At zero hour, 6 A.M. on 27th July, the artilleries of the 51st and 62nd Divisions, with the attached French batteries and twenty-four guns of the Divisional machine-gun batteries, opened the barrage.
The attack was met on the left by a light artillery barrage, and on the right by a fairly heavy shelling of the banks of the river and the Bois de l’Aulnay, but no infantry action beyond some long-range machine-gun fire was encountered. The whole front, including the redoubtable Espilly, had been evacuated.
At 10 A.M. the final objective was reached on the right just in time for the troops to see the last of the enemy transport hurriedly leaving Chaumuzy.
By 10.40 A.M. it was apparent that a general retirement was taking place on the whole front, and mounted patrols were sent forward to get into touch with the German rear-guard.
The attacking brigades were therefore ordered forward to the line from Chaumuzy to the north-west corner of the Bois de Courton, and by 1 P.M. the whole Division—infantry, artillery, and machine-gunners disposed in depth, and well covered by strong infantry patrols as well as the cavalry—were on the move, while the sappers were at work repairing the communications.
The last fight in the much-hated Bois de Courton and in Espilly had been fought, and those centres of resistance which had for so many hours appeared almost impregnable had at last fallen into our hands almost without a shot being fired.
It was with a sense of relief to all that it was found that the whole Division was advancing practically unmolested through an area on which a few hours previously the advance of even a section had been welcomed by a shower of machine-gun bullets. This sense of relief lost nothing from the fact that in the last two battles in which the Division had been engaged the whole Division had similarly been on the move, but in the wrong direction!
At 2 P.M. Chaumuzy was entered, and the artillery came into action near the north-east corner of the Bois de l’Aulnay, engaging the enemy who were reported by the mounted patrols to be falling back on the line of the road from Bligny to Chambrecy. At this time the German artillery from positions in rear of this road were becoming increasingly active on the Divisional front.
By 3 P.M. the battalions ordered to the line beyond Chaumuzy were all in position, and patrols were sent forward to the old French trench line skirting the western edge of the Bois d’Éclisse and curving round the Montagne de Bligny.
Later in the afternoon the mounted patrols definitely located the enemy on a line from Montagne de Bligny to the south of Chambrecy.