A congeries of machine-gun nests on its west slope, which was still untaken, by its enfilade fire from our sector had stopped the advance of the French on the left. Without waiting for them, and with a view to clearing the way for them, the Marines on the afternoon of the 4th, supported by their artillery, attacked this position. They tested out its strength well enough, in face of withering blasts, to learn that they must devise another plan of assault. This was a wise precaution, as the event was to prove. They spent the night in tireless and canny preparations for the next day's effort. Early in the morning a battalion started over the ridge. They did not want for shields; and their confidence in the accuracy of their veteran artillery led them to keep close behind the smothering fire of the barrage with a speed and agility in the systematic advance of their units which made a record even for the race-horse division. The German machine-gunners, as they saw that hurricane of bursting shells approaching, rushed to cover, which they hugged in desperate and prayerful intimacy as it passed over them. They rose, to find that a human whirlwind in its train was upon them. Without a single casualty the battalion had taken 213 prisoners and 75 machine-guns. The thing seemed miraculous; but there were the machine-guns, and there were the startled Germans who had thrown up their hands. When I went over the ground, still littered with equipment and scattered cartridge cases, that commanded every avenue of approach, I had an example which might well be quoted in all future text-books of how speed and skill may get "the jump" on an enemy. Here was certainly something, not to tell the Marines, but for the Marines to tell those Regulars, who, holding a large section of the line, could respond that though they had no theatrical exhibits to please the gallery gods they were having an affair of their own which might make any Marine thankful for his health's sake that he was climbing hills.
On the right of the Regular brigade the French had not yet taken Médéah farm, which was a perfect haven for machine-guns bearing on the Regulars' flank. The Germans, in this section, were fighting hard enough to atone for the easy surrender of their comrades on Blanc-Mont in their defense of the ridges in front of the village of Saint-Etienne-à-Arnes, the next landmark in the path of the 2nd's progress. The Marines found a thorn in the flesh in a strong point near Blanc-Mont, whose defenders refused to be stampeded. Enemy artillery fire was furious throughout the 5th. On the morning of the 6th, at 6.30, under another hurricane barrage, a regiment of Regulars and one of Marines side by side set out to take the last ridge before Saint-Etienne. This meant that something had to break. It was one of the occasions when professional spirit did not consider the folly of suicide, as the rival units charged side by side. They took the ridge with a loss that was estimated at thirty per cent, and dug in. The French on the left had forged ahead. Meanwhile, with the French on the right valiantly struggling against Médéah farm, and our Regulars checked, our line was at a sharp angle.