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BEING THE NARRATIVE OF BATTERY A OF THE 101st FIELD ARTILLERY

Page 126

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position;—one that we never forgot afterwards. By the time we had our guns "laid in", trail pits dug, and ammunition sorted out, it was well towards midnight. As everybody was pretty well tired out, all the cannoneers with the exception of the gun guards, went off to sleep, the digging of protective trenches being put off till the next morning. About 6 A. M. the Germans opened up a savage bombardment of 77's which literally swamped the area around us. The second section's ammunition pile was struck. Shells were blowing up in all directions. No one could stay there and live. Everybody made for some trenches about 100 metres away. But the damage had been done. Phil Cunningham and Laurence Williams were instantly killed; Seth Eldridge was mortally wounded and Jack Dunn, George Tyler, Ed. Martin and Parker, the medical man, were all seriously wounded. From then on, it made no difference what time of night we established our position, we never stopped to lie down until good, deep, shelter trenches had been dug first!

                In addition to our casualties, the first section gun, old "Lil," was found to be too badly damaged to use any more. We hated to turn it in, as it was a wonderful piece and had always worked like a charm, but,—c'est la guerre.

                During July 19 no further advance was made by our Division. We had to wait for the forces farther north to advance before we attempted to push in the pocket opposite us. We, however, harassed the German lines continually, to prevent as far as possible their bringing up reserves and supplies. We shelled all the roads around Etrepilly, the wooded areas back

 

 

 

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