There we stayed six days, finding working parties, etc., and then we moved up to Annequin for three days in reserve. At Annequin there was a coal-pit, which was shelled each day and nearly every night, although the civilians still occupied it. The church, typical of churches in the French villages, came under the enemy's fire first. Just behind and in rear was an estaminet run by two French girls. How they could live there beats me, as there were three large shell-holes in the walls, and a corner had been knocked off the house. They had placed barrels filled with earth over these holes, and carried on business in the same old way, making quite a good living from the English troops billeted there. On Sunday afternoons they used to take walks with some French Officers around what was then the French section of the line; our line finished on the left of the La Bassée Road. We stayed here four days, and on the afternoon of May the twenty-fourth moved into the trenches, taking over from the King's Liverpools the right of La Bassée Road, originally occupied by the French. We found on this part of the line the trenches very good, with four lines of them, a front line, a support line, and a reserve, called Maison Rouge: there were three red-bricked houses in this line. Some of the dug-outs in this line were also splendid, containing beds and furniture brought by the French from the ruined village of Cambrin just behind. Whilst we were here the enemy blew up a mine, but we had few casualties. In this village we had our Transport 1st Line, and also the Brigade Office. The Germans were quite eight hundred yards from us, and in between the two lines was an aeroplane, English or French, which had been hit and brought down by the enemy. On several occasions we went out at night to try to bring it in; but we found the engine had been buried too far in the ground, and all we could do was to take away parts. One day I watched a man go out in broad daylight collecting German helmets. We were relieved on the twenty-eighth by the Regiment which we had relieved four days before, the 9th King's Liverpools; and we returned to our old billets at Annequin. Around this sector of the line we were well backed by the famous French 75 gun. On June the first we relieved the 9th King's Liverpools from trenches at the brickfields at Quinchy. They had been moved from the trenches on the right of La Bassée Road during our time of reserve to those at the brickfields. We had a rough time here for three days: the enemy exploded two mines, which sent up the largest part of one of our Companies (C Company) with them. We were also much nearer the enemy than before, and were continually bombed. On the fourth we were relieved, and proceeded to Bethune, where we were billeted in a school. The very first night we were again shelled. We spent seven days here, enjoying the luxury of a large swimming-bath.