The position to be attacked had few artificial defences—the German wired line defending Menin and Roulers was just west of Dadizeele and Vijfwegen, and had already been pierced—but it was naturally strong. The embankment of the huge main road formed good protection to the enemy. But the key to the position was a hillock half-way between the road and Vijfwegen—Hill 41. Sixty feet above the surrounding country, crowned with several farms and their outbuildings, which had been strengthened with concrete, it was at once invaluable to the enemy and an excellent defensive position in fighting of this nature, when very little artillery was available to shake its machine-gun detachments prior to the infantry assault. With plenty, even of field artillery, it would not have been a very formidable obstacle, while a concentration of heavy artillery would have blown the defenders off its crest. But the big guns were still far behind.
At 7-30 a.m. the 108th Brigade passed through the troops of the 109th. The 9th Irish Fusiliers was on the right, the 12th Rifles on the left, and the 1st Irish Fusiliers in reserve, eight hundred yards behind the leading battalions. Each had one section of machine-guns and one Stokes mortar attached. The advance encountered considerable machine-gun fire from Hill 41 and the Menin-Roulers Road. Despite this, north of the hill it went forward in splendid fashion. The men of the 12th Rifles fought their way through the Zuidhoek Copse, and reached the Menin-Roulers Road by 10-30 a.m. Touch being gained here with the 9th Division, the 12th Rifles, according to previous agreement, took over from its troops as far north as Klephoek Cross Roads. On the right the 9th Irish Fusiliers reached the Gheluwe-Vijfwegen Road, and pressed on south of the latter village and past the southern flank of Hill 41. But upon the hill itself the German machine-gunners resisted all attacks. On the right of the 9th Irish Fusiliers the 29th Division made great strides, despite machine-guns distributed in depth all along its front. Though it did not take Gheluwe, and was unable to do so all day, its left flank reached the Gheluwe-Vijfwegen Road in touch with the 108th Brigade.
At last the 9th Irish Fusiliers also reached the Menin-Roulers Road, at Kezelberg, and attempted to work up it and obtain touch with its comrades of the 12th Rifles, a thousand yards further north, thus surrounding Hill 41. One strongly held farm-house, with twelve prisoners, was taken at 12-30, but thereafter fire from the hill prevented any move northward.
The capture of Hill 41 evidently required a serious effort. General Coffin arranged with the 9th Division that its 50th Brigade R.F.A. should support an attack with a barrage of smoke and high explosive. Behind this one company of the 12th Rifles was to advance at 4 p.m.
The Riflemen, in face of heavy fire, went forward most gallantly. The German resistance was equally determined. For every hedge there was a battle, the bayonet being frequently used. Thirty-one prisoners were taken, and about the same number of dead Germans counted after the attack. The crest, however, could not be reached, a line being established just short of it. But the strength of the German defence had been under-estimated. The story of Mœuvres was repeated with regard to this battalion. Before reinforcements could move up a heavy German bombardment came as prelude to a counter-attack, estimated at three hundred strong. Atop the hill it was held by the fire of Lewis guns, but, with their superiority of numbers, the Germans pushed round on either flank, rendering the position untenable. At six o'clock the company was compelled to fall back. Its casualties had not been heavy considering the fierce nature of the fighting.
The 107th Brigade had reached the line of Becelaere by the morning, and had been ordered to push up a battalion on the right of the 108th Brigade in the afternoon. The 2nd Rifles had attempted to advance upon Klythoek, on the Menin-Roulers Road, but had been held up by heavy machine-gun fire. Another attempt to advance was planned for the morning of October the 1st. This time there was more effective artillery support, two batteries of 6-inch howitzers being able to shell Hill 41 at long range. To attack the hill, two companies of the reserve battalion, the 1st Rifles, were brought up. The 12th Rifles was to co-operate on the left, and the 2nd Rifles of the 107th Brigade on the right. The 9th Division was to endeavour to cross the Menin-Roulers Road and capture Ledeghem, on the Menin-Roulers Railway. The new attack was launched at 6-15 a.m. in heavy mist. On the right the leading companies of the 2nd Rifles lost direction. The commanding officer, Lieut.-Colonel Bridcott, was killed while attempting to reorganise them. On the left also the attack failed. On Hill 41, however, the companies of the 1st Irish Fusiliers, fighting their way desperately forward in face of heavy resistance, reached Twigg Farm, just short of the crest, and captured that place with twenty-two prisoners. Further they were unable to go in face of the machine-gun fire. The fire from the eastern slope of the hill was also causing serious trouble to the troops of the 9th Division, now approaching the Menin-Roulers Railway. After capturing Ledeghem the Lowland Brigade made an attempt to turn Hill 41 from the north, to aid the 36th Division, but was beaten off in turn by the irrepressible machine-guns.
One more attempt finally to clear the obstinate hill was made that day by the 1st Inniskilling Fusiliers of the 109th Brigade, swinging in from the north. It was unsuccessful in its object, but it achieved another not less important. The Germans were about to launch a heavy counter-attack on the exposed right flank of the 9th Division, when this diversion checked them. The affair is thus reported in the History of the 9th (Scottish) Division:
"Lieut.-Colonel Smyth saw the Germans collecting troops for a great counter-stroke, and the K.O.S.B. were bracing themselves for a desperate resistance at Manhattan Farm, when the timely arrival of the 1st Inniskilling Fusiliers, who made a most heroic attack on Hill 41 from the north, scared the enemy and turned his efforts solely to defence. Though the Inniskillings failed to capture the hill, their plucky effort probably saved the K.O.S.B., and so great was the admiration of the latter and the troops of the Ninth Division who witnessed the attack, that the G.O.C. at their request wrote at once to the Thirty-sixth Division expressing the admiration and thanks of the officers and men of the Ninth."
Local counter-attacks did come against Twigg Farm, to be beaten off with loss by the company of the 1st Irish Fusiliers which held it. That night the 109th Brigade relieved the 108th.
The action of this day and of those following cannot be understood without a brief survey of the general situation. The British advance of the first two days, at its greatest point, from east of Ypres to the Menin-Roulers Road, had been eight miles. The Germans had been broken and thrown into confusion. But the very rapidity of the Allied advance, over such roads as those which crossed the welter of the old Ypres Salient, had created new difficulties. It was hard enough, as has been related, to bring guns forward. But that was by no means the main difficulty, even where the artillery was concerned. Batteries in an advance go forward only. The limbers which feed them, the lorries which feed the limbers from the train, must go forward and backward. Therein lay the real trouble. The roads were choked. The only tolerable among them, because, bad though they were, the remains of the old pavé held them together, were the Menin and Zonnebeke Roads. Upon each was a solid mass of transport, which often for hours at a time remained immobile. A few days after the events already recorded, wagons of the 107th Brigade took thirty-six hours to proceed from Potijze Château to Terhand. Captain Walker thus describes the Zonnebeke Road on the night of the 30th of September: