Nichols - Defiance!: withstanding the Kaiserschlacht

This edition published in 2015 by
Pen & Sword Military
An imprint of
Pen & Sword Books Ltd.
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Barnsley
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This book was first published as Pushed and the Return Push by William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh & London, 1919.

Copyright Coda Publishing Ltd. 2015.
Published under licence by Pen & Sword Books Ltd.

ISBN: 9781473833562
PDF ISBN: 9781473866935
EPUB ISBN: 9781473866928
PRC ISBN: 9781473866911

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
BEFORE THE ATTACK

CHAPTER II
THE BOCHE IS THROUGH!

CHAPTER III
THE END OF A BATTERY

CHAPTER IV
THE NIGHT OF MARCH 21

CHAPTER V
A GUNNERS V.C.

CHAPTER VI
BEHIND VILLEQUIER AUMONT

CHAPTER VII
STILL IN RETREAT

CHAPTER VIII
A LAST FIFTY ROUNDS

CHAPTER IX
FASTER AND FASTER

CHAPTER X
THE SCRAMBLE AT VARESNES

CHAPTER XI
THE G IN GAP

CHAPTER XII
OUT OF THE WAY

CHAPTER I
THE DEFENCE OF AMIENS

CHAPTER II
THE RED-ROOFED HOUSE

CHAPTER III
AN AUSTRALIAN HAND-OVER

CHAPTER IV
HAPPY DAYS!

CHAPTER V
BEFORE THE GREAT ATTACK

CHAPTER VI
THE BATTLE OF AUGUST 8

CHAPTER VII
SHORT LEAVE TO PARIS

CHAPTER VIII
TRONES WOOD AGAIN

CHAPTER IX
DOWN THE ROAD TO COMBLES

CHAPTER X
A MASTERLY TURNING MOVEMENT

CHAPTER XI
ON THE HEELS OF THE BOCHE

CHAPTER XII
THE MAJORS LOST PIPE

CHAPTER XIII
NURLU AND LIERAMONT

CHAPTER XIV
THE FIGHT FOR RONSSOY

CHAPTER XV
ERNEST IS LOST

CHAPTER XVI
THE DECISIVE DAYS

CHAPTER XVII
WITH THE AMERICANS

CHAPTER XVIII
A LAST DAY AT THE O.P.

CHAPTER XIX
THE COLONEL

PUSHED

CHAPTER I

BEFORE THE ATTACK

B Y MEANS OF a lorry lift from railhead, and a horse borrowed from the Divisional Ammunition Column, I found Brigade Headquarters in a village that the Germans had occupied before their retreat in the spring of 1917.

The huge, red-faced, grey-haired adjutant, best of ex-ranker officers, welcomed me on the farmhouse steps with a hard handshake and a bellowing Cheerio! followed by, Now that youre back, I can go on leave.

In the mess the colonel gave me kindly greeting, and told me something of the Brigades ups and downs since I had left France in August 1917, wounded at Zillebeke: how all the old and well-tried battery commanders became casualties before 1917 was out, but how, under young, keen, and patiently selected leaders, the batteries were working up towards real efficiency again. Then old Swiffy, the veterinary officer, came in, and the new American doctor, who appeared armed with two copies of the Saturday Evening Post. It was all very pleasant; and the feeling that men who had got to know you properly in the filthy turmoil and strain of Flanders were genuinely pleased to see you again, produced a glow of real happiness. I had, of course, to go out and inspect the adjutants new charger - a big rattling chestnut, conceded to him by an A.S.C. major. A mystery gift, if ever there was one: for he was a handsome beast, and chargers are getting very rare in France. They say he bucks, explained the adjutant. Hell go for weeks as quiet as a lamb, and then put it across you when you dont expect it. Im going to put him under treatment.

Wheres my groom? he roared. Following which there was elaborate preparation of a weighted saddle - not up to the adjutants 15 stone 5, but enough to make the horse realise he was carrying something; then an improvised lunging-rope was fashioned, and for twenty minutes the new charger had to do a circus trot and canter, with the adjutant as a critical and hopeful ringmaster. In the end the adjutant mounted and rode off, shouting that he would be back in half an hour to report on the mystery horses preliminary behaviour.

Then the regimental sergeant-major manoeuvred me towards the horse lines to look at the newly made-up telephone cart team.

You remember the doctors fat mare, sir - the wheeler, you used to call her? Well, she is a wheeler now, and a splendid worker too. We got the hand-wheeler from B Battery, and they make a perfect pair. And you remember the little horse who strayed into our lines at Thiepval - Punch we used to call him - as fat as butter, and didnt like his head touched? Well, hes in the lead; and another bay, a twin to him, that the adjutant got from the th Division. Changed Rabbits for him. You remember Rabbits, sir? - nice-looking horse, but inclined to stumble. All bays now, and not a better-looking telephone team in France.

And then an anxious moment. Nearest the wall in the shed which sheltered the officers horses stood my own horse - dear old Silvertail, always a gentleman among horses, but marked in his likes and dislikes. Would he know me after my six months absence? The grey ears went back as I approached, but my voice seemed to awake recognition. Before long a silver-grey nose was nozzling in the old confiding way from the fourth button towards the jacket pocket where the biscuits used to be kept. All was well with the world.

A rataplan on a side-drum feebly played in the street outside! - the village crier announcing that a calf had committed hari-kari on one of the flag-poles put up to warn horsemen that they mustnt take short cuts over sown land. The aged crier, in the brown velveteen and the stained white corduroys, took a fresh breath and went on to warn the half-dozen villagers who had come to their doorways that uprooting the red flags would be in defiance of the express orders of Monsieur le Maire (who owned many fields in the neighbourhood). The veal resulting from the accident would be shared out among the villagers that evening.

My camp-bed was put up in a room occupied by the adjutant; and during and after dinner there was much talk about the programme of intensive training with which the Brigade was going to occupy itself while out at rest. For the morrow the colonel had arranged a scheme - defence and counter-attack - which meant that skeleton batteries would have to be brought up to upset and demolish the remorseless plans of an imaginary German host; and there was diligent studying of F.A.T. and the latest pamphlets on Battery Staff Training, and other points of knowledge rusted by too much trench warfare.

It was exactly 2 P.M. on the morrow. We were mounted and moving off to participate in this theoretical battle, when the chug-chug-chug of a motor-cycle caused us to look towards the hill at the end of the village street: a despatch-rider, wearing the blue-and-white band of the Signal Service. The envelope he drew from his leather wallet was marked urgent.