72nd Seaforth Highlanders of Canada - Electric Scotland

CHAPTER XI.
GERMANY S INNINGS.
Great Boche offensive opens Commander in Chief s "Win or Die"
message Anxious moments and counter moves Canadians
withdrawn to G. H. Q. Reserve Intensive training Corps
sports Highland gathering at Tincques Appreciation of the
situation The Fampoux sector Lieut. J. McDonald s raid
Secret move south.
THE GREAT German attack up the valley of the Lys
through Armentieres, Bailleul and Estaires, towards
Merville and Bethune, was the leading military event of
the period at which we have arrived. It opened on April
7th, it was destined to be one of the hottest fights of the
war, and the situation at several junctures was desperate.
Three weeks after it opened, Sir Douglas Haig addressed
his famous "win or die"
message to all ranks of the Brit
ish Army under his command. He stated the objects of
the enemy, viz., to separate the British from the French,
to take the Channel ports and destroy the British Army.
This led the Commander to say, "Every position must be
held to the last man; there must be no retirement. With
our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our
cause, each one of us must fight to the end."
The immediate result of the attacks so far as the Cana
dian Corps was concerned, was the withdrawal of British
Divisions to meet the onslaught, and as a consequence the
Canadian Corps was called upon to hold, single-handed,
practically the whole of the exceedingly important Lens
coal fields. At this period the Corps consisted of three Di
visions only, the 1st, 3rd and 4th, which were all in the
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