In the spring of 1918, owing to the Russian Revolution, the Germans were able to concentrate all their strength in the West. Their aim was to break the Allied front by separating the French and the British before the United States of America could send her armies to the field. The attempt came very near success. The first blow fell on Thursday, 21st March; by the Saturday evening Sir Hubert Gough’s Fifth Army was in retreat, and it seemed as if nothing could save Amiens. The South African Brigade was part of the 9th Division, on the extreme left of the Fifth Army. It was in action from the first hour of the battle, and for two days, at the cost of some 900 casualties, it prevented a breach opening up at the worst danger-point—the junction of the armies of Byng and Gough. On the Saturday it was given a short time in reserve, but that afternoon it was again called into the fight. That evening General Tudor, commanding the 9th Division, visited its Brigadier, General Dawson. The 9th Division was holding an impossibly long line, and both its flanks were in the air. The South Africans were instructed to withdraw after dark to a position just west of the Arras-Péronne road and the village of Bouchavesnes. The orders were that this line was to be held "_at all costs._" Dawson accordingly began to withdraw his men about 9.45, and by 3 a.m. on the morning of Sunday, the 24th, the brigade was in position in the new line. When the Sunday dawned the two regiments of South Africans were holding a patch of front which, along with Delville Wood, is the most famous spot in all their annals. The ground sloped eastward, and then rose again to another ridge about a thousand yards distant—a ridge which gave the enemy excellent posts for observation and machine-gun positions. There were one good trench and several bad ones, and the whole area was dotted with shell-holes. Dawson took up his headquarters in a support trench some three hundred yards in rear of the front line. The strength of the brigade was about five hundred in all. Dawson’s only means of communication with divisional headquarters was by runners, and he had long lost touch with the divisional artillery. It was a weary and broken little company which waited on that hilltop in the fog of dawn. During three days the five hundred had fought a score of battles. Giddy with lack of sleep, grey with fatigue, poisoned by gas and tortured by the ceaseless bombardment, officers and men had faced the new perils which each hour brought forth with a fortitude beyond all human praise. But wars are fought with the body as well as with the spirit, and the body was breaking. Since the 20th of March, while the men had received rations, they had had no hot food or tea. Neither they nor their officers had any guess at what was happening elsewhere. They seemed to be isolated in a campaign of their own, shut out from all knowledge of their fellows and beyond the hope of mortal aid.