Nearly three million shells had been dumped forward for the preparatory bombardment, to feed 1,000 field guns, 180 heavy guns and 245 heavy howitzers, giving a density of one field gun per twenty yards of front and one heavy gun or howitzer to fifty-eight yards.49 The artillery plan was for the field guns to concentrate, before the battle, on cutting the enemy’s wire in front of his trenches, while the heavy guns were to attack the enemy’s artillery with “counter-battery” fire and destroy his trenches and strongpoints. At the moment of assault, as the British infantry left their trenches to
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