WITH THE N.Z. DIVISION

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 241, 6 July 1920, Page 5

WITH THE N.Z. DIVISION

* THREE YEARS AGO-AFTER MESSLNES. (Contributed.) Under all the circumstances, the Division's losses in the actual Battlo of Mes6ines were comparatively light. With so many sheiUs and so much sniping, it will over be a mystery how so many came through unscathed. Tho fact was that once through the enemy's barrage, one had little to contond with immediately in the w - ay of shell-fire. Rifle and ma--chine-gim fire there was in plenty; but, having gained our objective and dug in, very discreet were we in our movements in daylight. However, it was only a mntter of hours, and the Hun had ascertained the limits of our advance; one of days and he knew' more or less precisely whero our trenches were, and, knowing that, did not scruple to take full advantage of the! fact. Tho result waß that, on its going back into the line, the Division received rather a mauling. Our old friends, those Princes rf "Stormtruppon," the Ith Australian Division, hail taken over our old sector, now with Messines behind them. Tho New Zealand Division, after a. week's respite to lick its wounds, now took over from our even more intimato "cobbers," Iho 3rd Australian Division, in the adjoining sector fronting AVarneton and La Basse Villo. Here across no-man's land ran the Armentieres—Warneton Railway, and behind that, and in Hun territory, flowed tho Rivey Lys. • Once in the line again, there began the usual contest for the supremacy of no-man's land, for although the "Aussics" assured us with many regrets that all this territory right to the Lys and beyond couild have been had for the asking on the day of the battle and immediately afterwards, tho Hun had now dribbled back, and many a brush there was with bombing parties hereabouts, and many a good man fell in those little stunts put on by Ist Auckland and 2nd Wellington.

'Within our sector, not the least interesting place was St. Ives. At the Post Office, St. Ives, was Battalion Headqunrfceirs —just the usual heap of rubble, yet with a tolerable dug-out below, and interesting because hore, it is said, the drawings of Bruco first attracted attention. All this territory, although now newly captured, had been ours before, but in times less'strenuous, for in our day Art held no place in our minds.

To those on the slopes of Hill G3, living there in such security against shell firo as a,camouflage bell tent or a sheet of corrugated iron could afford, and tc> those living "beneath the hill in the Catacombs or in the breastworks ut <Bunhill Row—to those fell the working parties. Mothers, wives, and sisters, these same menfolk of yours, who nowadays will leave their beds only after much grumbling and growling at eight o'clock in the morning, swallow a hasty breakfast, aud rush for a tram,-these samo menfolk of yours, not three years ago, would, with mauy a joke (and not, of course, without a few curses), at two, three, or four o'clock in the morning, after a night mado hellish with.gas, and with out bite or sup, trudgo light-heartedly along Mudlane, tlnough Ploegstccrt Wood, past Dead Horse Corner, aud the mine craters to the front line, and thero gamble with Death, the while they dug trenches, filled sand bags, or drained shell-holes until the sun was well up in the sky. As wo worked, with the dawn camo the aeroplanes. How graceful they were as thev hovered overhead—our follows with their red. white and blue circles, and the Huns with their black crosses. Look! Here comes tome red fellows. My God! They're Huns. And so they were. Baron Kichthofen'B travelling circus. But what a magnificent sight—their gaudy colours flashing in the sun. Humour for once proved more truthful, and after a few days we were out of it all, miles away from tho roar of the guns and tho gas—and what a gruelling the Hun had given us with gas! But. as over the case, some there remained over,to sleep near "Plug Street" Wood. Few had been the days in line, but many were the fresh mounds at Pronto Point, and many the new little wooden crosses.