Of the 7th Brigade, the 1st Life Guards formed the left, their trenches leading south from the Zonnebeke Road. One of their squadrons was in a reserve trench at the back of the line. Next on the right came the 2nd Life Guards, then the Leicestershire Yeomanry, whose right rested on the Ypres-Roulers Railway.
The 6th Brigade held the line from the railway to the Bellewarde Lake, the 3rd Dragoons on the left, the North Somerset Yeomanry on the right, and the 1st Royal Dragoons (Royals) in reserve a bit to the rear, and but a few yards north of the Menin road.
The 8th Brigade, in reserve, was composed of the Royal Horse Guards (Blues), the 10th Hussars, and the Essex Yeomanry.
Each cavalry regiment had a fighting strength of about 300 men. The 1st Division numbered some 2,400 rifles, and the 3rd Division roughly 2,700, say, just over 5,000 men for the two Divisions. An extra number of machine-guns made up for their comparatively small numerical strength.
The trench-line into which the troopers were thrown that night was in poor condition for defence. A foot of mud was the average bottom, and further attempts at digging only resulted in more water and mud. Parapets of sandbags and wire entanglements were sadly needed all along the line, and, at that, sandbag parapets were all too easily demolished by Hun shell-fire, which made short work of them.
A careful reconnaissance of the 3rd Cavalry Division trenches failed to reveal a stretch of 100 yards where more sandbags and more wire were not urgently required.
[CHAPTER VI.]
Dawn on the 13th of May was the signal for a howitzer bombardment of the cavalry front which surpassed in intensity and duration any previous gun-fire during the whole War.