Part 2 (1/2)

”Hour after hour, day and night, with increasing intensity as the time went on, the enemy rained heavy sh.e.l.l into the area. Now he would send them cras.h.i.+ng in on a line south of the road--eight heavy sh.e.l.ls at a time, minute after minute, followed by a burst of shrapnel. Now he would place a curtain straight across this valley or that till the sky and landscape were blotted out, except for fleeting glimpses seen as through a lift of fog.... Day and night the men worked through it, fighting the horrid machinery far over the horizon as if they were fighting Germans hand to hand; building up whatever it battered down; buried some of them, not once, but again and again and again. What is a barrage against such troops? They went through it as you would go through a summer shower, too proud to bend their heads, many of them, because their mates were looking. I am telling you of things I have seen. As one of the best of their officers said to me: 'I have to walk about as if I liked it; what else can you do when your own men teach you to?'”

VIII

GENERAL THE HON. SIR JULIAN HEDWORTH GEORGE BYNG, K.C.B., K.C.M.G., M.V.O.

SIR JULIAN BYNG was born on September 11th, 1862, the seventh son of the second Earl of Strafford. He joined the 10th Hussars in 1883, and served in the Soudan Expedition of 1884, being present at the actions of El Teb and Tamai. In South Africa he commanded a column with great distinction in the pursuit of De Wet, and finished the campaign with the rank of Colonel. One of his most successful actions was on the Vlei River, west of Reitz, where he surprised a Boer Commando and took a 15-pounder, two pom-poms, and many prisoners.

He landed in Belgium in October, 1914, in command of the 3rd Cavalry Division. He accompanied Rawlinson's 7th Division in its retreat from Antwerp to Ypres. The doings of the famous 3rd Cavalry Division are writ large in history, and in all the great drama of Ypres there was no finer incident than the charge of the Household Brigade at Klein Zillebeke on November 6th, 1914.

In May, 1915, General Byng succeeded General Allenby in command of the Cavalry Corps, and was responsible for the cavalry fighting in the later part of the Second Battle of Ypres. In August of that year he went to the Dardanelles to take over the command of the IX Corps, and was present during the later stages of that campaign and the famous withdrawal from the peninsula. In February, 1916, he returned to France to command the XVII Corps, and was transferred to the Canadian Corps on May 24th.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LIEUT.-GEN. THE HON. SIR JULIAN BYNG]

Since then he has been one of the most brilliant among Corps Commanders.

During the Battle of the Somme the Canadians fought on the right of Sir Hubert Gough's 5th Army and did notable work, taking Courcelette, and fighting many desperate actions on the Thiepval Ridge. During the long stormy winter their raids on the enemy line were among the most remarkable on the British front. More especially, they made the section north of Arras an unquiet place for the enemy. Their culminating achievement came at the Battle of Arras on April 9th, 1917, when they stormed in one stride four positions on the Vimy Ridge, and wrested from the enemy the key of the plain of Douai.

In June Sir Julian Byng succeeded General Allenby in command of the Third Army.

Sir Julian Byng has the appearance and manner of the cavalier of tradition. No more soldierly figure has appeared in the campaign. He has had the good fortune always to have fine troops to lead, and he is a fit leader for the best troops. He has become to the Canadians what General Birdwood is to the Anzacs--at once a trusted Commander and a well-beloved friend.

IX

LIEUT.-GEN. SIR WALTER NORRIS CONGREVE, =V.C.=, K.C.B., M.V.O.

SIR WALTER CONGREVE, born in 1862, of Chartley and Congreve, County Stafford, was educated at Harrow and entered the Rifle Brigade in 1885.

He became a Captain in 1893, and Brevet Lieut.-Colonel in 1901. During the South African War he won the Victoria Cross for an heroic attempt to save the guns at Colenso--the occasion on which Lord Roberts' only son won the same honour and lost his life.

During the war he received a brevet Lieut.-Colonelcy. He was Private Secretary and a.s.sistant Military Secretary to Lord Kitchener when the latter was Commander-in-Chief at Pretoria.

After his return to England he became Commandant of the School of Musketry at Hythe, and, on the outbreak of the European War, went out in command of the 18th Infantry Brigade. From this he proceeded to the command of the 6th Division, with which he was present at the fighting at Hooge and Ypres in August and September, 1915.

At the Battle of the Somme he commanded the XIII Corps on the extreme British right in liaison with the French. He was responsible for the taking of Montauban, Bazentin and Longueval, and the desperate fighting around Guillemont. Ill-health compelled him to relinquish his command at the end of August, 1916, and, on his return, the XIII Corps was moved further to the left to Sir Hubert Gough's Army.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LIEUT.-GEN. SIR WALTER CONGREVE]

General Congreve has been in command of the XIII Corps since November 15th, 1915. His son, Brevet-Major William Congreve, The Rifle Brigade, who fell at Longueval, July 22nd, 1916, at the age of 25, was universally recognised as the most promising of the younger British soldiers. In two years he had won a Brevet Majority, the D.S.O., the Military Cross, and the Cross of the Legion of Honour, and, after his death, he received the Victoria Cross. No family has a more splendid fighting record.

X

LIEUT.-GENERAL JAMES AYLMER LOWTHORPE HALDANE, C.B., D.S.O.