Httpclient 4. X Auth Cache Not Set in the Context

I am using HttpClient 4.5.x to call a SOAP web service with NTLM authentication. Authentication happens successfully. It is a 3 way handshake. For example, if i do post-request including images or other data content, then for each handshake request, the data is sent.

One recommendation from the HttpClients material online is to do a cheap request first, and use the same client context object for the subsequent big size request. It also says this in the documentation - As of version 4.1, HttpClient automatically caches information about hosts it has successfully authenticated.

I tried the same. I have both these requests subsequently happening in the same method, and the same thread. The (default) caching does not happen. Both times the 3-way handshake was happening.

In the log I see the following statement [org.apache.http.client.protocol.RequestAuthCache] Auth cache not set in the context

May be this default does not work for NTLM. Is there any flag to turn the caching on? Or should I create AuthCache myself and maintain? It looks like only for preemptive authentication, one creates auth cache. So, I am doubtful if it applies to my case.

private void callServiceWithAuthentication (ByteArrayEntity entity)
    {
        try {

            /*
            AuthScope authScope = new AuthScope("WEBSERVICE-HOST", 443, AuthScope.ANY_REALM, "ntlm");
            */


            CloseableHttpClient httpclient = HttpClients.createDefault();
            NTCredentials ntCredentials = new NTCredentials(this.userName, this.password, null, "DOMAIN");
            CredentialsProvider credentialsProvider = new BasicCredentialsProvider();

            credentialsProvider.setCredentials(AuthScope.ANY, ntCredentials);
            httpClientContext = HttpClientContext.create();
            httpClientContext.setCredentialsProvider(credentialsProvider);

            HttpHost targetHost = new HttpHost ("WEBSERVICE_HOST", 443);

            // First cheap-cost request 
            HttpGet httpGet = new HttpGet ("WEBSERVICE_URL");
            CloseableHttpResponse httpResponse = httpclient.execute(httpGet, httpClientContext);
            HttpEntity getResponseEntity = httpResponse.getEntity();


            // Following real costly post request
            HttpPost post = new HttpPost("WEBSERVICE_URL");
            post.setEntity(entity);

            // Execute request
            try {
                CloseableHttpResponse response = httpclient.execute(post, httpClientContext);

                StatusLine statusLine = response.getStatusLine();
                HttpEntity rentity = response.getEntity();
                System.out.println ("HTTP Response Code: " + statusLine.getStatusCode());

                if (statusLine.getStatusCode() >= 300) {
                    throw new HttpResponseException(
                            statusLine.getStatusCode(),
                            statusLine.getReasonPhrase());
                }
                if (entity == null) {
                    throw new ClientProtocolException("Response contains no content");
                }
                System.out.println (rentity.getContent());
            }
            catch (Exception e) {
                e.printStackTrace();
            }
            finally {
                // Release current connection to the connection pool once you are done
                post.releaseConnection();
            }
        }
        catch (Exception e) {e.printStackTrace();}
        finally {
        }
    }