The reader will note then that we leave the Fourth Army, consisting from the right of the Ninth Corps, the Australians, and the Third Corps, in front of the terrific barrier of the main Hindenburg Line. We shall now hark back and follow the advance of Byng's Third Army from its attack on August 21st until, five weeks later, it found itself in front of the same position, carrying on the line of its comrades in the south.
[Illustration: Position of British Corps, end of September 1918.]
Advance of Shute's Fifth Corps--Great feat in crossing the Ancre--Across the old battlefield--Final position of Fifth Corps opposite Hindenburg's Main Line--Advance of Haldane's Sixth Corps--Severe fighting--Arrival of Fifty-second Division--Formation of Fergusson's Seventeenth Corps--Recapture of Havrincourt--Advance of Harper's Fourth Corps--Great tenacity of the troops--The New Zealanders and the Jaeger--Final position before the decisive battle.
On August 20 General Mangin had pushed forward the Tenth French Army, which formed the left of his force, and attacked along a sixteen-mile front from the Oise to the Aisne, thus connecting up the original operations with those initiated by Marshal Haig. The movement was very successful, taking some 10,000 prisoners and gaining several miles of ground. We have now to turn to the left of Rawlinson's advance, and to consider the new movement which brought Byng's Third British Army into the fray.
[Illustration: Advance of First, Third, and Fourth British Armies from August 21, 1918, to September 2, 1918. Arrows point to the Rupture of the Quéant-Drocourt Line]
Upon the left of the Third Corps, which was, as already described, fighting its way along the north bank of the Somme, there lay the Fifth Corps (Shute). On its left was the Fourth Corps (Harper), and north of that the Sixth Corps (Haldane). It was to these { 81} three units that the opening of the attack was entrusted. The frontage was about ten miles, extending from Moyenneville in the north to the Ancre in the south, so that it just cleared the impossible country of the first Somme battlefield--which even now a spectator cannot survey without a feeling of wondering horror, so churned up is it from end to end by the constant thresh of shells, burst of mines, and the spade-work of three great armies. The result of the first day's fighting was an advance of several miles along the whole front, with the capture of Beaucourt, Bucquoy, Moyenneville, and other villages, the farthest advance coming close to the Arras-Albert Railway, and to the village of Achiet-le-Grand.