BELOW John’s trenches on the Casde Site, a tin can holding stones is rattling; another sounds close by. The watchers, listeners all, respond without a sound to this first warning. The barbed wire rattles, barb scrapes barb and locks; the tin cans sound again. A whispered word and all safety catches are released. Here and there, the split pins of grenades are eased across the cast-iron shoulders.
A faint, incomprehensible sound is heard in the night; the air is ruffled lightly; an object falls near, by a slit trench, smoking. Less than two seconds pass in which the occupants regard it, understand its nature, duck and take cover as it explodes. This is the first grenade: the first of many.
Echoing now, the hill is ht with flame that flickers from above and below. Mortars begin to sound down near the Imjin and the call is taken up by those that he to the south behind C Company. Slowly, like a fire, the flames spread east and west around Castle Hill; and east again across the village of Choksong, as the enemy from Gloster Crossing, tardily launched at last, meets and is repulsed by D Company.
Now, almost hand to hand, the Chinese and British soldiers meet. Figures leap up from the attacking force, run forward to new cover and resume their fire upon the men of the defence who, coolly enough, return their fire, as targets come to view, as the attackers close with them. Occasionally an individual climax may be reached in an encounter between two men when, only a few feet apart, each waits to catch the other unawares, sees a target, fires, and leaps across to follow his advantage.
And now, to the defenders’ aid, the carefully planned defensive fire is summoned. The Vickers guns cut across the cliffs and slopes by which the Chinese forces climb to the attack. Long bursts of fire—ten, twenty, thirty, forty rounds—are fired and fired again: the water in the cooling jackets warms, the ground is littered with spent cases. The mortars and the gunners drop their high explosive in amongst the crowded ranks that press on to the hill slopes from the river crossings.
Such are the enemy’s losses that now and then there is a brief respite for the defence as the attackers are withdrawn for reinforcement. The weight of defensive fire is so great that the enemy has realized he must concentrate his strength in one main thrust up to each hilltop. As the night wanes, fresh hundreds are committed to this task, and the tired defenders, much depleted, face yet one more assault.
Mike commands D Company—Lakri is fuming in Japan, moving heaven and earth to get a plane to bring him back from leave. Victors of their first encounters, D Company are sadly weakened by the ceaseless blows rained on them. One of Mike’s platoons has been withdrawn right to the hilltop and they form a close defensive ring about the high ridge line which constitutes the vital ground of the position. Ever and again by weight of small-arms fire, by sorties, and as a result of many concentrations fired by mortars and guns, the assault waves are forced back. But still they reappear. For every casualty suffered by the enemy, two, three, four more Chinese will appear to take his place. Yet D Company is holding its ground.
From Castle Hill, the news is grave. John’s platoon, now decimated, has been withdrawn by Pat before they are over-run completely. Their officer dead, so many others of their comrades dead or wounded, they go back to Phil’s platoon position where they wait for dawn.
The Castle Site, the highest point of our defences forward, is taken after six hours fighting.
The dawn breaks. A pale, April sun is rising in the sky. Take any group of trenches here upon these two main hill positions looking north across the river. See, here, the weapon pits in which the defenders stand: unshaven, wind-burned faces streaked with black powder, filthy with sweat and dust from their exertions, look towards their enemy with eyes red from fatigue and sleeplessness; grim faces, yet not too grim that they refuse to smile when someone cracks a joke about the sunrise. Here, round the weapons smeared with burnt cordite, lie the few pathetic remnants of the wounded, since removed: cap comforters; a boot; some cigarettes half-soaked with blood; a photograph of two small girls; two keys; a broken pencil stub. The men lounge quietly in their positions, waiting for the brief respite to end.
“They’re coming back, Ted.”
A shot is fired, a scattered burst follows it. The sergeant calls an order to the mortar group. Already they can hear the shouting and see, here and there, the figures moving out from behind cover as their machine-guns pour fire from the newly occupied Castle Site. Bullets fly back and forth; overhead, almost lazily, grenades are being exchanged on either side; man meets man; hand meets hand. This tiny corner of the battle that is raging along the whole front, blazes up and up into extreme heat, reaches a climax and dies away to nothingness—another little lull, another breathing space.
Phil is called to the telephone at this moment; Pat’s voice sounds in his ear.
“Phil, at the present rate of casualties we can’t hold on unless we get the Castle Site back. Their machine-guns up there completely dominate your platoon and most of Terry’s. We shall never stop their advance until we hold that ground again.”
