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By nine o'clock on the morning of the 25th the convoys were coming in, and the wounded streamed into the reception room. They were 'walking cases, men who had been wounded in the early part of the attack and, able to walk, had made their way on foot to the regimental aid-post. All had been going well when they left. They were bubbling over with good spirits and excitement.
The M.O. may possibly come up to see him, but he may be too busy in his own aid-post. There are stretcher bearers in the trench able to bandage properly.
The average 'S.B., by the way, is a man from the battalion, not from the R.A.M.C. As soon as it is dark the stretcher bearers lift him and carry him across the open to the aid-post, which is perhaps five hundred or a thousand yards behind the firing trench, near the battalion headquarters. It is an eerie journey, with a certain amount of risk.
I have known a man carried into an aid-post in a state of great delight because he had 'got a Blighty one. He lay smoking and talking, little realising that his wound was so grave that it would be many months before he could walk again if indeed he would ever walk with two legs.
"When we walked over Wieltje we found our once 'strong point' no longer existent. The sandbags were scattered all over. Yet in the mine below in the estam General Stockwell had his Headquarters. "We were sent on from aid-post to aid-post. They were all crowded with wounded. The number of 'walking cases' was very large. At Potijze we were again sent on.
When the aid-post is reached the M.O. takes charge, assisted by the sergeant or corporal of the R.A.M.C., whom he has always with him, and the 'casualty' is laid alongside others in the dug-out, or cellar beneath some ruined house, that forms the aid-post and battalion dispensary. The first stage in the journey is now over. Soon a couple of cars creep quietly up.
Actually there were parts on the line where no feet had pressed the ground of No Man's Land for weeks on end, unless in open attack or counter-attack, and of these feet there were a good many that never returned to the trench, and a good many others that did return only to walk straight to the nearest aid-post and hospital.
So I walked into Ypres and passed the Cathedral and the Cloth Hall and reached the remains of the Prison which is now the central aid-post for Ypres. There was a pleasant padre there; and he got me a refreshing cup of tea. Then I went on again. I got on a lorry and was taken to the mill at Vlamertinghe, which is known as the 2/1 Wessex Dressing Station.
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