Person Page - 44

     The following extract gives more detail: Extract Page 219-220
THE LAST PHASE (August 23, 1918 to November 11, 1918)

For the next two days the Fifth was kept rather busy refitting and making arrangements for the coming Battle of Arras. One very noteworthy innovation was introduced at this time: Our officers were thoughtful enough to go over their battle maps with the senior noncoms. and acquaint the sergeants with the plans of the coming action. We believe that the smoothness with which posts and stations were established from that time on fully vindicated the confidence placed in the Bearer Sergeants. They were immeasurably helped by their newly-acquired knowledge of the battle terrain.

By the night of August 25th, battle organization was completed and the stretcher squads moved up to Beaurains Corner, ready to go forward behind the infantry on the following morning.

Zero hour had been originally set for 4.50 a.m. but was changed to 3 a.m. in order to effect a greater surprise and allow our troops to pass through the enemy's forward machine-gun defences before dawn.

Shortly after the opening barrage our bearers moved forward. The first waves of our attacking infantry were already a few hundred yards ahead of us and everything pointed to another victory. The few wounded men we attended to were highly jubilant over the success of the initial phase of the attack. Captain Hart, with most of the squads, moved over to the left, through Tilloy-lez-Mofflaines and then eastward, along the south side of the Arras-Cambrai road. Major Elliott and Captain Moses, with our other bearers, moved ahead in a south-easterly direction. They established an advanced dressing station near our old aid-post just west of Neuville-Vitasse. All our evacuations were made through this station until late in the afternoon, when another post was established just east of Neuville-Vitasse..

Although we had a great many wounded to handle throughout the day, our bearers work was considerably lightened through the help of hundreds of German prisoners. The captured Huns were so glad to be on our side of the Line they willingly shouldered stretcher cases and, in charge of one or two of our men, made their way across country to the Neuville-Vitasse clearing points. So anxious were some of the unescorted German carrying parties to get as far toward the rear as possible, they kept right on going and carried their burdens right into Arras.
During the night of the 26th Captain Hart s party made its headquarters in an old German dressing station just west of the captured village of Guemappe. In this station we found several dead and wounded Huns. Scattered about the place was con siderable first-aid material and among it we found a lot of paper shell-dressings, paper bandages, etc. The wounded Germans seemed quite pleased at finding themselves in our hands. Evidently, there had been a tragic shortage of medical supplies in their own army.

The first day of the scrap had passed with only one bearer, Frank Laflin, being killed and without any of our men being wounded. Our only other casualty was a water-cart which had been run over by an advancing tank near the Neuville-Vitasse station. Once again our troops had met with success. By 7 a.m. the infantry had captured Chapel Hill and Orange Hill and were in Monchy le Preux. By 11 a.m. they had taken the strongly held trench system east of Monchy and were in Guemappe at 4 a.m. Wancourt and Heninel were in Canadian hands by nightfall. The days advance was an average of about six thousand yards, and over two thousand prisoners had been taken.¹³