On the afternoon of the 15th of June, 1915, the 1st Canadian Infantry
Battalion moved up to a jumping-off position in our front line, with two
other battalions of the same brigade on its right, and a third in
support. The 7th Division (British) was about to make an attempt to
drive the Germans out of an important and formidable position known to
our troops as "Stony Mountain," and the 1st Canadian Battalion had been
told off to the task of covering and securing that division's right
flank of attack. This meant the conquest and occupation of one hundred
and fifty yards of the enemy's front line running southwards from "Stony
Mountain" to another German stronghold called "Dorchester." It was too
big a job to be undertaken in a casual, slap-dash manner or a
happy-go-lucky spirit. Experts prepared it, and the artillery and the
engineers took a hand in it.
We know that our gunners are always eager to fight at pistol range.
Major George Ralston, C.F.A., had two guns of his battery dug into place
and sand-bagged at a point in our fire-trench called "Duck's Bill" by
the morning of the 15th. These guns had been brought up to and through
Givenchy during the night, in the usual way, and from the forward edge
of the village they had been "man-handled" into the places prepared for
them. One was commanded by Lieutenant C. S. Craig and the other by
Lieutenant L. S. Kelly. All was ready before daybreak. The German line
opposite was only seventy-five yards away
During the afternoon our batteries, firing from normal positions in the
rear, bombarded selected points of the hostile front. At 5.45 the field
of fire of our two entrenched guns was uncovered by knocking away the
parapet in front of them. They immediately opened fire; and in fifteen
minutes they levelled the German parapet opposite for a distance of
nearly two hundred yards, slashed the wire along the same frontage and
disposed of six machine-gun emplacements.
Then we sprang a mine close in to the German trench; and then our
infantry went over.
The leading company of the 1st Battalion charged across the open ground
through the smoke and flying earth of the explosion. They were met and
swung slightly from their course by withering machine-gun fire from
Stony Mountain; but the unhit ran onwards, entered the hostile trench
and took and occupied that system of defences called Dorchester. They
fought to the left along the trench; but Stony Mountain itself held them
off.
With the second wave of the attack came Lieutenant Campbell, his two
Colt's machine-guns and their crews. On the way, before reaching the
shelter of the captured trench, all the members of one of his gun-crews
were wiped out. He got into the trench with only one of his guns and a
few unwounded men. He immediately moved to the left towards Stony
Mountain, until he was halted by a block in the trench. By this time one
Private Vincent was the only man of his two crews still standing and
unhit. All the others lay dead or wounded behind him. Vincent, who had
been a lumberjack in the woods of Ontario in the days of peace, was as
strong of body as of heart and a cool hand into the bargain. When his
officer failed to find a suitable base for his gun in that particular
position, Vincent saved time by offering his own broad back. So
Campbell straddled Vincent's back with the tripod of the gun and opened
fire on the enemy.
By this time our supply of bombs had given out and our attack was
weakening. The Germans massed for a counter-attack. Campbell fired over
a thousand rounds from his gun, from Vincent's back, dispersed the
enemy's initial counter-attack, and afterwards maintained his position
until the trench was entered by German bombers and he was seriously
wounded. Then Vincent abandoned the tripod and dragged the gun away to
safety.
Campbell crawled back towards his friends. He was met and lifted by
Sergeant-Major Owen and carried into our jumping-off trench, where he
died.
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