We lost our first man soon after we landed in France, and before we met the Germans. That was at Landrecies, where we went into French barracks, and were told off into rooms which we called rabbit-hutches, because they were so small--no bigger than a little kitchen at home. We were crowded into these, and the only bed we had was a bit of straw on the floor. The nights were bitterly cold, but the days were hot enough to melt us; so we had a bathing parade, and had a fine old time in the canal till one of our men was missed.
I looked around, and saw that one of our fellows was having artificial respiration tried on him. He came round, and then he told us that another man had gone under the water. Then began a really first-class diving display, many of our chaps plunging into the canal to try to find the missing soldier.
At last one of the divers rose and shouted, “I’ve got him!” And, sure enough, he had brought a poor chap to the surface. Lots of strong arms were stretched out, and in a few seconds the rescued man was got on to the bank, and every effort was made to bring him back to life. But nothing could be done. The man was drowned, and we buried him. This little tragedy threw quite a gloom over us till we moved away.
I am going to tell of a few of the things that happened and affected me personally. They took place mostly when we were retiring, and some of them occurred in the early days, when we were forging along in fearfully bad weather. We were soaked to the skin, and at night did our best to get some sort of shelter by building up the stacks of corn that had been cut for drying, but it was no use. The rain came through so heavily that we gave the task up, and waited for daylight again. When the day came it brought another rain of shells and bullets with it. The place got too warm for us, so we had to leave and retire again. We went on, getting as much shelter as we could; and then we had to halt, and here the sorry discovery was made that we had not a round of ammunition left. At this time there were advancing towards us some men in khaki, and our sergeant, thinking they were our own men, told us not to fire at them.
The order was not necessary, seeing that we had nothing to fire with. As soon as these men got level with us on our flank they opened fire, and then we knew that they were Germans, who had stripped some of our men, or had picked up British caps and greatcoats which had been thrown aside.