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I brought our gun crews together ready to leave though now I was sure our relief would be cancelled. Most of the fighting seemed to be over to our right by Mont Kemmel. That was where the star shells and ‘Brock's Benefit’ were concentrated, and that is what saved our relief – it was obvious we were not the main object of the enemy's attention.
Our orders came. Although I felt sure we should be recalled, perhaps enveloped by the attack if it spread to our sector which it was sure to do if it were successful, I was glad to go – or I would have been if I could have rid myself of the shame at leaving the infantry.
It is impossible to feel anything but amazement at what the infantry suffered in that war, and impossible to think anyone will convey it. They say that the Spanish infantry never recovered after Rocroi in 1643. When I read about it at school the phrases sank into my mind; now I can believe that what I witnessed was a disaster of that order – nothing less than murder of the spirit of incomparable men. For me the disaster was to have survived and to undergo the mortification of being watched leaving the battle by men condemned to stay.
Loaded as we were it seemed easier and more practicable to ignore the shelling. The whole back area, every path and crossroad, was under fire and to try to proceed by short rushes between flattening out on the ground would only mean that the danger was prolonged.
Carter and Cook met us. “All right?” “Yes, except the fire I told you about.” We had lost no men since early that evening. A small lorry took the whole party, guns and all, racketing and jolting down the remains of the road. Cook said we had been reinforced and the
new men would be waiting for us at our camp. We didn't need more men; if they could have reinforced our spirits that would have been something; more men was nothing.
That night Mont Kemmel fell. No one knew why it was not retaken. “Our chaps did retake it”, an infantry officer told me. “We got off to a good start