The new sector extended roughly from the ruined village of Roclincourt on the right to the ruined village of Neuville St Vaast (exclusive) on the left. The front line trenches were some thousand yards east of these two villages.
This country had been the scene of tremendous fighting when the French had advanced along the Lorette ridge and attacked the Vimy heights in conjunction with the British operations at Loos.
Here the French had made considerable progress, much of it yard by yard, after bitter fighting. Their gains, however, had not all been held. The fighting had been of so desperate and stubborn a nature that French and Germans had repeatedly dug themselves in in close proximity to each other. As a result, the whole sector consisted of an unintelligible maze of trenches, aptly called by the French the Labyrinth.
The country in rear of the lines contained many villages now well known to the Highland Division—the ruins of Ecurie, Anzin, Marœuil, Bray, Ecoivres, Mont St Eloi. This area can almost be called the spiritual home of the Highland Division in France, since it occupied it for three months in 1916, five months in 1917 during the battle of Arras, and returned there in May 1918. From May onwards it remained in that part of the world, with the exception of a brief interlude in Champagne, and from it began its victorious advance which culminated with the Armistice.
In this sector the whole country-side was overlooked by the enemy in an astonishing degree. He occupied the famous feature known as the Vimy Ridge, of which the highest point just north of Thelus reached the height of 135 metres. His foremost trenches were on the outlying spurs of the Ridge, while the trenches taken over from the French were in the low-lying ground at the foot of these spurs.
The enemy thus possessed all the advantages of close observation over our lines; while, in addition, from the upper slopes of the Ridge, he obtained a magnificent panoramic view of the whole of the areas in rear of the British trench systems. On a clear day he could see from Thelus as far westwards as the road running from Habarcq to the Hermaville-Arras road.
Moreover, south of the Scarpe, Observatory Ridge stared down at Roclincourt and Ecurie.
The French, to neutralise his facilities for observation, had constructed communication trenches of what seemed interminable length. These ran from Anzin, Marœuil, and Mont St Eloi to the fire trenches, none of these villages being within two miles of the front line. The labour of walking along these trenches, all cut on a very winding pattern, was severe. It, however, fortunately transpired that the French in constructing trenches of this length had either flattered the enemy’s vigilance, or that his vigilance had subsequently diminished, as it proved unnecessary to walk inside the trenches, certainly for the first three-quarters of a mile.
The enemy did, however, keep a sharp look-out for movement on the roads within range of his artillery. He had, shortly before the Division arrived, killed a French regimental commander who took the liberty of riding on horse-back along the Arras-Bethune road.
These long communication trenches were admirably dug by the French Territorials, who had constructed them, and were still standing and in daily use when the Division returned to this sector in February of the following year.