of aerial engagements with
British flyers with disastrous results to themselves. Three German
machines were brought down on the British side, and two fell within
the German lines. The British also drove down five more in a damaged
condition, while their own losses in these air combats amounted to
only three machines.

According to the British official report 6,190 Germans had been made
prisoner during four days' fighting in this sector.

On a front of about a mile and a half the British troops on November
18, 1916, again forged ahead for an average distance of 500 yards or
so on the south side of the Ancre. On the north of the river they
pushed on at daybreak through fast-falling snow until the British line
was now within three-quarters of a mile to the northeast of Beaucourt
and 500 yards beyond the Bois d'Holland, which was in British hands.
The last advance had brought them to the outskirts of Grandcourt and
here bomb fighting at close range went on throughout the day of
November 18, 1916.

To the west of this village ran the original main German second line,
which lower down passed through such famous places as the Stuff and
Zollern Redoubts. With its parallel lines of trenches and
complications it was quite as formidable as the main first line
constructed about the same time two years before. The British had
already broken through the line up to a point some 600 yards north of
Stuff Redoubt. On November 18, 1916, their troops again smashed the
line for a distance of more than 500 yards. The Germans still held
positions on the line to the south of Grandcourt, but the British had
penetrated so far to the right and to the left that the line could no
longer serve as a barrier to the village. The British advance was
begun about 6 a. m., preceded by a short but fierce bombardment of the
German line, and which according to the account afterward given by
prisoners caused the Germans to seek the shelter of their dugouts.
Troops from the British Isles and Canada who made the advance together
were among the Germans before the latter could issue from their
shelters after the withering storm of shells. At different places
savage hand-to-hand fighting went on in the trenches. On the sides of
the ravine below Grandcourt, where the slopes were swept by
machine-gun fire, the British were unable to advance. But for some two
miles to the right they swept all resistance away. Especially
important were the British gains on the extr