went to Brigade Headquarters as a Staff Learner. At the same time, Major
Toller returned to the Battalion as 2nd in Command. After commanding the
4th Battalion until a new Colonel arrived for them, he had been posted
to the 5th Lincolnshires, and for a time it looked as though he would be
permanently given command. However, bad luck pursued him, and, as two
new Colonels arrived for that Battalion the same day, he again lost his
Command. Considering that he had commanded us for three months during
the summer with great success, and was easily senior Major in the
Brigade, it was exceptionally bad luck that he had to wait another eight
months before finally getting his Battalion.

On the 10th November, we were told that we should once more take over a
part of the line, and the following morning we marched to Lacouture and
went into billets for one night. "B" Co. (Beasley) went on at once and
spent the night in support positions near the Rue du Bois between
Festubert and Neuve Chapelle. The rest of us moved up the next day and
took over our new line from the Sherwood Foresters the same night.
Battalion Headquarters lived in a little cottage, "No. 1" Albert Road,
two Companies occupied a large farm house in the same neighbourhood
fitted up as a rest house, one Company lived in a series of curiously
named keeps--"Haystack," "Z Orchard," "Path," and "Dead Cow," and one
Company only was in the front line.

The Brigade now held the line from "Kinkroo," a corruption of La Quinque
Rue, crossing to the "Boar's Head," and of this we held the stretch
opposite the two farms in No Man's Land, Fme du Bois and Fme Cour
d'Avoué. The latter, surrounded by a moat, had an evil reputation, and
was said to have been the death-trap of many patrols, which had gone
there and never been seen since. The trenches had been dug in the summer
when the country was dry, with no regard to the fact that in winter the