and for full seven days, June 2, to June 9, no man got a full hour's
sleep at a time. When not being shelled by the German batteries, the
machine gun bullets were raining around; if neither of these agencies of
hell were busy, airplanes were flying, many times so low that they
seemed to be even with the tops of the trees and singing us their
humming hymn of hate. An idea of the deadly nature of the conflict may
be had from the first day's casualties, that covered several thousand of
our men.

On the seventh day the German fire was so heavy it was impossible to get
ammunition up to the guns, and we pulled the backs out of the gun pit as
fast as we could smash them, man-handled the guns out of the Garden
down on to a little unused road in the rear of the railroad,
three-quarters of a mile southwest of the Garden; here the grass was a
foot or two in length, and we covered the guns with it and some brush,
dug out some large shell holes for them, then the wagons pulled up
there, unloading the ammunition, eight hundred to a thousand rounds
apiece, and we got orders to open up as an "S.O.S." came from the
trenches.

Fritz was not aware of our new position, for his fire was wild, and in
the darkness we were safe from the airplanes, although their humming was
distinctly audible as they flew here and there vainly looking for our
new spot. We worked the guns until 2 o'clock, cleaned them up and got a
couple of hours' badly-needed sleep.

At 4:45 A.M. next day another "S.O.S." came from the trenches, and, as
fast as we could do so, we let them have it,--this time in Sanctuary
Woods. Fritz replied, but his fire was wild. Again the planes came, in
an effort to find us, and we got the "keep-firing" whistle. The planes