Following these engagements, the actual locality of which was not disclosed, American forces were reported to be very active in aggressive operations in the neighborhood of Lunéville, a town east of the Toul sector. This information revealed an extension of the American positions in Lorraine and an augmentation of forces that made the new sector one of the most active on the front. It appeared that the two simultaneous raids mentioned took place in this vicinity, northwest and northeast of Badonviller. The trenches evacuated by the Germans were occupied by the Americans, who consolidated them with their own lines. This forward movement, though a small one, marked the first permanent advance by the American army in France, and enabled the Americans and French to operate from higher ground than heretofore. The Germans made only feeble attempts to retake the position, and each time were repulsed. The parapets were turned toward the enemy, dugout entrances were changed, and new dugouts built to protect the troops. An exploring patrol examined the trenches, proceeding laterally until they established contact with the enemy. They came upon snipers' posts, listening posts, and nests from which machine guns had been firing into the American lines. These ambushes of the enemy were turned over to the tender mercies of the American batteries, which wiped them out. The positions of the Germans were made so uncomfortable at various points that they tried to regain their lost foothold by connecting shell holes. Their guns pounded the new American positions with heavy shells, some of the twelve-inch type, without affecting the Franco-American consolidation. A German battery of mine throwers, one of which had made a direct hit on a dugout occupied by American soldiers, next received the earnest attention of American guns in the Lunéville sector. The battery had been causing considerable trouble. It was finally located, and upon it high-explosive shells were concentrated. It was blown up. More German trenches in the Lunéville sector were destroyed. The enemy vacated them. When a patrol, without assistance from the artillery, crossed no-man's-land, they found the first and second positions wiped out. The patrol obtained further information and returned without casualties, the Germans apparently not daring to molest them. The indications behind the German lines were that they saw the need of constructing stronger earthworks to withstand the American fire. A patrol ascertained that the enemy had constructed trenches built of concrete half way up the side, and was using rock crushers and concrete mixers for building a number of "pill-boxes" opposite the American front.