Mav 22, 1915. 
LAND AND .WATER* 
• 
Loos 
ofPkai 
SO. 
Heights ui "Metres- 
Ovftles 
•iJ' 
\ 
\ 
round the ruins of the chapel, and all the valley 
below in the shaded district of which the three 
comers are the three villages of Souchez, Ablain, 
and Carency. The French had made repeated 
attempts to take this fortified area, because, until 
it was taken, they could not properly watch, and 
later submit to heavy gun fire, the railway com- 
munications of the plain and their junction at 
Lens. 
In this last effort, May 8-9— -May 12 they 
were successful. The details of this action may 
best be followed upon the accompanying sketch. 
They began in the night between May 8 and 
Ii^Iay 9 by attacking to the north and to the south 
of the positions. They attacked on the north, 
along the direction of the arrow (1) towards the 
village of Loos. They appear to have advanced 
about as far as the line A B, and then to have lost 
— on May 11— the trenches there c^aptured. 
But on the south, along the arrow (2), after 
nearly four hours' preparation upon the mornin« 
of Simday, May 9, they carried first the hamlet of 
La Targette, and then beyond it a part of the 
village of Neuville St. Vaast. They made about 
2,000 prisoners, captured seven guns, and occupied 
a belt of territory about two miles in extent. 
Their next effort was to force the fortified 
area Souchez, Ablain. Carency, lying in the valleyj 
below the spur of Our Lady of Loretto, which 
spur, with its ruined chapel, is marked with thd 
letter A on the above sketch. 
They first attacked between Ablain and 
Carency," and at the same time along the spur 
towards A. They pursued this attack on the night 
between the 11th and the 12th, that is between 
the Tuesday and Wednesday of last week. 
Against Carency they failed, but they carried the 
height A, on which the ruined chapel stands. As 
they already had possession of La Targette and 
most of Neuville to the south they had already got 
3* 
