THE BATTLE REOPENS.
18th November.
The Battle of the Ancre, which for a moment had died down, began again this morning, at dawn, with a new violence.
The English had only paused just long enough to oil the vast machine, which has now resumed its regular, methodic movements; and the latest news permits us to anticipate a fresh and substantial success.
The scene of these last events has been rather different from that which witnessed the English advance of the 12th and 13th of November. This, one may say in passing, proves the elasticity of the British offensive.
If the eye travels, on the map, to the right, beyond the positions in which the last battle was fought, it follows a line almost parallel to the valley of the Ancre. To-night, then, the English, not pursuing this theoretically correct line, inclined their front slightly to the South, to the centre of a line drawn between Thiepval and Le Sars. This re-entering angle formed an obvious obstacle to the domination of the Ancre valley upon the whole of this part of the British front. For this reason General Sir Douglas Haig decided to abolish it.
Hence the movement of this morning.
The attack was elaborately prepared, and with the utmost secrecy, and was launched at dawn.
At the moment of writing this telegram the reports that are coming in from the scene of action show that the operation is being carried out, within the limits assigned, very successfully. To employ an expression coined by one of their own number, the Boche prisoners are "pouring" to the rear.
This morning the weather, so fine during the last three days, was extremely unfavourable to any movement of troops. There had been heavy snow during the night, and for the first time this winter our Allies fought in the snow. About 8 o'clock, the temperature having risen, a thaw set in. After that it was in foul mud that they did their fighting.