72nd Seaforth Highlanders of Canada - Electric Scotland

SEAFOBTH HIGHLANDERS OF CANADA
roborated the almanac. The transport lines had been busy
for some time hauling brick and stone to prepare winter
standings for the horses. Occupying the trenches and re
liefs from the same were mixed with notable football
games. The operations of the war were comparatively un
eventful but they were there. The 15th and 16th of Sep
tember were marked by artillery activities on the part of
the enemy. Much work was accomplished on the front line
system of trenches which was put into excellent shape.
It was at about this period that the termination came of
the dominating reign of the bomb as a rival to musketry.
During the summer the British authorities had been em
phasizing the superiority of the rifle and bayonet over the
hand grenade, because they found that the latter had come
to occupy a factitious position. Men went into battle laden
with it even as late as Vimy. A significant yarn on the
subject is that of a soldier who followed a solitary Ger
man for half a mile at a distance of 300 yards trying to
get up to him to bomb him, forgetting altogether that he
had a rifle with which he could shoot him!
On September 23rd the Battalion took part in a Brigade
Church Parade and march past before the Brigade Com
mander who on this occasion presented several decorations.
On the 24th practice work began, for a proposed attack on
Sallumines Hill with a view to forcing the evacuation of
Lens by the enemy, and during this rest period all ranks
studied a relief model of the area to be covered. The offi
cers and N. C. O. s went over the tapes laid out near
Berthonval Wood, and on the following days the Battalion
carried out the practices over these representative limits.
The Medicals won the final in the football championship
of the 4th Division. Also on September 29th, when the
Corps Championship Sports were held at Villers-au-Bois,
the Battalion tug of war team met that of the 29th Bat
talion, which it had previously defeated for the Army
Championship. The pull was a very long one, and at one
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