No offensive would benefit us which did not give us, at the very least, the whole of the crest of the northern ridge.  And to aim at this would be a big and risky undertaking, involving perhaps heavy casualties and large reserves.  We had only three British Divisions in Italy at this time, the 7th, 23rd and 48th, two of which were always in the line and one in reserve.  The French had now only two Divisions in Italy and the Italians, when the German advance in France became serious, had sent to France more men than there were French and British left in Italy.  The large fact remained that, since the military collapse of Russia the previous year, the Austrians had brought practically their whole Army on to the Italian Front and established a large superiority over the Italians, both in numbers and in guns.  Considerable Italian reserves had to be kept mobile and ready to meet an Austrian offensive anywhere along the mountain front or on the plain.  There was not likely to be much that could be safely spared to back up a Franco-British offensive on the Plateau.  None the less, the value of a successful offensive here was recognised to be so great, that it was several times on the point of being attempted in the months that followed.  But it did not finally come, until events elsewhere had prepared the way and sapped the enemy’s power of resistance.

This, however, is anticipating history.  In March, when we first arrived, we moved into a Battery position in the pine woods behind the rear slope of the southern ridge.  Our right hand gun was only a hundred yards from the cross-roads at Pria dell’ Acqua, disagreeably close, as we afterwards discovered.  For the enemy had those cross-roads “absolutely taped,” as the expression went.  In other respects the Battery position was a good one.  Being an old Italian position, it had gun pits already blasted in the rock, though they were not quite suited to our guns and line of fire, and we had to do some more blasting for ourselves.  In the course of this, a premature explosion occurred, wounding one of our gunners so severely that he lost one leg and the sight of both his eyes and a few days later, perhaps fortunately, died of other injuries.  He was a Cornishman, very young and very popular with every one in the Battery.  We missed him greatly.  In this same accident Winterton was also injured, and nearly lost an eye.  He went to Hospital and thence to England, and saw no more of the war, for the sight of his eye came back to him but slowly.

The Italians had also blasted some good caverne in the position, and these we gradually enlarged and multiplied, till we had cover for the whole Battery.  Being on the side of a hill, and our guns not constructed to fire at a greater elevation than forty-five degrees (the Italians had fired at “super-elevations” up to eighty), we had to cut down many trees in front of the guns.  But this clearance hardly showed in aeroplane photographs, as there were already many bare patches in the woods.  We had perfect flash-cover behind the ridge and were, indeed, quite invisible, when the guns were camouflaged, even to an aeroplane flying low and immediately overhead.  From our position we could shoot, if necessary, right over the top of the northern ridge, on the other side of the Plateau.  And this was good enough for most purposes.