The Seed of Empire by Fred M. White

It was just before dawn next day that the Germans made their initial attempt to recover the ground they had lost at Neuve Chapelle. This first counter-attack was promptly driven off with heavy loss, and the retreating Germans were pursued until they fell back on their machine gun strongholds in the farmhouses on the Pietre-road. It was a costly proceeding for the Germans, especially for the reinforcements, which were shelled heavily by our artillery as they advanced through the wood; indeed, for days afterwards the enemy were observed bringing out their dead from the undergrowth and burying them in the field behind. All that day, too, the Germans heavily bombarded the British lines, but altogether without effect. During the whole of that day and the following night the foe was gathering reinforcements, mainly consisting of Bavarian and Saxon regiments.

Dawn had not broken on March 9 when once more the British line was deluged with high explosive shells, a sure forerunner of one of those massed attacks which are so dear to the German heart, and which from first to last has cost the foe upwards of two million men on the different frontiers. They came on light-heartedly enough, blinded and fooled by their leaders, as is ever the German way. For these doomed troops had been told that there had been a slight accident, and that a handful of English troops had blundered into Neuve Chapelle, and that it needed little to turn them out again. So they came on in their usual dense formation, marching like men on the parade ground to one of the most hideous slaughters of war. Apparently the attack had been badly timed and planned without heed for the future. These Bavarians and Saxons had not expected to find the British so far advanced. In front of our men the attacking party progressed like men on a route march, their officers mounted for the most part, with drawn swords in their hands. At one place, at any rate, a non-commissioned officer was seen driving his men along with a whip as if he were rounding up a flock of sheep.