text: 8–10 April The Hindenburg Line defences enclosing the village of Bullecourt formed a re-entrant for about  to the  (Balcony Trench) around Quéant, defended by the  German 27th Division. On 8 April it was announced that wire cutting, begun on 5 April, would take another eight days. At dusk on 9 April, patrols went forward and found that the Hindenburg Line was occupied but that the wire cutting bombardment had made several lanes through the wire. Preparations were made in a rush, the 4th Australian Division to attack with two brigades, the 4th on the right and 12th on the left. The attack had to cover  to the wire and another  to the first trench at  about an hour and 48 minutes before the sun rose to evade crossfire in the re-entrant between Quéant and Bullecourt. Artillery-fire would continue as normal until zero hour then maintain barrages on the flanks.
  At  Bullecourt was subjected to a gas bombardment by Livens projectors and Stokes 4-inch mortars as the Australians assembled and waited for the tanks to arrive. Six battalions were out in the snow of no man's land. The left of the 12th Australian Brigade was only  from Bullecourt and dawn was approaching. Zero hour was put back but the tanks had only reached Noreuil and Holmes ordered the infantry back under cover; snow began to fall again and shielded the retirement. Patrols of the 2/7th and 2/8th battalions, West Yorkshire Regiment began to advance from  and at  the patrols began to retire. The patrols suffered