"My Sergeant shouted 'Into their trench!' There was so much noise, I could scarcely hear him. I leapt in. 4
Four Germans were trying to escape on the further side, I did not fire intending to take them prisoners, but the only thing I took was a hard blow on the side of the head from another and unseen Hun, and away went my perspective prisoners. But, I got him anyhow as he came up to finish me; a jab of my bayonet did the business.
I crawled up the trench, and came upon 2 men trying to strangle each other. I thought then of motion pictures I had watched back home. Here was a more terrible drama. A bayonet charge is a street fight magnified and made 10000 times more fierce at close range. It becomes almost impossible to use your bayonet, we fought more than half the time with our fists and feet, using our guns as clubs when we could." - Paul Vondette, 16 years old, 1st BN light infantry, 65th Regiment, Canada Expeditionary Force, Ypres, Belgium, 1915 #ww1 #reality #war #stayzero #zerofoxtrot