On May 1st the activity of the hostile artillery began to give evidence of registration on the left half of the battalion front, and support lines, important trench junctions, and communication trenches received direct hits or bursts sufficiently near to be suggestive. That night, as had been anticipated, it being the German Labour Day, sounds of shouting were clearly heard from the enemy lines, while a regular "Brock's benefit" was kept up for a considerable time. Next day the registration was even more marked, so early on the morning of May 4th 2nd-Lieutenant Hodgkinson and a small party of stout-hearted men from "D" Company (Walmsley, Mann, Moore, Evans, Woods, and Bissell) crept out to try to kidnap a German sentry. They worked their way up to a post in Centaur Trench opposite the Pont Ballot salient, and got right under the parapet without being detected. Hodgkinson was, in fact, just climbing into the trench to effect the capture when, most unluckily, the relief arrived, and one of them spotted the blackened face of Rifleman Mann peering over the parapet. Dawn had broken and the game was up. Bombs were hurled in among the Germans, the fellow who had spotted Mann receiving a back-hander from a Mills grenade in the face, and the party raced for home under a hail of machine-gun bullets, rifle grenades, and "pineapples." No casualties were sustained, and, as the G.O.C. Division remarked, "it was a bold and useful bit of work," which only failed through sheer bad luck.
At 10 p.m. the 2/7th K.L.R. began to arrive, and at 12.40 a.m., relief being complete, the various companies and platoons were making for Tissage Dump, where transport awaited the Lewis guns and trench stores. "C" Company moved into the subsidiary line.
Two companies were billeted in large houses in the Rue Jesuit adjoining Brigade Headquarters. These must have been fine residences once, and even the ravages of war had not been able entirely to destroy their architectural pretensions. What was of more importance, they were very strongly built and had good cellar accommodation.
The other two companies were at 57, Rue de Lille, where the battalion had spent the evening en route for the Rue du Bois. Battalion Headquarters were in a good house, No. 3, Rue Bayard, a turning off the Rue de Lille. You entered through a gateway into a paved courtyard, surrounded by various domestic offices, and thence up a few steps into a roomy building with a delightful garden behind. The dining-room contained a book-case full of beautifully bound volumes. The Quartermaster's Stores were situated in a large house in the Rue de Lille, opposite which the truck-lines for the trenches started. Mule-drawn trolleys as far as Tissage Dump, and from there smaller trucks man-handled, were the methods of transport employed. The transport lines remained at Bac St. Maur. For the men there were several good estaminets dotted about the town; while a good meal for officers could be obtained at the "Au Bœuf," an ordinary French provincial restaurant, while the more fastidious frequented "Lucienne's," opposite the church of Notre Dâme. There was also "Madame Burberry's" shop, where most items of clothing and field kit were on sale.
The period in reserve was not without incident. To begin with, General Headquarters' pamphlet S.S. 143, "The Training of Platoons for Offensive Action," had just been issued. It contained a scheme for the employment of a platoon as a small force of all arms—one section Lewis gunners, one rifle grenadiers, one bombers, and one riflemen, with a platoon headquarters consisting of the officer, platoon sergeant, runner, and signaller. Each battalion was now ordered to tell off one platoon for special instruction in this latest scheme. This was not particularly difficult, except that the average strength of a platoon and its four sections never approached the strength of the "War Establishment" platoon for whose instruction these illuminating pamphlets were always designed. The selection of ground proved far more difficult, but an open space in the vicinity of the Nieppe Bridge, where some old practice trenches stood, afforded reasonable facilities at a moderate distance from the billets. The Second-in-Command, Major H. K. Wilson, undertook to find a site, and ultimately decided upon what seemed suitable for the purpose. Unfortunately, the site selected had also been chosen as the position for certain silent batteries and defensive machine-gun companies, who watched Major Wilson making notes in his notebook and arrested him as a suspected person. Major Wilson persuaded the machine gunners to accompany him to Battalion Headquarters, whence, after he had been identified, they retired, feeling no doubt that they had at least done their duty. The incident caused considerable merriment, but to no one more than to the officer chiefly concerned.
The shelling of Armentières by the enemy had recently become a daily and nightly operation. Our gradual increase of guns of major calibre hidden among the houses—there were two 8-inch howitzers in a garden in the Rue Bayard—was quite sufficient to attract hostile notice. Apart from Armentières itself, the enemy had also been busy shelling many back areas, and in retaliation the Second Army decided on a general back area shoot, commencing at 7.30 p.m. on April 7th, and all ranks were warned to keep under cover.
The shoot duly commenced, but in spite of the din we heard what sounded uncommonly like a barrage on the 2/7th K.L.R. front. However, we imagined, as at first did they, that this was the anticipated retaliation. At 7.45 p.m. a false gas alarm occurred, but at 8 p.m. the order came for the battalion to stand-to. The raid for which we thought the Germans had been registering had actually come off, and, as ill-luck would have it, at the same moment as our area shoot. At 10.15 p.m. we were ordered to send up a company to reinforce the 2/7th K.L.R., and "D" Company duly moved off, returning at dawn the next morning without casualties. A further barrage at 10 p.m. caused a second stand-to, but the fire died away in a short time, and normal conditions were finally re-established.
On May 8th "A" Company relieved "C" Company in the subsidiary line, and full particulars of the raids were obtainable. The enemy had certainly put up a very fine barrage, but fortunately "C" Company had escaped casualties, though Captain Eccles, returning from Battalion Headquarters, had a narrow escape, and had been forced on one occasion to make a somewhat hasty descent into a muddy ditch.
Preparations now commenced for the relief, an operation which became easier every time the battalion returned to the old sector. On May 11th the Lewis gunners moved in, and the trollies were soon busy trundling up and down the Houplines road, which became more unhealthy every day. Shelling was, in fact, much more frequent and general by day, though our nights also were regularly disturbed by the scream and crash of the shells landing in the houses. The area round the Pont de Nieppe attracted special attention, and many civilians were killed or wounded. The gas-works, where a number of guns were concentrated, the churches of Notre Dâme and St. Vaast, the Rue Sadi Carnot, the railway station, and other places, also came in for their share of attention, till really one began to think that perhaps the trenches were preferable to the billets.
On May 10th a Padre was attached to us, the Rev. M. T. Eland, and it was arranged that he should share Captain McHugh's elegant quarters at Tissage Dump. This was a reasonably intact house, containing, amongst other choice bits of furniture collected from the neighbouring houses, some beautiful plush-covered chairs. The area just beyond Tissage Dump itself used to come in for a good deal of shelling, but McHugh slept unconcernedly on the first floor, and paid little attention to the noise of falling débris and the hum of flying splinters. It was a handy place of call for visitors, often rather breathless in consequence of having traversed the last part of the Houplines road in what the text-books call "a series of short rushes."