WIRE-CUTTING HERO.

Colonist, Volume LVII, Issue 13771, 7 May 1915, Page 2

WIRE-CUTTING HERO.

Matchless pluck and superb willpower have w-ph for Marcel:. Forget, a French soldier serving with a colonial regiment, the coveted military medal of France. The story, as related in the "Journal d'Amiens/' is an inspiring narrative. The scene was at a point on the French front south of Arras. Forget left the trenches to cut through the barbed wire entanglements which the Germans had constructed in front of their lino?, and for an. hour he laboured with his wire-cutters almost under the noses of the Germans. But before he had finished the guns had begun to fire, and bullets were falling fast about him. A few more cuts and the work would be done. Then, at a range of ISffaj he received a charge of lead in his right -thigh, tearing the flesh, and leaving the leg swinging loosely under him. He dropped his rifle and wire-cutters, hut he was not dead, and he would not own himself beaten. He began to crawl, towards the French trenches, whence his comrades cheered him and shouted "Courage!" The captain of his company made as if to leap out of the trench and go to his assistance, but a ser-

geant sfcoppeo! him. "Not you, sir." he said. "Let me go first." And the sergeant jumped out, and, crawling, reached P'orget, who was more dead than alive. The sergeant lay flat on his stomach, and Forget dragged himself on to his back, his left arm around his reseller's neck, with the bullets still raining over and around them. A fresh sting of pain, and Forgets left wrist was splintered by a bullet which pierced the sergeant's head. Forget lay f;:r an instant upon the corpse, and then rolled beside it. But his comrades were still calling, and his mighty will triumphed. He continued to crawl forward under the bullets, although he could only do so by thrusting his right hand into the sodden ground up to the wrist and pulling himself bodily along. He finally reached the trench, rolled over its crest, and fell into the ditch among his conrsades. Since then Forget has made a marvellous1 recovery from iiia wounds.. . ;