Phil looks over the edge of the trench at the Castle Site, two hundred yards away, as Pat continues talking, giving him the instructions for the counter attack. They talk for a minute or so; there is not much more to be said when an instruction is given to assault with a handful of tired men across open ground. Everyone knows it is vital: everyone knows it is appallingly dangerous. The only details to be fixed are the arrangements for supporting fire; and, though A Company’s Gunners are dead, Ronnie will support them from D Company’s hill. Behind, the machine-gunners will ensure that they are not engaged from the open, eastern flank. Phil gathers his tiny assault party together.
It is time; they rise from the ground and move forward up to the barbed wire that once protected the rear of John’s platoon. Already two men are hit and Papworth, the Medical Corporal, is attending to them. They are through the wire safely—safely!—when the machine-gun in the bunker begins to fire. Phil is badly wounded: he drops to the ground. They drag him back through the wire somehow and seek what little cover there is as it creeps across their front. The machine-gun stops, content now it has driven them back; waiting for a better target when they move into the open again.
“It’s all right, sir,” says someone to Phil. “The Medical Corporal’s been sent for. He’ll be here any minute.”
Phil raises himself from the ground, rests on a friendly shoulder, then climbs by a great effort on to one knee.
“We must take the Castle Site,” he says; and gets up to take it.
The others beg him to wait until his wounds are tended. One man places a hand on his side.
“Just wait until Papworth has seen you, sir——”
But Phil has gone: gone to the wire, gone through the wire, gone towards the bunker. The others come out behind him, their eyes all on him. And suddenly it seems as if, for a few breathless moments, the whole of the remainder of that field of battle is still and silent, watching amazed, the lone figure that runs so painfully forward to the bunker holding the approach to the Castle Site: one tiny figure, throwing grenades, firing a pistol, set to take Castle Hill.
Perhaps he will make it—in spite of his wounds, in spite of the odds—perhaps this act of supreme gallantry may, by its sheer audacity, succeed. But the machine-gun in the bunker fires directly into him: he staggers, falls, is dead instantly; the grenade he threw a second before his death explodes after it in the mouth of the bunker. The machine-gun does not fire on three of Phil’s platoon who run forward to pick him up; it does not fire again through the battle: it is destroyed; the muzzle blown away, the crew dead.
Before dawn, the Battalion Command Post had moved up the hill to the ridge between Guido’s platoon and Paul’s company headquarters. From here, in a bunker constructed under R.S.M. Hobbs’s supervision some days before, the Colonel could overlook the battle on the two hill positions north of us. The desperate nature of the struggle was manifest before the morning sun rose. By night, the calls for fire support, each fresh report from A or D Company Headquarters, and the Gunner wireless links had made it all too clear that this attack was in strength. If this was feinting, it was a costly, realistic feint!
Just after dawn, Walters, at his wireless, said that Pat wanted me on the set. I sat down on the reverse slope of the hill behind the bunker and spoke into the handset. Pat replied:
“I’m afraid we’ve lost Castle Site. I am mounting a counterattack now but I want to know whether to expect to stay here indefinitely or not. If I am to stay on, I must be re-inforced as my numbers are getting very low.”
I told him to wait and went back into the bunker. The Colonel was standing in the Observation Post at the far end. I told him what Pat had said and asked what he intended to do. He looked through his glasses at D Company’s hill and then said:
“I’ll talk to him myself.”
We both went back to the wireless set. I stood watching the Colonel as he spoke to Pat, the distant crackle of rifle and light-machine-gun fire in my ears, and the long tack-tack-tack of the Vickers mingling with the hollow boom of the mortars firing from just below us. The Colonel had stopped talking; from the headset came the buzz of Pat’s voice. Then the Colonel replied. He said:
“You will stay there at all costs until further notice.” At all costs.
Pat knew what that order meant, and I knew—and the Colonel knew. As he got up I saw that he was pale and that his hand shook a little as he relit his pipe.
I watched the Colonel go back to the bunker as I put on the headset to speak to Pat again. The next half-hour would tell how the day would go for us.
There were two questions in the Colonel’s mind as he stood at the open end of the bunker, viewing the action fought by his two forward companies: would the Chinese continue to press their attack in daylight with the threat of intervention by our aircraft; and, secondly, how long would it be before the Chinese discovered that both our flanks were completely open—that the ROKs were two and a half miles to the west, the Fifth Fusiliers two to the east—and encircle us? Yet, whatever the answer to these questions, his orders were to hold the road between Choksong and Solma-ri. Very well, the Battalion would hold it. And the Battalion would remain disposed as at present just as long as each sub-unit retained its integrity; for our present disposition was unquestionably well-suited to fighting an action designed to hold the road firmly.
