When our fellows reached St. Benoit they found that the Germans had started a fire in the Chateau, but it was quickly extinguished. The church too, had been set on fire and was beyond saving. When Jim Barry of C. Company saw it blazing he shouted “Glory be to God, those devils have burnt the church. Let’s see what we can save out of it.” With Tierney and Boyle and others following after he ran into the burning building and carried out statues and candelabra which they deposited carefully outside. Having finished their pious work they began to remember that they were hungry. Barry took from his musette bag some German potatoes which he had stored there in place of grenades that had been used up in action, and said, “Well we have done what we could, and now we’ve got a good fire here, and we might as well use it.” They stuck the potatoes on the ends of their bayonets and roasted them in the embers. Just then another party came along with some bottled beer that they had salvaged from the German supplies in Pannes, so they picnicked merrily in the square in front of the blazing temple. It was well for all of us that the Germans had departed so suddenly that they left supplies behind, because it was an almost impossible task to get the kitchens and ration wagons through, on account not only of the poor condition of the roads but of the congestion of traffic. We never saw a worse jam in the whole war than on the main road from Seicheprey to Pannes—tanks, guns and caissons, ammunition wagons, trucks, infantry trains, all trying to get forward along one narrow road, and the whole line held up if a single vehicle got stuck; mounted men and foot soldiers trailed along the edge of this procession often having to flounder through the swamps of the Rupt de Mad. The situation became dangerous towards evening of the second day when a large squadron of enemy battle planes swooped down on our own, and after the fiercest contest I have ever seen in the air drove two of ours to earth and regained the mastery. They did not, however, resort to bombing, satisfying themselves with reporting conditions to their own artillery. Our wagon train had a most uncomfortable half hour as it passed along the road between Beney and St. Benoit. Shell after shell came hissing towards them, but luckily the German guns were firing just a trifle short. If the shells had carried another fifty yards the train would have been wiped out; but the drivers sat steady on their boxes and kept the mules going at even pace until they reached their destination.