at these points, and took a terrific toll in British
lives. Particularly was this true at three specially strong German
positions. One called Port Arthur by the British, another at Pietre
Mill and the third was the fortified bridge over Des Layes Creek.
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