I began talking to Pat again, discussing the prospect of reinforcements, and telling him that his ammunition replacement was already going forward in Oxford carriers under Henry’s supervision. We spoke only very briefly and he ended by saying:
“Don’t worry about us; we’ll be all right.”
I said: “Good luck.”
I did not speak to Pat again; he was killed a quarter of an hour later.
There were no planes that day; there were targets and more elsewhere. The Gunner Colonel spoke to me twice, and I knew from his voice how desperately he wanted to help us. So the Chinese were pushed unceasingly over the Gloster and Western Crossings. The guns and mortars fired all day but the Rifles and Fusiliers—to say nothing of the brave Belgians—needed support too. There were so many of them. Really, for a force reputedly bent on “imperialist aggression” we must have seemed pathetically thin on the ground to the Chinese Commissars.
At about half past eight it became apparent that the positions of A and D Companies had become untenable; little by little they were being swamped by a tide of men. Each minute was widening the gaps between the little fighting groups—as yet still organized platoons and companies. The time had come when the advantage of holding the ground forward would be outweighed by the loss of much or all of two rifle-company groups. The order to withdraw was given over the wireless.
Watching from the Command Post, I saw the men withdrawing, step by step, down the reverse hill slopes: D Company and A Company leaving the ground they had fought for so well, that had cost the enemy such a price.
I went down the hill a little later and there, by the ford, the survivors of the night battle were coming in: a long, straggling line of men; for all were heavily laden with arms and ammunition. To me they looked cheerful, though tired—but something more than that: they looked surprised. I think, above all, it was a surprise to many of them that they had been withdrawn—grave though they had known their position to be, and dangerous their surroundings. Unquestionably, it was difficult for them to understand that, in holding their ground for so long, they had made a priceless contribution to the battle: but a soldier engaged in a fight that may be to the death has no time for the appreciation of such things. He is, to say the least, otherwise engaged.
Just north of the ford, along the roadsides, around the cook-house and the Regimental Aid Post, they rested now, as Watkins issued tea as fast as he could make it, and all the bread, bacon and sausages he had to hand. Comrade passed mess tin to comrade, who drank and passed in turn to his next neighbour. Men lay back, without removing their haversacks, their heads resting in the ditches, smoking, talking quietly, resting. Yes, it had been a long night.
The Colonel came down the hill. He had just moved B Company back fifteen hundred yards to the very base of Kamak-San to conform with A and D Companies’ withdrawal. He had now to fit the latter two into the revised defence disposition. With Mike and Jumbo he looked over the map and pointed out their new positions on the ground. Jumbo was to take the much-reduced A Company to man the key ridge to the west which Spike’s Pioneers now held. Behind, looked down upon by this long feature—marked Hill 235—was a small, square, almost flat-topped hill, where Mike would deploy D Company. As Mike and Jumbo went outside again, Henry was marking the map afresh. The old, blue lines that circled Castle Hill, Choksong, the hill D Company had held, soon vanished from the shiny talc. Now two new rings marked their positions; the symbols were completed by the moving chinagraph. The operations map was fitted back into its place and Henry soon descended to correct his own in the Intelligence Office. I put out my hand to the telephone to tell the remainder of the Battalion how our new line stood, taking it from its rest without looking down. For I was looking at the tiny group of marks upon the talc; and as I looked I realized that this was what the Chinese would attack next—to-night!
When I recall that day, it rises in my memory as a series of incidents, clear in themselves, but joined by a very hazy thread of continuity.
I remember Colour-Sergeant Buxcey organising his Korean porters with mighty loads for the first of many ascents to their new positions. Nine, I think, he made. Nine times up the hill; and so, poor devils, nine times down a path at once precipitous and rough. On coming down, one wished for the easier journey of the upward climb; and upwards, sweating, breathless, weary, one envied those who went the opposite way.
When Buxcey’s anxious face has left my mind, I can see Bob working at the Regimental Aid Post, one hand still wet with blood as he turns round, pausing for a moment to clean himself before he begins to minister to yet another wounded man. The ambulance cars are filled; the jeep that Bounden drives has been out time and again with the stretchers on its racks. Baxter, Brisland, Mills, the whole staff of the RAP, is hard at work with dressings, drugs, instruments. This is the reckoning they pay for basking in the sun down by the stream when times are quiet. It is a price they pay willingly and to the full.
