ry Brigade--the 18th--at
Lichfield. Divisional troops mobilized in Ireland. The order for
mobilization was received at 10 p.m. on the 4th August 1914.

On the 15th August units mobilized in Ireland commenced embarkation at
Cork and Queenstown for England, and the Division was concentrated in
camps in the neighbourhood of Cambridge and Newmarket by the 18th
August.

The period from the 18th August to the 7th September was one of hard
training. Those who were with the Division at that time will also
remember, with gratitude, the many kindnesses shown them by the people
of Cambridge; the canteens and recreation rooms instituted for the
men, and the hospitality shown by colleges and individuals to the
officers. They will remember, too, their growing impatience to get
out, and their increasing fear that the Division would arrive too
late.

On the 7th September, however, entrainment for Southampton commenced,
and on the 9th the first troops of the Division disembarked at St.
Nazaire.

From St. Nazaire a long train journey, which the novelty of the
experience robbed of its tediousness, took the Division a short
distance east of Paris, where it concentrated in billets in the area
Coulommiers--Mortcerf--Marles--Chaume by the 12th September.

CHAPTER II

BATTLE OF THE AISNE

1914

The period 13th to 19th September was spent in the march to the Aisne,
where the Division arrived at a time when a certain amount of anxiety
was felt by the Higher Command. The 5th French Army on the right, the
British Army in the centre, and the 6th French Army under General
Maunoury on the left, had pushed the Germans back across the Marne,
and on the 14th September the British troops had crossed the Aisne on
the front Soissons-Bourg--the I Corps at Bourg, the II Corps at Vailly
and Missy, and the III at Venizel. The French right attack from the
direction of Rheims and the British attack by the I Corps had
progressed much faster than the left, and had reached the heights on
the line Craonne-Troyon, astride the famous Chemin des Dames. These
were now the objective of fierce attacks by the Germans, and the 6th
Division, which had been allotted originally to the III Corps, was put
into General Reserve instead, only the artillery joining the III
Corps. The units of the I Corps were very tired and weakened after the
big retreat from Mons and the subsequent hard fighting on the Marne
and Aisne, so immediately on its arrival the 18th Infa