On the 15th Major H. J. Duncan-Teape rejoined the Battalion and was appointed second in command. The works programme was now beginning to be operated by Brigade Headquarters to the fullest extent and the greatest possible working strength was daily employed, the chief tasks being the digging of cable trenches for the signal services, the construction of new dugouts and the deepening and strengthening of existing communication and fire trenches.
D Company and one platoon of B Company in fact were despatched on the 18th to Hébuterne, where they were billeted for night digging work; and every available man of the remaining companies was detailed for work of one sort or another. So insistent was the demand for more labour that on the 20th May the band and every available man of the transport section had to be put to work on digging parties.
On the 20th and 21st May a series of Brigade reliefs took place, the trenches being occupied by the 169th Brigade, who replaced the 167th; while the 168th withdrew in Divisional reserve to Grenas, a hamlet near the Doullens-Arras Road, where Brigade Headquarters opened on the 21st. The Rangers and Scottish were billeted close by at Halloy; but the 1/4th Londons and the Kensingtons remained in the forward area attached to the 169th Brigade, the latter battalion occupying W sector, on the right of the Divisional front. The 1/4th Londons moved on the 21st in Brigade reserve to Bayencourt, about a mile and a half south of Souastre and slightly nearer the trenches.
On the 22nd the detachments in Hébuterne were relieved by C Company, who took over their tasks. Each night of the period of duty in Bayencourt the Battalion continued to supply large numbers of men for fatigues of various sorts, the parties being small and divided amongst a large number of tasks. These working parties were equipped as lightly as possible, the men carrying water-bottles and respirators over the left shoulder; a bandolier of fifty rounds over the right shoulder; and their rifles with bayonet in scabbard fixed. But although the troops moved "light" the duties were onerous, partly from the long hours of work and the strain induced by the short available time in which to complete apparently impossible tasks; and not least by the bad weather, the season from the middle of May onwards being for the most part wet. Hitherto practically no casualties had been sustained, the first recorded casualties at the enemy's hands during the Battalion's attachment to the 56th Division occurring on the 24th May, when two men were wounded at work in Hébuterne.
On the afternoon of the 28th May the 1/4th Londons relieved the Kensingtons in W subsector of the Divisional front, the Battalion still being under the orders of the 169th Brigade. The Kensingtons took over on relief the billets at Bayencourt.
The Divisional sector as taken over from the 46th Division early in May had consisted of the original line taken up by the French troops in October 1914 during the extension of the battle line from the Aisne to the sea. This line the French had continued to hold until they were finally relieved of responsibility for it in June 1915, when the British extended their lines southward to the Somme. The frontage of the sector extended as shown on Map No. 4 from the Bucquoy Road on the right to a point opposite the most westerly point of Gommecourt Wood on the left, being divided into two subsectors, W and Y, by an imaginary line running roughly parallel to, and 200 yards north of, the Hébuterne-Bucquoy Road. Opposite the British lines the Germans held a position of enormous strength bastioned by the enclosure of Gommecourt Wood which marked an abrupt salient in their line. As was only too frequently the case the enemy possessed considerable advantages of observation over the British lines, the ground rising steadily in rear of his front trenches to the Gommecourt-Bucquoy ridge, which, although not a hill of outstanding pre-eminence, formed the summit of the Somme watershed described earlier in this chapter.
Except in the neighbourhood of villages such as Hébuterne, which are surrounded by orchards and enclosed in a ring fence, the Somme country is, like most of Picardy and Artois, devoid of hedges, and from road to road the swell of the hillside is unbroken by fence or ditch. The roads themselves, however, are in many cases "sunken," that is, contained in a deep cutting, the cover afforded by the banks playing an important part in the actions fought in this area.
A glance at the map will help to make the position clear. The trench line shown as a reserve position on the map and marked as the WR and YR lines was at the date of the 56th Division's advent the most advanced trench, so that No Man's Land varied in width from 800 to 600 yards. This fact is most important and a full realisation of it is essential to a correct understanding of the enormous task performed by the 56th Division.
In view of the impending attack the great width of No Man's Land was clearly a great disadvantage, as the time which must necessarily be occupied by assaulting columns in advancing an average of distance of 700 yards before reaching the German front line would expose them to risk of very serious loss and possibly deprive the attack completely of the weight necessary to enable it to be driven home. Nothing daunted by this difficulty, however, the 56th Division at once proceeded to make arrangements to push the lines forward and roughly to halve the width of No Man's Land. This audacious scheme was put into operation, and before the end of May the construction of the new front line—that shown as the front line on the map—was begun.
