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The Germans were pushed down the hill from Wancourt Tower and Guemappe was taken. The 4th N.F. did well, getting to a place called Buck Trench. And the Divisional front was advanced to a point not far from the outskirts of Cherisy. It was unfortunate that we had no fresh troops at this juncture to press home the attack.
When we left the line at Cherisy we had a good idea what our destination was to be. But first of all we moved a short way back in the direction of Miraumont. The 149th Infantry Brigade was quartered at Courcelles-le-Comte, a shattered village in the area vacated by the Germans after the battle on the Somme.
The further offensives of 1917 were carried on more to the north and south, and the Arras area saw no more big fighting till the beginning of 1918. The 50th Division came into action on April 11, and worked alternately with the 14th Division. The enemy were pushed across the Cojeul Valley and into the outskirts of Vis-en-Artois and Cherisy.
It had been a quiet part of the line, and consequently the patient industry of the German had had full scope. The 50th Division began to take over the line west of Cherisy and Vis about the middle of June; but only two brigades were in the front trenches together, and it was our turn to remain behind.
Also each brigade held in turn the trenches on the right, known as the Cherisy sector, and then the trenches on the left, known as the Vis sector. My time was given to Intelligence in the line and to Salvage when out of the line.
There was practically no accommodation here and ground sheets had to be used as shelters. The following day it relieved the 10th Battalion Essex Regiment in the front line, just south of the Cojeul River Valley, opposite Cherisy. After four days in this sector it went out to Divisional reserve near Boisleux-au-Mont, where, on the 27th June, it was visited by Col. the Hon.
The left of the assaulting battalions was to have touched Fontaine Crosilles but swung away to the right. This left an unprotected flank to them, as the nearest troops on that flank were the Canadians near Cherisy. Captain Fyfe was in command and at once decided to attack the enemy, who were entrenched on the slope facing him behind the Fontaine Crosilles Crosilles road.
Croisille and Cherisy were targets of German guns, and I saw them ravaging among the ruins, and dodged them. But our men, who lived close to these places, stayed there too long to dodge them always. They were inhabitants, not visitors.
Throughout May 4, 1917, the British were occupied in organizing and strengthening the new positions they had won in and around Fresnoy and in the sectors of the Hindenburg line near Bullecourt. Repeated German counterattacks were repulsed at all points, except in the neighborhood of Cherisy and the Arras-Cambrai road, where the British were forced to abandon some of their new positions.
On May 3, 1917, General Haig's troops struck a fourth blow against the German front east and southeast of Arras, penetrating the Hindenburg line west of Queant. The British push toward Cherisy, Bullecourt, and Queant was at the southern end of the day's major operation, which covered a range of nearly eighteen miles. At the north Fresnoy was the chief objective.
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