Meantime opposite Vaucelles the 2nd Brigade had not succeeded in crossing the Canal. On 1st October it had sideslipped northwards. The 37th Division, relieving the 5th, took over the 1st Canterbury sector at Vaucelles, and 2nd Canterbury occupied the whole of the new brigade front south of Les Rues des Vignes. The change, however, offered even less facility for an advance, for 2nd Canterbury were now faced by the bridgeless Canal. Of the 3 spans of the bridge on the Tordoir Lock, at the southern end of Les Rues des Vignes, 2 had been blown up, and along the whole front the weedy muddy water was at least 5 feet deep. On the east bank also, though the enemy's movement was now restricted by the efficient fire of our artillery, he still held in strength his positions in Cheneaux Wood and about the quarries. From this high ground, the northern extremity of the La Terrière plateau, he could make no withdrawal without imperilling the last entrenched positions of the Hindenburg Line to the south.

Early in the misty morning of 4th October a silence of the enemy's guns appeared to betoken a retirement, but when the fog lifted there were indications that on the contrary he had even, possibly as a feint, strengthened his defences. His machine guns were as ever active against the forward Bonavis slopes south of Les Rues des Vignes, and large movements of troops in the rear areas suggested the possibility of counterattack at Crèvecœur.

While the whole of the Third and First Armies were by now similarly brought to a standstill, the Fourth Army had on 3rd October completed their task of breaching the Hindenburg Line by the capture of its last system opposite their front, 5 miles cast of the Canal. The result of this last advance turned the enemy defences on the La Terrière plateau.

In the morning of 5th October the eagerly-awaited signs of withdrawal were forthcoming. 2nd Canterbury reported hostile shelling of Vaucelles and of the eastern bank in the neighbourhood. Without losing a moment, the right company commander (Capt. L. B. Hutton) went in person with a patrol southwards on to the 37th Division's front. Scrambling over the Vaucelles bridge, before the troops on the spot moved, Hutton's party passed through the village, penetrated the near edge of Cheneaux Wood, and reached Fox Farm, south of it, without opposition. The patrol was followed by a 2nd Canterbury company, which crossed opposite the brigade front, 3 men at a time, on a German raft formed of a duck-walk supported by bundles of corks.

The platoon forming this company's advanced guard, under 2nd Lt. J. Mitchell, met with considerable resistance in the sunken roads on the slopes north of Cheneaux Wood. 5 machine guns and 15 prisoners were captured in successive encounters. On the fourth occasion, the German officer who commanded the machine gunners, after first holding up his hands, endeavoured to stab one of our party with a dagger. He raised his arm to strike, but L.-Cpl. M. H. Coppell, seeing his action, shot him dead instantly. Not a few other Germans were killed. A second company was diverted round to cross at Vaucelles, Meanwhile the Engineers had constructed a more substantial raft, on which the remaining companies, with a section of machine guns, ferried themselves across. 37th Division patrols were also now over the Canal and moving east.

Continuing their advance, the leading Canterbury company cleared the high ground about Cheneaux Wood, adding an officer and 22 men to their number of prisoners. On this spur they formed a defensive flank, and the support companies advanced on the Bel Aise Farm and the Beaurevoir-Masnières line with its 50-yard-wide belt of unbroken entanglements. This was the pivot of the enemy's withdrawal. Machine guns fired actively from it, but the patrols discovered saps giving approach towards the wire. Here they established the presence of a powerful garrison.

The necessity of guarding the right flank had swung the direction of the Canterbury movement some 600 yards southwards, but the 4th Rifles on the left swiftly filled the gap. For the Rifle Brigade, still being intermittently shelled with gas and high-explosive in the Crèvecœur positions, were also able to make headway. One company of the 4th Battalion extended the bridgehead opposite Les Rues des Vignes and surprised a German post, capturing 18 prisoners and a machine gun. A second company moved over the Canal in support. Nearing the Beaurevoir-Masnières line, the leading company was counter-attacked on the left flank but drove off its assailants, with the help of the support company. Two platoons actually entered the trench, but were later forced to fall back a distance of 150 yards, Rflmn. P. Henderson covering the withdrawal and crawling back later with his Lewis gun under direct and heavy fire. The left front line company, however, which had posts in the northern extremity of the Beaurovoir-Masnières line, succeeded in clearing it for 500 yards southwards. Owing to this hard fighting the 4th Rifles' casualties were fairly heavy, amounting to an officer and 5 men killed and an officer and 39 men wounded. The 1st Rifles' patrols in the centre met very strong fire from Lesdain, but reached its western outskirts, capturing 4 prisoners. On the left the 3rd Battalion gained some 500 yards in front of the Crucifix Road, but as the centre battalion could not make progress into Lesdain, the newly-established posts became exposed to the machine guns in the village and were withdrawn.

In view of the strength of the Beaurevoir-Masnières wire the enemy's position could not be rushed. But the advance already achieved facilitated immediately the Engineers' task of constructing bridges over the Scheldt Canal and river for guns and transport. Forward sections of artillery also could now be thrown over the Canal, and the fact that the New Zealanders and the 37th Division on their right had now room for deployment on the eastern bank would be of enormous assistance in the next movement.

The Battle of Cambrai and the Hindenburg Line closed on 5th October. Bitter resistance was being still encountered in the envelopment of Cambrai, but the strategic aims of the battle had been achieved, and the whole Hindenburg defence system was in our hands. From the various strong counterattacks launched against us during the first 3 days of the battle along the Army front and from the fact that generally the bridges on the Scheldt Canal were only hurriedly destroyed, it seemed probable that the enemy had not only intended to hold up the British attack but had been confident of his power to do so. As late as 24th September Admiral Hintze had assured the Reichstag that the wall of bronze in the west would never be broken. It was now irretrievably shattered. With the passage of the Canal du Nord{246} and the capture of the Hindenburg Line the first phase of the British offensive, the struggle in entrenched positions, was closed, and the menace to the enemy's railways and lines of communication became immediate. Except for the Beaurevoir-Masnières line and some other still less complete defences, no artificial obstacle barred the way to Maubeuge. Nor could the Germans find comfort in the north. The Flanders battle{247} commenced on 28th September. Ploegsteert Wood, Messines, and Polygon Wood were once more in our hands, and a large tract of country beyond the limits of the advance achieved in 1917. Threatened equally by this movement and by the progress on Cambrai, the Germans were already withdrawing south of the Lys, and by 4th October British troops were again in the old New Zealand area about Erquinghem Armentières and Houplines.