I remember watching the slow, wind-tossed descent of a helicopter that came down for some casualties to whom the winding, bumpy road back south would have meant certain death. I saw Bob and the Padre standing back as the plane lifted, their hair blown wildly by the slipstream from the rotors as she lifted into the sky.
Shaw and Mr. Evans, the Chief Clerk, went off to Seoul in my jeep. I watched them until they disappeared round the road-bend down by Graham’s mortar pits. Richard was down by the ford, and Carl, the Counter-Mortar Officer.
“I’m sending my vehicles back, except for my jeep,” said Carl. “I’ve decided I’ll stay with you to make up your number of Forward Observation Officers. I’ve seen the Colonel.”
The lumbering half-tracks disappeared along the road and Carl settled down to chat to Guy on Gunner matters. I wondered what the Gunner Colonel was going to say on finding that his radar specialist had stayed with us. And I thanked God that the latter was a real Gunner as well as a boffin.
We were certainly going to discover that he had not forgotten how to shoot.
Donald, the Assistant Adjutant, came into the Command Vehicle. We had various things to discuss—welfare cases—two men had to go from the Battalion on a Field Hygiene course—there were messages from Freddie, who had thought of them as he rode back to B Echelon after his visit earlier in the day. Afterwards, we had some coffee and over it I told him that he had better stay forward to reinforce A Company, just for the time being. He went off happily to climb the slopes to Jumbo’s Hill, as pleased as Punch that he could take command of a platoon—if only for the forthcoming engagement—before he was packed back to Rear H.Q. and his Assistant Adjutancy.
Jumbo had come forward that morning to find Pat and two of his platoon commanders, John and Philip, dead; only Terry left to lead fifty-seven fit men out of the original body nearly one hundred strong. The arrival of Donald would give him two platoon commanders. I put the phone back after telling him the news, and walked out on to the grass to get some sleep.
That morning the Padre said a funeral service for Pat, whose body had been sent back from Company Headquarters on the ammunition-laden Oxford Carrier which Henry had driven through a hail of fire descending on the pass to Choksong. Pat’s body was the only one to which we could pay our last respects—but we did not forget the others. Three of us stood by while the solemn words were quietly said; then we saluted and walked away, each busy with his own thoughts.
Pat lay at rest beside the soft-voiced stream, quiet in the morning sunlight, the noise of last night’s battle gone forever in the wind.
“The Second-in-Command is here, sir,” said Judkins, my batman. “And are you going to have anything to eat?”
I opened my eyes to blue sky and huge white clouds. It was afternoon; I had slept for two hours. Judkins stood on the grass by the edge of my blanket, a mug and plate in one hand, a knife, fork, and spoon in the other.
I hated getting up; and I was a fool to refuse the hot stew Watkins had cooked. How little one learns by experience! I asked Judkins for some tea and had a cigarette with Digby, the Second-in-Command. He had come forward from Rear H.Q. some time before but had been unwilling to awaken me.
“The Colonel has told me to go back in view of this attack on Rear H.Q.,” he said. We settled a point or two before he got into his jeep and drove off with Bainbridge at the wheel, for all the world as if he was on his way to a dinner party. They were going to a party all right. Four hours before a sizeable force, which had circled us, had attacked Rear H.Q. The road was cut, and the route forward that might bring us relief or reinforcement was—at that very moment—closing.
It is dark, the moon obscured by cloud. Night is the time for their attack. Although we have had no planes during the day, our Gunners have inflicted too much damage to permit them to press their advance. Released from concern about our troops, hitherto so closely engaged on the hills forward, the Gunners delivered concentration after concentration on the almost endless series of targets before them before the enemy called a halt and went to ground.
But now it is dark. Already their stealthy infantry will have left the little holes in which they have kept hidden from the sun and our observers.
We sit in a battle Command Post. Walters is there at his wireless: nearby sit Richard, Henry, and Guy. Frank is laying a line from the Mortar Troop Headquarters where Sergeant-Major Askew keeps his solitary vigil; somewhere about is Smythe, the Signal Sergeant; Lucas, the Operations Clerk, is making yet another cup of coffee; the Colonel is sitting with his head against the earthen wall, taking advantage of the quiet to doze. I sit by Walters and, in the glow of red light from the wireless, see that his eyelids are drooping, heavy with an unsatisfied need for sleep. My eyes are heavy, too. How marvellous, what luxury, to find oneself suddenly in a bed with nothing to wake up for until, say, breakfast on a silver tray, in thirty hours’ time. Well, why ask a bed? A blanket on that grass outside.…
Frank is talking to me, and I realize that I have been dropping off into a doze. It is better that I get up and walk about outside for a little. Richard follows me as Frank departs for his Headquarters, a hundred yards away. We hear the stream rushing over the little waterfall; the light wind cools our cheeks, hot from the close atmosphere of the dug-out. The radiance of the moon is widening in the sky above us. Beneath our feet, the old year’s grass rustles as we stroll up and down, talking.
