ssary ammunition during the hours of daylight; and further, the
possession of this vantage point would release for duty elsewhere a
tremendous number of men whose presence there was unavoidable, because
of the control he had over the valley and the surrounding country. So,
when the chief command decided to take the ridge, they went about the
job in a manner thoroughly characteristic of the Scotch commander, Sir
Douglas Haig, and his thoroughness was well borne out by the results.

For the space of a month prior to the drive, every hour of the darkness
was used to get guns, ammunition and supplies into place; all night long
the traffic on the roads was so congested that going faster than a walk
with any conveyance, over any part of the channels of communication, was
simply out of the question; but when day broke it was imperative that
not a single conveyance of any kind be in sight on any road.

Do not imagine, however, that we were free to work as long as the
shelter of night lasted; in the artificial light furnished by the
flares, Fritz did a lot of damage. On one single night during this work
of preparation on the Mont St. Eloi road alone, 156 horses were killed;
and on all through roads, each night that the stage was being set for
the production of the first scene, casualties were had with deadly
regularity.

When everything was in place and the curtain ready to be drawn up, 1400
batteries were in a position along the Lens-Arras road and valley,
standing wheel to wheel, many of them brought to bear over roads that
had been specially constructed for their conveyance, as regular routes
were not usable for them and a road one-and-a-half-miles long, made out
of three-inch thick planking, was placed ready for use in three days'
time, together with a narrow-gauge railroad, for rushing up ammunition
and taking back wounded men. This road and narrow-gauge railway took a
short cut across the valley and proved a godsend in relieving the
congestion on the regular road, and was of inestimable value in
achieving our end.

On the 2nd day of April, 1917, stage manager Haig ordered the curtain
raised and, with its raising, vengeance was let loose. Gaps 20 to 30
feet wide were blasted in the barbed wire; some of the mine shafts
about Lens were flattened and destroyed; Fritzie's supply roads were
rained upon with a steady hail of hell night and day, preventing the
entrance to his trenches not only of ammunition, but also of food, a