es to the
front line were shelled during the night by 60-pounder and field-gun
batteries. Gas shells dosed the centres of communication and bivouac
areas, and every quarter of the defences was made uncomfortable. The
sound-ranging sections told us the enemy had between sixteen and
twenty-four guns south of Gaza, and from forty to forty-eight north of
the town, and over 100 guns were disclosed, including more than thirty
firing from the Tank Redoubt well away to the eastward. On October 29
some of the guns south of Gaza had been forced back by the severity of
our counter battery work, and of the ten guns remaining between us and
the town on that date all except four had been removed by November
2. For several nights the bombardment continued without a move by
infantry. Then just at the moment von Kress was discussing the loss of
Beersheba and his plans to meet our further advance in that direction,
some infantry of the 75th Division raided Outpost Hill, the southern
extremity of the entrenched hill system south of Ali Muntar, and
killed far more Turks than they took prisoners. There was an
intense bombardment of the enemy's works at the same time. The next
night--November 1-2--was the opening of XXIst Corps' great attack on
Gaza, and though the enemy did not leave the town or the remainder of
the trenches we had not assaulted till nearly a week afterwards, the
vigour of the attack and the bravery with which it was thrust home,
and the subsequent total failure of counter-attacks, must have made
the enemy commanders realise on the afternoon of November 2 that Gaza
was doomed and that their boasts that Gaza was impregnable were thin
air. Their reserves were on the way to their left where they were
urgently wanted, there was nothing strong enough to replace such heavy
wastage caused to them by the attack of the night of November 1 and
the morning of the 2nd, and our big gains of ground were an enormous
advantage to us for the second phase in the Gaza sector, for we had
bitten deeply into the Turks' right flank.

Like the concentration of the XXth Corps and the Desert Mounted Corps
for the jump off on to Beersheba, the preparations against the Turks'
extreme right had to be very secretly made. The XXIst Corps Commander
had to look a long way ahead. He had to consider the possibility of
the enemy abandoning Gaza when Beersheba was captured, and falling
back to the line of the wadi Hesi. His troops had been confined to
trench