all quiet for awhile and then the storm broke; all
the German artillery for miles was concentrated on this front of about
a thousand yards, and the men were literally blown out of their
positions. It poured rain and our aeroplanes were unable to take
observations, with the result that, where at first our artillery was
firing too far, when they shortened up, they shelled our own men. The
Germans also concentrated heavy trench mortars on the craters, and
after blowing the men to pieces all day, they attacked at night. What
men were left died where they stood. All the bottoms of the craters
were just a pool of thin mud, and when our boys were wounded they just
slid down the sides of the craters and perished in the pool of mud at
the bottom. Some of the craters were lost, and our relieving parties,
going in at night to relieve, what they thought were our men, found the
Germans in possession and bomb-fights ensued. In the meantime the
enemy artillery had a barrage across behind the craters making it
almost impossible for men to get through alive. The 28th were hurried
up and after spending a night in "Dickebush" we were taken up to
"Scottish" Wood in support. Woodrow, Webster, Corporal Grimsdale, and
all the company bombers were sent out from there, and they held one of
the craters. After hanging on the lip of the crater all day under a
constant rain of "sausages" (one hundred pounds of high explosives in
each) they tried to dig in and consolidate, but they had lost half
their number, and then the Germans attacked them from all sides. They
worked their rifles as long as they could, but they were clogged with
mud; and then fought them hand to hand--those that fell never rose
again--slipping down into that horrible mess at the bottom. Webster
saw Woodrow fall, and he and Grimsdale fought their way out; Grim
happened to find his way to our lines, but Webster got lost and for
twenty-four hours, that night and the next day, he lay out there; in
the daytime he had to lie still and at night he couldn't find which
line was ours; and machine guns were spitting all ways. At last he
crawled near our trench and heard the boys talking, and he came in; it
was two days after when I saw him--five days before he had been a
happy, daredevil sort of a boy--now he looked like a corpse with living
eyes of coal. He never got over it, and after the Battle of Hooge was
invalided home, a complete wreck. While all this was going on, "C"