They even piled them up and made barricades of their dead. Towards dusk, though we were still exposed to terrible shell fire, and to move was almost courting suicide, several of our lads volunteered to collect and carry away the wounded. Many got hit in doing so, but they cared nothing. We were taken to a little farmhouse to wait for the field ambulance wagons. Officers were telling us yarns, were sending everywhere for milk and resolutely refused to be bandaged until we were seen to." A wounded private of the Royal Munster Fusiliers told the following story of fighting when the regiment had to bear the brunt of the whole German attack, while the rest of the brigade fell back: "They came at us from all points--horse, foot, artillery, and all, and the air was thick with screaming, shouting men waving swords and blazing away at us like blue murder. Our lads stood up to them without the least taste of fear, and when their cavalry came down on us we received them with fixed bayonets in front, the rear ranks firing away as steadily as you please. All round us we saw them collecting until there was hardly a hole fit for a wee mouse to get through, and then it was that the hardest fight of all took place, for we wouldn't surrender, and tried our hardest to cut through the stone wall of the Germans. "It was hell's own work, but we never hoisted the white flag. One of our men has been recommended for the Distinguished Service Medal. When the man--who was working the machine gun--was killed he came up and took his place. Then the gun was smashed altogether, and his hand blown off with a shell." The nickname of the regiment is "Dirty Shirts," and because of their heavy losses on this occasion it was said that the Germans had cleaned up the "Dirty Shirts." "Well," said an indignant Fusilier, "it was a moighty expensive washin' for them, anny way." One of the Irish Dragoon Guards carried a wounded trooper to a farmhouse under fire. A German patrol called at the house and found them. From behind a barrier the Dragoons kept the Germans at bay. The Germans then brought a machine gun up and threatened to destroy the house. Rather than bring suffering on their hosts or the village the two hunted men made a rush out with some mad idea, perhaps, of taking the gun that had been brought against them. They got no further than the threshold of the door, where they fell dead, their blood bespattering the walls of the house.