Our captain cried out, “Now you’ve got ’em, men!” But we hadn’t. Their artillery begins with that to fire more hellish than ever, and before you could almost think what to do a fresh lots of the “sausages” came along, and we had to beat a retreat.
During the retreat one of our sergeants was wounded and fell. With that our captain runs back and tries to lift him. As he was doing so he was struck in the foot, and fell over. We thought he was done for, but he scrambles up and drags the sergeant along until a couple of us chaps goes out to help ’em in. You should have seen his foot when he took his boot off--I mean the captain. It wasn’t half smashed.
How a number of British troops made a dash in the night to save some women and children from the Germans was told by Lance-corporal Tanner, of the 2nd Oxfordshire and Bucks Light Infantry. On the Sunday the regiment arrived at Mons.
We took up our position in the trenches, he said, and fought for some time. In the evening the order came to retire, and we marched back to Conde, with the intention of billeting for the night and having a rest. Suddenly, about midnight, we were ordered out, and set off to march to the village of Douai, some miles away, as news had reached us that the Germans were slaughtering the natives there.
It was a thrilling march in the darkness, across the unfamiliar country. We were liable to be attacked at any moment, of course, but everyone was keen on saving the women and children, and hurried on. We kept the sharpest lookout on all sides, but saw nothing of the enemy.
When we reached Douai a number of the inhabitants rushed out to meet us. They were overjoyed to see us, and speedily told what the Germans had done. They had killed a number of women and children. With fixed bayonets we advanced into the village, and we saw signs all around us of the cruelty of the enemy.
Private R. Wills, of the Highland Light Infantry, who also took part in the march to the village, here continued the story.
We found that most of the Germans had not waited for our arrival, and there were only a few left in the place. However, we made sure that none remained there.
We started a house-to-house search. Our men went into all the houses, and every now and then they found one or two of the enemy hiding in a corner or upstairs. Many of them surrendered at once, others did not.