About this time the 93rd Brigade became one of the (Army) Field Artillery Brigades which were then being formed, and No. 3 Section of the Divisional Ammunition Column consequently became the 93rd Brigade Ammunition Column. D/93 was split up, one section going to each of the other howitzer batteries. The 93rd Brigade remained for some time longer in the XIVth Corps, but ceased to belong to the 20th Divisional Artillery, which henceforth consisted of only the 91st and 92nd Brigades. By the 4th of January 1917 the Division had taken over from the Guards a line running from south of Saillisel to north of Sailly-Saillisel. Half of the former village and the whole of the latter were in our hands. For the first week this was the right sector of the XIVth Corps front, but after a readjustment on the 10th it became the centre sector, with the 17th Division on the left and the Guards on the right. The 91st Field Artillery Brigade was in the line. The 92nd came in on the 10th, when Brig.-General Browell took command of the artillery covering this sector, and consisting of the 20th and 29th Divisional Artilleries, two batteries of R.H.A., and a Heavy Artillery Group. Little occurred to mark the month spent in this sector. The front covered by the XIVth Corps, however, was most important, and the Sailly-Saillisel sector was the key of the position. The ridge along which the front trenches ran not only flanked the enemy’s position at Le Transloy, but also commanded all the approaches from Combles to the front line system. The valleys on the north and east of the ridge, as well as the large wood of St Pierre Vaast, gave the enemy covered approaches in which he might collect his troops in order to assault our line. The front was held in two brigade groups, the 61st Brigade with the 10th K.R.R.C. and the 10th R.B. on the right; the 60th Brigade with the 11th K.R.R.C. and 11th R.B. on the left. Divisional Headquarters was at Arrow Head Copse. The front line trenches consisted of a series of isolated posts, in some cases within 30 feet of the enemy, but they were much better than the trenches in front of Le Transloy; nearly every man had a shelter of some sort, and the number of sick was very small. Early in January a long list of New Year’s honours for the Division was published, headed by Major-General Douglas Smith, who was promoted to the substantive rank of Major-General. On the 6th, Lieut-Colonel Maddocks, G.S.O.I., with several others who lived in the deep tunnel dug-outs at Divisional Headquarters taken over from the French, was suddenly taken ill with a severe form of influenza and invalided to a base hospital. He was succeeded on the 10th by Lieut.-Colonel J. M’D. Haskard, D.S.O., Royal Dublin Fusiliers.