on the straight road (Albert-Bapaume), which ran diagonally across the
battlefield. In the extreme left-hand bottom corner are Martinsart
and Martinsart Wood, on the safe side of the River Ancre, where spent
Battalions of the 49th Division used to withdraw to lick their wounds.
The course of the Ancre is clearly shown from just above Albert to
Miraumont, winding its stream under Authuille and Hamel Bridges; and
between Authuille and St. Pierre Divion lie Thiepval and Thiepval Wood,
the possession of which was so hotly contested since the battle was first
joined on July 1st. The more we look at this timbered countryside, with
its chalk-pits, its farms and mills, the more unsuitable it seems to
the red carnage of 1916. Yet the troops behaved magnificently, and Sir
Douglas Haig sent several messages during these trying weeks to express
his thanks and appreciation. To one Battalion he sent on August 30th by
the hands of the Divisional Commander a sprig of white heather as an
emblem of good luck. Hard though the going was, and bad though the luck
seemed to be, making acclimatization tedious and difficult, it rarely
happened, even among raw troops, that the conditions proved too exacting.
Very typical of the spirit of the Division, in the midst of its harassing
experiences, where the room designed by nature for smiles was too narrow
almost to contain its special circles of man’s inferno, was the part
borne in the third week of September by the 7th Battalion of the West
Riding Regiment. They had been at Hedauville since September 4th, at
two hours’ march from Martinsart Wood, whither, in order to go into the
line, they moved on Friday, September 15th. There they had tea, and took
rations for the next day, and were loaded with two bombs per man, and
so proceeded from 7 p.m. to new trenches, south of Thiepval, which had
been captured only the night before. The relief was delayed in execution
partly by artillery barrage, partly by an attack of German bombers,
partly by heavy rain, and partly by too few guides; there was only one
guide to each Company, ‘and these were strange to the trenches and had
difficulty in finding the way.’ It was completed by 4-20 in the morning
(September 16th), and during ‘intermittent shelling’ all that Saturday
arrangements were concerted for an attack on the German trenches in the
evening of the 17th. This operation was most successful; on the left an
objective was gained, and held, 350 feet in advance of schedule. The
details are not uninteresting, and will repay closer study, not because
the area of the attack was large in proportion to the whole battlefield,
but because it was difficult _terrain_ and the obstacles were well
overcome.
Just north of the famous Leipsic Salient on the map, lay, first,
the Hohenzollern Trench and, secondly, the Wonder Work: two strongly
fortified positions. Eastward out of Thiepval, from the point where the
road from the Cemetery meets the main road in a right angle, ran the
Zollern Trench, terminating (for present purposes) at the Zollern Redoubt
north of Mouquet Farm. Further along the road from the Cemetery, at a
point about as far north of the Crucifix as the Cemetery is south of
it, the Stuff Trench started to run eastwards, parallel to the Zollern
Trench below. It was very elaborately fortified, and terminated in the
Stuff Redoubt still further above Mouquet Farm. The Regina Trench ran
further eastward, from about the point where the Stuff Trench terminated.
Parallel with the road from the Cemetery and Crucifix, the Lucky Way ran
up towards Grandcourt, and the Grandcourt Trench branched off eastward a
little below the village, again in a parallel line with the Regina and
Zollern Trenches. West of that Cemetery road and crossing the Divion
Road about half-way between the Cemetery and St. Pierre Divion was the
horrible Schwaben Redoubt; and, though these names do not exhaust the
German defences of Thiepval, they recall sufficiently the opposition to
the 7th West Ridings and their support on this third Sunday in September.
The assault was made in four waves at intervals of fifteen, twenty and
fifteen feet, the unit being a Platoon. A Bomb Squad, consisting of one
N.C.O. and eleven other Ranks, accompanied each half-Company, and every
man of the last two waves carried either a pick or a shovel. Report
Centres, main and subsidiary, Battalion Scouts, and other special parties
were detailed for duty, and all Troops were reported in position at 6
p.m. Nearly everything went right, except that a portion of D Company,
including both Lewis Guns and their detachments, were believed to have
advanced towards the Row of Apple Trees, and were either taken prisoners
or wiped out by machine-gun fire. About 7 o’clock reports were received
that the objective had been captured, though it was doubtful how the left
flank had fared. The total casualties in this little action were five
Officers and 215 other Ranks. Certain valuable lessons were learned:
the action proved that the jumping-off trench should be parallel to the
objective (this precaution enabled direction to be kept accurately); that
every man, and not merely the last comers, should carry a pick or shovel,
fastened to his body by rope or tape; and that the consolidating parties
should either be kept back till the barrage stops or require dug-outs:
trivial details, perhaps, but they saved life and added to efficiency. We
may add that the Army Commander, Sir Hubert Gough, visited the Battalion
on September 19th, and expressed his satisfaction with the operation,
which gained an important part of the enemy defences after five previous
attempts had failed, and served to straighten the line held by the 147th
Infantry Brigade north of the Leipsic Salient.
A still more important lesson had been learned, and the means were now
at hand to apply it. If these formidable blockhouses were to be crushed,
a new military weapon was essential, and early on September 15th the
first Tank waddled into warfare. From this date to the end of September,
by a brilliant series of advances from the south, across and along the
Albert-Bapaume Road, a victorious crown was put to the tenacious vigil
and hard fighting of the Fifth Army, and the attack swung round at last
on the pivot held by Sir Hubert Gough. This attack (September 26th) was
described by Sir Douglas Haig as not less than
‘a brilliant success. On the right,’ he narrated, ‘our troops
(2nd and 1st Canadians Divisions of the Canadian Corps,
Lieut.-General Sir J. H. G. Byng) reached the system of
enemy trenches which formed their objectives without great
difficulty. In Thiepval and the strong works to the north of
it the enemy’s resistance was more desperate. Three waves of
our attacking troops (11th and 18th Divisions, II. Corps,
Lieut.-General C. W. Jacob) carried the outer defences of
Mouquet Farm, and, pushing on, entered Zollern Redoubt, which
they stormed and consolidated.... On the left of the attack
fierce fighting, in which Tanks again gave valuable assistance
to our troops (18th Division), continued in Thiepval during
that day and the following night, but by 8-30 a.m. on the 27th
September the whole of the village of Thiepval was in our
hands.... On the same date the south and west sides of Stuff
Redoubt were carried by our troops (11th Division), together
with the length of trench connecting that strong point with
Schwaben Redoubt to the west, and also the greater part of the
enemy’s defensive line eastwards along the northern slopes of
the ridge. Schwaben Redoubt was assaulted during the afternoon
of the 28th September (18th Division), and ... we captured
the whole of the southern face of the Redoubt and pushed out
patrols to the northern face and towards St. Pierre Divion’[64]:
grand exploits these, and infinitely welcome to the gallant Territorials
of the West Riding, who had shared since July 1st in the long and
formidable task of holding that north-west corner till the appointed hour
struck for its fall, and their work could be resumed and fitted in with
the larger plans of the Allied Commands.
