[Illustration: Sketch Map to illustrate the Fighting near La Bassée of the 1st Corps, January 25-26, 1915.]
For the next ten days the struggle continued. On the 29th the Germans again attacked south of the canal, and tried to get into the "keep" by means of scaling ladders, but were beaten off with severe losses. On 1st February, very early in the morning, the Coldstreams were driven from their trenches south of the canal, and two counter-attacks failed to recover them. As the light grew better, our artillery came into action, and so accurate a fire was kept up on the lost trenches that the Germans could not hold them. At ten o'clock fifty men of the 2nd Coldstreams and thirty men of the Irish Guards, along with sappers carrying sand-bags and barbed wire, rushed forward, and not only recovered the lost trenches, but seized one of the enemy's posts on the embankment of the canal. It was during this attack that Lance-Corporal Michael O'Leary won the Victoria Cross by a remarkable feat of gallantry which will be described in the next chapter.
"Our men," says Eye-witness, "were enabled to take in flank one of the enemy's trenches to the south, and they fought their way along it, throwing hand grenades, until they dislodged the Germans from a considerable length. We thus established ourselves firmly in a good position on the canal bank and in the adjoining trenches. During the action we captured fourteen prisoners and two machine guns, also many wounded. Our losses were not severe, but the enemy suffered heavily, especially from our artillery fire. . . . Our men were in excellent spirits after the encounter, and on being relieved somewhat later, marched back to their billets singing to the accompaniment of mouth organs and the roar of guns."
About 2 p.m. on the night of the 5th-6th February the British and French artillery turned their heavy howitzers on the "railway triangle," and began a fierce bombardment. The boom of the guns and the roar of the exploding shells were clearly heard twenty miles away, and to those near at hand the noise was terrific. One lyddite shell blew a house bodily into the air; while others, exploding amongst the brick stacks, wrought awful havoc amongst the enemy. At 2.15 a.m. an attack was launched at a strong position held by the Germans amidst stacks of bricks. Our storming columns rushed the position from three sides at once, and captured it with very little loss. Prisoners afterwards said that the noise of the bursting shells, and the thick clouds of dust which arose, prevented them from hearing or seeing our men until they were almost upon them. Other trenches were captured, and the next day the Germans tried hard to recover the lost ground. Our gunners, however, were too much for them, and succeeded in destroying one of their heavy batteries.