The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade: August 1914 to March 1915

It was a long way yet to St Quentin, about eight miles, and on the road and off it were men, waggons, and stragglers in every direction. The jumble of the night had disintegrate...

It was hotter than ever over those parched fields, and the march was complicated, for when we had reached Trilbardon down a narrow leafy path, past a bridge over the Marne which...

As we moved up the steep hill towards Chézy, we came across packs, rifles, and kit of all sorts flung away, broken-down waggons, more dead Germans, and, at last, on a whole conv...

I sprinted a good 400 yards under fire for the shelter of a thick hedge, and when I got there found to my disgust there was a young river to be got over before I could reach the...

Saturday afternoon was spent in studying the ground in our front and looking to the approaches and the arrangements for the Brigade. Our front was of course well covered, but th...

Then off at 5 A.M. next morning, ourselves for Pont Ste Maxence. Major Vandeleur of the Scottish Rifles had just arrived to take command of the Cheshires, who had had nothing bu...

There were already a great many inhabitants on the road fleeing south-westwards, pitiful crowds of women and old men and children, carrying bundles on their backs, or wheeling b...

O that mud! We have heard lots about Flanders mud, but the reality transcends imagination, especially in winter. Greasy, slippery, holding clay, over your toes in most places an...

On further consideration of the situation, I settled to make Brigade Headquarters at the Beukenhorst Château,[18] half a mile farther back, and started the R.E. and a strange fa...

The first question was, Was Canteleux occupied by the enemy? Preparations were made to shell it at 6 A.M., but figures were seen strolling about there which did not look very Ge...

So we fell back about 200 yards through the wood, and straightened up our line--in a much worse defensive position as regards our own bit, but it could not be helped. My suggest...

We had an extraordinarily quiet night--a full eight hours' sleep without any disturbance,--and we were consequently feeling much fitter. But the ball began full early by a viole...

E-text prepared by David Clarke, Christine P. Travers, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) from digital material generously mad...

But during the whole of that winter there was very little for the higher commands to do, except to collect and send up material for the trenches, and to try and keep pace with t...