war diaries part 3

11th March 1796
The  next day we were tasked with advancing onto the village of Vhich.
The morning was very foggy, the 20th  was to advance on the right flank of the main advance of the divisions. The main strike was to be the ridge to our north this was were the cannon was firing from last night. This is were the generals say the main body of the enemy is. Our job is to cover the flank of the advance. We advanced to our position early, the fog was still heavy in the valley as we begin to advance. We set off at 7:00 in open order  we covered the ground as best we could as it was full of hedges and ditches and boggy in some places.
To our left I could hear the dull thud of the enemy artillery as they started to open fire on our troops this must mean the main advance has begun.We continued our advance as we stumbled over hedges  and ditches from out of the mist, musket fire erupted we had found the enemy. I was wounded almost  instantly and for the second time in may arm. The enemy fire increased,we could not advance into this fire and our casualties started to mount. We had to feed all our companies into this fire fight,our numbers began to tell and the enemies fire began to slacken  bar a few isolated shots. The enemy withdraw out of the hedges and into the open, and then into another field complex. All this time they kept up a heavy fire we gained the enemy hedge line and at this point I was wounded and had to fall back to our rear. I awoke a little later still dazed. I wandered to the fight which had moved on some distance to the north of me. Francais adventures continue in part 4