The troops detailed for the attack were in order from right to left, 1 company 2/3rd, 1 company 2/1st, 1½ companies 2/2nd and 1 company 2/4th Londons. For the purposes of the operation the companies of the 2/3rd and 2/4th Londons were respectively under command of the officers commanding 2/1st and 2/2nd Londons. The attack was to be delivered under a heavy barrage from a strong concentration of guns of the 7th, 58th and 62nd Divisions and the Corps Heavy Artillery, together with the massed guns of the three Brigade Machine-Gun Companies. Arrangements were also made for the provision of supporting rifle, Lewis gun and machine-gun fire by the 21st Division. The 174th Brigade was to arrange for the establishment of a line of posts along the sunken road in prolongation to the right of the 173rd Brigade's objective. A Company (Cotton) was detailed for the first day's attack, and the special task allotted to it by Lieut.-Col. Richardson, commanding the 2/2nd Battalion, was the capture of the sunken cross-roads to the left of the Hump and of a German strong point in the front line about 100 yards north of them. The assembly was successfully carried out during the night of 14th/15th June, and completed by about 2.15 a.m. At 2.50 a.m. our barrage opened and the assaulting waves moved forward to the attack in good order, keeping well up to the barrage and suffering very little loss. The attack proved successful though it led to some hard fighting. The actual advance was entrusted to two platoons under 2/Lieut. Wheatley (right) and 2/Lieut. Bell (left). The objective at this point was strengthened by two "pillbox" machine-gun posts and was in line with the trench already held on our left by the 21st Division, from which it was divided by a double barricade; and Lieut.-Col. Richardson took up his Battle Headquarters in a dugout in their line, as did also Capt. Cotton. A third platoon of A Company under 2/Lieut. Boorman assembled in the 21st Division trench, and was formed as a bombing party with others to rush the double barricade at zero hour and to bomb the enemy out of their two pillboxes before our barrage had lifted off the enemy trench in order to clear it before the arrival of Bell and Wheatley with their platoons. A good many casualties were therefore inevitably caused to Boorman's platoon by our own shell fire, and he reached the traverse next to the first pillbox with only two corporals, Sherwood and Whitworth. Here the two N.C.O.'s threw bombs, which landed neatly outside the two doors of the pillbox, and directly they exploded Boorman dashed round the traverse with a bomb in each hand. Sheltering himself against the wall, he threw his bombs into each door of the pillbox before the Germans inside had recovered from the effects of Sherwood and Whitworth's attack. This neat piece of work secured the pillbox to us, but before Boorman could reorganise his party for the further advance to the second pillbox Bell's platoon had occupied the