Chapter VI: MAY (continued)

The great German attack on May 13th--Twelve hours of Hun
howitzer fire--Terrible and awe-inspiring spectacle--The niagara
of shell-sound--Around impassable Ypres to Potijze--Close
work by a coal-box--Through a black shell-cloud--The York
and Durham "Terriers"--Bombarded in a Potijze dug-out--The
shell-swept line--Colonel Budworth's wisdom and the German
General's lost opportunity--The super-human work of the
Queen's Bays saves the line--The Life Guards shelled from
their trenches--Bits of position lost wholesale--Good work by
an armoured car--Accurate and invaluable gunning by British
Artillery--German attacks dispersed--Heavy casualties among the
18th Hussars--The splendid charge of the Blues, 10th Hussars and
Essex Yeomanry--David Campbell's 6th Brigade holds a line of
obliterated trenches--Reports of heavy losses--The remnants form
a new line--A talk with two of the Blues on the battle-field--A
plucky Essex Yeoman--Over 1,600 casualties in the two cavalry
divisions engaged--A lost despatch case--In the "huts" near
Vlamertinghe--An unnecessary run up the Menin Road at night--The
flotsam and jetsam of a divisional relief in the dark--A cellar
headquarters on the Menin Road--The position at Hooge--Cheery
K.R.R. cyclists--A gunner's curious story--The composition of
the Salient line on the morning of May 24th--In the thick of
a Hun gas attack--The 28th Division lose their line--The 18th
Hussars outflanked--A "Gas Diary"--The 9th Lancers hold the
trench-line--Fine work by the York and Durham Territorials--The
15th Hussars win laurels--Gas everywhere--A shell demolishes an
ammunition limber--A brave Cheshire sergeant--A wounded Tommy
and his yarn--Huns refuse to take prisoners--A counter-attack by
the Royal Fusiliers--D.S.O.'s and Military Crosses--18th Hussars
casualties--Captain Grenfell and Captain Court of the 9th Lancers
buried at Vlamertinghe--General De Lisle given command of the
29th Division and leaves France for the Dardanelles 223-296

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

THE AUTHOR _Frontispiece_

FACING PAGE

Members of the Staff outside the headquarters of the
1st Cavalry Division 8

Between Philosophe and Vermelles; on the left, the
château wall 9

A bird's-eye view of shattered Vermelles, January, 1915 28

Major Desmond Fitzgerald of the Lancers and a gas-pipe
trench-mortar 29

A Winter Cavalry shelter in France 32

Construction of Cavalry shelter in France 33

The Rue de Menin in March 1915, looking west over the
Menin Bridge across the canal moat 54

Officers under the stone lion on the Menin Bridge at
Ypres 55

The Grande Place at Ypres and the Cloth Hall, March,
1915 66

The Choir of the ruined Ypres Cathedral 67

Scenes of battle of olden time in colours on the shattered
walls of Ypres Cloth Hall 70

A communication trench leading to the front line position
in the Sanctuary Wood 71

Officers of Lancers in their dug-outs in the front line
trenches 86

A dug-out in front of Zillebeke 87

The Zillebeke Church, March 1915 92

German prisoners in Ypres, captured after the explosion
of a British mine near Hooge 93

Damage caused by a 17-inch shell in Poperinghe, April,
1915 150

Red Cross ambulances on the coast 151

A French "75" in the mud of a Flanders beet-field 172

An ambulance which was struck by a shell while carrying
wounded from east of Ypres 172

View showing depth of 17-inch shell-hole in the garden of
a château between Poperinghe and Elverdinghe. 173

Staff Officers at lunch 176

Looking east over the Menin Bridge at the edge of Ypres 177

Dragoon Guards resting in the huts at Vlamertinghe 212

Graves of Capt. Annesley, Lieut. Drake, and Capt. Peto,
all of the 10th Hussars, in a graveyard on the Menin
Road 213

Officers of the Cavalry Corps 218

A typical farm in Flanders, in which British soldiers were
billeted 219

Hussars' cook-house, Vlamertinghe huts, Vlamertinghe. 248

Group of Cavalry Officers at the huts at Vlamertinghe. 249

View of the 13th century château at Esquelbecque 260

"Jeff" Phipps-Hornby and Frederic Coleman comparing
underpinning outside Ypres, May, 1915: the thinnest
and thickest "supports" in the 1st Cavalry Division 261

Map 296

WITH CAVALRY IN 1915.