Читать книгу The War History of the 1st/ 4th Battalion, 1914-1918. The Loyal North Lancashire Regiment онлайн

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Considerable confusion was caused owing to the mist and the employment by the enemy of smoke bombs, the four platoons in reserve not being called upon for this reason, though all their officers were killed and they suffered many other casualties. The operation was a costly one. Nine Other Ranks were killed, 97 wounded, and 107 reported missing; whilst of the Officers, Captain E. M. Rennard and Captain H. Lindsay were killed, Second Lieutenants O. H. Ducksbury and J. H. Holden missing (afterwards found to be prisoners of war), and Lieutenants De Blaby and A. T. D. Evans and Second Lieutenants E. L. Fairclough and T. A. Bigger wounded. Lieutenant De Blaby died the following day.

On the 9th of August the remnant of the Battalion was relieved by one Company of the 1/5th South Lancashires and marched to bivouacs, where Lieutenant-Colonel Hindle again took over command.

Three days after coming out of the line a large permanent working party of 150 men, under Major Parker, proceeded to the trenches to the 2/5th Lancashire Fusiliers, who were also detailed for the same work, and on the 14th August Major Parker was wounded. The Brigade subsequently left the area. The Battalion which had been strengthened by drafts of 100 men from the Manchesters and one Officer and 110 Other Ranks from the East Lancashire Regiment, entraining at MERICOURT and detraining at ABBEVILLE, marched to billets in SAIGNEVILLE, via CAMBRON and GOUY. Here training proceeded on the usual lines, whilst a lecture was given to the Officers and N.C.O.’s of the Brigade by Major-General H. S. Jeudwine. The General used the tail of a cart as a platform—without warning it tipped up and sent him sprawling in the road. This was too much for the gravity of the troops—and of the General himself. No one laughed more heartily than he did as he picked himself up and resumed the thread of the lecture—this time from the ground level.