In late January and early February 1915, German and British troops conducted raids and local attacks in the Affairs of Cuinchy, which took place at Givenchy-lès-la-Bassée and just south of La Bassée Canal, leaving the front line little changed.

To the east of the line, the land declines in a series of spurs into the Flanders plain, bounded by canals linking Douai, Béthune, Saint-Omer and Calais.

From Kemmel, a low ridge lies to the north-east, declining in elevation past Ypres through Wytschaete, Gheluvelt and Passchendaele, curving north then north-west to Diksmuide where it merged with the plain.

The Lys, Yser and upper Scheldt had been canalised and between them the water level underground was close to the surface, rose further in the autumn and filled any dip, the sides of which then collapsed.

South of La Bassée Canal around Lens and Béthune was a coal-mining district full of slag heaps, pit heads (fosses) and miners' houses (corons).

North of the canal, the city of Lille, Tourcoing and Roubaix formed a manufacturing complex, with outlying industries at Armentières, Comines, Halluin and Menin, along the Lys river, with isolated sugar beet and alcohol refineries and a steel works near Aire-sur-la-Lys.

The difficulty of movement after the end of summer absorbed much local labour on road maintenance, leaving field defences to be built by front-line soldiers.

Further north, the French I and II Cavalry corps (General Louis Conneau) and de Mitry, part of the 87th Territorial Division and some Chasseurs, held a line from Béthune to Estaires, Merville, Aire, Fôret de Clairmarais and St Omer, where the rest of the 87th Territorial Division connected with Dunkirk; Cassel and Lille further east were still occupied by French troops.

The 4th Cavalry Corps further north, managed to advance and on 7 October, passed through Ypres before being forced back to Bailleul, by French Territorial troops near Hazebrouck.

[9] The British 1st and 2nd Cavalry divisions covered the arrival of the infantry and on 10 October, using motor buses supplied by the French, II Corps advanced 22 mi (35 km).

Next day the northern corps of the 6th Army attacked from La Bassée to St Yves and gained little ground but prevented British and French troops from being moved north to Ypres and the Yser fronts.

From 16 to 18 October, II Corps attacks pivoted on the right and the left flank advanced to Aubers, against German opposition at every ditch and bridge, which inflicted another thousand casualties.

At the end of 20 October, the II Corps was ordered to dig in from the canal near Givenchy, to Violaines, Illies, Herlies and Riez, while offensive operations continued to the north.

[18] The countryside was flat, marshy and cut by many streams, which in many places made trench digging impractical, so breastworks built upwards were substituted, despite being conspicuous and easy to demolish with artillery-fire.

An infantry company and the 7th Brigade Signal Section engaged the Germans at 150 yd (140 m) as they apparently lost direction in the mist and more troops arrived to close the gap.

[27] By morning, the II Corps headquarters staff were relieved, that despite 13 days of battle, exhaustion and the loss of many pre-war regulars and experienced reservists, a determined German attack had been defeated.

The corps front was not attacked on 25 October but German guns accurately bombarded the British positions, with assistance from observation aircraft, flying in clear weather.

Smith-Dorrien forecast a lull in German attacks but requested reinforcements from French who agreed, because a defeat at La Bassée would compromise offensive operations in Belgium.

The German attack began at 2:30 p.m. and quickly got behind the defenders, who were almost cut off an hour later and were pursued through the village, the two battalions involved being reduced to about 500 men including replacements.

Brigadier-General Frederick Maude the 14th Brigade commander to the south, had sent his reserve battalion which arrived after the 9th Bhopal and moved, north to make a flank attack on the Germans in the village but night fell before the troops were ready.

Later that night the 3rd Division commander, Major-General Colin Mackenzie, approved the decision to relinquish the village and the survivors of the three British battalions, fewer than 600 men, were collected at Richebourg St Vaast with the 2nd Cavalry Brigade, which had arrived from the north.

Every second available man was made available to the Corps Chief Engineer (Major-General C. Mackenzie) to dig a second line and Smith-Dorrien oversaw the preparations at the 3rd Division headquarters for the counter-attack.

The junction of the 13th and 14th brigades near La Quinque Rue and Festubert was attacked at about 4:00 a.m., when the Germans moved quietly forward in mist but were then caught by artillery and small arms fire.

[39] Movement forward to the British positions was difficult in daylight, due to a lack of communication trenches, so Indian troops moved along wet ditches in the dark and conducted the relief over two nights.

[40] The French had been able to use the undamaged railways behind their front to move troops more quickly than the Germans, who had to take long detours, wait for repairs to damaged tracks and replace rolling stock.

The French resorted to more cautious infantry tactics, using cover to reduce casualties and a centralised system of control as the German army commanders followed contradictory plans.

[38] The German 6th Army had been reinforced and originally been intended to break through from Arras to La Bassée and Armentières, until 29 October when all available heavy artillery was transferred north for the Battle of Gheluvelt.

[50] The Indian Corps battalions came under much shellfire during the relief and remained in the front-line trenches, instead of retreating further back temporarily, a practice which had been adopted by experienced units.

On 2 November, a bigger German attack north-west of Neuve-Chapelle drove a Gurkha battalion back until local counter-attacks recovered the ground by 5 October and the old trenches were filled in and abandoned.

Some historians have written that c. 65 per cent of Indian casualties were self-inflicted wounds, not always punished by court martial but a study by Sir Bruce Seton in 1915, found no evidence to support such an allegation.