ench aviators had seen a German counterattack getting under way
near the sugar factory at Souchez. Preparatory to the Teuton advance
the German artillery hurled hundreds of high-explosive shells on the
section where the French would have been had they not received the
order to keep under cover. To be exposed under such conditions would
have meant annihilation. Believing their plans for the counterattack
were working favorably, the Germans advanced, only to be mowed down by
the French guns. Then the French infantry charged and gained another
trench line. So eager were the younger French soldiers that some of
those who charged from the south were not content with taking the
trench which was their objective point, but dashed on into a ravine
that extended in the direction of Ablain. There they killed or made
prisoners of the Germans they found. This dash was extremely hazardous
in the face of a possible German counterattack, which luckily for the
French did not occur as the Teutons retired to Souchez in confusion
and were unable to rally for any counterattack. A summary of the day's
fighting includes the taking of all of the German trenches across the
Bethune-Loos road; the attack on the fortified chapel of Notre Dame de
Lorette, and the gaining of the trenches to the south of it, these
connecting with Ablain and Souchez; the capture of the cemetery of
Neuville St. Vaast; and the defeat of the German reserves who were
rushed in motor cars from Lens and Douai. The trenches and approaches
being too narrow and deep to allow freedom of action in using rifle
and bayonet, the rifle is generally slung on the man's back in
bandolier, and the fighting within the trenches is done with short
weapons, especially with hand grenades, hence the new military
expressions "bombing" and "bombing parties," as the squads are called
that are especially detailed for bomb work during the charges.

The fighting continued fiercely throughout May 11, 1915. Late in the
day the French took the lower part of the Arabs' Spur. An unsuccessful
counterattack was made that night from the Spur of the White Way. But
the French were harried by the artillery in Angres and the machine
guns in Ablain, and their discomforts were added to by the work of
the bursting shells which opened the graves of soldiers who had been
slain in previous months.

Carency, surrounded on the east, south and west, and wrecked by the
20,000 shells which had been fired upon it, surren