or the brigades on their right.

The 15th Brigade had really been very lucky, and had neither been
shelled nor attacked very heavily, and consequently we were pretty
fresh and undamaged. I forget if we got any definite message to
retire, and if so, when, but it was fairly obvious that we couldn't
stay where we were much longer. The Dorsets were quite happy in
Troisvilles and thereabouts, but the 9th Brigade on their left had had
a very bad time, and were already beginning to withdraw, though in
good order.

This being so, I sent orders to the battery of the 15th R.F.A. Brigade
in my front to retire before they got cut off; and they executed it
grandly, bringing up the horses at a gallop, swinging round, hooking
in, and starting off at a canter as if at an Aldershot field-day,
though they were under heavy shell and rifle fire all the time.

Only two horses and about two men were hit altogether, and though all
these were apparently killed, the men got up after a little and were
brought safely off with the Bedfords.

The K.O.S.B.'s were now falling back on us from the right, and they
were strung out along the Norfolks' late position, and almost at right
angles to our line, for the Germans were pressing us there, and heavy
rifle fire was breaking out there and nearly in our right rear. Then I
ordered the Cheshires and after them the Bedfords to retire, which
they did quite calmly and in good order; and lastly came the Dorsets,
very well handled by Bols and forming a rear-guard to the rest of the
troops hereabouts. His machine-guns under Lieut. Wodehouse had been
doing excellent work, and the shooting of both Bedfords and Dorsets
had had a great effect in keeping off the German attack hereabouts.

By this time units had become a bit mixed, and lines of troops
belonging to different battalions and even different brigades were
retiring slowly over the open ground and under a heavy fire of
shrapnel--which by the same token seemed to do extraordinarily little
damage. It was difficult to give a definite point for all these troops
to move on, for we had been warned against retiring through villages,
as they were naturally made a cockshy of by the enemy's guns. Reumont
was being already heavily bombarded, and though we had instructions to
fall back south-westwards along the road to Estrees, this road passed
through Reumont. I did not know how to get comfortably on to it
without going through some village, so gave a general dir