44
THE YPRES TIMES
By Captain Harry W. Hiltz, 25th (Nova Scotia) Battalion.
TO select an engagement of the Canadian Corps in the Ypres Salient as
representative of the many struggles in which it participated is a difficult
task. One will never forget the gallant stand of the grand old 1st Division
in the Second Battle of Ypres, and the hardships endured by the valiant 2nd
Division at Saint Eloi in April, 1916. Keeping these in mind, I still think that
the Battle of Sanctuary Wood, which opened on June 1st, as an enemy triumph and
closed on June 13th as a Canadian victory, is one of the best pages in the Battle
Book of Canada.
The fighting since March, 1916, had been moving steadily northward, and
northward with it moved the Canadian Corps. The Corps had now grown to the
strength of. three divisions The 2nd Division had joined the first near Kemmel
in September, 1915, and these two divisions had been joined by the third in the
early months of 1916. And so, with trench raids in the vicinity of Messines and
Wytschaete, through the battle of Saint Eloi, they came at last to the actions at
Sanctuary Wood and Hooge.
These actions were fought south-east of Ypres. If one could stand on some
high point within the circle of the walls of the city one would have an excellent
view of the field of battle, with the possible exception of the most extreme outer
edge. The Menin Road, which is the Glory Road of so many Canadian and
Imperial battalions, drives for a mile over the flats and then ascends for a like
distance to the village) of Hooge. The ridge, with the exception of one main gap,
curves south-west and runs to Mount Sorrel. It represents a bowl of which the
city of Ypres is the central depression.
Standing in this position the observer can cast his eye along the ridge and
look across a mile of meadows crossed by green hedges, the northern part covered
only by a few scattered and riven trees, until the eye comes to Zouave Wood,
which runs up to the greatest of the gaps. This gap separates Hooge from the
remainder of the Mount' Sorrel system, and through it the enemy can look down
on the British positions on the plain. A bit farther south the slopes are covered
with the greater expanse of Sanctuary Wood, at one time so dense as to be almost
impassable to the Guards in October, 1914, and now sadly thinned by shell-fire and
crowned by the low mounds of Hill 61 and Hill 62. Called by the enemy
Doppelhohe, or double-heights, beyond is Mount Sorrel, and here the British
line breaks sharply back to the west and the railway at Hill 60. Between Sanctuary
Wood and Mount Sorrel is Observatory Ridge, a long tongue of higher ground,
bare and barren, running due west into the British positions at Zallebeke village
and lake.
This was the position occupied by the Canadian 3rd Division on June 1st, 1916.
It was by no means a pleasant prospect; white, scarred, headless trees, churned
earth, rusted wire, and scattered useless equipment lay as a backdrop for the
ceaseless growl of the guns which seemed to come from every point of the horizon.
The Battle of Sanctuary Wood and Hooge cannot be successfully portrayed
without minute detail. Three divisions took part in the engagement, the 3rd
being first engaged, later the 1st, while the 2nd were at Saint Eloi, and were
not drawn into the conflict until at a later stage of the battle. Therefore, to trace in
detail the movement of these three divisions would take more time and space
than is at my disposal.