But their appeal was too late. We had surprised them. No power on earth could save them; our barrage was perfect and we worked under it steadily. The training over the tapes was partly forgotten. We were eager to reach the Hun trenches; we were out for blood! God, how awful it seemed! Men fell around me gasping, sputtering; but we still moved on relentlessly.
When within fifty yards of the barrage, I signalled to the men to extend. I didn't know how many men I had lost. I saw my platoon sergeant fall just after we had gotten over the top. As they fell, other men took their places from other units. These men had lost their officers and placed themselves under me. I directed them and we moved again.
Our barrage played four shells per minute on a lateral space of 20 yards. The intense bombardment in front of us sent German limbs, bodies and earth all sky high.
Then our barrage lifted to the German support trench, which was called the Fringe Trench. As our barrage lifted, we rushed forward, and immediately took our first objective. Here we halted for one minute to allow our barrage to play upon the Fringe Trench without exposing ourselves unnecessarily. This was in accordance with orders.
One of the men who joined my platoon from another battalion met in this trench an old schoolmate who was in my platoon. As they were close to me, I overheard the following dialogue as they shouted to one another:
My boy shouted to the other man, "Hello, Tom, what are you doing out here?"
The reply was: "I like to fight, Bill, as I always did when I was at school, and being a single man, I came out here to Hunt the Huns." On asking Bill what brought him out, he gave the startling reply that he was married. He had married a widow with a large family. He liked peace and he therefore came here to get it. Each of them had what he wished for!
We followed on until we were within fifty yards of our barrage, which had to play five minutes on this trench. At such a distance, the air is hot and oppressive. I signalled to the boys not to go too fast for fear of moving into our own shell fire. As the barrage lifted, we doubled and jumped into the Fringe Trench, our second objective. There was no opposition. Quite a number of German dead lay about the trench.