FORGOTTEN SOLDIER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21076, 9 January 1932, Page 2 (Supplement)

FORGOTTEN SOLDIER.

MAN WHO ENDED THE WAIS THE HINDENBURCi LINE- S CAPTURE OF DEFENCE PLANS/?!"The Man Who Ended The War—the tefli gotten subaltern who captured the flinden:--- I burg Line defence plans and so enabled t the allied armies to crash through' force an Armistice —has been found. V ~31l The man is Lieutenant E. J. Rolling , M.C., of the 17th i Armoured Car) t Tank ? I Battalion, and now Scrgfc. E. J.'BogWjrl of the Neath police, South Wales. thirteen years bo has j.acrolled the \ I of Neath unaware of the great part fea-ll't played in the world's history. .■ j'-i&g Yet had he not, cn August G, dashed in his armoured car into territory nine miles in advance •ot own front line and raided a German'doegp'' | headquarters the war have lasted ■ ? another two years. ', ifj'-Jjj'.-l The revelation in the Snriday that it was an unknown and unhonomed©! subaltern who, by capturing thesej(j®!f * I man plans, had brought t!ie war .to abrupt end set all Britain talking..Scorejlf'l of young officers forwarded letters in'tisp : f belief that they,ggere Ihe men f but a careful anclexhau.suve investigation 1 ' t left little doubt that Sergeant RoUijjgjfe | made the vital raid and found the pl anj - |i that gave almost yard-by-yard detail* ' f of the Hindenburg Line. King's Congratulations. '■ | Sergeant Rollings was the only. nuuj.J who did not make the claim personally. The information was sent by one of hij"collcagues, Lieutenant J. T. Yeoman, who", was wounded in the battle. A few dayi*~ i after tho raid Colonel E. J. Carter,, was in command of the battalion wa* personally congratulated by the King 09. the achievements of his men in the laid. » An account of the incident appears in* f a souvenir histor; of the battalion's work. : It reads:— ,-r "The King was motoring to "Villersi Bretonrteux, and seeing the armoured : cars by the roadside sent for an officer. Lieutenant Herd was the officer on duty . . . and he was able to give the King full details of the raid. The Kirig : congratulated the section on their achievement." Later the King saw Colonel " Carter and had a long talk with him. A Sunday Express representative took ■ Sergeant Rollings to see his old ISblonel, who is still in the service. They "shook • hands on it. "There is no .doubt, about it," said the colonel, "he is your.man." The story of the raid is almost as dramatic as its consequences. The plans " were actually captured at Framemlle, ten miles east of Amiens, in. the -battle of August 8, ISIB. Sergeant Rolling* tells the story as follows: >f " The 17th (Armoured Car) Tank Battalion, in which I was a lieutenant,, was a movable unit, and on August 7, 1918, we received sudden orders to attach ourselves at once to the Australian Corps at Villers-Bretonneux, a hundred miles away. ' We arrived there the same night, and onr orders were short and to the point. /"We were to wait behind tb&jfipr •■5 until the Australians had made a break in it, then race through, Search for ail - < German "headquarters, raicl them for docn- ; \ ments, and shoot every German on sight When " Hel! Broke Loose." | " I received personal orders to concentrate on a German heodoiiarterj *t Framerville, which was nine mil® in advance of our front line. Before dawn • : the next morning -we were all at'6«'r waiting. I was in charge of two armoured cars. ( '?'■■&? \ "Dawn—and hell broke loose. The • Australians went over like men possessed, and .fifteen minutes later we received the signal—they were through! Off we went, leaving the Australians straining at the leash in the German front line, eager for more successes. The tanks towed ns for two and a-half miles, and here we found the roads free from shell-hoUs, and left them behind. j . " Framerville was now about seven and a-half miles away. In the distance . we could see the German rearguard still retreating but fighting desperately to make a stand. I knew that if the break in the line was filled that would be the % end of us, but I decided to make a bid'to; ? it, and we raced at top speed along the | Amiens-St. Quentin road. " | " After a while, however, we found 1 we had to fight our way through the retreating Germans, but they were, completely disorganised and we killed then in scores. My chief worry was onr own .$* shells, wliich were dropping dangerously . near. By noon we had fought our wty g through to Frarmerville, with the Gcr- |'i man rearguard behind us being dealt with I by tho Australians. ' * 1 :; . "We found the German Corps head* v quarters in sn old farmhouse. I remember Jf there were three steps leading to the door, £ because I mounted them slowly, revolver | in hand. I " But the German staff had fled a few | minutes before, apparently, and so com- : plete was their panic that they had not | stopped to burn their papers. Precious Scraps of Paper. • » -j " Some of the documents were torn ■? up, but I packed every scrap into sand* ; bags. I could not read German, and in | any case I had no time to read any « | the documents, sc every little torn-up j scrap went info the sandbags. . - " When I came out I found my gunners : in the car, holding up four German staff officers. We took all their papers A?® j revolvers, but they were killed sudden burst of machine-gun fire. -agpi " For three more hours -wt mopped |j»||j villages within a radius , of a fifteen miles, and when I gos handed over the sandbags to my compa|>f :| commander, Majo. W. E..Boucher, " They were sent 011 to General quarters for examination, and after I heard nothing, except that I got to my M.C. * , " A few days later, on the 28th, I shot in tho head, and my active serW? I came to an end. 1 never knew the p-tf* J those papers played in ending tbe4Wpgj until now. I "In 1920 I went back to the Glamorgaa ,f County Police as a constable. Two yeWy! later I was transferred to Neath, an ,° f 1926 was made a sergeant. But goodness | this is a surprise!" _ . Sergeant Rollings is married, daughter aged eleven and a son aged | The Sunday Express says:—" Evea | there is an official icluctance to confirm facts, and the name cf Lieutenant RoIWW I remains outside the official histories .ji the war." *■ ,7'f