A blocking party of eight sappers of the 1st Field Company of Canadian Engineers, which had followed the leading company into the attack, had also been all killed and wounded; but one man, Sapper Harmon, gathering bombs from his dead and wounded comrades, bombed his way along the trench alone, finally getting away with ten bullets in his body after he had hurled his last bomb.
The second company under Captain G. L. Wilkinson joined with the leading company in an attack on the German second-line trench. The enemy presented a stiff front and many were bayoneted who resisted. The group of prisoners sent back later with an escort came under fire of their own guns in Stony Mountain, and some of them were killed as well as a few of their captors.
The third company was in charge of Lieutenant T. C. Sims, the other company officers, Captain F. W. Robinson and Lieutenant P. W. Pick, having been killed at the time of the mine explosion. In the advance across the open space between the lines they suffered many casualties, but completed the work of consolidating the first-line German trench that had been captured. The fourth company, which now advanced to support, met with a series of misfortunes. Captain Delamater, the officer in charge, was wounded, and Lieutenant J. C. L. Young, who assumed command, was wounded soon after. The command now devolved upon Lieutenant Tranter, who a moment later was killed. Company Sergeant Major Owen then assumed charge, who proved himself fully equal to the task in bravery and resource. When Lieutenant F. W. Campbell was bringing up two machine guns to the rear of Captain Wilkinson's company the whole crew of one gun were either killed or wounded. A few men of the other crew reached the Germans' first-line trench and pushed on toward Stony Mountain, preceded by bombers and under heavy fire, until held up by an enemy barricade. Of the machine-gun crew only Lieutenant Campbell and Private Vincent were fit to fight and they still had the machine gun and tripod. Lacking a suitable base, Lieutenant Campbell set up the gun on Private Vincent's broad back and maintained a continuous fire on the enemy. When German bombers invaded the trench Lieutenant Campbell was struck down, but succeeded in crawling out of the trench and was carried in a dying condition to the Canadian line by Company Sergeant Major Owen. Private Vincent meanwhile had made his escape from the enemy trench and brought away the machine gun in safety.
The Germans' heavy machine-gun fire forced the Canadian working parties to abandon the attempt to construct the line joining the Canadian trenches with the enemy trench that had been captured. The battalion's efforts were now concentrated in building barricades immediately south of Stony Mountain and to the north of Dorchester, and to maintaining a strong hold on the second-line trench.
Owing to the explosion of the mine, as previously noted, the battalion suffered from a lack of bombs. Private Smith of Southampton, Ontario, son of a Methodist minister, a young man under twenty, undertook to increase the supply. He had been buried when the mine exploded, but dug himself out. This catastrophe deprived the Canadians in the captured trench of bombs, and Private Smith, gathering bombs from the dead and wounded around him, crawled forward on all fours, and under fire, bringing the needed supplies to his comrades. Five times he went forward loaded down with bombs to the points where they were mostly needed, and while his clothes were reduced to tatters by the German fire he miraculously escaped uninjured.
Despite Private Smith's heroic effort the supply of bombs ran out, while the increasing machine-gun and rifle fire from Stony Mountain added to the difficulties of the Canadians in holding the line.
Reenforcements from the 3d Battalion arrived, but little could be done until more bombs could be found. Four volunteers were killed one by one while on their way to get more. Sergeant Krantz of London, Ontario, succeeded in bringing back a load, and Sergeant Newell, a cheesemaker of Watford, and Sergeant Major Cuddy, a druggist from Strathroy, went out on the same mission. The Canadians in the second German line, having lost most of their officers, were slowly forced back along the communication trench, and as nearly all the volunteers who had gone after bombs were killed, the supply gave out and the defense was in a perilous position.
Meanwhile the British division, owing to the strength of Stony Mountain and of the German line north of that strong point, had been unable to advance on the left. The Canadians meanwhile stood fast, trusting that attack on the left would succeed.
The Germans having assembled strong forces for attack, the remnant of the battalion, lacking bombs and other supplies, was forced to withdraw from all the ground that had been gained, losing heavily from the enemy's fire during the operation.
Only three out of twenty-three combatant officers who were in this action escaped death or wounds. The fortunate ones were Colonel Hill, who was in the thick of the struggle and displayed great courage and resource, and Lieutenants S. A. Creighton and T. C. Sims.