Our wire entanglements were exceedingly poor, and immediate attention was directed to the improvement of this important part of our defences; the parapets also were thin, firebays sadly in need of revetment, and the whole sector seriously lacking in shelter for the men. No time was lost in evolving an extensive works programme, which was promptly put into execution, the more important work being carried out under Royal Engineer supervision. The urgency of the Brigade works programme rendered the supply of large working parties necessary, and it was therefore arranged that of the two battalions for the time being in Laventie one would act as "Works Battalion" finding all working parties, while the other would devote itself to training.
The most peculiar feature of this sector lay in the immunity from shell fire of Laventie behind the British lines and of Aubers in the German territory. Each village layabout 2000 yards in rear of the respective front trenches, and both were used as reserve billets for the troops holding the line. By mutual and tacit consent the artillery on each side refrained from bombarding the other's billets; any infringement of this unwritten law on one side being met with immediate and severe retaliation by the other. During the period therefore spent in the Laventie area, the Battalion on coming out of the line had the enjoyment of occupying tolerably wind-and water-tight billets without molestation, although they were distant little more than a mile from the enemy lines. A considerable number of civilians still clung to their battered homes in Laventie, and it was strange to see French soldiers, whose divisions were serving in Alsace or the Argonne, come to Laventie "on leave from the front"!
The 1/4th Londons now settled down to a regular routine of four days in the right subsection breastworks followed by four days in billets in Laventie, tours being later extended to six days, and as this routine continued until the middle of December we need not follow it in detail.
The sector had been particularly quiet prior to the 56th Division's arrival, but almost from the day of its taking over the line conditions began to change. Possibly a certain undesirable aggressiveness on the part of the Londoners began to annoy an enemy who, but for interference, was content to conduct a perfectly peaceful war; possibly the change was due to the recovery of both sides from the fatigue and over-strain of the Somme. Whatever the reason, certain it is that as the winter wore on the whole Neuve Chapelle-Fauquissart area began to become much more lively than it had been. On our side the most vigorous system of patrolling, of daily organised shoots by guns of all calibres, trench mortars and machine-guns, and of an intensive course of sniping, quickly gave us the ascendancy and caused the Germans a pardonable irritation under which they showed themselves less and less disposed to take their punishment quietly.
In the line the Battalion was busily occupied with its share of the works programme and in patrolling in which the infrequency of encounters with the enemy in No Man's Land gradually led to the belief that his front breastwork was not occupied. This was probed further on the last evening of November when a fighting patrol of twenty men under 2/Lieut. W. H. Webster (Intelligence Officer) entered the enemy lines at the Wick Salient and found it untenanted, in a shocking condition of flood and affording ample evidence that no attempt was being made to repair the serious damage caused by our artillery fire.
During the third week in November the Battalion's frontage was extended to the right, involving the occupation by the right company of an extra 400 yards of breastwork and an additional supporting post, Erith, and by the reserve company of a fourth keep on the Bacquerot line called Lonely Post. This new piece of breastwork was usually subjected to a good deal of enemy trench mortar fire, especially about the point at which Erith Street communication trench joined the front line. This was an unpleasant spot. Erith Street sunk into a slight depression so that all traffic using it was plainly visible to the Germans; and as it came to an abrupt end some fifteen yards short of the front line an undesirable gap occurred which had to be traversed with more than ordinary agility by those whose duty took them that way. A good deal of extra trench repairing work was imposed on us in consequence of the enemy's attentions at this point, and unfortunately some casualties occurred.
The enemy's activity was rather marked on the 26th November, during the morning of which day over seventy 5·9-inch shells fell near the Convent observation post but without a direct hit being obtained. The Convent, together with two or three other posts along the line of the Rue Tilleloy, used by the forward observation officers of our supporting artillery, consisted of a substantial brick tower some 25 feet in height, like an attenuated Martello Tower. These had been erected behind the cover of the houses of Fauquissart before the village had been destroyed. But the subsequent demolition of the houses had exposed the towers, which consequently stood up naked and unashamed within 200 yards of our front line, and their presence, possibly combined with his evident inability to hit them, seemed to be a constant source of annoyance to the enemy.
All this time the Battalion strength was steadily increasing with reinforcements from home and with the return of many who had been wounded on the Somme, till by Christmas it mustered some 700 all ranks. Officer reinforcements followed on each other's heels with surprising rapidity, and the following joined during November:
Captains V. S. Bowater and H. M. Lorden, Lieuts. H. Jones (appointed Brigade Bombing Officer) and H. J. M. Williams, 2/Lieuts. E. G. Dew, L. W. Wreford, S. P. Stotter, H. W. Spiers, R. W. Chamberlain and W. A. Froy; 2/Lieuts. H. N. Williams, L. W. N. Jones, H. D. Rees, Bradley (to 168th L.T.M. Battery) and A. L. Harper (attached from 4th Royal Welsh Fusiliers); 2/Lieuts. F. H. Hutchins, A. G. Davis and L. E. Ballance (attached from 11th Londons); Captain H. Pentelow and Lieuts. T. Coleman (Works Officer) and H. D. Beeby (attached from Hunts Cyclist Battalion).
Captain Pentelow was unluckily hit and sent to hospital two days after his arrival.