The task of clearing the line would not, perhaps, in ordinary circumstances have been a very difficult one.  But the breakdown gang and their tools were scattered to the winds, and several had fled along the track or across the fields.  Moreover, the enemy’s artillery fire was pitiless, continuous, and distracting.  The affair had, however, to be carried through.

The first thing to be done was to detach the truck half off the rails from the one completely so.  To do this the engine had to be moved to slacken the strain on the twisted couplings.  When these had been released, the next step was to drag the partly derailed truck backwards along the line until it was clear of the other wreckage, and then to throw it bodily off the rails.  This may seem very simple, but the dead weight of the iron truck half on the sleepers was enormous, and the engine wheels skidded vainly several times before any hauling power was obtained.  At last the truck was drawn sufficiently far back, and I called for volunteers to overturn it from the side while the engine pushed it from the end.  It was very evident that these men would be exposed to considerable danger.  Twenty were called for, and there was an immediate response.  But only nine, including the major of volunteers and four or five of the Dublin Fusiliers, actually stepped out into the open.  The attempt was nevertheless successful.  The truck heeled further over under their pushing, and, the engine giving a shove at the right moment, it fell off the line and the track was clear.  Safety and success appeared in sight together, but disappointment overtook them.

The engine was about six inches wider than the tender, and the corner of its footplate would not pass the corner of the newly overturned truck.  It did not seem safe to push very hard, lest the engine should itself be derailed.  So time after time the engine moved back a yard or two and shoved forward at the obstruction, and each time moved it a little.  But soon it was evident that complications had set in.  The newly derailed truck became jammed with that originally off the line, and the more the engine pushed the greater became the block.  Volunteers were again called on to assist, but though seven men, two of whom, I think, were wounded, did their best, the attempt was a failure.

Perseverance, however, is a virtue.  If the trucks only jammed the tighter for the forward pushing they might be loosened by pulling backwards.  Now, however, a new difficulty arose.  The coupling chains of the engine would not reach by five or six inches those of the overturned truck.  Search was made for a spare link.  By a solitary gleam of good luck one was found.  The engine hauled at the wreckage, and before the chains parted pulled it about a yard backwards.  Now, certainly, the line was clear at last.  But again the corner of the footplate jammed with the corner of the truck, and again we came to a jarring halt.