We attacked at 3 10 this morning the German positions on the Messines-Wytschaete ridge, on a front of over nine miles.
We have everywhere captured our first objectives, and further progress is reported to be satisfactory along the whole front of attack.
Numbers of prisoners are reported already to be reaching the collecting stations.
9 50 NIGHT.
Our operations south of Ypres have been continued methodically throughout the day and have been attended by complete success.
The Messines-Wytschaete Ridge, which for over two and a half years has dominated our position in the Ypres salient, was stormed by our troops this morning.
In this attack we captured the villages of Messines and Wytschaete and the enemy defence systems, including many strongly organised woods and defended localities, on a front of over eight miles from south of La Douve brook to north of Mont Sorrel.
Later in the day our troops again moved forward in accordance with the plan of operations and carried the village of Oosttoverne and the enemyÕs rearguard defence system east of the village on a front of over five miles.
In the course of this advance an attempted counter-attack against the southern portion of our new positions was completely broken up by our artillery fire.
The enemyÕs casualties in to-dayÕs fighting have been heavy. In addition to his other losses, up to 4 30 p.m. this afternoon, over 5,000 German prisoners had passed through our collecting stations. Other have still to be brought in.
We have also captured a number of guns and many trench mortars and machine-guns, which have not yet been counted.
There was again great activity in the air yesterday, and many fights took place.
Five hostile formations, one of which consisted of over 30 machines, were attacked and dispersed with heavy casualties. In the course of the fighting nine German aeroplanes were brought down and at least nine others were driven down out of control.
Six of our aeroplanes are missing.   
June 8, 1917


WAR  CORRESPONDENTSÕ 
HEADQUARTERS,  THURSDAY.
Today we dealt the Germans as hard a blow as we have ever struck them. On a front of 17,000 or 18,000 yards from Observatory Ridge, south-east of Ypres on the north, to before Ploegsteert on the south, we have shattered all his long-prepared defences, and the famous Messines Ridge is in our hands.
The attack was made by General PlumerÕs army, which so far has had no chance of an offensive, but for more than two years has been continuously on the defensive, and has had the terrible job of holding the Ypres salient. The object of the attack was the capture of the Messines Ridge, which really is hardly a ridge at all, but only a long, low slope which reaches its culminating point of approximately 250ft. near the village of Wytschaete.
Looked at from this side Ñ and how familiar we are with it! Ñ it is merely a gentle slope, which presents to the eye a fairly clear-cut skyline running north and south. The importance of a height such as this, however, is purely relative. Though itself a mere ignoble rise in the ground, it is the final height before the plains of Flanders, and, above all, it dominates from the south side the Ypres salient. What that has meant during these last two years we have known when no troops, no transport, no guns, and hardly any individuals have been able to move by the roads in the southern Ypres area without being under the immediate observation of the enemy on the Messines ridge.
You already understand that the line of all this western front was of the GermansÕ selecting, and they selected well. Almost everywhere they made their positions along the high ground, and we have had to work as best we could in the flats below or on the opposing slopes. From Ypres downwards there were especially three ridges opposed to the British front which have left us at the mercy of enemy observation. These, counting from the south, were Albert Ridge, Vimy Ridge, and Messines Ridge. The Albert Ridge we wrested from the enemy in the Battle of the Somme. Vimy we snatched from him in the Battle of Arras. Today we have grasped, and I hope hold firmly, the last of the three.
The Terrific Bombardment.
It would have been difficult to believe that any bombardment could surpass in power and spectacular effect those which ushered in the Battle of the Somme a year ago, or the Battle of Arras last April. But unquestionably this morningÕs bombardment did so. It was terrific beyond words. Seven days we have been shelling the enemyÕs positions pitilessly, never letting them rest, and occasionally subjecting one portion of the line or another to a hurricane bombardment of greater or lesser duration. Twice, indeed, we have poured upon the whole front to be attacked, by way of rehearsal, a tornado on the same scale as this morning. Under this treatment the whole topography of the front has changed. Woods have been swept out of existence, hill slopes have been stripped and laid bare, and villages like Wytschaete and Messines have disappeared. At the same time we have kept continually raiding the enemy trenches up and down the line. Certain Irish troops in the attack made five raids in 40 hours. From prisoners taken in these raids we have learned of the tremendous havoc wrought by our shelling, and those captured in more than one part of the line have told the same story Ñ that it has been impossible to get food up to the front line for five days.
Before The Attack.
During the hours immediately preceding the dawn we did not shell heavily. According to the standard of even two years ago it would have been considered a fairly continuous and sustained bombardment, but as such things are reckoned now it was mere desultory shelling which gradually fell as the morning approached.
As we ceased an almost perfect hush descended for a while, in which one heard the fluting notes of a distant nightingale. Then, however, the Germans grew more active, and to the left where I was the air was full of the whining ping of shrapnel searching for certain batteries of ours, almost as if it had been full of bees.
600 Tons of Explosives.
How many mines went up at once I do not exactly know, but it was nearly a score. Many of these mines were made over a year ago, and since then have lain under German feet undiscovered. In all I believe over 600 tons of explosives in twenty or so blasts were touched off along an arc of ten miles.
Personally I can only vouch for having seen nine of the great leaping streams of orange flame which shot up from that part of the front immediately before me, each one of the nine a huge volcano in itself. And each vast sheet of flame, as it leaped roaring upwards, threw up dense masses of dust and smoke which stood like great pillars towering into the sky all illuminated by the fires below.
It was terrifying as a spectacle, and what was more terrifying was that the earth shook like a house of cards. I stood on a solid hill, and it quaked like jelly or like some small house on the edge of a railway line when a heavy train thunders by.
An officer of our party, worn out by a nightÕs vigil, had fallen asleep on the ground in spite of all the noise and the German shells. He leaped to his feet, muttering, ÒEarthquake, of course, earthquake!Ó
Then, even before the echoes of the awful explosions died and while the pillars of smoke still towered and grew, all our batteries awoke at once. As in one instance, the whole horizon blazed into one flickering flame, with the flash of our guns and stabs of bursting shells and streams of lights and flares. Imagine the whole sky ringed with lightning which flickers white and yellow and orange, red, and green. Imagine thousands of giant fireflies of all the colours of the rainbow. Imagine the sky one diamond with a million facets being shaken in a giant hand. Imagine what you will, and still you will get no picture of it. All this to the eastward, while overhead the sky, now clear, was a pale translucent blue in which the moon swam serenely.