1 88 Sportsmen Parsons in Peace and War 



our hands, but when they advanced a quarter of an hour later 

 they were caught under the fire of our rifles and machine-guns 

 and broke. On the way back they suffered heavily in the bar- 

 rage of our artillery. In this early hour of a new day about 

 thirty Germans with a machine-gun were seen in a trench to the 

 right, and a party of Shropshires organised a bombing attack 

 and drove them out towards the ruins of a little ' estaminet ' 

 or inn on the right of the position. Here they were raked by the 

 rifle-fire of the company facing that point, and few of them 

 reached their own lines. The machine-gun is now a trophy of 

 the Shropshires, with another taken in a sap later in the day. 

 The men who attacked on the left had similar adventures at 

 first in the flood, and then through sharp bursts of rifle-fire 

 and in the recaptured trench, where they killed some of the 

 enemy, and chased out about thirty more. The Germans' 

 counter-attack at dawn arrived within about thirty yards of 

 this position, but it seemed disorganised and was quickly 

 repulsed. The Shropshires gained and held the lost line. 



" This is the general narrative of the action, but individual 

 acts of courage and self-sacrifice come very clear and shining out 

 of that night of darkness when masses of men struggled through 

 a bog to another quagmire. There was a lance-corporal who 

 was shot badly in the shoulder, but toiled under heavy fire to 

 bring back a wounded comrade to safety. It took some hours 

 to cover that six hundred yards with the stricken man. Another 

 Shropshire lad held an isolated sap single-handed, and armed 

 with bombs, against the German counter-attacks. One of these 

 country boys was severely wounded in the first assault, but 

 crawled into the German trench and stayed there for thirty-six 

 hours, during which he helped to repulse two counter-attacks. 

 One of the Shropshire officers led his men to the assault while one 

 of his arms was hanging by a thread after a piece of shrapnel had 

 struck him. A private in the Army Medical Corps organised 

 rescue-parties for the wounded who lay out in the open under 

 heavy shell-fire, and though hit in the head by a shell splinter 

 or shrapnel bullet, continued his work and helped to save about 

 fifty men. A sergeant went back twice for support over open 

 ground which was being fiercely shelled, and though he sank up 

 to his armpits in the bog, struggled out and fulfilled his task. 

 Another sergeant worked for two hours in the zone of fire, 



