With the coming of the dawn on October 30, 1914, the fighting was
resumed with even more savage determination on both sides. The
hottest engagement centered about the ridge of Zandvoorde. German
artillery fire cleared the allied trenches, burying many of the
British soldiers alive under mountains of earth and debris. This
forced the line to retreat a full mile to Klein Zillebeke to the
north. The kaiser witnessed this engagement and by his presence
cheered the German soldiers on to the most desperate fighting.
On the following day October 31, 1914, the crisis came. The fighting
began along the Menin-Ypres road early in the morning and advanced
with great violence upon the village of Gheluvelt. The First and
Third Brigades or the First Division were swept back and the First
Coldstream Guards were wiped out as a unit. The whole division
was driven back from Gheluvelt to the woods between Veldhoek and
Hooge. The allied headquarters at Hooge were shelled. General Lomas
was wounded and six or the staff officers were killed.
The Royal Fusiliers who desperately stuck to their trenches fighting
savagely were cut off and destroyed. Out of a thousand but seventy
soldiers remained. Between two and three o'clock there occurred
the most desperate fighting seen in the battle of Ypres. At 2:30
o'clock in the afternoon the Allies recaptured Gheluvelt at the
point of the bayonet and by evening the Allies had regained their
position.
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