Eh? Oh, just an ordinary front-line trench, you know; rather chipped
about, of course, by the Boche heavies, you know; but--oh, hang it, you
know what the ordinary fire trench looks like; along the north side of
the Mametz Wood we were. What? Oh, yes, we were packed pretty close, of
course, while we were waiting; only got there a little before midnight.
My chaps were all in splendid heart, and keen as mustard to get the
word "Go!" I was lucky; met my friend ----, almost directly we got in.
The weather was jolly then; but there'd been a lot of rain, and the
trench was in a beastly state. You know what it's like, after a lot
of strafing, when you get heavy rains on the churned-up ground. It
was like porridge with syrup over it; and we were all absolutely
plastered--hair and mustaches and everything--before we'd been half
an hour in the place. The Boche was crumping us pretty heavy all the
time, but it didn't really matter, because, for some reason, he didn't
seem to have got our range just right, and nearly all his big stuff was
landing in front or behind, and giving us very little but the mud of
it.
What did worry me a bit was his machine guns. His snipers, too, seemed
fairly on the spot, though how the devil they could be, with our
artillery as busy as it was, I can't think. But I know several of my
sentries were laid out by rifle bullets. I particularly wanted to let
the others get a smoke when they could, seeing we'd be there three or
four hours; helps to keep 'em steady in the waiting, you know; but we
had to be mighty careful about matches, the Boche being no more than a
hundred yards off.
Just before 3 I got my position, right in the middle of my company. We
were going over at 3:25, you know. The trench was deep there, with a
hell of a lot of mud and water; but there was no set parapet left; just
a gradual slope of muck, as though cartloads of it had been dropped
from the sky by giants--spilt porridge. I wanted to be first out, if I
could--good effect on the men, you know--but I couldn't trust myself in
all that muck, so I'd collared a rum-case from ----'s dugout, and was
nursing the blooming thing, so that when the time came I could plant it
in the mud and get a bit of a spring from that. Glad I did, too.
I passed the word along at a quarter past to be ready for my whistle;
but it was all you could do to make a fellow hear by shouting in his
ear. Our heavies were giving it lip then, I can tell you. I was in a
devil of a stew lest some of my chaps should get over too soon. They
kept wriggling up and forward in the mud. They were frightfully keen to
get moving. I gathered from my Sergeant their one fear was that if we
couldn't get going our artillery would have left no strafing for us to
do. Little they knew their Boche, if they thought that.
I thought I could just make out our artillery lift, about a minute and
a half before the twenty-five, but I wouldn't swear to it. On the
stroke of the twenty-five I got a good jump from my rum-box, and fell
head first into a little pool--whizz-bang hole, I suppose; something
small. It loosened two of my front teeth pretty much. I'd my whistle in
my teeth, you see. But I blew like blazes directly I got my head up.
Never made a sound. Whistle full of mud. But it didn't matter a bit.
They all saw me take my dive, and a lot were in front of me when I got
going. But I overhauled 'em, and got in front.