The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-09-09
OFFICER DESCRIBES
 MOVING FORWARD
 OF BIG ARTILLERY
CT 'ng of Positions Fol Ic,. -lg Victory Is Matter of Four or Five
 Days Work


 as was begun during the past few
 weeks in Flanders Is preceded by many
 weeks of preparatory activity. The
 moving up to their new positions of
 hundreds of batteries of artillery is
 only one phase of this preparatory ac.
 tivity, but one which requires an in
 finite amount of labor and transport
 To move battery of howitzers from
 the old vimy ridge battlefield to the
 new Flanders battlefield requires. I roughly four or five days. An account
 of this process of transfer has beer
 written for the Associated Press by Lieut. K. N. Colville. attached to 1000" heavy battery, royal garrison artillery, He writes: We were not sorry to leave Petit
 court. It's last occupants had been
 certain Huns and these folk are not at the best of times very desirable tenants. while their time in occupa.
 ton of Petitcourt had latterly been very far from best not even good,
 in fact. Long before they left the houses had been suffered to fall into
 such state of disrepair that they were driven to living in the cellars. | ' for the purpose. Here they had spent days at time without emerging to the light of heaven, and the sanitary arrangements, whatever they may have been, had evidently broken down badly. STORY OF MOVE 1000" heavy battery, royal garrison artillery, in due course came to occupy the scene of the desolation which it. self had helped to create. This, in- deed, is the tragedy of the heavy gun ] ner's life. He arrives opposite some pleasant tree-swathed village, admires from his point of vantage across the valley the white chateau, and thinks enviously of the comfortable quarters 5 it is affording to the other side. In 4 a few weeks, or a few months it is his turn to occupy that promised land But. alas. he wishes himself back on Pisgah, away from the smell and the filth and the ghastly ruin of this she'll torn place.
 Such spot was Petitcourt, and we were not sorry when we learned that our work here was done, and that we { were to go and repeat the operation else where. For before we could again ply s our grim task there must be brief interval of movement, of the open road, of the comradeship 1t brings to men and horses
 We had a day or two to make prep. arations for our journey, and the time a was fully occupied At pinch we could move at a few hours notice, 3 but trench warfare encourages one to accumulate stores and articles of lux \ ury which may as we'll be properly S disposed of if possible, for nothing of it can be taken except the equipment laid down. So our surplus stores were returned to ordnance. and our odds and ends of furniture, home made beds and tables saved from the ruins of the vil- \ lage, were distributed among our neighbors Then, the day before the start, the guns were pulled out from Petitcourt. and the whole battery 3 united once more, spent the night down at the wagon lines, all ready for an early start next morning.
 RAIN NOW EXPECTED "A light rain was falling, a thing q so common in the battle area that we have ceased to count it as good or \ evil, it is part of the persistent or der of nature. The vocalsts of the d battery caroled snatches of all man. ner of songs. sentimental, burlesque or bellicose One of the last kind proud a ly told how:
 "'We fought them on the Marne, We fought them on the Aisne; < We gave them hell at New Chappelle. N At last the appointed hour arrived and the cortege. half mile long, filed out in column of route on to the road "All morning we wound along; our 4 progress was slow for there was much traffic on the roads and we had two villages to pass through. We could not take the direct north-and south route l to destination, for that would en- tail too muchs crossing of the main lines of transport. We must go back to one of the hubs from which these lines radiate, like spokes, and from \ these turn back along the spoke that ] leads to our assigned point on the 5 iron -girt wheels perimeter.
 Mid d-day brings long halt, in the neighborhood of water troughs and a drink and bite of food for man and beast The rain has lifted, the sound of gunfire has died away be hind us.
 SEEING AFTER BILLETING After dinner one of the subalterns, 7 with a sergeant and an orderly, goes on to see to our nights billet. The essentials which the billeting officer must keep in mind are these. Horses T men and officers must be close togeth | CT. Room to turn the guns there must be, and the standing must be good or the wheels will be deep in the soft | 5 in an open field, into which some of the limbered wagons are taken for the pcketing ropes to be made fast to The other vehicles are parked in by roads. At night the horses are taken l to water, brought back, rubbed down. ! fed and left in charge of picket 1 while the men go to their bi1lets ana the welcome meal which the cooks l have been preparing.
 There are other batteries moving on the same road, and one must go out first in the morning. We elect to move first next morning, so we must be ID and about early. for there is plenty to do before boot and saddlen The I horses must be watered, groomed ana 3 fed, the men must breakfast and their kit be slowed. The routine of this day and it's successors is like that of the first As we move further back. : which we do for the first two days, the country changes. Further back the | country wears a more prosperous air than in the war-worn parts we have come from. Our second night, indeed, ; is spent in a town where the civilian / element outnumbers the British sol. ! diery and the houses are real houses and not a nights lodgings for so many 'hommes' and so many 'chevaux,' with particular attention drawn to the l commodiousness of their caves Occasionally we pass other units moving up Once we pass another heavy battery returning to the line laff ct Ttc