We found a likely position, where some old trenches and dugouts were, about ½ mile in rear of ST JEAN. Shells were bursting right over, but everywhere seemed to be the same.
The Captain didn't like it, for there was practically no cover, so we went a little more near the town. A Canadian officer asked what we were wanting, and when we told him that we thought of bringing the battery into position there, he said - ' For God's sakes, don't bring them here, this corner is Hell itself. Get out of it as quick as you can.'
Shells were dropping all around and it seems marvelous that none of us have got hit. I afterwards learned that this part was called 'Dead Man's Corner', and it deserved the name, for many dead were thereabouts. We had just left and decided it would have to do, for all places seemed alike.
While the battery was coming up, we started to lay out a wire to a likely spot to observe. George took a couple of men to start from the place they found, and I took Collins and Billison with me.
We ran a wire from the position through the village of ST JEAN.
We reached the village alright, and as everywhere else, it was being shelled. As I jumped a small stream by the church, a large shell burst almost on us, so we took shelter behind a building. We could not move for shrapnel bullets.
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