We might close the present chapter here. The full story of September
15th and the days which followed at Thiepval is involved with other
volumes of war history than that of the 49th Division. The romance of
the coming of the Tanks belongs to the Machine-Gun Corps, Heavy Section;
the death of Raymond Asquith in the attack belongs to the Grenadier
Guards, and to the eminent family of which he was a member. What belongs
to us, as the inalienable heritage of the Troops commanded by General
Perceval, is the fact that for three months, less three days, from their
first assembly in Aveluy Wood, they held on firmly and grimly to that
narrow foothold in the Ancre Valley which was dominated always by German
guns. They went and came to the muddy, bloody trenches, from Authuille
Wood, Aveluy Wood, Martinsart Wood, day by day, under a pitiless harvest
sun or a yet more pitiless autumnal rain; and by their steadfastness
and tenacity, even more than by their toll of German life or their
fragmentary captures of German trenches, they enabled Sir Douglas Haig to
perfect, without haste and without undue anxiety, the long, slow sweep
of his advance which swung back on Thiepval at the last. And, though the
details at this stage must be kept subordinate to the main features, lest
we should seem to claim more than a just share, yet it is satisfactory
to observe that certain Battalions of our Division participated in these
final operations. Thus the 5th West Yorkshires were detailed as support
to the 7th Bedfordshire Regiment for the attack on Schwaben Redoubt on
September 27th. They were formed up on that afternoon, and again before
daybreak the next morning. Zero hour was fixed finally at 1 p.m. On that
day the three supporting Companies became a part of the main advance,
and the final Brigade objective was reached by a mixture of both units,
the men from Yorkshire and Beds. It was a fine conclusion to the waiting
orders imposed after July 1st, and it elicited the following fine
testimony from Major-General T. H. Shoubridge, C.B., C.M.G., Commanding
the 54th Infantry Brigade, in a letter dated October 1st, 1916, and
addressed to Major-General Perceval:
‘I feel I must write and tell you how splendidly the 5th West
Yorkshire supported the attack of the 7th Bedfordshire Regiment
on the Schwaben Redoubt.... The Battalion had, I fear, a trying
time, as the attack was postponed, and I had to bring them up
in support at night, though they had practically been told they
would not be wanted that night. In spite of all difficulties,
when the final attack took place, they formed up in perfect
order and advanced during the attack with marked determination.
I was very struck with the soldierly qualities of the men and
the keenness they displayed, and I am very proud to have had
them under my Command.... All my Battalions are full of praise
for the Artillery support afforded them both during the attack
on Thiepval and the subsequent attack on Schwaben Redoubt....
We all feel very grateful to the troops of your Division
associated with us.... Forgive type,’ added the gallant
General, ‘Have just come out of the battle, and have no ink!’
Recognition, too, eminently merited, reached the 49th Divisional
Commander from Lieut.-General C. W. Jacob, Commanding, as we saw, the II.
Corps. He wrote, on October 3rd:
‘As the Division under your Command has now been transferred
to another Corps, I take this opportunity of thanking you,
your Staff, the Commanders of Brigades, and all Ranks of the
Division, for all the good work you put in while you were in
the II. Corps.
‘The conditions were trying, and your casualties heavy. The
calls made on units necessitated great exertions, which were
always cheerfully carried out. The gallantry of the Officers
and men is shown by the large number of decorations won by
them, and the spirit of all Ranks is good. The clearing of
the Leipsic Salient, the prompt way all calls for raids on
the enemy’s trenches were met, and the heavy work done by
the Division in the preparations for the final attack on
Thiepval are gratifying records.... It was unfortunate that
the Division as a whole could not take part in the final
capture of Thiepval, but you will all be glad to know that your
representatives in that battle, the 49th Divisional Artillery
and the 146th Infantry Brigade, did excellent work, and added
still further to the good reputation of the Division.’
Schwaben Redoubt, we may add, was not retained without a struggle. There
was still one corner to be seized where the Regina Trench branched out
in the direction of Courcelette, and, running north of that village,
came down towards the Albert-Bapaume Road, almost immediately above
Le Sars; and these gains, too, were made and held despite desperate
counter-attacks before the middle of November. So, when winter came down
on the Somme battlefield, and the warring armies went to earth, the
Allied line which had bulged in towards Albert now bulged out towards
Bapaume. ‘That these troops should have accomplished so much under such
conditions ... constitutes a feat of which the history of our nation
records no equal.’[65] We have tried to describe this feat, in so far
as concerns the part, modest in area, indeed, but very exacting in
performance, which was played by the 49th Division and we have tried to
exhibit that part in its true relation to the drama as a whole.
We may now touch upon one or two details.
Before the close of 1916 a third Victoria Cross fell to the share of the
49th Division. The recipient was Major (then Captain) W. B. Allen, of the
1/3rd West Riding Field Ambulance, attached to the 246th Brigade, Royal
Field Artillery. The gallant Officer had already received the decoration
of the Military Cross, and we cite here the official record of the
circumstances in which the supreme reward was won:
‘For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty. When gun
detachments were unloading H.B. Ammunition from wagons which
had just come up, the enemy suddenly began to shell the battery
and the ammunition, and caused several casualties. Captain
Allen saw the occurrences and at once, with utter disregard
of danger, ran straight across the open, under heavy shell
fire, commenced dressing the wounded, and undoubtedly by his
promptness saved many of them from bleeding to death. He was
himself hit four times during the first hour by pieces of
shell, one of which fractured two of his ribs, but he never
mentioned this at the time, and coolly went on with his work
till the last man was dressed and safely removed. He then went
over to another battery and tended a wounded Officer. It was
only when this was done that he returned to his dug-out and
reported his own injury’.
Every Arm of the Service had its heroes. Major Allen in the R.A.M.C.
earned the Victoria Cross; Major Alan F. Hobson, D.S.O., in the West
Riding Divisional Royal Engineers, who was killed on August 26th, earned
the following tribute from a brother-officer of his unit:
‘Poor Hobson, our Major, was killed about three days ago by
a shell in the neighbourhood of our work. One has read of
lovable, brave leaders in personal histories of previous wars.
Hobson was one of those men whom writers love to describe as
the best and truest type of an Englishman. He never asked one
of us to go where he would not go himself. He was always happy,
even-tempered and just.’
A hero’s grave or the Victoria Cross: it was a common choice, settled
by fate during the war, and at no time commoner or more inevitable than
during these Battles of the Somme. A few extracts from the letters of a
fallen Officer may be given in conclusion to this period, not because
they differ essentially (for a happy style is an accident of fortune)
from other letters sent home from the Western front, but because they
express in word-pictures, compiled on the spot and at first hand, the
spirit of the very gallant men whose cheerful devotion in 1916 made
possible the victory of 1918.
First, an account of an ordinary sight by the roadside:
‘While we were waiting for orders there was a constant
procession of troops going up and troops going back from the
front line. It was an intensely interesting procession to me,
but there were some terribly sad sights of mangled men being
brought back on stretchers. The “walking cases” were very
pathetic; one in particular I remember. A young Officer leaning
heavily upon the arm of one of his men, the right side of
his face bandaged up. His left eye closed in agony, along he
stumbled, while on each side of him our guns went off with a
roar that must have been trying to a man evidently so shattered
in nerve, and all the time he was exposed to Boche shelling.’
Another extract from the same letter:
‘It is a pitiable sight to see horses badly wounded, poor dumb
things, so brave and patient under shell fire. When one is
riding near one of one’s own batteries, and guns suddenly belch
forth flame and smoke over one’s head, these dear creatures
hardly wince. From the time the first shell fell among the
horses until we left the town—about two hours later, we were
dodging shells. When we were outside, the warning hiss of a
Fritz caused a funny sight. Those near buildings jumped to a
sheltering wall, some of us who were near trees embraced their
trunks and dodged round them when we thought the burst would
be on one side. We screamed with laughter at each other, but
when one burst rather too close, our heads ached and our hearts
thumped (anyway, mine did, and it is no use disguising the
fact).’
