e being brought to
bear along both sides of the Ypres-Roulers railroad.

The British fought bravely, but it was impossible for them to hold out
against the avalanche of lead. First the right of a brigade went to
pieces and then its center and the left of another brigade south of it
were forced back. Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry held
fast. The Second Essex Regiment also made some little success for
their side by annihilating a small detachment of Germans; but that was
more than offset by the breaking of the center of another brigade,
after which the First Suffolks were surrounded and put out of the
fight. Finally the Germans pushed their way on to Frezenberg. Sir
Herbert Plumer realized by the middle of the afternoon that a
counterattack was necessary. He had held two battalions in reserve
along the Ypres-Menin Road. He also had five battalions with him and
reenforcements in the form of a brigade of infantry had arrived at
Vlamertinghe Chateau, back of Ypres. He sent the First Royal
Warwickshires, the Second Royal Dublin Fusiliers, the Second Surreys,
the Third Middlesex, and the First York and Lancaster Regiments into
the break in the line with the result that Frezenberg was retaken.
This victory was short-lived, however; for the German machine-gun fire
was too fierce for the men to withstand. The British retired to a new
front which ran north and south through Verlorenhoek. The Twelfth
London Regiment, on the left, though it lost many men, managed to get
to the original line of trenches. Next the British were menaced from
the north and east. Great bodies of Teutons rushed from the woods
south of the Menin highway, when others rushed down the Poelcappelle
Road and took Wieltje, which is only about two miles from Ypres.

The fighting continued all night, but shortly after midnight the
British charged with the bayonet and retook Wieltje as well as most of
that section to the north of it which they had lost. Early on May 9,
1915, the fighting was continued, and, in the afternoon, the Germans
charged from the woods in a vain attempt to take Ypres after a severe
bombardment of the British trenches. An attacking party of five
hundred was slain north of the town. On the eastern side of the
salient there were five distinct attacks. An attempt to capture the
Chateau Hooge was made early in the evening, only to result in heaping
the ground with German dead. The day closed with 150 yards of British
trenches in the