At 6.30 a.m. on August 30th the Brigade took over the front line from the 170th Brigade, of our Division, and the battalion concentrated west of Fontaine. We had now come into the fringe of the battle zone, and had three men killed and four wounded. We remained in this area till the next day, August 31st, when we received orders at 9.30 p.m. that we were to attack on September 1st at 6.5 p.m. Before describing the attack it should be stated that it was the final stage of the Battle of Bapaume, which had opened on August 21st on the whole front of the Third Army and the left wing of the Fourth Army. It finally resulted in the capture of 3,400 prisoners and 270 guns, and the advance of the line Roye (on the Amiens--Noyon road) to Arleux, ten miles north-west of Arras, up to a line which ran west of Nesle, Peronne, and Bullecourt. In other words, the enemy had been driven right across the old Somme battlefield, and the northern portion of the Hindenburg Line had been pierced. The action in which the battalion, in conjunction with other troops, took part was intended to complete the success which the previous day's fighting had won, and prepare the way for the next great assault. The following extract from the _Morning Post_ dated September 3rd, 1918, is worth quoting at this point. * * * * * "THE LANCASHIRES' ACHIEVEMENT. "The breaking of this line was an intricate operation, and a detailed account of its accomplishment would be too technical for the average reader. It is sufficient to say that the Drocourt Line is a series of parallel trenches in two groups, known as the front and support systems, running northward out of the Hindenburg system near Quéant, and in front of the villages of Cagnicourt, Dury, and Etaing to the River Scarpe. Against the greater part of the line--that is, from Etaing on the Scarpe down to Cagnicourt--the English troops and Canadians had only simple front and support trenches to cross. On the right, however, the great triangle of closely woven ditches and tunnels was a much harder obstacle, and our progress in this region has been much slower in the preliminary stages of the advance. You know the trouble caused by Bullecourt and Hendecourt, even more by Riencourt, all of them lying fast in the meshes of the joined defensive systems--Hindenburg and Drocourt--a solid mass of earthworks over three miles deep, riddled with secret refuges and machine-gun emplacements.