several intermediate lines of trenches, all of which were most confusing for the battalions in front. The Coldstream battalions mistook these intermediate lines for objectives, and thought that they had reached the third objective when they were really between the first and second objectives. Their real position, however, was correctly reported by the air scouts.
Meantime the Quadrilateral—a powerful system of redoubts—on the right had made any advance by the Sixth Division impossible, and on the left also the Fourteenth Division had been held up by some strong points in the enemy’s line. The result was that the Guards Division had both flanks in the air, and was subjected to a withering fire almost from the start. The 3rd Battalion Grenadiers on the right and the 3rd Battalion Coldstream on the left were obliged to throw out protective flanks, and so had some difficulty in keeping pace with the battalions in the centre.
It was some time before the two brigades were firmly established in the first objective, as there were parts of the line in which some Germans had been left, more especially in the space reserved for the tanks, which unfortunately never arrived. However, the 1st and 2nd Battalions Coldstream in the centre pushed on and gained the second objective, while the battalions right and left threw back protective flanks. The second objective was a trench running into the first objective, and only concerned the Coldstream battalions on the left.
On the next day, the 16th, Corkran’s Brigade was ordered to advance through the leading
brigades and continue the attack. But it did not start till the middle of the day, and after having gone some distance was held up by machine-gun fire and the men were told to dig themselves in where they were.
The whole Division was taken out of the line on the night of the 18th and remained resting in bivouacs until the 20th, when each brigade sent battalions into the front line to dig assembly trenches and straighten parts of the line. On the 22nd Major-General G. Feilding issued the following orders:
Guards Division Order, No. 82
1. (a) The Fourth Army will renew the attack on Z day in combination with attacks by the French to the South and the Reserve Army to the North.
(b) The objectives of the Fourteenth Corps include Morval and Lesbœufs, and those of the Fifteenth Corps Gueudecourt.
(c) The attack of the Fourteenth Corps will be carried out by the Fifth Division on the right, the Sixth Division in the centre, and the Guards Division on the left. The Fifty-eighth Division will form a defensive flank to the south of the Fifth Division. The Twenty-first Division will be attacking on our left.