d themselves at the mercy of the Reds.

Every effort was made to improve the shell-proof dugouts. Engineers and
doughboys slaved at the toil. Wire was hurried for the double apron
defenses on which to catch the mass attacks of the Bolsheviki. Supplies
were stored at every point for sixty days so that a siege could be
stood. And an Allied fleet was arranged to come as soon as the
icebreakers could get them through the choked-up neck of the White Sea.
And meanwhile the Canadian artillery was strengthened with the hope that
they could oppose the Red fleets and delay them till the river opened to
passage of the Allied fleets coming to save the troops.

The battle-worn veterans of "A" and "D" were strengthened by the men of
"F" Company who had come into the front lines in March and now were
bearing their full share and then some of the winter's end defense
against the Red pressure. Cossack allies and Archangel regiments also
were added to the Russian quotas that had done service on those fronts
in the winter. Russian artillery units also were sent to Toulgas. In
every way possible these desperate fronts were prepared to meet the
heralded spring drive of the Red Guards.

As the ice and snow daily disappeared more and more Americans began
arranging "booby traps" and dummy machine gun posts in the woods. These
machine gun posts were prepared by fastening a bucket of water with a
small hole punched in the bottom above another bucket which was tied to
the trigger of a machine gun or rifle. The amount of water could be
regulated so as to cause the gun to fire at regular intervals of from
thirty minutes to an hour. Through the woods we strung concealed wires
and sticks attached to hand grenades, the slightest touch of which would
cause them to explode. Meanwhile in the rear, "B" Company Engineers, who
had relieved "A" Company Engineers, were busily engaged in stuffing gun
cotton, explosives and inflammable material in every building and shed
at Kitsa and Maximovskaya.

On April nineteenth the ice in the Vaga was heaving and cracking. Kitsa,
the doomed Kitsa, where the Yanks and Scots and Canadians alternately
had held on so many days, expecting any time another overwhelming
attack, was at this time being held by "F" Company. But the British
officer in command had delayed his order to evacuate till Captain Ramsay
was barely able to lead his men across. One more foolhardy day of delay
would have lost the British officer a company