Between Naaneh and Mansura the 6th Mounted Brigade was preparing for another dashing charge.  The enemy who had been opposing us for two days consisted of remnants of two divisions of both the Turkish VIIth and VIIIth Armies brought together and hurriedly reorganised.  The victory at Mughar had almost, if not quite, split the force in two, that is to say that portion of the line which had been given the duty of holding Mughar had been so weakened by heavy casualties, and the loss of moral consequent upon the shock of the cavalry charge, that it had fallen back to Ramleh and Ludd and was incapable of further serious resistance.  There was still a strong and virile force on the seaside, though that was adequately dealt with, but the centre was very weak, and the enemy’s only chance of preventing the mounted troops from working through and round his right centre was to fall back on Abu Shushe and Tel Jezar to cover Latron, with its good water supply and the main metalled road where it enters the hills on the way to Jerusalem.  The loss of Tel Jezar meant that we could get to Latron and the Vale of Ajalon, and the action of the 6th Mounted Brigade on the morning of the 14th gave it to us.

The Berks Yeomanry had had outposts on the railway south-east of Naaneh since before dawn.  They had seen the position the previous day, and at dawn sent forward a squadron dismounted to engage the machine guns posted in the walled-in house at the north of the village.  From the railway to the Abu Shushe ridge is about three miles of up and down country with two or three rises of sufficient height to afford some cover to advancing cavalry.  General Godwin arranged that six machine guns should go forward to give covering fire, and, supported by the Berks battery R.H.A. from a good position half a mile west of the railway, the Bucks Hussars were to deliver a mounted attack against the hill, with the assistance on their left of two squadrons of Berks Yeomanry.  The Dorset Yeomanry were moved up to the red hill of Melat into support.

At seven o’clock the attack started, the 22nd Mounted Brigade operating on foot on the left.  The Bucks Hussars, taking advantage of all the dead ground, galloped about a mile and a half until they came to a dip behind a gently rising mound, when, it being clear that the enemy held the whole ridge in strength, Colonel Cripps signalled to Brigade Headquarters at Melat for support.  The Dorset Yeomanry moved out to the right of the Bucks, and the latter then charged the hill a little south of the village and captured it.  It was a fine effort.  The sides of the hill were steep with shelves of rock, and the crest was a mass of stones and boulders, while from some caves, one or two of them quite big places, the Turks had machine guns in action.  When the Bucks were charging there was a good deal of machine-gun fire from the right, but the Dorsets dealt with this very speedily, assisted by the Berks battery which had also moved forward to a near position from which