Away from Arras and down on the south of the line a certain body of
Canadians have been having some of the most astounding adventures in all
this battle, and fighting with valor and heroic audacity. They are
officers and men of a machine gun detachment organized in the early days
of the war by a French Canadian officer.
For ten days these Canadians have fought running fights with the German
artillery, have engaged German cavalry and smashed them, have checked
enemy columns crossing bridges and pouring onward, have scattered large
bodies of men surrounding British troops, and in ten days of crowded
life have destroyed many German storm troops and helped to hold up the
tide of their advance. Their own losses have not been light, for these
Canadians have been filled with a grim passion of determination, and
when the supreme test came they fought and died.
Sometimes they fought in long gray open cars, and sometimes they fought
dismounted, with machine guns on the ground; but always they fought
through the ten days and nights, with less than twenty hours' sleep all
that time. These cars near Maricourt gathered together 150 men who had
been cut off and held the enemy at bay, covering the withdrawal of some
of the British heavy guns and tanks. At that time they fought
dismounted, with Vickers guns, in front of the barbed wire. The
Canadians had many casualties, and a Captain's arm was torn away by an
explosive bullet, and at last only a Sergeant and two men of the battery
were left unwounded. One of them mounted a motor cycle and brought back
cars and took back the wounded. Two cars found the enemy massing up a
road, and their machine guns enfiladed the field-gray men and killed
them in large numbers.
Near La Motte they fought heavy bodies of German cavalry, killed a
number, and put the rest to flight. They have not been seen since. At
Cerisy a battalion of Germans, 600 strong, was encountered at a
crossroads by one car, which brought them to a standstill and dispersed
them with heavy losses. Everywhere they have been these Canadian armored
cars have helped to steady the line and give confidence to the infantry.