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Updated: May 21, 2025
Every year, between June 24th and July 2d, the inhabitants of the two neighboring villages of Gouzeaucourt and Gonnelieu perform the ceremony of "turning the onion" that is to say, they dance in a circle, joining hands, on the village green of one or the other hamlet.
They came along munching apples and whistling, as though on peace maneuvers. Next day, after they had gained back Gouzeaucourt, I saw many of them wounded, lying under tarpaulins, all dirty and bloody. The Germans had adopted our own way of attack. They had assembled masses of troops secretly, moving them forward by night under the cover of woods, so that our air scouts saw no movement by day.
The tanks went away through the breach they had made, with the infantry swarming round them, and captured Havrincourt, Hermies, Ribecourt, Gouzeaucourt, Masnieres, and Marcoing, and a wide stretch of country forming a cup or amphitheater below a series of low ridges south of Bourlon Wood, where the ground rose again.
Orders were issued during the morning for a "stand-to" in readiness to move at very short notice, and about 3.45 p.m. instructions were received to entrain at Gouzeaucourt. In less than an hour the Battalion was on the march, the transport moving at the same time by road.
Their method was as unexpected as our own, and where it was applied against our right it was almost as successful. From Bonavis south to Vendhuille all our gains were lost, and within an hour and a half the Germans had pierced the line we had held since April and captured Gonnelieu, Villers-Guislain, and Gouzeaucourt.
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