. "We paraded just after daylight below the ridge on a snow-covered bleak hillside. Bugles rang out and off we went, slowly at first over the hilltop, on past our guns and into the valley beyond. Things now began to hummm. Shrapnel shrieked and machine-guns rattled, each taking its toll. Not a man looked back and the pace increased; our objective a village on the next hilltop. Some wheeled right other left to enter at either side. One squadron got bogged and became an easy target for enemy gunners. As we dashed up the village street the enemy disappeared into the nearest hole. "Dismount for Action." Three-fourths of the men hurried away to dig themselves in desperately, while the remainder took the horses to cover behind some walls and buildings. Our objective was gained and all seems well. But the price was yet to be paid. As we looked to our girths and adjusted saddles an enemy aeroplane droned overhead and the airman spied us out. His stary signal had scarcely died out when a shell smashed a hole through a wall nearby and others crashed in the street, Horses plunged and reared , but soon became quiet when checked and never flinched again. Hell now seemed to let loose, houses crumbled and fell about our ears and men and horses were torn asunder by evil smelling high explosives. All had work to do, perhaps shoot a horse to end its suffering, or tie a bandage on a wounded pal; even a Jerry saved a Tommies life by trying a tourniquet on his shattered thigh. friend or foe became comrades thus. A shell burst near me. I felt a violent shove and warn blood spurting from a wounded horse drenched my face. Two horses went down and it took all my strength to drag clear a comrade who was firmly pinned beneath them. Blood mingling with slushy snow ran down the gutters. Curiously, I thought of Tennyson's "Charge of the Light Brigade" and I felt that famous incident was child's play to this. How long it lasted I know not, for time and eternity seemed strangely mixed. But darkness came at last. Some thirty or so surviving horses with their attendant horsemen went sadly away. We left a thousand horses and msny comrades in that village street. I rode one horse and led another that was badly wounded. To him I said "Charlie, if you can't gallop, leave you I must" but gallop he did, like the hero he was, and back we went, past our guns over the hilltop, along a shell-torn track and through a festered city. When at last we bivouacked snow was falling heavily. I and two other crouched together sheltered beneath a blanket, the snow soon covering us like a shroud. fatigue and exposure brought fitful sleep, the end of a desperate day."
