Maintaining communications

We as signallers, we’d go out on the line and we had two, as a rule we’d have two tapping-in stations. Our line would probably be, oh, two miles long, so you’d alternate. You’d be at “A” tapping-in station today, “B” tapping-in station the next day, and then the observation post the next day. Then you have one day off at the battery where you were a battery signaller. We’d lay wire, telephone wires, generally along the ground from our battery to the two batteries on either side of us, and to headquarters, divisional headquarters behind us, and the observation post. The observation post would be in the front line, wherever there was a little hill or any place where you could observe the enemy’s line. And they, of course, would know just where they were. We’d be constantly shelled. And it was our boast at the time that they couldn’t keep us, Fritzie couldn’t keep us out of communication for more than ten minutes at one time, and I think we lived up to that.