A Company of Tanks

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William Henry Lowe Watson. A Company of Tanks

CHAPTER I. ON THE XIth CORPS FRONT (October to December 1916.)

CHAPTER II. FRED KARNO'S ARMY (January to April 1917.)

CHAPTER III. BEFORE THE FIRST BATTLE (March and April 1917.)

CHAPTER IV. THE FIRST BATTLE OF BULLECOURT (April 11, 1917.)

CHAPTER V. THE SECOND BATTLE OF BULLECOURT (May 3, 1917.)

CHAPTER VI. REST AND TRAINING (May and June 1917.)

CHAPTER VII. THE THIRD BATTLE OF YPRES—PREPARATIONS (July 1917.)

CHAPTER VIII. THE THIRD BATTLE OF YPRES—ST JULIEN (August 1917.)

CHAPTER IX. THE THIRD BATTLE OF YPRES—THE POELCAPELLE ROAD (September and October 1917.)

CHAPTER X. THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI—FLESQUIERES (November 4th to 20th, 1917.)

CHAPTER XI. THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI—BOURLON WOOD (November 21st to 23rd, 1917.)

CHAPTER XII. THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI—GOUZEAUCOURT (November 24th to December 1st, 1917.)

CHAPTER XIII. HAVRINCOURT TO HARROW (December 1st, 1917, to January 31st, 1918.)

CHAPTER XIV. THE CARRIER TANKS (January 31st to August 1st, 1918.)

CHAPTER XV. THE BATTLE OF AMIENS (August 1st to August 27th, 1918.)

CHAPTER XVI. THE HINDENBURG LINE (August 27th to October 8th, 1918.)

CHAPTER XVII. THE SECOND BATTLE OF LE CATEAU (October 9th to October 30th, 1918.)

CHAPTER XVIII. THE END OF THE WAR (October 31st, 1918, to January 12th, 1919.)

Отрывок из книги

The village of Locon lies five miles out from Bethune, on the Estaires road. Now it is broken by the war: in October 1916 it was as comfortable and quiet a village as any four miles behind the line. If you had entered it at dusk, when the flashes of the guns begin to show, and passed by the square and the church and that trap for despatch-riders where the chemin-de-fer vicinal crosses to the left of the road from the right, you would have come to a scrap of orchard on your left where the British cavalrymen are buried who fell in 1914. Perhaps you would not have noticed the graves, because they were overgrown and the wood of the crosses was coloured green with lichen. Beyond the orchard was a farm with a garden in front, full of common flowers, and a flagged path to the door.

Inside there is a cheerful little low room. A photograph of the Prince of Wales, a sacred picture, and an out-of-date calendar, presented by the 'Petit Parisien,' decorate the walls. Maman, a dear gnarled old woman—old from the fields—stands with folded arms by the glittering stove which projects into the centre of the room. She never would sit down except to eat and sew, but would always stand by her stove. Papa sits comfortably, with legs straight out, smoking a pipe of caporal and reading the 'Telegramme.' Julienne, pretty like a sparrow, with quick brown eyes, jerky movements, and fuzzy hair, the flapper from the big grocer's at La Gorgue, for once is quiet and mends Hamond's socks. In a moment she will flirt like a kitten or quarrel with Louie, a spoilt and altogether unpleasant boy, who at last is going to school. The stalwart girl of seventeen, Adrienne, is sewing laundry marks on Louie's linen. It is warm and cosy.

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Haigh had ridden forward to Ecoust with a handful of Glasgow yeomen in order to keep an eye on the dump and reconnoitre the country between Ecoust and the Hindenburg Line. He started in the afternoon, joining an ammunition column on the way. They approached the village at dusk. The enemy was shelling the road and suspected battery positions short of the first houses. The column made a dash for it at full gallop, but a couple of shells found the column, killing a team and the drivers.

Haigh and his men wandered into a smithy and lit a small fire, for it was bitterly cold. The shelling continued, but the smithy was not hit. They passed a wretched night, and at dawn discovered a cellar, where they made themselves comfortable after they had removed the bodies of two Germans.

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