Last Saturday afternoon, after I had been hearing confessions amongst them, four or five of the Irish lads waited to see me. I went for a walk with them around an old moat and as we stood looking at a stone tablet that commemorated the victory of some Duke of Lorraine over a Duke of Burgundy four hundred years ago, Billy Elwood put the question, “Father, do you think we’ll be afraid?” “Not you,” I said, “not a bit of it. You may feel rather tight across the chest for the five minutes before you tear into it, but when you get going you’ll forget even that, because your blood will be up.” “I believe you,” he said. “Of course you know none of us are afraid and we are all anxious to have a try at it, but it’s our first time in a thing of this sort and the only worry we have is that something might go wrong inside of us and spoil the good name of the Irish.” Before the raid started there was an amusing little interlude. Corporal Bob Foster of Company D had a little Irish flag given to him by Sergeant Evers of the Band, and the lads were determined that that flag would go over the top in the first organized attack made by the regiment. A young officer, not of our Division, who had been sent as an observer, saw the flag stuck at the top of Foster’s rifle and felt it his duty to protest against it. After a short parley Bootz demanded, “What are you here for, anyway.” “I’m an observer,” was the response. “Then climb a tree and observe, and let me run this raid.” Our artillery was busy bombarding the position that was to be the object of assault and at 7:35 P. M. the men went out through our wires under cover of darkness and took up their position near the _chicanes_ (passages) in the enemy wire, which had been reconnoitered the night before. Our artillery laid down a barrage at 7:50 for a space of three minutes upon which the front line advanced and got possession of the German trenches without opposition, as the Germans had evacuated them during the heavy bombardment of the past two days. They were just in time in reaching shelter for the German artillery began to shell their own abandoned line most vigorously. The trouble about this attack was that our own artillery preparation had been too good. The Germans could not help inferring that this point was to be made the object of an assault, so they drew back and waited until the infantry had reached the position. Then they turned on them the full force of artillery and machine gun fire from positions further back, leaving to the assaulters the choice between getting back to their own lines, or attacking an unknown and well defended position in the dark. The French Officer in charge gave the order to retire. During this period Edward Maher of Company B must have been killed because no word of him was ever received. Corporal William Elwood and Joseph Miller of Company C were fatally wounded. Badly wounded were Sergeants John F. Scully, Fred Almendinger and Martin Gill of