The Germans thundered on towards their fancied safety; then there were crashes from the French artillery, and shells went plump into the horsemen and practically annihilated them. Horses and men were shattered, and of those who escaped the French took about one hundred and fifty prisoners. It was a fine little performance, and helped us to fix in our memories the first meeting with the Frenchmen on the Marne.
The artillery fire on the Marne was awful in its destructiveness and earsplitting in its noise--sometimes the very air seemed to be solid matter that was broken into chunks and knocked about you; but we soon got used to it all, and laughed and smoked and joked in the trenches, where, at the back, we had dug-outs which we called rabbit-hutches. These were shelter-places, well covered at the top, and were most useful protections against shells. When the enemy’s fire became too hot we would go into our rabbit-hutches.
About noon on the 6th we had re-formed and advanced to the bank of the river, and there we found that we were opposed to a large body of Germans and that they had howitzer batteries with them. These howitzers do deadly mischief, and the fumes from their lyddite shells are perfectly poisonous--they spread through a good big patch of air and suffocate the men. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when the Germans began to pour into us a fearful fire, and we were enfiladed; but our trenches gave us some fine shelter, and the Germans did not have their own way for long, nor did they do much damage at that point. Here again the British had ready one more of the many surprises that the Germans met with on the banks of the Marne. One of our batteries of short howitzers, four guns, went along the river bank and hid in some bushes on the right of the German howitzers, while a battery of our field artillery dashed up and took a commanding position which got the Germans between two fires. Then the command was given, “Ten rounds rapid fire!”
But ten rounds were not needed--only four were fired before the German battery was put to rest. But the crippling of the German howitzers did not seem to have much effect on the enemy at that point, for they rushed up more of the infantry, which, brought along by immense numbers of trains and motors, literally swarmed over the countryside.