I begged a ride in a G.H.Q. car and found myself during the forenoon near the headquarters of General Davies of the 8th Division.
Not many days before, General de Lisle had called at Estaires, and we had been hospitably given lunch by General Davies, when we had learned something of the general topography of the line on the 8th Division front. The ground in that sector was so water-logged and soft that it did not admit of the construction of a trench line such as we had held in the Ypres Salient. Each small point of vantage to the east of Laventie—a house here, or a rise of ground there—had been made into miniature forts by the British or the Germans. A trench line proper existed, but consisted, from the nature of the terrain, of trench-works and parapets of sandbags, all above ground. These were less impregnable than a trench line in solid ground, and could much more easily be demolished by shell-fire.
The road from Estaires to La Bassée, on the morning of March 10th, was full of advancing troops and returning wounded. General Davies' headquarters were said to be at Rouge Croix, not far west of the town of Neuve Chapelle.
I did not go as far as the cross roads at Rouge Croix, as that point was under heavy German shell-fire.
Little could I see except the enemy's shells, and still less could I learn. That the 8th Division had taken the front line German trenches was common rumour.
Finally a wounded subaltern, a mere boy, came back, hysterically cheerful in spite of a nasty wound in his arm. He belonged to the 25th Brigade—Lincolns, Dorsets, Rifle Brigade and Wiltshires.
"We took Neuve Chapelle," he said. "Many casualties? Yes, plenty. You see, we had orders to take the bally town at all costs, and we did it!"
He was sure his fellows had the ridge that commanded Aubers, and had heard that our men on the right had reached a point a couple of miles beyond La Bassée. Cheerful lad, that. Neither the Auber Ridge nor La Bassée was to be ours, but it was not for lack of his sort. He and his kind, with the men behind them that fought that day at Neuve Chapelle, could have taken Aubers and Lille beyond it had someone not blundered that 10th of March.