Sailly was captured first (October 15), the French attacking the defences of the castle, park and old church which flanked Sailly on the west. After desperate fighting, the Germans were forced to retreat. Following up their success, the French pursued the retreating enemy into their second lines and entered the village, reducing the fortified houses one by one, and occupying the whole of the village west of the Bapaume-Péronne road. By nightfall, the central cross-roads of Sailly was reached. On the 16th, a new block of houses was carried. On the 17th, the Germans counter-attacked furiously several times in force, and succeeded in regaining a footing in the defences lost the day before, to which they clung desperately. The capture of the village was only completed on the 18th, when the French consolidated their gains by carrying the ridges which dominate Sailly from the west and north. The honour of taking Sailly fell to the 152nd Infantry Regiment of the Vosges, already famous by the capture, in Alsace, of the village of Steinbach and the Hartmannsweillerkopf. For eight days, this gallant unit _"fully maintained its gains, in spite of the most intense bombardment, and as many as three violent counter-attacks daily"_ (Order of the Day of December 4, 1916, being the third Citation "à l'ordre de l'Armée" of this regiment). [Illustration: GRAVES IN THE PARK OF SAILLY-SAILLISEL CHÂTEAU] The battle was soon resumed with the same violence for the possession of Saillisel. At the end of October, the French reached the church--about 200 yards from the first houses of the hamlet--and continued to advance on the following days, occupying Saillisel almost entirely on November 5. They were, however, unable to maintain themselves there, and the Germans, after extremely violent fighting, reoccupied the ruins of the hamlet. Saillisel was finally and totally conquered on November 11-12. A party of German machine-gunners in a block of houses refused to surrender, and had to be overpowered with bombs. Sailly-Saillisel must be added to the long list of the villages which have totally vanished. The old castle is now a shapeless mass of ruins. The park was so badly cut up by the shells that there remain practically no vestiges of the trenches and fortifications which the Germans had accumulated there. All the trees were more or less shattered, and rank vegetation now overruns the whole place. Groups of graves scattered here and there, recall the terrible battles which were fought there. Of the church, only the bases of a few pillars remain. The graves in the churchyard were torn open by the bombardments, and the village was almost entirely levelled. _To visit Saillisel, take, opposite a large pool, a road--at right angles to N. 37--which runs past the ruins of the church: follow it as far as the cross-roads._ The sight is impressive, on account of the large number of French graves and shell-holes; some of the latter are of enormous size.