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Then came the enemy counter-attacks, but the marines held. In Belleau Wood the fighting had been literally from tree to tree, stronghold to stronghold; and it was a fight which must last for weeks before its accomplishment in victory. Belleau Wood was a jungle, its every rocky formation containing a German machine-gun nest, almost impossible to reach by artillery or grenade fire.
The bridges had already been destroyed by airmen and Italian Artillery, and the Austrian forces had either been driven back across or into the river by Italian counter-attacks, or had been cut off and compelled to surrender. We, therefore, came back to the Plateau without firing a round. But we did not remain there long.
But it was more difficult to retain these conquests; the advanced positions were exposed to enfilading German fire, and counter-attacks drove us back at various points and made the retention of others a matter of desperate conflict for weeks.
After the Turks had made the last of a series of costly but abortive counter-attacks to regain Jerusalem and were finally and for ever driven back, the city was placed strictly out of bounds until Borton Pasha and the medical authorities had thoroughly purged it of all unpleasantness: the Germans and Turks were extremely uncleanly in their habits.
Goats were rushing wildly about the place from morning till midnight pursued by their wrathful owners, to the detriment of the peace of Waddy and the undoing of the tractable local milkers; and at last a great resentment took possession of the matrons of the township there were counter-attacks among the houses, rescue parties beset the women carrying off prizes, and a few skirmishes happened on the flat.
But there were no reserves at hand to consolidate the victory and hold up the German counter-attacks. There were plenty miles away in the rear, retained by Sir John French because along the extended line of attack from Ypres to Lens it was not known where they would most be needed; and even when the need was clear, interrupted telephones and defective staff-work caused confusion and delay.
Go to one mess and you will hear talk about garbage pails and how to kill flies; to another, about hospitals and clearing stations for the wounded; to another, about barbed wire, sandbags, spades, timber, and galvanized iron the engineers; to another, about guns, shells, rifles, bullets, mortars, bombs, bayonets, and high explosives the ordnance; to another, about jam, bread, bacon, uniforms, iron rations, socks, underclothes, tinned goods, fresh beef, and motor-trucks the Army Service Corps; to another, about attacks, counter-attacks, and salients, and about what the others are doing and will have to do the operations.
Most of the infantry occupying these trenches were driven back, but their retirement was due far more to the surprise and temporary confusion caused by the burning liquid than to the actual damage inflicted. Gallant endeavours were made by repeated counter-attacks to recapture the lost section of trenches.
The lost trenches were re-occupied, and our own brigade, which had been lying in support, was ordered to take over and hold them against the expected counter-attacks. The Bluff, which was the main feature of the position and the worst part of which The Royals, as the senior battalion, were given to hold, was a low hill jutting out at the re-entrant to the Salient, south-east of Ypres.
For the rest of the month Mackensen's huge machine of destruction was moving forward to the second stage of its journey on the San. Its progress was delayed by Russian counter-attacks on the Austrians under Von Woyrsch in Poland and on Mackensen's other wing which was advancing from the Carpathians on to the Dniester.
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