as said
to be only "a few kilometres" away. It was in fact more than twenty. I
discovered that it was on the Tagliamento and I supposed that, once
across the river, we should be momentarily safe from risk of capture,
and, if ammunition was forthcoming, our Batteries might once more come
into action. Meanwhile we should push on as soon as possible. On the
other hand the men were very tired, having been marching for twenty-four
hours, with only a few short breaks. A few hours' sleep now might be
worth a lot to them later on.

Several civilians came up to me and asked when the Germans would be
here. "This is my house," one old man explained, pointing to a small
house near the Hospital, "and I shall have to leave everything if I go
away. But I cannot stay....," and he began to cry.

In the early hours of the 29th I put some of our most footsore
stragglers on to lorries going in the direction of Latisana. The rest
marched off under Henderson, one of the officers from Raven's
Headquarters, who had come with me in the car to San Giorgio. Meanwhile
I was keeping a look-out for our guns in the dense columns of traffic
slowly crawling past. I saw guns belonging to other Batteries, and was
told that some of ours were further behind. It was just getting light,
when a tractor appeared drawing two of our guns and one belonging to
another British Battery, which we had picked up on the road a long way
back with only three gunners in charge of it, and which would certainly
have been lost, if we had not taken it in tow. But, as the result of
this additional load, our tractor had been breaking down all the way
along, and had fallen almost to the rear of the retreating column. It
had a damnable and useless accumulator, but there was no means of
changing this. With the tractor and guns were Winterton, Darrell, and
Leary, also the Battery Quartermaster Sergeant and two of our lorries.
They told me Manzoni was well on ahead with the other two guns and I
told them that the Major and the bulk of the dismounted party must also
be a good distance ahead, as stragglers from this party had appeared
here many hours before.

We were now the last British guns on the road, a post of honour which we
continued to hold. I was delighted to find that I was now entitled, by
reason of seniority, to take command. I sent on the two lorries with
Winterton and Darrell, to get in touch as soon as possible with the two
guns in front and the Major's party. Leary a