Private W.Day, Denaby,
Yorks and Lancs – wounded
Another local soldier was wounded at Hill 70. Private W. Day of 142, Doncaster road, Denaby main, receiving a bullet in the hand. He’s a married man, with five children, and he enlisted during the war. He is now in hospital at Westerham, Ken from whence he writes:
“I see in the paper an article on the storming of Loos. Yes and Kitchener´s Army was in it. We were up to the neck in it. It poured with rain and at 10 o’clock on Saturday night, drenched through, we marched into the firing line. We had orders to extend, and 50 yards further we were met with a hail of bullets. We lay down, returned fire, and soon shifted them. We found them in a wood in the middle of Hill 70, and shifted them from there too, getting in ourselves.
About seven o’clock on Sunday morning we had orders to extend again, as the Germans were coming with thousands of reinforcements. We got the cannons to workand you should have seen the Germans dropping in hundreds. We captured 500 men and about 14 guns. Shrapnel was flying in the air, and the earth trembled as if there was an earthquake.. But we didn’t care. We kept pegging away until we could not do any more.
I myself got wounded. Lance Cpl Gent (Goldthorpe) was shot through the shoulder, and Sgt Gough through the armpit. Private Davis (Denaby) was wounded in both legs and the right arm.
We lost a good number of brave men killed and wounded, but we kept pegging away. You lads that have not heard your countries call and have not donned the khaki, come along and do your bit, the same as councillor Tom Hill. He is giving you a pattern. Come up in thousands. We have got them on the run. Our battalion won glory, because they neve r flinched.”