THE WRONG TRENCH.

Northern Advocate, 10 May 1915, Page 7

THE WRONG TRENCH.

An officer in a Cornish regiment explains in a letter to a relative how he stumbled by mistake across a German trench. He had orders to relieve a certain regiment •which was in the trenches, and, with the assistance of guides he set off. The first trench they reached was occupied by a British force, but not the one he was to relieve. Nobody iv this trench was able to direct his and his men to their destination. With a private he went back for further information as to the locality of the trench bis men were to occupy. There he was placed in contact with two men belonging to the regiment he was to relieve, and they volunteered to direct him to h.is proper destination. "Off the four of us started to collect my men from the wrong trench," he writes. "H was now darker than before, anri it was raining in torrents. We went very slowly, keeping together all the time. Tn the darkness we missed the trench we were aiming for—it must have been by inches —and walked un until we came to one . All four of us were standing on the parapet and looking down into the trench. I asked quite low, but distinctly, 'Who arc you?' and was greeted with a startled exclamation in German. Wo were so close to them that wr could have shaken hands with them, but instead of paying them that courtesy we bolted for all we wero worth. They opened a point-blank fire at us, hut did not liit us, and we were soon out of sight in the darkness. In our flight we stumbled head over heols into the trench whore we had left my men. We put ourselves under our two guides, and about 3.30 a.m. arrived at the right trench. "Tt is a terrible thing this wandering at night over totally unknown ground. T think it is responsible for a great number of the missing oni> see* in the casualty lists."