And from the last of this series of dead letters:
‘Presently our trench crossed No Man’s Land—at least, it once
was No Man’s Land; now it belongs to us until we can turn it
over to its proper owners. We examined Fritz’s handiwork where
he had spent months of watching and fighting. We could see what
British fighting was like by the evidence there.... At one
place we were within forty yards of him, but we heard no sound.
The only sound that broke the stillness of that beautiful
day was the bang of our own guns and the swish of our crumps
overhead. At one point, close to the tangled wire of Fritz’s
front line, we saw a sad sight, perhaps the saddest sight of
war, groups of our own lads, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.
Heroes, they had done their bit and there they lie. They have
died so that others can live to be free from the yoke of a
monster in human form, whose greed for power must be stifled.’
‘Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping’: this iterated note conveys, now that
the war is over and the maps are folded and put away, a tender thought
properly keyed, at which to close our account of the Somme battlefield.
It is a field of great achievement and of pious memories, hallowed for
all time in English history, and the ‘more’ that remained to be done,
as foreseen in the vision of this writer, could not be more worthily
accomplished than in the spirit of the heroes of the Somme.
II. WINTER, 1916-17.
It was the peculiarity of the war in France and Flanders that there was
no clear ending to any battle. At Ypres, at Verdun, and on the Somme,
the tide of war flowed with full flood, and ebbed away without definite
decision. There was a little more erosion of the trenches on one side or
the other, a few more miles of territory submerged, or disengaged from
the invader, revealing, when the tide rolled back, the waste and ravage
and destruction, and then a temporary lull, till
‘The tide comes again,
And brims the little sea-shore lakes, and sets
Seaweed afloat, and fills
The silent pools, rivers, and rivulets,
Among the inland hills.’
We reach such a coign of observation, such a lull, less real than
apparent, for brave men were being killed every day, in the period from
November to January, 1916-17. It lay between the exhaustion of the Somme
offensive and the refluent wave of battle-fury up and down the line in
early spring; and this brief interval may be utilized to pick up a few
stray threads.
Let us look at home in the first instance.
The West Riding Territorial Force Association had by now settled down
to its stride. We left its members in 1915[66] struggling, perhaps a
little breathlessly, with difficulties of accountancy in their Separation
Allowance Department, with the organization of Auxiliary Hospitals, the
equipment of 2nd and 3rd Line units, the formation of a National Reserve,
and the constant perplexities of the recruiting problem. We find them
at the close of the next year with one Division crowned with honour in
the field, with another Division straining at the leash, and with a
certain reduction in their commitments, owing partly to National Service
legislation, partly to firmer methods at Whitehall, and partly to other
causes. Necessity had nationalized the war; and, though more than 52,000
accounts of soldiers’ wives and dependants were now on the Paymaster’s
books, though more than 3,000 beds in 53 Auxiliary Hospitals were now
available in the Riding, and more than 21,000 pairs of socks and 45,000
other comforts had been despatched to the troops during the winter, the
Association had thoroughly mastered the technique of war administration
when the original triumvirate of Lord Harewood, Lord Scarbrough and
General Mends, as President, Chairman and Secretary respectively, was
broken up in February, 1917, by Lord Scarbrough’s transfer to the War
Office as Director-General of the Territorial and Volunteer Forces.[67]
The appearance of the words ‘and Volunteer’ requires a brief note of
explanation. The Chairman informed his Association in January, 1917,
that the local administration of the Volunteer Force had, at the request
of the Army Council, been undertaken by County Associations. ‘Generally
speaking,’ ran the writ,[68] ‘the division of functions between the local
military authorities and T.F. Associations in regard to the Volunteer
Force will correspond to that obtaining in the case of the Territorial
Force in times of peace.’ It was not, perhaps, the best precedent to
select, but it was the best available in the circumstances, and an
historian will surely arise to tell the story of the part-time soldier
in the Great War, what he did and what he might have been used to do.
Such historian will be endowed with imagination to sympathise with the
buffeted patriot in the early days of the war, and he will possess
sufficient knowledge of the facts to follow his tangled skein of fortune
through the maze of legislative enactments and contracting-out tribunals,
which cast him up on the lap of his tired country, in November, 1918,
half a volunteer and half a conscript and the most melancholy mongrel
of the Army Council. This, happily, is not our present business. We are
simply concerned to show how the Volunteer Act of 1916, which had become
law late in December, brought the Volunteer Force into the orbit of the
County Associations on the one part and of the Director-General of the
Territorial Force on the other. That Act made provision for Volunteers to
enter into an agreement with His Majesty for the performance of certain
duties of home defence ‘for a period not exceeding the duration of the
present war.’ The time-clause was the essence of the contract. Till then,
under the Act of 1863, a Volunteer, prior to mobilization, which could
only ensue in case of imminent invasion, and which never ensued during
the late war, had the right to quit his Corps at his own option on giving
a fortnight’s notice to his Commanding Officer. Under these conditions
he was plainly no soldier, however elastic the terms of his employment.
He could neither be clothed nor trained at the public expense, for the
public would have no value for their money if the Force, or any part
of it, walked out at fourteen days’ notice. Permanence of service was
then first obtained when the Volunteer Force was reconstituted out of
personnel bound by agreements entered into under the new Act of 1916;
and thus it happened at the beginning of the next year that the work of
Associations was increased by responsibility for the local administration
of the Volunteer units raised in their respective counties, and that
these duties were tacked on to the machinery of the Territorial Force
organization. How heavy the duties became may be measured by a single
item of statistics: as many as 217 Army Council Instructions referring
_exclusively_ to the Volunteer Force were promulgated before the date of
the Armistice.
Lastly, reference is due to German action during this lull, or to
what we know or may infer about it. Plainly, their moral had been
badly shaken. Sir Douglas Haig was resolute on this point, and the
extraordinary ‘all but’ luck which dogged their campaign on the Western
front from the beginning to the end of the war, and of which the full
military explanation must await the evidence from their side, was as
characteristic at Verdun as anywhere. They all but got home to their
objective: so nearly that the German Emperor’s telegrams, which he used
to compose after the model of his grandfather’s in the 1870-71 campaign,
just missed being accurate by a few yards; and this ‘little less, and
what worlds apart,’ which separated the Crown Prince from victory,
however cleverly wrapped up in the language of public despatches, must
have caused more than common chagrin. For actually it was Verdun which
was wanted, the right breast of the mother of men, and not the outposts
of its defences, nor even the serried rows of French dead. These might
serve in less vital regions to dazzle the eyes of the world; at Verdun,
they drew attention to the defeat. Nor was consolation to be derived from
the results of that attempt to relieve Verdun which we have followed in
the battles of the Somme. The higher ground, or ridges, still remained in
German possession, but it was a precarious hold, as we shall see, and,
while the mere configuration of the ground was soon to tell in favour
of the Allies, other factors, which cannot be mapped except in an atlas
of psychology, were beginning already to count. The repeated losses of
fortified positions, culminating in the Wonder Work and Redoubts which
had resisted the assaults of July 1st, were disastrous not only on their
own account but also as indicating a weakness which might conceivably
spread to the Rhine. If the theory of defence proved unsound, no degree
of valour in practice would ever avail to put it right. We must not
prejudge this question. We are not writing the German history of the
war. But it is legitimate to say that, apart from the general retirement
which the Germans ordered in March, 1917, and which reached a rate of
ten miles a day, our troops gradually discovered a change in the enemy’s
system of defences. He began, first on the British and afterwards on the
French front, to abandon the formal lines of trenches, and to employ the
natural features of the soil, when and where these might occur, as the
basis of his defences. The crater, or shell-hole cavity, was brought
into use in this way, and no outward mark was allowed to distinguish a
fortified group of craters, subterraneously connected with one another
and otherwise rendered formidable, from harmless groups in its immediate
neighbourhood. Thus, the cession by the Germans of ‘only our foremost
crater-positions,’ or of a ‘craterfield’ _tout court_, began to figure
in their reports for the edification or delusion of German readers.
