The situation was not a pleasant one. It is true that the majority of the shells were bursting behind the front line, but there were sufficient “shorts” to make things very uncomfortable. The wire was torn to shreds, parapets were breached, and many casualties were suffered, particularly by the two flank companies. It was the first time that the Battalion had had to stand a really heavy bombardment in the front line, and they came through it splendidly. For three hours they waited, while the shells crashed around them, longing for the moment when the enemy would appear and they would have the chance to “get a bit of their own back.” About 4-30 p.m. their opportunity came. A party of Germans, clad in fatigue dress, emerged from the trenches opposite and began calmly to cut a passage through their own wire, near the sap-head. This was too much for A Company. Perhaps it would have been better had fire been withheld a little longer, until an actual attack came. But no one thought of that at the time. Tired of his long inactivity under heavy shelling, every man was at once on the fire step working his bolt for all he was worth. Shells were still bursting all around, but none paid attention to them. There was the enemy in the open; nothing else mattered. And the wire-cutting part of the operation came to an abrupt conclusion. By this time, the sap-head had been blown in by a well-directed shell. But the garrison, with whom the indefatigable company commander, Major R. E. Sugden, spent most of his time that day, simply extricated themselves from the debris and set to work to construct a fresh bombing block. Shortly after, the enemy made his next move. A party of Germans, about twenty in number, wearing bombing aprons filled with stick grenades, crawled up in the folds of the ground and began to bomb the sap-head. A brisk encounter ensued. Most of the German grenades fell short and the British proved that they could easily out-throw the enemy. With the assistance of a Maxim gun the attack was driven off with comparative ease, as were two further attacks of a similar character. About the time that the third was made, another party of the enemy was seen moving along a hedge row in the direction of the British line. Fortunately this move was detected early by the crew of a machine gun, which soon drove them to cover. All this time the bombardment continued.