think
nearly half of my company volunteered, but I was among the first eighteen
to be picked. We were armed with grenades enough to do an hour's bombing.
Two of the men were detailed to keep renewing the sandbags as they were
torn down by the boches' constant bombing. The German grenades, set with a
time fuse, exploded a few seconds after leaving the thrower's hand. The
boches were evidently nervous about these grenades, for they almost
invariably cut the time fuse too long or threw the bomb too soon after
cutting it, so that our men frequently caught the unexploded grenades and
hurled them back at the Germans.

The first two to go "west" when our volunteer party got into action were
the sandbag men, and at the end of that hour there were only four of us
left to come out of that Hell, ten being killed and four badly wounded.
After our turn, volunteers were entirely out of the question, so each
section had to take an hour at it. The trench point where the bombing
occurred was called the "Glory Hole," and it was well named.

Upon getting back to the trench, I swore off "bombing," and decided that I
would stick to scouting, although almost all the old scouts had been
killed. Why I was not, is still a mystery to me. After a few days at the
"Glory Hole" we were sent to the rear to billets.

You will remember that there were thirteen bullet holes in the Potsdam
bugle which I brought back from the charge on the German trenches near La
Bassee. How many of them were made after the bugle came into my possession
and was put in my pack, I do not know, but, at any rate, I believe that
thirteen is my lucky number. This is the reason: After a short rest in
billets, we were returned to a portion of the trench near a part we had
occupied before. The regiment had been recruited up to full strength
again, and I can tell you that there were very few of the original Black
Watch left. In fact, the personnel that we now had was almost a third
regiment. In order to reach the high broken ground to our right, where
there was a great deal of patrolling and scouting to be done, it was
necessary to cross an absolutely exposed strip of ground about thirty
yards long. So many men had been killed here that we called it "crossing
the bar" when we had to traverse this neck of land. You must remember, we
did not have a decent air fleet in those days and infantry patrolling and
scouting were much more important than they are to-day. From the high
ground