An integral part of the crater-system, as worked out more elaborately
at a later date, was the ‘pill-box,’ or sunk blockhouse, which was
strengthened towards the foe and left more thinly built on the home side,
so as to render it useless as a weapon should its fire be directed by
its captors. We may conclude that the blows which had been dealt at the
continuous lines of trenches in the battles of the Ancre and the Somme
had alarmed the German High Command; and that a part of the motive for
the retirement (and a very effective part it proved) was to prepare
those fortified groups and concrete nests of deadly machine-gun fire at
all kinds of irregular distances. The intention was partly to deceive
the airman’s eye, and to stop that preparation of exact trench-maps to
which the Germans had borne testimony on the Somme. But partly, too,
the modification of the defence-system implied that our offensive had
not been vain. Its immediate effect, accordingly, however serious and
impeding it was to prove, was not without good hope. The vaunted theory
of ‘impregnability’ had been shaken, and, though the end of the war was
still out of sight, yet Thiepval, like Jutland, bore a message which the
rest of the war was to expound.
Full information on these problems is still lacking from the German
side, and without it, as indicated above, our conclusions must be
indicated hypothetically. But all the evidence now available makes
it clear that they are reasonably correct. Thus, Ludendorff, writing
after a tour of the Western Front in December, 1916, laid stress on the
urgent need of re-organizing the fighting power of the German Infantry.
The machine-gun had become the chief fire-arm, and ‘our existing
machine-guns’, he declared, ‘were too heavy for the purpose.... In order
to strengthen our fire, at least in the most important parts of the
chief theatre of war, it was necessary to create special Machine-gun
Companies—so to speak, Machine-gun Sharp-shooters.’ Attention is also
called in the German Commander’s authoritative _Memoirs_ to the need of
hand-mines, grenades, and all quick-loading weapons, and to the formation
of storm troops. ‘The course of the Somme Battle,’ continues the General,
‘had also supplied important lessons with respect to the construction and
plan of our lines. The very deep underground forts in the front trenches
had to be replaced by shallower constructions. Concrete “pill-boxes,”
which, however, unfortunately took long to build, had acquired an
increasing value. The conspicuous lines of trenches, which appeared as
sharp lines on every aerial photograph, supplied far too good a target
for the enemy Artillery. The system of defence had to be made broader and
looser and better adapted to the ground. The large, thick barriers of
wire, pleasant as they were when there was little doing, were no longer a
protection. They withered under the enemy barrage’; and an angry tribute
is paid in his chapter to the equipment of the _Entente_ Armies with war
material, which ‘had been developed to an extent hitherto undreamed of,’
and to ‘the resolution of the _Entente_, their strangling starvation
blockade, and their propaganda of lies and hate which was so dangerous to
us.’
It is good to see ourselves as our enemy saw us after the Battle of the
Somme. And, perhaps, though we are anticipating a month or two, we may
conclude this chapter by a quotation from a German Army Order, hitherto
unpublished, of April 4th, 1917. It illustrates from another angle the
effects of those ‘_Entente_ Armies’ and ‘their propaganda’ to which
Ludendorff alludes in such embittered terms. The Order ran:
‘A National Day has been decreed at home for April 12th, in the
sense that members of the large Trade Unions and Associations
give up that day’s income, salary or wage for the benefit of
the Fatherland.
‘The wish has been expressed that this programme may be
supported as follows: _viz._, that Officers and other Ranks may
volunteer to give up their pay for one day.
‘All Officers and other Ranks who are willing to abandon for
one day the amount of pay due to them will apply to,’ etc.
The captured papers do not disclose the extent of the response to this
appeal, but, plainly, at the beginning of 1917, all was not well with the
Fatherland.
CHAPTER IX
WITH THE 62ND IN FRANCE
The eleven miles from Albert to Bapaume, eight of which we travelled in
the last chapter, should be familiar by now. In order to gain a clear
view of the activities of the 62nd Division after its arrival in France,
we may now draw a rectilineal figure enclosed by four main roads, with
the Albert-Bapaume road as a portion of the base. Call the Albert-Bapaume
road A, B. Extend it to C, Cambrai, on the east; draw a line C, AA, from
Cambrai to Arras, north, north-west; draw a line, AA, D, from Arras
to Doullens, west, south-west, and join D, A, Doullens to Albert, to
complete the figure. On C, AA, Cambrai-Arras, a triangle may be erected
with Douai at its apex, thus connecting this new rectangle with the
country, Douai, Lens, La Bassée, Lille, which we visited in Chapter IV.
On D, A, Doullens-Albert, another triangle may be erected, with Amiens
at the south-western base. We have thus a fairly accurate outline of the
lie of the land to which General Braithwaite took his troops in January,
1917, and we know, approximately, at least, how much of that land had
been set free by the Battles of the Somme and the Ancre.
[Illustration]
The gains in those battles are to be exploited. We shall be occupied for
some time to come within the four sides of that shell-ridden quadrangle.
The upper road from Doullens to Arras was free, though it was not wise
to try to enter Arras except under cover of darkness, as the approach to
it from the west was exposed to observation and shell fire, and the town
itself had been badly damaged by bombardment. The lower road was free, as
we know, till within three miles of Bapaume, whence our front wound round
to below Arras. The object now is, to drive the Germans back on the whole
long line from Ypres to Reims, and, especially, within this area, to
drive them back between Arras and Bapaume, nearer to Douai and Cambrai.
That object was achieved, we shall see, in three great battles during
1917:—
Arras in April and May,
Ypres (3rd) in June till September, and
Cambrai at the end of November.
