[96] The heavy artillery at Sir John French’s disposal at this period was still extremely limited, and its effectiveness was greatly hampered by the lack of ammunition, stringent restrictions having to be placed on the ammunition expenditure of guns of all calibres. Fortunately for the Allies a similar handicap was beginning to make itself felt among the Germans; even their preparations had been hardly equal to the vast ammunition expenditure which had been incurred.
[97] The portion of the Ypres salient attacked by the XXIII Corps was defended by French troops alone; there were no British north of the Broodseinde cross-roads.
[98] The enemy is giving the Allies credit for his own tricks.
[99] However, when British troops took over the coastal sector in 1917 Lombartzyde was in Allied possession.
[100] For Order of Battle, see [Appendix].
[101] A Machine-Gun Detachment (Abtheilung) is a mounted battery with six guns.
[102] Consisting of the 4th Ersatz Division and the 43rd Reserve Division.
[103] It is not clear why a British assertion about the defence of Dixmude should be quoted, nor indeed is it clear what shape this assertion can have taken, as no British troops were concerned in the Dixmude fighting, nor could there have been any occasion for any official British announcement about Dixmude.
In the diagram above, for 201st, 202nd, and 203rd Res. Jäger Regt. read Res. Infantry Regt.
[104] The frontage attacked by the twelve battalions of General von Winckler’s Guard Division, far from being held by two British Divisions was held from north to south by the 1st Infantry Brigade, now reduced to some 800 bayonets, a battalion of Zouaves and the left brigade of the 3rd Division, little over 1200 strong. Even if the whole of the 3rd Guard Regiment may have been absorbed in the task of covering the main attack from the British troops lining the southern edge of the Polygon Wood, the superiority of the attacking force was sufficiently pronounced.