The Fateful Battle Line by Michael Glover

Author:Michael Glover [Glover, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Military, World War II
ISBN: 9781473819276
Google: b9iXAwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Published: 2014-02-28T04:13:46+00:00

When our Mills bombs were given to us we crept out and equalised spacing. Bayonets were already fixed and magazines charged. We lay down to wait for the whistle. The night was fine, warm and strangely quiet. When at last it came, the sound of the whistle was low so that others could be heard left and right, their slightly different tones blending unexpectedly for the bare second that the whistling lasted. We rose in silence in the dark and moved steadily forward, intent on keeping abreast and in touch. Everything now depended upon local control by junior NCOs, or so we junior NCOs imagined, and it was just as well that we did and felt so important and responsible, whether we were or not.23

I could hear nothing at first but the low clicking of entrenching-tool handles and brass tag-ends of equipment, and here and there a sniff or the clearing of a nervous throat. After a glance left and right for alignment we gathered ourselves for an increase in speed, for the German trench had become plainly visible as a whitey-grey line24 in the semi-darkness. Mounting excitement brought our speed up all along the line to a dash and in a few seconds our first grenades began to explode right in the trench. The German wire I can scarcely remember, for action had begun. Right in front of my two sections a red signal flare soared up from the German trench. It located their sentries for us and there was another volley of Mills bombs and we leapt into the trench while the flare gave us light. I found the trench very deep, perhaps eleven feet, and well appointed. There was little rifle fire and only a few stick-grenade explosions, for we had the enemy completely surprised, but when I found that I was close to a large white flag with a red cross on it draped above the entrance of a deep dug-out, I wondered whether he had collected his wounded here for us to look after, left a few expendable troops and cleared out to defend a position behind or in Poziéres itself. Then I guessed that this was about the spot from which the red flare had been fired and peered cautiously round the near entrance post with a Mills bomb ready. As I did so another red flare, fired from the bottom of the steps, narrowly missed me but struck the trench wall in front, making a wonderful illumination. This was not properly conducted Red Cross business so, taking no risks, I lobbed my bomb down the steps, first giving it a few seconds. I heard a bounce or two and then it exploded. It must have hit a supporting post about half-way down, bursting there, fortunately for those below.

I followed it down and found several Germans in charge, or pretending to be in charge of a dug-out full of wounded. They were not stretcher bearers or Red Cross men of any kind because there was a clatter of rifles and equipment on the floor as I reached the bottom step.

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