Keeping this large view in mind, and recalling, generally, its relations,
as remarked briefly in the last chapter, to the configuration of the soil
and the effect of this and of other conditions on the plans of the German
High Command,[69] we may follow for a few days the story of one unit’s
experiences, in order to set these in relation to the Division, the
Corps, and the Army. For from the night of January 11th-12th, when the
62nd Division first slept, or tried to sleep—for it was so cold—on French
soil, till the Battle of Arras in April, every Battalion in that Division
was engaged in the same driving work: in the same work of driving the
Germans back, of anticipating their retreat to prepared positions, of
consolidating small but important gains, of proving their own worth as
a fighting unit, of breaking out, between Thiepval and Hébuterne, to
Serre, Puisieux, Miraumont, Achiet, Irles, Pys, always nearer to the
Bapaume-Arras road. We may select for this purpose the 2/5th Battalion of
the Duke of Wellington’s West Riding Regiment. It was another Battalion
of the same Regiment whose fortunes we followed in Chapter II. from its
earliest volunteer beginnings, and now, as then, we possess the advantage
of consulting a personal diary kept by an Officer of the selected
unit.[70]
The first thing, where everything seemed strange, was to get to
know the way about. A ride to Auxi le Château gave opportunity for a
‘very interesting talk’ with an Officer in the 1/5th Battalion of the
same Regiment (49th Division). A day or two later came a tour of the
trenches in an old London General omnibus. The party visited Acheux and
Warlencourt, and then drove along the Doullens-Arras road, which was
closed to traffic at one point owing to shelling. They went through
Arras, noticing its damage by fire and incendiary shells, and reached
the line held by the 7th East Surreys. Here they had an opportunity
of watching the system of relief: the East Surreys by the 6th West
Kents. ‘It was a daylight relief and worked out very well indeed.’ The
reserve and front-line trenches were examined: the latter were highly
complicated; all the Platoon dug-outs were in cellars, owing to the
ruined state of the houses and factories; at one point, only twenty-five
yards from the German front-line. Patrols went out clothed in white to
match the snow. A Company cook-house was blown in by trench-mortar fire,
wounding two servants and ruining the breakfast. And so back to Doullens
and Bus-les-Artois, rejoining their Battalions. This was in January. On
February 3rd, ‘the weather was so cold that the ink in my fountain-pen
was frozen.’ On the 7th, ‘the cold was so intense that the oil on the
Lewis guns froze.’ On the 13th, a tour in the trenches before Serre, in
relief of the 1st Dorsets: ‘the sights one saw in and about the trenches
rather opened one’s eyes. The dead, both our own and the enemy, were
lying about partially buried; rifles, grenades, unexploded shells, bombs
and equipment. The trenches themselves did not exist as such, as in most
cases they had been blown in.’ On the 15th, the thaw commenced, and in
some respects was more intolerable than the frost. The mud in places was
two feet deep, and reliefs and so on were considerably hampered.
[Illustration]
The shadow, or, rather, the light, of the coming German retreat lay
over all. Every trench which was captured brought a wider view and a
larger prospect into sight, and there is no doubt that the 62nd Division,
to that extent more fortunate than the 49th, arrived at a time and in
a locality which afforded, in business parlance, small turn-overs and
quick returns. The long waiting experience which ate the heart out of
constantly harassed troops was now, temporarily, if not definitely,
passed; they were pushing outwards hopefully to open country and signs
of the retreat occurred every day. Thus, on February 25th, at 2 o’clock
in the morning, the enemy was reported to have vacated Serre, which, if
a straight line be drawn from Albert to Arras, may be pricked in just
to the left of that line at a point about two-fifths along it. Puisieux
lies on the line just above Serre. Achiet-le-Petit, Achiet-le-Grand and
Sapignies lie behind Puisieux eastwards, at distances roughly, of two
miles. Miraumont is south of Puisieux, Irles south of Achiet-le-Petit,
and Pys south of Irles. They are all in the Albert-Arras-Bapaume triangle
within the shell-ridden quadrangle above.
Let us start at Serre on that dark February morning. A push was made out
and up towards Puisieux. There were strong positions to be negotiated:
Gudgeon Trench, Sunken Road, Orchard Alley and Railway. Two patrols were
sent out early on the 26th under subaltern Officers of the 2/4th King’s
Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, and reported Gudgeon and Orchard trenches
clear. Later, it was discovered that the patrol’s Gudgeon was a trench
not shown on the map, and that the patrol’s Orchard was the true Gudgeon;
mist and mud and an unmapped trench are ugly extras in patrol-work. Three
Companies (A, B, D) of the Battalion were pushed up to the real Gudgeon
trench with orders to put out posts on the Sunken Road in front and an
observation-line on the Railway in front of that. They succeeded in
placing two outposts, but machine-gun fire stopped the observation-line.
There remained the heavily fortified Wundt Werk, which we have not yet
mentioned, and which was held by C Company under the Officer Commanding
the Battalion. Many fine deeds were performed on this day of continuous
exposure to shell and rifle fire. A non-commissioned officer, for
example, was sent forward to take charge of a small party, who had been
badly knocked about. He kept them under cover in a shell-hole all the
rest of the day, and by his coolness and trustworthiness undoubtedly
saved their lives.
The 2/4th K.O.Y.L.I. were relieved during the night by the 2/5th West
Ridings, to whom we accordingly return. Their new orders were to take
Orchard Alley and push outposts in the Sunken Road running from Puisieux
to Achiet-le-Petit. At 8 p.m. on February 27th, the Commanding Officer
advised the Brigadier that Orchard Alley had been captured; at an early
hour the next morning, the outposts in Sunken Road had been established,
and later in the day these positions had been consolidated, and touch had
been obtained with the 2nd Royal Warwicks on the left and the 2/6th West
Ridings on the right. The Brigadier wired his appreciation, and, later,
the Military Cross was awarded to Lieut. P. R. Ridley in the following
circumstances:—
‘On the evening of 27th-28th February, 1917, the Officer was
in charge of a party of three Officers’ patrols, each of one
Officer and fifteen other Ranks, detailed to rush Orchard
Alley from Gudgeon Trench. Lieut. Ridley was responsible for
maintaining the direction, marching on a compass-bearing
for 500 yards across unknown and difficult country. This
Officer led his party with great dash, shooting one German
and capturing another on entering the trench. He showed
considerable coolness and ability in the attack, and in
organizing the defence of the trench.’
The Military Medal was awarded on the same occasion to Lance-Cpl. Herbert
Priestley, who had been in command of a Bombing Section in that party,
and who, despite a wound in the head, led his men in a most gallant
manner. These were the first honours (first of a long list) in the 62nd
Division.
There was to be an attack on Achiet-le-Petit. The course of the offensive
indicated it, and it was indicated too, by attack-practices early in
March, when 500 men of the 2/5th West Ridings were employed at Forceville
in digging trenches similar to the German system at Achiet-le-Petit. On
March 15th, after completing sundry exercises, the Battalion proceeded
to Miraumont, where they took over a line from the 2/5th King’s Own
Yorkshire Light Infantry, half a mile south-east of Achiet-le-Petit.
They found the 2/4th of the same Regiment on their right and the 2/7th
on their left during this tour. On the 17th, the 2/4th reported that
they had occupied an enemy trench 300 yards in advance of their line
without meeting opposition; at the same time patrols of the 2/5th
found 300 yards in front of them free from the enemy. Hopes rose, as
the country began to open out. B Company was promptly ordered to push
on through Achiet-le-Petit, and to occupy Sunken Road, north of that
village. The remaining Companies also moved forward, and occupied the
support-trenches. Later on the same day, a further push was made to
Achiet-le-Grand; gaps were to be cut in the wire to let the Cavalry
through, and D Company was to push on to Gomiecourt. The wire proved a
formidable obstacle; but just before midnight on the 17th the Brigadier
was informed that the orders had been carried out. By 4-30 a.m. on March
18th, D Company was in occupation of Gomiecourt. They had encountered
only slight machine-gun fire, and five hours later the Cavalry went
through. Thenceforward to the end of March, the Battalion stood fast on
the ground occupied. There was plenty to do in consolidating it, and
plenty of German material left behind which served that purpose. But all
existing accommodation had been destroyed, the majority of trees had
been killed, several dug-out entrances had been mined, and important
road-junctions had been blown up.
