A rough sketch of the circumstances which led up to my being taken a prisoner of war are more or less indispensable. We were called up at a moment’s notice from another part of the line, where our division was in reserve, to a position in front of a line of our trenches lost to the enemy a few hours previously in their attempted advance on Calais. These trenches had been held by Indian regiments, and small blame to them for losing them. Judging from what we saw, they must have had a pretty rough time. It was in retaking these three lines of trenches that I became a prisoner. I think the position was known as La BassÉe Canal position. Our brigade formed up Recognising the immediate necessity for action, and the danger of leaving the flank of the unit on our left exposed, I was compelled to act on my own initiative, being the only other officer in the company. When we had taken the first line of trenches with the bayonet and consolidated the position, not hearing from the scouts sent out to reconnoitre, I went over to have a look at the Boches’ second line. On my way back I was hit with a bullet in the ankle joint, which felt exactly like a blow from a hammer. Strange to say, I felt no pain, and found I could manage to get along by using the foot as a sort of stump. The sensation was very similar to what is experienced when one’s foot goes to sleep. Shortly after this my orderly informed me that the company on my right was preparing to advance, and immediately a cheer informed me that they had done so, and we swept onward again. How I was able to lead the men I do not know, but somehow my ankle seemed to do the work all right. It was about a hundred yards to the Boche line, and rather too far to attack in one rush. Consequently we got down to establish superiority of fire, when to my alarm I found we were being fired at in flank. A reconnaissance discovered this to be a half-company of men without an officer, belonging to another regiment on my left. Immediately I organised them as my supports, and shortly afterwards took the second Boche line by assault. I use the term “assault” for want of a better, since the Boches had vacated their trenches, leaving only the wounded. We hardly had a minute’s breathing-space in this trench when information again came from the right that our men there were advancing, and so on again. Here, however, the Boche really fought it out; but our men, having been properly worked up, would stop at nothing. We gave a good About eight o’clock in the evening the officer in charge of our headquarters company came up to the front line and did most excellent work, helping to send back a good many of the men, since we were too crowded. Here it was that, after the excitement was over, I knew all about my wound, which was paining me exceedingly. However, there was too much to be done for me to lie up with it. All night long we waited for a counter-attack, but nothing happened except desultory shelling and sniping. Towards four o’clock the next morning the enemy’s artillery began to get busy, and when the dawn broke we discovered that the enemy had snapped up to us during the night to within easy grenade-throwing distance. Their artillery grew more and more intense. I noted Towards 8 a.m. the officer commanding the front line paid me a visit, and informed me that he found it impossible to deal with the bombs, having nothing to reply with, and also that the ammunition was running short. He thought the position would very shortly become untenable, in which case he would retire, and if he thought fit would send me orders to do likewise. I never got those orders; and although I had taken every possible precaution to keep in touch with the units on my right and left, the company of my own battalion on my right managed to carry out their retirement before I was aware of it. Owing to the formation of the ground, it was impossible for us to see anything that was going on on our flanks; we were therefore entirely dependent on our scouts for all information. About 9.30 a.m. the unit on my left unexpectedly retired, without sending me any explanation as to their reasons. Then suddenly there was the devil’s own artillery fire, and a big shell landed close to me, and I felt a concussion in my right side, as if hit with a battering-ram. I felt myself lifted, and the next moment was gasping for breath under a heap of debris. My lungs were almost bursting when I was pulled out by some of my men. For a few minutes everything was blank, and then the first thing I knew was that the Boches were in our trench, both right and left. Immediately I tried to get the men out and retire, only to discover that the Boches had retaken the second line of trenches behind us, which had hitherto acted as our support trenches. We had no communication trenches between the first and second lines, owing to the fact that we had no tools with which to construct them. Thus we had the enemy on four sides of us. The only thing to do was to make I am not certain what time the Boches surrounded us—I think about 10.30 a.m. Our strength was then roughly about two hundred men; but we held the trench for five and a half hours, after which there were not thirty of us left. Then suddenly the Boches showered us with bombs. The result was final. Personally, I lay at the bottom of the trench, quite incapable of doing or understanding anything. It never dawned on me that I might actually be taken prisoner alive, for I had accepted it as a certainty that I should be finished where I lay. Unconsciously I wondered what it would be like to have one’s brains bashed out with the butt end of a rifle. Would it be very painful? Anyhow, it would be quicker. And then I remember some one jerking In crossing over No Man’s Land, as it were, I was horrified to see Germans finishing off our wounded with their bayonets. As we were hurried on through the muddy German trenches, regardless of our wounds, we could hear squeals and Of the three men with me, one was hit through the jaw, losing strength rapidly from loss of blood, another was shot through the eyes and totally blind, and the last through the abdomen. It would be quite impossible to imagine their agonies in being forced to walk in their badly wounded condition through the trenches, sometimes up to the waist in mud. Such callousness is very difficult to understand, but it is evidently part and parcel of the Boche composition. One piece of trench through which we had to make our way showed the effects of our magnificent artillery work, as it was literally choked with German dead, over whose bodies we were forced to walk. One of our guards, who was leading, deliberately tramped his way on the bodies of his comrades, numbers of whom were not dead, pushing them into the slimy mud, and when I showed my disgust Moving on again, we encountered small parties of reinforcements going up to the front line. In each case we were shoved out of the trench, although there was plenty of room for these men to pass. As far as I can remember, when we had covered about a mile, one of my men, mentioned before as having been shot through the jaw, collapsed from loss of blood. The guard allowed him two or three minutes’ grace, then pricked him up again with the point of his bayonet. This happened three times. The last time one of the guards, exasperated by our slow progress, At last, after what appeared to be an interminable journey, we stumbled into La BassÉe, where our guard handed us over to another N.C.O. at the outskirts of the town, who conducted us to brigade headquarters. This man seemed more or less kindly, even offering me a cigarette. Almost immediately I was ushered before an interrogating officer, with whom I refused to speak before my two men were taken to hospital; to this he immediately agreed, apparently surprised at our not having received attention at the front With regard to the interrogation, needless to say very little information was gathered from me. On asking for medical attention for myself, I was informed that I should receive everything I required at the station, where I was escorted by another guard. This man turned out to be quite kindly, as on arrival at the station, not finding any evidence of the Red Cross, he helped me to take off my puttees and breeches, whilst I cleansed By this time it was practically dark, probably about five o’clock in the morning. An hour afterwards two or three German officers came in and made themselves as unpleasant and insulting as possible, producing several Dum-Dum bullets, which they accused us of using, discussing amongst themselves the advisability of taking us out and shooting us immediately for breaking the rules of civilised warfare, a decidedly humorous remark from the lips of a Hun. One of the British officers who spoke German argued the foolishness of such an accusation, but to no effect. About eight o’clock the same evening we were removed with a few men in fourth-class carriages under a strong guard to a station on the way to Lille, where we spent the night in an outhouse which had a small stove in it and a little straw. Here we endeavoured to dry some of our clothes, one of our own officers dressing my ankle with his field dressing. Here also some hot soup was brought to us by a German N.C.O., with black bread. During the night, when the stove had gone out, one of our guards noticing some of the sleepers shivering with cold, tried to cover them with some straw. This was a small act of kindness which I shall always remember. We noticed that any little act of kindness such as this was never done by a German soldier when one of his officers or N.C.O.s was present or near at hand. Towards early morning we were ordered to dress again in our half-dry clothes, and about six or seven o’clock we entrained in fourth-class carriages and were taken to |