Milford chronicle., 1915-05-21
Sunday, March. 9TH. 1915.


ings that war entails. Ed
Sunday, March 9TH, 1915
Near Y.
Dearest Mother and Father
[ do feel so chock full of interest
ing tit-bits to put into a letter to you
all. but il is so hard to write here
picture the conditions:
A room about the size of your bed
room. beautifully papered with gold
frieze and carved dadO, an elaborate
ly carved fire place no carpet, no
glass in the window, no furniture and
IA officers, all their equipment on the
floor, (which is covered with straw,
every officer caked with dirt, un-
shaved, rather petulant, pretending to
be CHEEKY, eating, sleeping, waiting
for the As hours rest CD Shrapnel
bursting within 100 yards every 10
minutes or so. and every now and
then somebody having to get out to
see if the men are keeping under COW
er and not making too much smoke
with their fires! But I'll try to be
intelligible After a trying march
from b. on Wednesday we were
more or less bivouacked by the side
of the road, and next evening march
ed four miles into y. Such an un
canny town by night. We tramped
past two battaliOns of French infan-
try through the town square, most of
the shops open. every window smash
ed, hardly a roof on-then the Cath |
edral, silhouetted with its shattered |
roof against the evening sky, and !
then what a sight-the famous Cloth |
Hall quite so yards long and broad, |
with a fine tower at each corner, a |
.F Nhal
towers shattered, the windows all /
smashed. and everywhere that awful /
deadening stink of burnt wet refuse /
prevailing the streets. Through the
town the battalion marched, over the
mOat, and out into the same fiat cOun
try in the dark, with star shells like
rockets showing up in the distance.
After about three miles we halted by
a barn, two days rations were pro-
Vided for each company. and guides
were chosen. Several shells whistled
over our heads enroute for ". At
last we shifted of in single file, turn
ed in off the road, and then came the
most appalling mile have ever
walked-through a ruined chateaus
grounds. garden seats and lovely
lawns. all ruined. sOdden and marshy.
over ploughed fields, through barbed
4
dark, and the men had to hold one
another to keep connection, through
a wood and then we halted at the
loot Of q steep isolated hill that we
we're to occupy. Here we found our
machine gunners had got adTift. and
we had to send out patrols to find .
them. At last they turned up. When !
we left the road Il was D. m, when :
we had got over this mile il was S:45! i
Now for the hill we had to occupy. \
Up steep hill ran a slushy path :
quite knee deep In mud At one place !
two mea went In over their waists =
Half way up the trench started. The 4
parapet was four feet high and the 4
trench three feet broad and very bad :
We had over 100 men in this trench 7
1t night and had listening posts out 4
10 left and right to report in case the +,
Germans tried to slip through be- n
.weea our Hill nd the canal. All the n
light we had sixty men working Ii
1ard under the hillside making dug :,
puts for the day time. All day this N
liil is a perfect Hades, for the Ger r
mans shell the trench to pieces with n,
and drop their heavy stuff NJ
lver the crest, so you can't leave n
1ore thaR a few men in the trench N
y day. of
All night we worked like blazes, h,
overed in mud and hungry. First we ~
ad to make a path up this sort of Nc
recipice with brushWood, then the
ug-outs, little caves in the hillside q,
Imported with logs cut from the SI
rees. Then came orders for me to "a
o out in front of the trench to re- o.
mnOitre as to the field of fire in the
-Ont OF us, and to report on the a
r.NT -.
the defence generally. / didn't 70,
ke 4 . eit, tor was rather AFRAID Br
being hit by our own men as
andered about, and every time a bo
ar shell went up to light up the nj
,untry l had to fall fiat in the mud
Id slush. l tripped over several Wis
renchmen in my wanderings (query
armans, r. C. NJ and stole a bay ine
let from one as a souvenir. l got
lck safe and filthy, and it was near h ,
dawn. When the men had been ag,
Ithdrawn the shelling started. 1t fo
As awful, but rather funny the way isf,
took" different people Some of
em laughed indifferently, other felt
d looked afraid, other got almost a
] felt rather "swimmy,"
L got on all right and it might
We been worse. I
We had about half dozen men hit, emu
{ bad! What annoyed me was a tioI
,ssage that came through from the yer
.illery fire on it and report" Why ual
ID, observe the result of our heavy par
llery fire on it and report" Why Il '
at they do their own dirty work? ply
wever had to go out, squat in the evel
nch and spy through my glasses cou
the beastly castle. Shell after shell Clai
-st around the castle. / didn't OF
wv how to report 80 yds. N. E." OF {
0 yds. S. W." "Hit S. E." and so schC
telephoned through. That night and
had more digging and the next she
it was a bit quieter. That even tri
we had a poor fellow killed, and man
buried him below the hill. -Four intel
his pals dug his grave and asked half