We may read a part of this story in more detail. Little exploits fully
related illuminate the history which they helped to make. What part was
borne by B Company (above) in this adventure? They were commanded by
Captain Joseph Walker, whose orders were to hold Resurrection Trench
south of Achiet-le-Petit and to capture that village. For three days and
nights they came in for a very heavy bombardment, in which the trench was
obliterated in parts and severe casualties were suffered. On March 17th,
an hour before dawn, two battle-patrols were sent out to the flanks of
the village. The rest of the Company followed under Captain Walker, and,
despite some machine-gun fire, they took the village and passed through
it. They dug-in on the north side and threw out a defensive flank, which
drove off the enemy rearguard. Achiet-le-Petit was promptly blown to bits
by ‘a terrific barrage of heavy stuff,’ but B Company had not waited for
it. At mid-day the Corps Pigeoner arrived with a basket of birds, and
reports were sent back to Headquarters. In the evening, instructions came
for the whole of the line to move forward and attack Achiet-le-Grand and
Gomiecourt. Before this could be done, the German wire had to be cut to
allow the Cavalry to pass through. ‘The wire was nearly a hundred yards
in depth in three broad belts, and so thick that it had to be dug up in
parts.’ The task was completed before daylight by B and C Companies. B
Company then advanced to their objective and occupied the western side of
Achiet-le-Grand, and A Company cleared Logeast Wood: a good day’s work,
it will be admitted.
This narrative may still be expanded: the day’s work is typical of
what was happening throughout the district. From Achiet-le-Grand to
Gomiecourt, two villages otherwise insignificant, the distance is under
two miles. At 1 a.m., March 18th, 1917, there was a heavy mist, and it
was difficult to find the road; so ‘we struck across open country on
compass-bearing,’ say the records, ‘and arrived in the trenches west of
Gomiecourt at 3-30 a.m., occupied these, and then sent out two patrols
through the village, but they did not find a soul’: a deserted village,
but from other causes than Oliver Goldsmith’s. ‘The junction of every
road in the village had been mined and blown up, and everything of value
had been destroyed. All fruit-trees had either been cut down, or an
incision made round the bark so that the sap would not rise.[71] All
wells had been blown in, and one had been poisoned with arsenic,’ so
the R.E. Officer reported to our diarist. The R.E.’s took 700 lbs. of
unexploded charge out of the cellar of the only village _château_, where
the front stairway had fallen in and there was a big hole in the floor
of the entrance hall. We read an interesting note, too, on March 26th:
‘Walked with Lieut. Ridley’ (we watched him win his M.C.) ‘across country
to Bapaume’ (the eleven miles had been cleared at last). ‘Noticed the
Hôtel de Ville still standing; most other buildings had been blown up.
Then went south of the town towards the trenches, but, as these reminded
one too much of Beaumont Hamel, had lunch and then came back. Walked
along the Bapaume-Arras’ (B, AA) ‘main road as far as Ervillers’ (a third
of the way from Bapaume) ‘and then struck across country to Gomiecourt.
Bapaume Town Hall and Sapignies Church had both been mined and left by
the enemy and blew up during the night.’ So, the deserted villages bore
traces of their late inhabitants.
If a straight line be drawn from Bapaume to Douai, bisecting the
Cambrai-Arras road (C, AA, of our quadrangle), and if that straight line
be divided into three equal parts, the village of Bullecourt will be
found at one-third of the way from Bapaume and two-thirds from Douai. It
is thus well within our quadrangle, yet well on the further side of the
road from Bapaume to Arras, along which we just now walked to Ervillers.
We shall be occupied with Bullecourt for some time: on April 11th in a
snowstorm, when ‘an attack was made against the Hindenburg Line, in the
neighbourhood of Bullecourt,’ and again on May 3rd and following days,
when ‘it was advisable that Bullecourt should be captured without loss of
time.’[72] For the German retreat was at an end.
Bapaume had fallen on March 17th, Péronne on the following day. South
and east of Péronne, on the 21st, the Fourth Army had captured forty
villages. French troops reached the outskirts of St. Quentin, and counted
their villages by the score. The Cavalry, mounted and dismounted, had
come in for a bit of their own, and a fine exhilaration of open fighting
had been blown like a freshening breeze along the east wall of the
shell-torn quadrangle. But after the third week of March the pace of
the retreat began to slacken; and, as soon as the first days of April
dispelled the cover of the mist, and the wind and the sun dried up the
mud from which the Germans had been retiring, their slower pace stiffened
into resistance, and their resistance hardened into battle. All along
the Hindenburg Line, so much advertised, yet in places so elastic, which
was to guard the ridges of observation, the Battle of Arras was engaged
in April, May and a part of June, and during the course of that Battle,
Bullecourt was won and lost and won again.
No more need be said about the retreat. The precise ratio between
initiative and compulsion, precisely how far, that is to say, it was
carried through according to plan and directed by forces under German
control, will not be settled till the official war-histories of both
belligerents have been published, and may even be disputed thereafter.
Certainly, it was admirably executed; less certainly, it was voluntary
in all its parts; most certainly, it was accompanied by incidents
which indelibly stained the reputation of the German Military Command.
That ‘the systematic destruction of roads, railways and bridges in the
evacuated area made unprecedented demands upon the Royal Engineers,’ or
that in four and a half days, for example, from the morning of March 18th
the Somme at Brie was rebridged for our troops,[73] were facts of warfare
as legitimate for the enemy as they were creditable to his pursuers. What
was illegitimate and irreparable was the not less systematic destruction,
forbidden in the Pentateuch, as Mr. Buchan[74] notes, of ‘trees for meat’
and water for drinking. We have remarked these features _in petto_: the
single trees felled or slashed, the single wells poisoned or blown in,
the single monuments gutted or mined; and France knows the full tale of
her own wrongs.
So we come to the Battle of Arras, which opened definitely on April 9th
and rolled in thunder along the northern ridges to its renewed flood in
the Third Battle of Ypres.
We may look at the map again. The Battle of Arras was fought on a front
of sixteen or seventeen miles, stretching, roughly, nine miles to the
north and seven or eight to the south of Arras. Arras, as we know, was
within the British line; its cellars and sewers, as a fact, had been
prepared for the accommodation of our troops, though they were not long
in request. The British line to the south of Arras (we are writing of
the opening of the battle) crossed the Arras-Cambrai main road almost
immediately below the town, facing Tilloy-les-Mofflaines on the right,
and running down to Croisilles and Ecoust, which looked across the line
to Bullecourt. Below Bullecourt, two miles or so to the right, and
about three miles above the Bapaume-Cambrai road, the village of Quéant
should be observed for the sake of its trench-connection with Drocourt
in the north (east-south-east of Lens), which formed a switch to the
Hindenburg Line, in case of German accidents behind Arras. It was the
Quéant-Drocourt trench-system which made Bullecourt so important to its
defenders. The British line to the north of Arras (still at the opening
of the battle, but outside of our original quadrangle) crossed the River
Scarpe in the eastern suburbs of the town, and ran up with a bearing
to the left between Souchez and Givenchy, turning to the right again
between Loos and Lens. Vimy, with all its fortifications, both natural
and artificial, was the key to an advance in this area. The situation
should be studied on a larger map, but it is useful to see it, too, in
miniature; and for this purpose we repeat once more our sketch on page 90
above. On the rough square, Arras-Bapaume-Cambrai-Douai, we erect now on
the northern side the road-junctions from Arras to Douai through Souchez
and Lens. The British line ran up, as we have said, between Souchez and
Givenchy, with Vimy and its ridges on the right, and ran down to the west
of Bullecourt, which helped to guard the Quéant-Drocourt switch. It only
remains to observe that from Lens to Ypres was a journey of less than
thirty miles, and that an attack at Messines and Wytschaete formed an
obvious corollary to successes at Bullecourt and Vimy.
