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By Root 1663 0

up to help them and, although shell-fire had accounted for some seventy casualties, the last few days had been comparatively quiet. Crask was not alone in suspecting that something was brewing and that the lull was only the calm before the storm for, working as they were at close quarters, he could sense that Colonel Wallace was worried and on edge. Captain Chalmers was a frequent visitor to the HQ dug-out, struggling back with difficulty from the front line, where the bombarded banks of the stream had given way and the water had spread to turn the low ground from a morass into a swamp. Conditions in the trenches were worse – much worse – and so Chalmers explained to the Colonel several times a day. ‘Pitiable’ was the word he used. The line was a pitiable mass of mud and blood, the men were ‘done up’ and in a pitiable condition, constantly asking when they were going to be relieved. There was nothing the colonel could do about it.

It was Crask who received the signal when it finally came through and, suppressing his own delight, handed it poker-faced to the Colonel. The battalion would be relieved that night. Colonel Wallace gave an audible sigh of thankfulness. ‘Thank God for that!’ he said. Then, turning to the Adjutant, ‘Let Chalmers know – and say he can tell the men.’ The message was logged in the small hours of the morning of 8 May. But in the darkness behind the enemy trenches orderlies were dishing out coffee, bread and sausage to long lines of German soldiers waiting to attack.

Pte. H. J. Crask, MM, 1st Bn., Suffolk Regt., 84 Brig., 28 Div.

I’d been on the telephone all night. About 6 a.m. a message came through that the 69th Battery would open fire on the whizz bang battery that had been bothering us. Whether it did or not I don’t know, for the Germans immediately opened an attack. Shells were raining all over the shop – especially round about us so as to prevent our supports getting up. I was in the dug-out with the C.O. and the Adjutant, working the telephone and making ready for breakfast – but that part of the business didn’t come off! All remained intact for about twenty minutes. Then number 1 dug-out next to us was struck by a shell, badly wounding Drew in the head and burying all the rifles, so everyone there scattered for the exit. Sergeant Crabb came into ours. Our dug-out lasted out for about another ten minutes, then a shell exploded just in the rear of the dug-out and knocked the telephone, me and Crabb out of our positions and wounded the Adjutant who was directly behind us. We hardly knew what was happening for a few minutes or how we had got off so lucky. The telephone, chair, table, all had disappeared – with a hole a few yards in circumference staring at us in their place. We all cleared out to the emergency trench which had been dug in the rear of a ditch and which turned out far worse than the shattered dug-outs because we were up to our waists in water – and up to our necks after ducking down with shells raining all around! During all this they had also dropped one on number 3 dug-out, shattering a beam which struck Corporal Pugh and smashed his right leg just above the ankle and also wounded him in the head and left arm. It was the hottest shop I had ever been in! I just had time to get properly soaked through, shaking with cold, when a shell dropped right on the edge of the trench, burying me and Lance-Corporal Game. I was lucky again for, after being helped out, Game was found to be horribly wounded with two large holes in the back, one on either side of his backbone. I took him back to number 2 dug-out (which hadn’t been hit again) and there I done him up as best I could.

All round the salient the air was whirling in a ferment of smoke and flying mud. The din was deafening, shock waves vibrated along the front, and the earth quaked and heaved and blew apart with the force of the explosions. Fields disappeared. Trenches disintegrated. Men were blown to bits. Two miles away from the Suffolks, and separated from them by the front of the 83rd Brigade, the Princess Patricias were having