In the middle of the battle a driver got wounded and asked to see the colours before he died, and he was told by an officer that the guns were his colours. He replied, “Tell the drivers to keep their eyes on their guns, because if we lose our guns we lose our colours.” Just then the infantry had to retire, and the gunners had to leave their guns, but the drivers were so proud of their guns that they went and got them out, and we retired to St. Quentin. We had a roll-call, and only ten were left out of my battery. This was the battle in which poor Winchester (an old Cornwall boy) lost his life in trying to get the guns away. When the order came to retire it was received by a disappointed force. Such a one was a private in the Middlesex Regiment, who wrote as follows:— It was somewhere in the neighbourhood of Mons, I believe, that we got our first chance. We had been marching for days with hardly any sleep. When we took up our position the Germans were nearer than we thought, because we had only just settled down to get some rest when there came the blinding glare of the searchlight. This went away almost as suddenly as it appeared, and it was followed by a perfect hail of bullets. We lost a good many in the fight, but we were all bitterly disappointed when we got the order to retire. I got a couple of bullets through my leg, but I hope it won’t be long before I get back again. We never got near enough to use our bayonets. I only wish we had done. Talk about civilised warfare! Don’t you believe it. The Germans are perfect fiends. We have already given the experiences of some of the West Kents, who were in the thick of the fighting from the beginning. The following is an account by another man in this regiment, who said:— “We were in a scrubby position just outside Mons from Saturday afternoon till Monday morning. After four hours of action each of our six big guns was put out of action. Either the gunners were killed or wounded, or the guns themselves damaged. For the rest of the time—that is, until Monday morning, when we retired—we had to stick the German fire without being able to retaliate. It was bad enough to stand this incessant banging away, but it made it worse not to be able to reply. All day Sunday and all Sunday night the Germans continued to shrapnel us. At night it was just hellish. We had constructed some entrenchment, but it didn’t afford much cover, and our losses were very heavy. On Monday we received the order to retire to the south of the town, and some hours later, when the roll-call was called, it was found that we had 300 dead alone, including four officers.