At 9 P. M. the Battalion was told it might go back and get tea and supplies at some cross-roads or other in the darkness behind it. The cookers never came up and the supplies were not available till past midnight on the 12th. As their orders were to return to 1st Brigade Headquarters at 2 A. M. to take part in an attack on a German trench, the men had not much sleep. The trench had been captured by the enemy the day before, but they had abandoned it and dug another, commanding, in the rear, whence they could deal with any attempt at recapture on our part. The composite force of the 2nd Grenadiers, Munster Fusiliers, Irish Guards, and Oxfordshire L.I. discovered this much, wading through mud in the darkness before dawn, at a cost to the Battalion of Major Webber and Lieutenant Harding and some twelve men wounded. They were caught front and flank and scattered among the shell-holes. General FitzClarence was killed by enemy fire out of the dark, and eventually the troops returned to 1st Brigade Headquarters where a company of the Grenadiers were told off to dig trenches in a gap which had been found in the line, while the remainder, the Irish Guards and the Munsters, were sent back to the woods near Hooge Château which was full of fragments of broken battalions, from Scots Guards to Zouaves. The Battalion reached its destination at 6 A. M. of the 12th. Three-quarters of an hour later it was ordered up to the woods on the Gheluvelt road. They occupied “dug-outs”--the first time the Diary mentions these as part of the scheme of things--on the north side of the road near the end of the wood west of Veldhoek; sent a platoon to reinforce the Scots Fusiliers who were hard-pressed, near by; and were heavily shelled at intervals all day, besides being sniped and machine-gunned by the enemy who commanded the main road towards Hooge. None the less, they were fed that night without accident. Captains Everard and Hanbury-Tracy, Lieutenant Pigott were sent to hospital, and 2nd Lieutenant Antrobus rejoined from hospital. This left to the Battalion--Captain Orr-Ewing, Captain the Hon. J. Trefusis, Adjutant R. M. C. Sandhurst who had joined a day or so before, Lieutenant L. R. Hargreaves, and 2nd Lieutenant Antrobus, who was next day wounded in the arm by a shell. Lieutenant Walker, Acting Quartermaster, was sick, and Captain Gough was acting as Brigade Transport Officer. At that moment the strength of the Battalion is reported at “about” 160 officers and men. A draft of 50 N.C.O.’s and men arrived on the 13th November.