New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915: April-September, 1915Various
History
New York Times Current History; The European War, Vol 2, No. 3, June, 1915: April-September, 1915
Various
World War, 1914-1918
Soon it became evident that even St. Julien, exposed to fire from right
and left, was no longer tenable in the face of overwhelming numerical
superiority. The Third Brigade was therefore ordered to retreat further
south, selling every yard of ground as dearly as it had done since 5
o'clock on Thursday. But it was found impossible, without hazarding far
larger forces, to disentangle the detachment of the Royal Highlanders of
Montreal, Thirteenth Battalion, and of the Royal Montreal Regiment,
Fourteenth Battalion. The brigade was ordered, and not a moment too
soon, to move back. It left these units with hearts as heavy as those
with which his comrades had said farewell to Captain McCuaig. The
German tide rolled, indeed, over the deserted village, but for several
hours after the enemy had become master of the village the sullen and
persistent rifle fire which survived showed that they were not yet
master of the Canadian rearguard. If they died, they died worthily of
Canada.
The enforced retirement of the Third Brigade (and to have stayed longer
would have been madness) reproduced for the Second Brigade, commanded by
Brig. Gen. Curry, in a singularly exact fashion, the position of the
Third Brigade itself at the moment of the withdrawal of the French. The
Second Brigade, it must be remembered, had retained the whole line of
trenches, roughly 2,500 yards, which it was holding at 5 o'clock on
Thursday afternoon, supported by the incomparable exertions of the Third
Brigade, and by the highly hazardous deployment in which necessity had
involved that brigade. The Second Brigade had maintained its lines.
It now devolved upon General Curry, commanding this brigade, to
reproduce the tactical maneuvres with which, earlier in the fight, the
Third Brigade had adapted itself to the flank movement of overwhelming
numerical superiority. He flung his left flank around south, and his
record is, that in the very crisis of this immense struggle he held his
line of trenches from Thursday at 5 o'clock till Sunday afternoon. And
on Sunday afternoon he had not abandoned his trenches. There were none
left. They had been obliterated by artillery. He withdrew his undefeated
troops from the fragments of his field fortifications, and the hearts of
his men were as completely unbroken as the parapets of his trenches were
completely broken. In such a brigade it is invidious to single out any
battalion for special praise, but it is, perhaps, necessary to the story
to point out that Lieut. Col. Lipsett, commanding the Ninetieth Winnipeg
Rifles, Eighth Battalion of the Second Brigade, held the extreme left of
the brigade position at the most critical moment.
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