Adams and a handful of men made their way along the parapet to the left and found an observation hut situated on it close by. This was bombed, but no occupants were found inside. Brock is believed to have gone inside this hut for the purpose of examining its interior; there is no authentic evidence that he was ever seen again. Adams stationed some of his men to guard a ladder leading from the parapet to the floor of the Mole and then returned to find us struggling with the grappling anchors as already described. Adams then reconnoitred again to the eastward and located a German machine-gun firing at the parapet from the trench system on the floor of the Mole. Barbed wire surrounded this trench, which interposed between _Vindictive_ and the three-gun battery at the end of the broad part of the Mole. The seamen were then detailed to bomb the trench position, but in doing so they suffered many casualties from machine-gun {201} fire. The position on the parapet was almost entirely exposed to gun-fire from the Mole itself, the lookout station affording the only cover. The German vessels berthed at the inner side of the Mole had also joined in the fight. The terrific noise, the darkness, the bursting of shell, and the hail of machine-gun bullets rendered it exceedingly difficult for any one individual to make such observations as would lead to a connected account of the fighting on the Mole itself. [Sidenote: A Splendid Sacrifice] Just before arriving alongside the Mole, Lieutenant-Commander Harrison, in supreme command of the seamen storming parties after Commander Halahan's death, was struck on the head by a fragment of a shell; he was knocked senseless and sustained a broken jaw. On recovering consciousness he proceeded over one of the gangways to the parapet, where he took over command of the party detailed to attack the Mole batteries to the eastward, Lieutenant-Commander Adams going back to obtain reënforcements. Gathering together a handful of his men, Harrison led a charge along the parapet itself in the face of heavy machine-gun fire. He was killed at the head of his men, all but two of whom were also killed, these two being wounded. Harrison's charge down that narrow gangway of death was a worthy finale to the large number of charges which, as a forward of the first rank, he had led down many a Rugby football ground. He had "played the game" to the end. To quote the final words in the official notification of his posthumous award of the Victoria Cross--"Lieutenant-Commander Harrison, although already severely wounded {202} and undoubtedly in great pain, displayed indomitable resolution and courage of the highest order in pressing his attack, knowing as he did that any delay in silencing the guns might jeopardise the main object of the expedition, i.e., the blocking of the Zeebrugge-Bruges Canal."