The remaining brigades of the Division moved up behind us and the Division took over the right of the line from Soba through Kushil, Nebi Samwil to Beit Izza. Nebi Samwil, so called by the reason of its being the traditional burying place of Samuel, was a distinct thorn in the side of the Turks.
This high hill overlooked Jersualem and threatened the road to the north from that city and our presence there was much resented by the Turks. They made strenuous endeavours to recapture the hill but all their efforts failed. When the 180th Brigade took over the hill there was on the top of it a splendid mosque with a graceful minaret. But Boche gunners with the Turk were no better in their respect for things religious than their brethren in France and it was not long before the minaret and mosque were utterly destroyed by a concentrated bombardment of heavy metal.
The final preparations for the attack on Jerusalem having been completed, the 74th Division which had by this time come up in rear took over Nebi Samwil from the 180th Brigade and we concentrated near Soba. The 179th Brigade were to attack the left of the Turkish position near Ain Karim, and if possible effect a junction with the 53rd Division, which was struggling up the Hebron road. The 180th Brigade were to attack up the main Jaffa-Jerusalem road through Kolonieh and Lifta while the 181st Brigade were in reserve.
On the night 7/8th December we advanced from Soba, crossed the Wadi Surar and at 3.30 a.m. on the 8th of December the Brigade attacked the high ground overlooking the Wadi Surar and south of Ain Karim and were speedily successful. This operation was a difficult one and its success was essential to the main operation. The whole brigade with mountain batteries descended the precipitous hillside in single file. It was a wretched night with no glimmer of moonlight to assist us and the rain fell heavily. The whole route was fraught with much danger to life and limb, but was negociated without a casualty. The main attack was delivered by the other regiments in the Brigade but we were called upon to assist. “C” Company who had taken the Jura Heights and were subjected to three determined counter attacks, the last two of which “C” Company helped to break up, were sent to the help of the Kensingtons.
Meanwhile Captain Leech, our medical officer, hearing that our sister Battalion had sustained over a hundred casualties, came up under heavy fire from two machine guns which were still holding out in a building of Ain Karim in our rear. He and our stretcher bearers, particularly Privates Davey and Eels, rendered most gallant service to our own and the Kensington wounded for which, and for their timely assistance, “C” Company earned the grateful thanks of that regiment’s C.O. By 4.0 a.m. all objectives had been gained and one hour later the main attack up the Lifta road commenced. Much stubborn resistance was met with, as the Turk was well dug in and the progress of the attack was retarded by the fact that our help was not forthcoming as had been expected. This was not our fault. We had hoped to effect a junction with the 53rd Division, and then advance together, but the 53rd were by then many miles away fighting hard to come to our assistance. The resistance they met with delayed them and we in consequence were subjected to much hostile artillery fire from our right flank and unable to push forward. The weather was very bad, a high and bitterly cold wind and torrential rains made conditions extremely uncomfortable. We were clad only in tropical kit, had been exposed to the elements on hills nearly 3,000 feet high for over twenty-four hours and were by no means in a happy frame of mind. The Turk was also making himself extremely objectionable and we were supplied with many gifts in the shape of shells. Our opinions of Jerusalem at that time are not fit to be recorded here, and they did not change for many a long day. Near Lifta the Turk was making strenuous efforts to keep us out, but by 3.30 p.m. he was dislodged by a gallant bayonet attack, and Lifta was occupied at dusk. We pushed on to the outskirts of Jerusalem and remained in battle outposts.
That night pandemonium reigned in the Holy City. The Turk was evacuating as quickly as possible, so quickly that when a patrol of the 180th Brigade advanced from Lifta in the early morning of the 9th of December it was met by the “Mayor” who proffered the surrender of the city. Major-General Shea was instructed to accept it and did so at 1.0 p.m., and Jerusalem passed for ever out of the dominion of the Turks.
