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Upstarts
Meanwhile we sat still and studied the terrain.
Well, not quite still. Our CP was moved three times before we decided that we would
probably be shelled wherever we moved anyhow. All three firing batteries moved at least
once, too. Jerry obviously had some artillery, and he certainly had one of the finest OP's
anyone could ask for. All you had to do was look above or between the trees in the
hedgerows, and you could see it - Hill 122. Between us and the hill were some five miles of
hedgerows, orchards, and tangled woodlands (the Normans, unlike the other French, did not
keep the underbrush cleared out of their woods). But that hill still loomed up above
everything else in the landscape. We fired at it, off and on, but it was too far away and the
Germans kept too quiet for us to see any definite targets.
During this period, some Air Corps Engineers moved in right beside us and started
bulldozing out a landing strip between us and B Battery, effectively chewing up all our
telephone wire to them. The new construction was within easy artillery range of the enemy,
but that didn't seem to bother the Air Corps people in the least. On the morning of July 4,
these characters decided to celebrate by shooting off all their machine guns into the air and
scaring us out of several years' growth. We got even, though. At noon every artillery cannon
in VIII Corps fired in a serenade as a salute to Independence Day.
It must have been while we were waiting that we got our first bath since embarking
from Wales. A quartermaster field shower unit had been set up somewhere out of artillery
range, and we got to send everyone in staggered shifts. The whole layout was in big tents.
About twenty men at a time would go into the first dressing room and strip. Next they filed
into the shower room and stood under the warm spray for about 30 seconds to get wet all
over. Then the showers turned off automatically long enough so you could soap, then on
again for another half minute to rinse. And finally you would move into another dressing
room to towel off and put on clean clothes.
You have no idea how good it felt. I still had salt water from the English Channel to
wash off, and all of us smelled rank after a month with no ablutions. We did have fresh water
during that month, and most of us had shaved occasionally. Maybe a few enterprising men
had managed a sponge bath, but most of us were filthy.
We did finally find a spot from which we could get a good view of the area between
us and Hill 122 - or as much of it as the trees on the hedgerows permitted. It was better than
nothing, so we set up a battalion OP there, manned by the survey crew when they were not
out surveying. It was about a football field forward of a major crossroads with a ten foot
concrete cross towering above it.
One afternoon I was at that OP, adjusting fire on what I thought was a German
position. Two men from the survey section were with me as I heard a couple of rounds
whistle overhead. I commented to them, "They have two 'overs' now. When you hear a
'short,' they'll have a bracket, and we had better start to duck. "
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