The Story of the Great War, Volume 8: Victory with the Allies; Armistice; Peace Congress; Canada's War Organizations and vast War Industries; Canadian Battles Overseas
History
The Story of the Great War, Volume 8: Victory with the Allies; Armistice; Peace Congress; Canada's War Organizations and vast War Industries; Canadian Battles Overseas
World War, 1914-1918
On the day after the attack, when the space between the British and
German lines was swept by a heavy shell and rifle fire, a wounded man
was observed lying in the open. Lance Corporal E. A. Barrett of the
4th Battalion, who had been steward of the Edmonton Club, at once
volunteered to go out and bring the wounded man in. This act he
successfully carried out in safety though in clear view of the enemy
who made him their special target.
A few days later Lieutenant Houghton of Winnipeg, machine-gun officer
of the 8th Battalion, noticed a British soldier lying near a German
trench and evidently badly wounded. When dark set in, with the
assistance of Private G. F. Clark of the 8th Battalion, Winnipeg
Rifles, they dug a hole in the parapet, and Clark went out and brought
in the wounded man. A bullet through Clark's cap showed how narrowly
he had escaped with his life. As the opponents' trenches here were not
more than thirty-five yards apart the Germans must have been napping,
as they failed to get him. After the rescue of the wounded man Private
Clark went out and brought in a machine gun which the Canadians had
been forced to abandon near the German trenches in the recent attack.
For several days after the attack the Canadians were under heavy
artillery fire, when they were relieved, and the headquarters moved to
the north. Here they occupied a trench line taken over from the
British.
On Dominion Day the trenches were decorated with the flowers of
France, which seemed to enrage the Germans, who proceeded to destroy
the ornamentation by concentrated fire. Back of the lines the men of
the Dominion celebrated the holiday with athletic sports, the pipers
of the Scottish Canadian battalions enlivening the occasion by playing
the national airs of Great Britain and the Allies.
CHAPTER XIII
THE SECOND AND THIRD CANADIAN DIVISIONS--BATTLES OF ST.-ÉLOI AND
SANCTUARY WOOD--VICTORY AFTER DEFEAT
During the summer various units of the Second Canadian Division
arrived in England and went into training at Shorncliffe, where they
were more fortunate than the First Division, who worked through months
of rain, while they had the benefit of sunny summer weather.
Major General Turner took over the command from General Steele, who
remained to command the troops at Shorncliffe. On September 5, 1915,
the transportation of the troops to Havre was begun. Eight battalions
were left in reserve at Shorncliffe.
The First Division in the latter part of summer held a sector whose
right rested on the northern edge of Ploegsteert. As the troops of the
Second Division joined the fighting line the sector was extended
northward until the left rested on a point a short distance south of
St.-Eloi. The Second Division took over the northern line ending by
St.-Eloi, while the First occupied the Ploegsteert area to the south.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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