We were billeted that night in an empty school in a garden named “Abraham’s Vineyard,” and next day moving out to the north took up an outpost line at Shafat on the Jerusalem-Nablous (Shechem) road where we remained till the 15th of December when we returned to billets in Jerusalem, in the school in “Abraham’s Vineyard.” Jerusalem was the first town worthy of the name that we had seen since leaving Ismailia and to many the prospects held out when viewed from afar off was not fulfilled on closer inspection. The weather was cold and wet, but we made light of such minor discomforts, being so overcome with the novelty of being in Jerusalem. The idea seemed so fantastic. This ancient city which for centuries had been a bone of contention between East and West was at last in Christian hands and withal in the hands of the London Division! True it is that our Welsh friends of the 53rd Division had lent a very helping hand by struggling up the Hebron road, but nevertheless it was to the London Division that credit was due for the releasing of this home of Christianity from the hands of its enemies. Yet withal it was difficult to arouse any real sentiment concerning this famous city. It was inexpressibly dirty, the people comprised all the nations and races known in Biblical times and since, and they like the city were very dirty. Of sanitation there appeared to be no sign and outside the Jaffa Gate the main water cistern, which from its accumulation of rain-water provided drink for the greater part of the city, had to all appearances not been cleansed since the time of Herod. The railway station, a comparatively modern addition, was in a state of chaos, although perhaps the R.F.C. were to blame for that. The fine ancient wall which, with the Temple site—and the water cisterns—was one of the only original things left from Biblical times, had been cut into at the request of the Kaiser and a hideous clock tower crowned with a large clock by “Dents” had been built in the gap made. Appallingly dirty fellows in charge of a few decrepit animals attached to a kind of cab stood near the clock tower plying for hire, but their condition was such that it needed no General Routine Order to forbid us to use them. Of the Holy Places within the city we were allowed only a view from the outside until some months later, but we studiously traversed the whole city armed with the Padre as guide and a Bible as guide-book. We visited the Temple site, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, David’s Tower, and traversed the so-called Via Dolorosa complete with its sites of the supposed halts of Christ during His journey with the Cross. The pool of Siloam was an offensively smelling puddle of dirty water, whilst the Brook Kidron was a mere trickle. Indeed, the whole aspect of the city dispelled in the minds of most of us that vision we had often had in our youth and had forgotten of Jerusalem the Golden. Whatever faith we had in the genuineness of the Holy Places was sorely tested and it was not long before we came to the conclusion that one either had to view everything through rosy-tinted spectacles and believe all that was said, or be convinced that most of it was sham and accordingly see the castles built up in our boyhood rudely shattered by a simple historical fact. Nevertheless Jerusalem possessed a great attraction for us. Outside the old city had grown up a comparatively new town with many modern buildings, and to the north was a genuine church of England—St. George’s Cathedral.
The shops began to display their goods openly for the first time for three years, and the natives offered fruit—figs, oranges, nuts, etc.—for sale in the market places. And indeed it was an event of some importance to be able to walk the streets of the famous city Jerusalem and feel that one was really a Crusader, a descendant of those hardy people who 800 years ago had borne the heat and the burden of the day clad not in khaki drill, but in armour. The amount of correspondence which was handed over to the Army Postal Service was enormous—and written let it be noted for the main part on German paper by German pencils—and in many a home in England to-day is treasured a Divisional Christmas Card for 1917 sent from Jerusalem. We had ideas of being able to spend our Christmas in the city, but that was not to be, and on Christmas Eve, 1917, we relieved the 180th Brigade in the line Beit Hannina—Tel-el-Ful astride the Nablous road. The weather became very bad and the climatic conditions were by no means pleasant. The line was held on the west by the Kensingtons in front of Hannain, and on the east by the Westminsters in front of Tel-el-Ful, and we were in support. Bivouacs had just been erected and we were settling down for a wet cold night when the Colonel sent for Company Commanders.
Headquarters was situated in an old tomb cut in the solid rock and entering we saw the C.O. seated at the head of a roughly made table and near him his senior officers. When we had all arrived he said, “Just listen while I read out the Brigadier’s Christmas greetings.”
“... it is expected that the enemy will attack at dawn on Christmas morning.”