Suddenly, Richard pauses in mid-sentence. We both look up, quickly, to the eastern end of C Company’s ridge. The battle has started.
In the Command Post dug-out, the telephone is ringing.
In the original Battalion defensive layout, Denis’s Company—B Company—were on the far right flank, holding the approaches to the great Kamak-San feature—itself too vast for us to hold—at the same time constituting the right rear base of the Battalion. Unlike C Company, they had never been absolutely in reserve, inasmuch as there had been nothing except the river between them and the enemy; although, of course, to their northwest, A and D Companies had been in closer proximity to an often evanescent foe. Now, with both A and D Companies withdrawn, their prospect of a major engagement became a certainty.
Whilst the battle had raged around Choksong village for the possession of A and D Companies’ hills, B Company had been little more than spectators. A few Chinese patrols had bumped them during the hours of darkness, but they had held their fire, except at one post where a complete patrol of fifteen men was destroyed by an LMG of Geoff’s platoon. Thus the Chinese did not know B Company’s positions on the morning of the 23rd; for all they knew, their contact on the previous night might well have been with one of our patrols, instead of with a position in our main defences. Thus, expecting to renew the attack that night, they had sent a further series of patrols forward towards B Company during the morning; and these patrols were all in strength, designed to produce, at all costs, reaction from us.
Denis was determined not to reveal his positions unless absolutely compelled to; but, faced with a number of strong armed parties along his front, he realized that, sooner or later he would be forced to engage them. In these circumstances, he made up his mind to do so by sortie, by which means the enemy could not be certain either of the main position or—equally important—the strength of the force from which they had sprung.
Sergeant Petherick took out a force in this connection, expecting to engage, at most, twenty men: he returned after meeting two hundred. Backwards and forwards, all among the battle knolls that lay below the peak of Kamak-San, engagements flared up and died, only to be renewed elsewhere.
The daylight waned, the evening shadows deepened, merged and grew into one, to form the darkness of another night.
Below great Kamak-San, Denis’s Company prepared themselves for what they knew the darkness would bring forth.
To the west, that night, the 1st ROK Division was to repulse, with great tenacity, a strong and vigorous attack by two divisions attempting to open up the road that ran from Munsan-Ni to Seoul—a part of the western highway that ran up from the south to the border on the Yalu River. Eastwards, the Fifth Fusiliers would fight desperately against attacks across the river in great strength; and beyond, the Belgians and the Rifles, Puerto Ricans, Turks, Americans would be engaged in increasing intensity.
Here, near Choksong, lay the centre of the attack upon the western sector; here ran the road which was, historically, the main route of invasion from the north.
Already one full day behind their time-plan for the advance, the Chinese now prepared to end the resistance once and for all, and surge along the road to Seoul through Uijong-bu, catching, perhaps, the whole left flank of the UN 3rd Division unawares.
Their problem now was, at what point should they attack? Last night’s experience made it plain that one vast, human wave would never serve to overwhelm the sturdy wall of the defence. Further, the British left flank, on Hill 235, would not be easy to attack. They could not know of Jumbo’s dangerous weakness on the ridge.
Then, too, attack upon the west might leave us time and opportunity to make a second withdrawal, on to Kamak-San, from which we should not easily be dislodged. The choice fell, therefore, upon the approaches to Kamak-San, and thus upon B Company and part of C, whose right flank lay across the western spur leading to the final, jagged crest.
I run into the dugout: Walters has answered the telephone, which he hands to me. Denis says:
“Well, we’ve started. They’re attacking Beverly’s platoon now—about a hundred and fifty, I should think.”
My torch is on the map; and I examine the exact location of the attack as the Colonel begins to talk to Denis. Nearby, I hear the heavier sound of shells exploding above the noisy small-arms fire and mortars. Recce is shooting along B Company’s front.