[Illustration]
We are not directly concerned with the bigger strategy of this Spring
campaign. Sir Douglas Haig made it clear that he regarded the capture of
the Vimy Ridge as necessary in itself and important for the view which it
would afford over the plains to Douai and beyond. When this object should
be achieved he proposed to transfer his main offensive into Flanders.
‘The positions held by us in the Ypres salient since May, 1915, were
far from satisfactory,’ he wrote. ‘They were completely overlooked by
the enemy. Their defence involved a considerable strain on the troops
occupying them, and ... our positions would be much improved by the
capture of the Messines-Wytschaete Ridge, and of the high ground which
extends thence north-eastwards for some seven miles.’ These plans were
re-adjusted to some extent by arrangement with the French Command: ‘The
British attack, under the revised scheme, was, in the first instance, to
be preparatory to a more decisive operation to be undertaken a little
later by the French Armies,’ and though, as the British Commander wrote,
‘my original plan for the preliminary operations on the Arras front
fortunately fitted in well with what was required of me under the revised
scheme,’ yet, in order to give full effect ‘to the new rôle allotted to
me in this revised scheme, preparations for the attack in Flanders had
to be restricted for the time being to what could be done by such troops
and other labour as could not in any case be made available on the Arras
front.[75]’
So much in this place for the plans. What were the troops entrusted
with their execution? Looking at a larger map again, and assuming for
a moment that a week’s fighting (April 9th to 16th) has already taken
place, and that the British front has been advanced, as indicated, from
the outskirts of Lens in the north to Croisilles in the south, we may now
enumerate Sir Douglas Haig’s forces as they were distributed from north
to south in order of battle on April 17th. Note that the First Army was
commanded by General Sir H. S. Horne, the Third by General Sir E. H.
H. Allenby, the Fourth by General Sir Henry Rawlinson and the Fifth by
General Sir Hubert Gough: great Generals all, and tried Commanders. We
give, first, the positions, so far as they can be located for certainty
in the third line which resulted from a week’s fighting, and, next, in
descending scale of military organization, the Army, the Corps, the
Division, and the Regiments:—
ORDER OF BATTLE, 17th April, 1917.
------------+-----+----------+----------------+-------------------------
Position. |Army.| Corps. | Division. | Regiments.
------------+-----+----------+----------------+-------------------------
| | | |
VIMY | I. | Canadian |1st, 2nd, 3rd, |
| | | 4th Canadian, |
| | | 5th British. |
| | | |
North of | III.| XVII. |51st (Highland) |Gordon Highlanders
RIVER SCARPE| | | |A. & S. Highlanders.
| | | |Seaforth Highlanders.
| | | |Roy. Scots.
| | | |Black Watch.
| | | |
| | |34th |Roy. Scots (2 Bns.).
| | | |Lincolnshire, Suffolk,
| | | |Northd. Fus. (9 Bns.).
| | | |
FAMPOUX | | |9th (Scottish) |Black Watch.
| | | |Seaforth Highlanders
| | | | (2 Bns.).
| | | |Scottish Rifles.
| | | |Roy. Scots (2 Bns.).
| | | |A. & S. Highlanders.
| | | |Cameron Highlanders.
| | | |S. African Bde. (4 Bns.).
| | | |K.O.S.B.
| | | |
| | |4th |Household Bn.
| | | |Roy. Warwickshire.
| | | |Seaforth Highlanders.
| | | |R. Irish Fus.
| | | |Somersetshire L.I.
| | | |E. Lancs.
| | | |Hampshire.
| | | |Rifle Brigade.
| | | |K.O. (R. Lancs.)
| | | |Lancs. Fus.
| | | |Duke of Wellington’s
| | | | (W.R.).
| | | |Essex.
| | | |
South of | | XVIII. |12th (Eastern) |Norfolk.
RIVER SCARPE| | | |Suffolk.
near MONCHY | | | |Essex.
| | | |R. Berkshire.
| | | |R. Fusiliers (2 Bns.).
| | | |R. Sussex.
| | | |Middlesex.
| | | |Queen’s (R.W. Surrey)
| | | |Buffs (E. Kent.)
| | | |E. Surrey.
| | | |R.W. Kent.
| | | |Northants.
| | | |
| | |14th (Light) |K.R.R.C. (3 Bns.).
| | | |Rifle Bde. (3 Bns.).
| | | |Oxford & Bucks L.I.
| | | |K.S.L.I.
| | | |Somerset L.I.
| | | |D.L.I.
| | | |K.O.Y.L.I.
| | | |Durham L.I.
| | | |King’s (Liverpool).
| | | |
| | |30th |Liverpool (4 Bns.).
| | | |Manchester (4 Bns).
| | | |Beds.
| | | |Yorks. R.
| | | |Scots. Fus.
| | | |Wilts.
| | | |S. Lancs.
| | |37th |
| | | |R. Fus. (2 Bns.).
| | | |K.R.R.C.
| | | |Rifle Bde.
| | | |R. Warwickshire.
| | | |E. Lancs.
| | | |
| | |37th |N. Lancs.
| | | |Beds.
| | | |N. Staffs.
| | | |Lincolnshire.
| | | |Somerset.
| | | |Middlesex.
| | | |York. & Lancs.
| | | |
| | VI. |29th |R. Fus.
| | | |R. Dublin Fus.
| | | |Lancs. Fus.
| | | |Middlesex.
| | | |K.O.S.B.
| | | |Inniskilling Fus.
| | | |S. Wales B.
| | | |Border.
| | | |Essex.
| | | |Hampshire.
| | | |Worcestershire.
| | | |Newfoundland.
| | | |
Advanced, | | |15th (Scottish) |Black Watch.
via ARRAS | | | |Seaforth Highlanders.
| | | |Gordon Highlanders
| | | | (2 Bns.).
| | | |Cameron Highlanders
| | | | (2 Bns.).
| | | |R. Scots.
| | | |R. Scots. Fus.
| | | |A. & S. Highlanders
| | | |K.O.S.B.
| | | |Scottish Rifles.
| | | |Highland L.I. (2 Bns.).
| | | |
? | | |3rd |K.R.R.C.
| | | |10th R. Welsh Fus.
| | | |West Yorks.
| | | |R. Scots.
| | | |Gordon Highlanders.
| | | |R. Scots. Fus.
| | | |R. Fusiliers.
| | | |Northd. Fus.
| | | |Suffolk.
| | | |K.O. (Roy. Lancs.)
| | | |E. Yorkshire.
| | | |7th K.S.L.I.
| | | |12th King’s (Liverpool)
| | | |
? | | |17th (Northern) |W. Yorkshire.
| | | |E. Yorkshire.
| | | |Yorkshire.
| | | |Dorsetshire.
| | | |Lincolnshire.
| | | |Border.
| | | |S. Staffs.
| | | |Sherwood Foresters.
| | | |Northd. Fus.
| | | |Lancs. Fus.
| | | |Duke of Wellington’s
| | | | (W.R.).
| | | |Manchester.
| | | |Yorks. & Lancs.
| | | |
South of | | VII. |21st |Northd. Fus. (3 Bns.).
