The messages were received by the Headquarters of the 36th Division. The resistance of Racecourse and Boadicea Redoubts affords a rare example of that "cold courage," unsupported by the ardour and excitement of an advance or the hope of ultimate victory, which has been so often displayed by soldiers of British race in all periods of the history of British arms. At 4-15 p.m. the 61st Brigade of the 20th Division, placed at the disposal of the 36th Division, was ordered to man the St. Simon defences, an arc covering the hairpin bend in the Canal de St. Quentin, and including the villages of Avesne and the Pont de Tugny. General Cochrane, commanding the Brigade, established headquarters at St. Simon. The position on the right flank grew still more serious toward evening. Finally the Commander of the Fifth Army decided to withdraw the III. Corps behind the Canal de St. Quentin, in conformity with which move it was necessary for the 36th Division to be swung back also, pivoting upon the 1st Inniskillings, which battalion still clung to its Battle Zone. The 61st Brigade was ordered to withdraw across the Canal, obtaining touch on the right with the troops of the 14th Division, east of Avesne. From its left, half-way between Tugny and Artemps, the 108th Brigade was to hold up to the cemetery at Happencourt. Thence, up to and inclusive of Le Hamel, was to come the 107th Brigade. Then the 9th Inniskillings was to prolong the line to the Battle Zone defences of the 1st Inniskillings. The 61st Brigade was not to withdraw from the arc of the St. Simon bridgehead till the troops of the other Brigades had completed their retirement. When this had been effected, the 61st Brigade was to be in touch not only with the 108th, along the Canal, but with the 60th Brigade of its own Division, now at the disposal of the 30th Division, which had outposts on a line from the Canal south of Happencourt to Vaux, north of the Ham-St. Quentin Road.