When the Battalion first received orders to move up to the coast, the 49th Division was intended to take part in a big attack on the Dunes Sector, with its flank resting on the sea. This operation had been prevented by an enemy attack on July 11th, which had captured the whole of the Dunes Sector and pushed back the British line to the south side of the Yser Canal. Now the Division was detailed to make a frontal attack on the village of Lombartzyde. The 147th Infantry Brigade was to operate on the left, with its right on the Nieuport-Lombartzyde Road and its left on the Galeide Brook. The Battalion was to lead the attack on the right of the Brigade. The operation was a very complicated and difficult one. A large number of men had to be assembled on a very narrow front, and, after taking a series of objectives, which included the western half of the village of Lombartzyde, the Battalion was to consolidate a line on the light railway N.N.W. of the village, with another battalion of the Brigade on its left, facing nearly due west along the Galeide. With the enemy very much on the alert on that front, the assembly alone would have been fraught with great danger and difficulty. A facsimile of the enemy trenches had been dug near at hand by another division, and this was used by the 147th Infantry Brigade. In order to approximate to the actual conditions of the operation, the Battalion used to fall in at 1-0 a.m. and march off to its assembly positions. All had to be assembled by half-an-hour before dawn. At dawn the “attack” would begin, and the Battalion would be back in camp about 8-0 a.m. Little was done during the rest of the day. But this attack never took place. The Battalion never learned definitely why this was. Perhaps it was due to the severe casualties inflicted on the other Brigades of the Division by the enemy’s first use of “mustard” gas. On the last day of July the Battalion moved to La Panne Bains, and took over coast defence duties from a Belgian battalion. In those days La Panne was a delightful place, and the three days spent there were much enjoyed by all. The town had suffered little from shell fire or bombing, and everything was going on much the same as in peace time. The coast defence duties were not heavy. Billets were mostly on the sea front, in good houses or hotels. The “Terlynk” and the “Continental” were well patronised. It was a regular seaside holiday for everyone. (_b_) The Lombartzyde Sector. On the night of August 3rd/4th the Battalion relieved the 1/5th Battalion King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry in the Lombartzyde Right Sub-sector. Motor buses conveyed them to a point about midway between Oost Dunkerque and Nieuport, and from there they marched up to the line. The night was unusually quiet for that sector, but pouring rain hampered the relief and caused much discomfort.