A very gallant act was performed here on the 1st October when a mine shaft got full of foul air and the R.E. listening post was overcome. Captain G. H. Gilbey, Sgt. Toole and Pte. Holmes of “C” Company, 11th R.B., descended the mine shaft at great risk and succeeded in rescuing three out of the five men of the listening post. They persevered in this work until they were exhausted. Captain Gilbey was given the M.C. and Sgt. Toole and Pte. Holmes the D.C.M.
After the 25th of September there was no further offensive action on the Laventie front to assist the operations that were still going on south of the La Bassée Canal. Various measures, however, were adopted from time to time with the purpose of leading the enemy to expect an attack and of holding his troops to this part of the line.
Thus on the night of the 8th/9th of October an attempt to cut the enemy’s wire at two points with gun-cotton torpedoes was made by the 59th Brigade.
Lieut. Hugh Jones and Lieut. Grant, both of the 96th Field Company, R.E., directed the operations, and escorts were found by the 10th R.B. and the 11th K.R.R.C. The enemy was very alert, and the right party under Lieut. Grant was unable to reach the German lines owing to the activity of hostile patrols. Eventually at 2.10 A.M. the charge was fired in on enemy sap, where it did considerable damage; the party then got away under heavy fire without casualties. Lieut. Hugh Jones with the left party reached the wire at 1.30 A.M. and placed the torpedoes in position. He attempted to fire them, but was delayed by a faulty fuze. Suddenly the enemy opened a heavy fire at point-blank range. Lieut. Hugh Jones was badly wounded, but he made another attempt to fire the charge and only when this also failed and two of his four men had been wounded did he withdraw. For his action on this occasion he was awarded the M.C.
Still with the idea of holding the enemy to his ground a demonstration was made on the 13th of October by the IIIrd and Indian Corps. On the 20th Division front the line of the 60th Brigade near Mauquissait was chosen as the scene of a feint attack in which the assaulting troops were to be represented by dummies.
During the preceding night a false parapet was built across a re-entrant in the line. At 7 A.M. on the 13th the Divisional Artillery opened fire, cutting the wire very effectively and shelling various points in rear of the German position. The intense bombardment which begun at 12.30 P.M. badly damaged the enemy’s front line, and one gun firing on certain of his trenches in enfilade is believed to have caused much loss to his troops as they manned the parapet. At the same time a smoke barrage was started along the whole of the 60th Brigade front. Boxes of free phosphorus had been put out during the night between the lines and these were fired electrically from the trenches, while catapults and trench mortars helped by throwing smoke bombs. The screen was very effective, and covered the front with a thick cloud for nearly two hours.
The 60th Brigade front line was at this time held by the 6th K.S.L.I. on the right, the 11th D.L.I. in the centre, and the 12th R.B. on the left. Two battalions—the D.L.I. and the R.B.—used dummies which were made of sacks stuffed with straw and clothed with old salvaged greatcoats and with caps either salvaged or else lent by the men.
On the front of the D.L.I. the smoke was too thick for the dummies to be seen except for the first few minutes, when they were effectively used.
Opposite the 12th R.B. on the left the smoke was not continually dense, and in the clearer intervals the dummies were a great success. They were stuck on bayonets, put over the parapet and then withdrawn; they were rolled over the parapet as if shot, and then pulled back by strings when the smoke became thick again; they were poked out of the sally ports, moved up and down n sap in front of the trenches and laid out in ditches in front so as to be just visible.
When the smoke barrage began the enemy opened heavy rifle and machine-gun fire which he kept up for half an hour. Judging from the intensity of this fire he must have been manning his parapet in strength. At the same time the enemy field guns and howitzers severely shelled our trenches, creating a barrage along the 60th Brigade front. Most of the shells seem to have fallen on the support trenches and on the old assembly places, for the 12th R.B. had only two casualties, and this they attribute to the fact that all men of this battalion were kept in the front trenches during the bombardment and none behind in support. The trench mortars also came in for fairly heavy shelling. One of the detachments had bad luck, for when the gun was being packed up the officer and two men were killed and the third man wounded by the last shell that the Germans fired in the course of these operations. Our bombardment ceased at 2.10 P.M. and by 2.45 all was quiet.