Horses serving with the New Zealand army often endured the same hardships as soldiers, including long periods of travel, scarce healthcare and constant artillery fire. Highly valued on the front line, soldiers were responsible for doing their best to look after their steeds. However, as Leonard Leary relates in this interview,  once injured they often became a liability and many were simply shot and buried on the battlefields. Along the Western Front, horses were primarily engaged in teams which were roped together to pull field guns and trailers of ammunition across difficult terrain.

Much of this ammunition was required for the creeping barrage, a new tactic in trench-based warfare. First used in 1913, this military strategy was perfected on a large scale at the Battle of the Somme in 1916, and later became synonymous with the First World War itself. This strategy required a line of artillery or shell fire to bombard the enemy in front, providing cover for entrenched infantry to advance. In this way, the enemy’s dugouts were destroyed, allowing infantry to march forward and push back the enemy line.

Unfortunately, a successful barrage was reliant on correctly calculated variables like temperature and wind, which gave the strategy a wide margin of error. Consequently, many soldiers fell victim to their own shells that fell short. However, in this recording, Leary praises the efficiency of the New Zealand barrages, which were a source of pride for their infantrymen.