With a Reservist in France: A Personal Account of All the Engagements in Which the 1st Division 1st Corps Took Part, viz.: Mons (Including the Retirement), the Marne, the Aisne, First Battle of Ypres, Neuve Chapelle, Festubert, and LoosBolwell, F. A.
History
With a Reservist in France: A Personal Account of All the Engagements in Which the 1st Division 1st Corps Took Part, viz.: Mons (Including the Retirement), the Marne, the Aisne, First Battle of Ypres, Neuve Chapelle, Festubert, and Loos
Bolwell, F. A.
World War, 1914-1918 -- Campaigns -- France
That night the 3rd Battalion Scots Guards, just out from England, came
into the wood also, and a fresh Regiment of Zouaves joined us. We were
all very pleased to think that we were about to be relieved, and I
remember well taking a dozen field post-cards from different men of the
Scots Guards to post as we went down the line. We marched out at eight
o'clock, every one convinced that we were going to have our rest, when,
on reaching the road, instead of marching towards Ypres, they took us
towards the trenches. Even then we thought we were going for our rest,
some suggesting that we were on our way to a meeting-place for the
Brigade; others took it to be another way round--"Yes, _viâ_ Germany,"
remarked some one. Well, we did _not_ get our rest: we went into the
trenches again on _two_ occasions after that, and for forty-eight-hour
stretches. At length we were relieved by the Guards Brigade, and went
back to Hazebruck by easy stages.
I should like to say a few words about Ypres before I close the account
of my experiences there. We were during the whole of the first Battle,
from October the twenty-third to the seventeenth of November, 1914,
fighting in the trenches all the time, with the exception of the first
three days. I was in the Bipschoote-Langemarck-road engagement, in
what is now better known as "the Ypres salient." From the time when
I first went there until October the thirty-first our front line was
fully six kilometres from Ypres town, but between the twenty-third and
the thirty-first of October the Germans gained from us quite three to
four kilometres. We did not regard this as a defeat to the British
arms, as at that time the enemy were, without exaggeration, six to one
against us, and they were also much better equipped with artillery. On
the contrary, I wish to pay my humble tribute to all ranks who served
during that time, short as they were of men, sometimes even putting the
military police into the trenches, to say nothing of the cavalry and
cyclist corps. It was there that we finished off the remainder of what
was the original Prussian Guards, as well as the Bavarian Guards; and
to-day the British nation has to thank those troops who fought so well
during that time, and put a finish to the chance of the Germans ever
reaching Calais, and thence England.
My Regiment entered Ypres not less than one thousand strong, and while
there we had five lots of reinforcements: we came away with only
seventy-five men and one Officer, a Lieutenant. I do not, however, in
my above remarks refer specially to my own Regiment any more than to
any other Regiment in my Brigade or Division--all the Regiments in the
1st Division were splendid: though some may have been a little better
than the others where all were very good.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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