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Updated: June 11, 2025
It thus became difficult for these troops to attain their subsequent objectives in the direction of the Nablus road north of Jerusalem. Meanwhile, the task of the 74th Division was to swing forward, with their left resting and pivoting on Neby Samwil, to capture Beit Iksa village and works, and so to swing forward to the Nablus road.
A liberal rum ration added cheerfulness and the Battalion settled down to await relief by a brigade of the 74th Division. Then a long march back and a month of rest and food and sleep would make the men fit for anything. That relief never came.
The dismounted yeomanry of the 231st and 230th Infantry Brigades rushed through, and by half-past one the 74th Division had secured their objectives. The 179th and 181st Brigades of the 60th Division had won their trenches almost an hour earlier, and about 5000 yards of works were in our hands south of the wadi Saba.
The line held by the enemy was our old front line of March overlooking the Bellicourt-Le Catalet section of the Hindenburg line, and they were determined to hang on to that at all costs. The attack on the Hindenburg line was not for us. The 74th Division was booked for the advance further north.
This, combined with a memo, which said "All units XX. Corps except 74th Division will indent for shorts forthwith," made it quite clear that we were bound for France, and so it proved. Next day the Brigade marched via Beitin to Bireh and bivouacked just west of Ram Allah.
It was to gain those craters, and new ones to be made by our mine charges, that the 74th Brigade of the 25th Division, a body of Lancashire men, the 9th Loyal North Lancashires and the 11th Royal Fusiliers, with a company of Royal Engineers and some Welsh pioneers, were detailed for the perilous adventure of driving in the mine shafts, putting tremendous charges of high explosives in the sapheads, and rushing the German positions.
The 74th Division carried on to Nebi Samwil, Beit Izza to Beit Dukku, with the 10th Division on their left through Foka, Tahta to Suffa, the gap between the XXth Corps to the right of the XXIst Corps being held by the 3rd Australian Light Horse Brigade of the Australian Mounted Division.
After this smashing success in the first stage of operations all our tails were well up, and everyone was keen to know what was to be the next move. The next day found the 60th concentrated at Beersheba; the 74th just north of the barrier on the Fara-Beersheba road, while an advance northward had been begun by the 53rd and, in the evening, by a party of the 74th.
Perhaps he considered his positions impregnable they would have been practically impregnable in British hands and he made no attempt to cut support trenches behind the crest. There was one system only, and his failure to provide defences in depth cost him dear. Against the 74th Division's front the nature of the country was equally difficult.
One brigade of the 53rd Division was to advance from the Bethlehem-Beit Jala area with its left on the line drawn from Sherafat through Malhah to protect the 60th Division's flank, the other brigade marching direct on Jerusalem, and to move by roads south of the town to a position covering Jerusalem from the east and north-east, but and these were instructions specially impressed on this brigade 'the City of Jerusalem will not be entered, and all movements by troops and vehicles will be restricted to roads passing outside the City. The objective of the 60th and 74th Divisions was a general line from Ras et Tawil, a hill east of the Nablus road about four miles north of Jerusalem, to Nebi Samwil, one brigade of the 74th Division holding Nebi Samwil and Beit Izza defences and to form the pivot of the attack.
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