Wilhelm for a certainty lost an ace in the haystack. Besides our chum
and heavens knows what others, he had sniped the road along which relief
parties were passing up and down; and that same night one of the
soldiers of an infantry battalion of the Warwicks, winding its way to
the front trenches, got his death from a bullet squarely in the neck;
and the Germans having through him gotten an absolutely accurate range,
our gun was wiped out by a single shell, together with two members of
the crew.
Next afternoon, while resting in billets to where I had been ordered, a
shell struck the building, a splinter knocking out the eye of Ed.
Jackson, who was sitting beside me. He was not killed, but his wound was
a blighty, taking him out of the game for good. The unwelcome visitors
continuing to come, we were rushed to our battery of three guns in an
orchard near by; a curtain of sandbags was placed in front to prevent
the flash being seen. As soon as we started firing, rifle shots from our
left scattered the mud on all sides, coming at intervals of five or ten
minutes.
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