t reference to one another in different parts of
the field. It seemed as though our generals, after conferring with one
another over telephones, said, "All right, tell So-and-so to have a
go at Thiepval," or, "To-day we will send such-and-such a division to
capture Delville Wood," or, "We must get that line of trenches outside
Bazentin." Orders were drawn up on the basis of that decision and passed
down to brigades, who read them as their sentence of death, and obeyed
with or without protest, and sent three or four battalions to assault
a place which was covered by German batteries round an arc of twenty
miles, ready to open out a tempest of fire directly a rocket rose from
their infantry, and to tear up the woods and earth in that neighborhood
if our men gained ground. If the whole battle-line moved forward the
German fire would have been dispersed, but in these separate attacks on
places like Trones Wood and Delville Wood, and later on High Wood, it
was a vast concentration of explosives which plowed up our men.

So it was that Delville Wood was captured and lost several times and
became "Devil's" Wood to men who lay there under the crash and fury of
massed gun-fire until a wretched remnant of what had been a glorious
brigade of youth crawled out stricken and bleeding when relieved by
another brigade ordered to take their turn in that devil's caldron,
or to recapture it when German bombing-parties and machine-gunners had
followed in the wake of fire, and had crouched again among the fallen
trees, and in the shell-craters and ditches, with our dead and their
dead to keep them company. In Delville Wood the South African Brigade
of the 9th Division was cut to pieces, and I saw the survivors come out
with few officers to lead them.

In Trones Wood, in Bernafay Wood, in Mametz Wood, there had been great
slaughter of English troops and Welsh. The 18th Division and the 38th
suffered horribly. In Delville Wood many battalions were slashed to
pieces before these South Africans. And after that came High Wood.. .
All that was left of High Wood in the autumn of 1916 was a thin row of
branchless trees, but in July and August there were still glades
under heavy foliage, until the branches were lopped off and the leaves
scattered by our incessant fire. It was an important position, vital for
the enemy's defense, and our attack on the right flank of the Pozieres
Ridge, above Bazentin and Delville Wood, giving on the reverse slope a