Paul is on the other telephone; his news from C Company is the same: parties of enemy attempting to infiltrate, while others assault our positions in great strength, trying again to engulf us. Jack’s platoon and David’s are engaged; Guido’s platoon is under machine-gun fire from D Company’s former position.
It is ten minutes to twelve: the battle is warming.
Here they come again: a screaming mob of cotton-suited soldiers, their yellow faces gleaming in the light of the trip flares they have sprung and the mortar flares drifting slowly down beneath their parachutes.
An hour after midnight, the whole of B and C Companies are engaged; the guns, the mortars, the machine-guns once again deliver their supporting fire with all their might.
In character, the battle much resembles that of the previous night: wave after wave of men armed with grenades and burp-guns storm the positions under cover of mortar and machine-gun fire, are halted, engaged in a short desperate struggle, and driven back. A lull follows. Both sides reorganize. The attack recommences. The character of the battle is the same, too, in that these ceaseless blows, delivered in such strength, inevitably reduce our numbers speedily. Their casualties are high—much higher than ours; but in this battle of attrition they can afford them; we cannot.
It is in the nature of the ground that the battle differs; and the Chinese have made the mistake of attacking obliquely across our front—perhaps because they did not really know where B Company lay. Thus for the first two hours, much of the weight of their attack was spent fruitlessly. Only after great loss have they redirected their line of assault. Old Kamak-San looks down upon a ring of intermittent flame across his northern base. Last night the flames were further off. Now they are nearer; growing nearer, hour by hour.
It is three o’clock. In the Command Post we are drinking coffee and talking. The telephone is quiet for the moment but the noise of the battle reaches us clearly. As I sit talking to Richard, I wonder if he realizes how gravely we are situated: a vast body of the enemy pushing south; our flanks open; the road cut behind us. It is a great comfort to reflect that, though they can take Kamak-San without firing a shot—they have only to travel round our unguarded flanks, after all—it will do them no good. We hold the road; and we shall continue to hold it.
The telephone is ringing again: Paul is speaking:
“I’m afraid they’ve overrun my top position,” he says, “and they’re reinforcing hard. They’re simply pouring chaps in up above us. Let me know what the Colonel wants me to do, will you?”
This is, immediately, disaster. The enemy has forced his way up on to Paul’s highest defensive post by overwhelming his men with their numbers. The result of this is that the Chinese now command most of C Company’s ground, have forced a wedge between C and B Company, and dominate the valley in which the mortars lie—heavy and medium—and the entire Headquarters. If we are not quick, we may be caught by the enemy who has only to fire over open sights straight down into us.
Already, however, the Colonel, who is listening, has made up his mind.
“Pack the Headquarters up,” he says, “and get every one out of the valley up between D Company and the Anti-Tank Platoon position. I’m going to withdraw C Company in ten minutes; and I shall move B over to join us after first light.”
He picks up the telephone and starts to speak to Paul as I give Richard and Henry their instructions. They need but a few words: speed is the requirement here. Foolishly, I forget Frank has laid a line to the Command Post, and waste precious time going to his Headquarters. He is not there. I give a message to Sergeant-Major Askew and go on: Graham’s mortars are warned—Sam’s Headquarters—the Regimental Aid Post—the Regimental Sergeant-Major. Before I return to the Command Post, the first party of signallers is moving up the gorge towards D Company’s hill.
Back at the Command Post I burn those papers that must not be taken. Lucas and I pick up Jennings, the Rear Link Wireless commander: together we smash the fixed radio-equipment. Again, I go around the area. Overhead, along the ridge C Company is holding, there is a sudden ominous quiet. I wonder if they are already mounting a machine-gun at the head of the valley; if they are already descending to the stream, crossing by the mortar pits which I am now approaching. It is no good wondering: I shall know soon enough what they are doing. The mortar pits stand silent, strangely deserted after the bustle of the earlier part of the night. Turning back along the road, I see a mug of steaming tea standing on a box at the entrance to Sam’s HQ. The RAP has gone, too; Bob’s jeep is in wild disorder; packages, web equipment, an old coffee tin are scattered across the seats, flung there in haste after he had removed the other contents. Everyone has gone.
Not quite everyone. There is a murmur of voices from the signals office; a metallic rasping catches my ear. As I step down from the bank on the edge of the road, two signallers appear. They have come back for spare batteries, quite unaware that the sands in the hour-glass are fast running out. Indeed, I cannot be sure if there is even one grain left to fall: the Chinese have held the head of the valley for nearly forty minutes.
Together, we cross the road, traverse the low, flat ground, and enter the gorge.