At three o'clock the 1st A.L.H. Brigade was directed by the Corps to follow the rest of the cavalry towards El Salt, by the Umm el Shert track, leaving only one squadron on Red Hill.
Meanwhile our infantry had attacked the Shunet Nimrin positions on the west, and captured the advanced works, but were unable to make any farther progress, in face of greatly superior numbers of the enemy.
The 3rd A.L.H. Brigade, pushing very fast up the track from Jisr el Damieh, approached El Salt late in the afternoon, and was held up by fire from some enemy works covering the town on the north-west. The 9th and 10th Regiments attacked these works at once, and stormed them with the bayonet after a stiff fight. As soon as the position was taken, the 8th Regiment, which had been held in reserve under cover, mounted and galloped into the town, which was full of enemy troops. The Turks, surprised by this sudden charge, fought without cohesion, and the hustling tactics of the Australians broke up all attempts at reorganisation. By seven in the evening the whole place was in our hands, with some three hundred prisoners, a large number of machine guns, and all the papers and documents of the Turkish IVth Army headquarters, which was located in the town. The commander of the army, indeed, only just made good his escape. One regiment picketed the approaches of the town on the north, while the position was being cleared and the prisoners collected.
A squadron of the 8th Regiment pursued the enemy some distance down the Amman road, and captured a considerable number of prisoners. On its return, about eleven o'clock at night, the 10th Regiment was sent out along the road in the dark, to make good the junction of the Amman-Ain el Sir roads, some seven miles east of El Salt. The enemy was located in position astride the road at Ain Hemar, just west of the junction, and, as it was impossible to ascertain his strength in the darkness, the regiment threw out pickets, and remained facing the Turks till daylight.
The 5th Mounted and the 2nd and 1st A.L.H. Brigades, with the headquarters of the Australian Mounted Division and two mountain batteries, were overtaken by night on the Umm el Shert track. They had to lead their horses in single file up a very steep goat path, and made but slow progress. The head of the column reached El Salt early in the morning of the 1st of May, and the 2nd Brigade at once pushed on along the Amman road to Ain Hemar, drove off the small force of Turks there, and occupied the road junction. The 3rd Brigade held an outpost line north-west and north of El Salt, and the 1st Brigade a similar line to the west, astride the El Shert track. The three brigades thus formed a cordon round El Salt on the east, north, and west. The 5th Brigade was ordered to move down the main road towards Shunet Nimrin, and attack the enemy's rear vigorously.