VIth. Corps | | | |E. Yorkshire.
| | | |Yorkshire.
| | | |Durham L.I.
| | | |K.O.Y.L.I. (2 Bns.).
| | | |Leicestershire (4 Bns.).
| | | |Lincolnshire.
| | | |
Between R. | | |33rd |R. Fusiliers.
Cojeul and | | | |K.R.R.C.
R. Sensée | | | |King’s.
| | | |Queen’s.
| | | |Suffolk.
| | | |Worcestershire.
| | | |Scottish Rifles (2 Bns.).
| | | |Middlesex.
| | | |A. & S. Highlanders.
| | | |R. Welsh Fus.
| | | |Highland L.I.
| | | |
? | | |50th |Northd. Fus.
| | | (Northumbrian) |Durham L.I.
| | | |Yorkshire.
| | | |
? | | |56th (London) |London.
| | | |Middlesex.
| | | |
BULLECOURT | V. | V. |7th |Border.
| | | |Devonshire (2 Bns.).
| | | |Queen’s.
| | | |Gordon Highlanders.
| | | |H.A.C.
| | | |R. Welsh Fus.
| | | |S. Staffs.
| | | |Manchester (4 Bns.).
| | | |Warwickshire.
| | | |
? | | |11th (Northern) |D. of Wellington’s.
| | | |W. Yorkshire.
| | | |Yorkshire.
| | | |York. and Lancs.
| | | |Lincolnshire.
| | | |Border.
| | | |S. Staffs.
| | | |Sherwood Foresters.
| | | |Dorsetshire.
| | | |Northd. Fus.
| | | |Lancs. Fus.
| | | |Manchester.
| | | |E. Yorkshire.
| | | |
BULLECOURT | | |58th (London) |London, 2nd Line, T.F.
| | | |
| | |62nd (W. Riding)|W. Yorks. (4 Bns.)
| | | |D. of Wellington’s
| | | | (4 Bns.).
| | | |K.O.Y.L.I. (2 Bns.).
| | | |York. & Lancs. (2 Bns.).
| | | |
LAGNICOURT | |Australian| |
------------+-----+----------+----------------+-------------------------
It was a strong force, as is apparent, and except in the extreme southern
sector, from Ecoust (opposite Bullecourt) to Lagnicourt, no 2nd Line
Territorial troops were engaged. There, with Londoners on their left and
Australians on their right, twelve battalions from the West Riding took
their part.
The operation was not successful. ‘The attacking troops of the Fifth
Army,’ wrote Sir Douglas Haig, ‘were obliged to withdraw to their
original line.[76]’ Thus they missed the more sensational advances which
were secured at Vimy and Monchy-le-Preux. But they contributed by their
action to those results, and their gallantry earned a high encomium from
the British Commander-in-Chief, and established for the 62nd Division,
in its first engagement on a big scale, a record worthy of more veteran
troops.
Let us start in this sector on April 9th, the day of the opening of the
Battle of Arras.
It was explained to the Front-line Battalions that, in the event of the
attack of the Third Army on Neuville Vitasse being successful, and of the
advance being pushed forward to Fontaine-les-Croisilles and Cherisy, the
enemy might evacuate his positions. Patrols were sent out, accordingly,
in order to ascertain the facts; and the 2/6th West Yorkshires, for
example, if we may select one Battalion out of the twelve, were ordered
to hold themselves in readiness to advance after 12 o’clock noon at one
hour’s notice. A provisional scheme of operations was laid down, in
anticipation of the sequence of events, should the Hindenburg Line be
evacuated on that part. These plans missed fire, however, and on the
next day (10th) the unit which we have selected was still stationed at
St. Leger. In the early morning information arrived of an impending
German counter attack, and, after orders had been issued for a move at
ten minutes’ notice, Brigade Orders arrived during the afternoon for
a night march to Ecoust. This move was duly accomplished. The object
was to capture Bullecourt and Hendecourt, and then to move forward in
the general direction of Cagnicourt, on the further side of the Quéant
switch. Shortly after midnight on April 11th, the troops were informed to
this effect; Zero hour was 4-30 a.m.
We have to record that the operation, as planned, could not be fully
carried out. Briefly, it had been devised as follows: unless, as seemed
improbable, the Hindenburg Line should be found to have been evacuated,
the Australian Division, supported by Tanks, was to push forward to
Riencourt and Bullecourt. As soon as their work rendered it possible,
the 185th Infantry Brigade (Brigadier-General V. W. de Falbe, C.M.G.,
D.S.O.) was to push one Battalion into Bullecourt from the south-west,
with another Battalion in support. The Tanks (two, followed by four),
after clearing Bullecourt, were to move out of the village, and clear
the Hindenburg Line up to a stated position, where they would come
under the orders of General de Falbe, in command of an Advanced Guard,
detailed to capture Hendecourt and to move forward as indicated above.
This formed the operation, as planned. The operation, as executed,
starts with Battalion reports to the Brigade, at 5-15 a.m., 6 a.m. and
7-10 a.m., to the effect that not a Tank was in sight. We may imagine
the anxiety at Headquarters. Reconstruct the surroundings on that April
morning: the immense line of British Troops stretching right away beyond
Vimy, the noise of guns, the open country on the other side; remember
the significance of Bullecourt, not merely as the objective of the 62nd
Division, but as the last stronghold of the enemy in that sector before
he retired to the Quéant switch behind the real Hindenburg Line; multiply
every missed appointment and its consequent inconveniences in civil
life to the _n_th power of calculation; add a responsible sense of the
great issues depending on prompt action; and then conceive what it meant
to Lt.-Col. John H. Hastings, D.S.O., the Officer Commanding the 2/6th
West Yorkshires (to return for a moment to this unit), to have to report
three times in two hours that, so far as he was aware, the conditions
precedent to his pushing on to Bullecourt still remained unfulfilled.
Item one: the Tanks had not arrived. Item two: there was still no news
of the Australians having entered Bullecourt. Colonel Hastings went
forward to make enquiries, and to discuss matters with the Australian
Division. On his return, he advised the Brigadier that the situation
was ‘very obscure.’ His patrols, he said, had not reported, but there
was no sign of the Australians clearing Bullecourt, and several enemy
machine-guns had been located on the south-east fringe of the village.
This report crossed a message from the Brigade (through the 2/8th
Battalion, West Yorks.), stating that Tanks had been seen at a factory
between Bullecourt and Hendecourt, and adding: ‘Please take immediate
action, without waiting for Tanks to arrive, to clear up situation in
Bullecourt and seize Hindenburg Line to the west of the village.’ (This
message in original was received an hour later.) A reply was sent through
the 2/8th Battalion to the effect that the instructions seemed to be
‘based on faulty and erroneous information’: the main point was that the
Australians had not entered Bullecourt, and that reports from the patrols
were still awaited. While this reply was on its way, the Brigadier
visited the Battalion Headquarters, and ‘was evidently dissatisfied
with the want of progress.’ He admitted to Colonel Hastings that the
conditions laid down as preliminary to the advance still appeared
incomplete (which means that the Tanks had not operated), but he was
anxious that the push should be attempted, and Colonel Hastings went up
again to investigate.
Meanwhile, what about the Tanks? Major W. H. L. Watson, D.S.O., of the
Machine-Gun Corps, Heavy Section, writing in _Blackwood’s Magazine_,
June, 1919, stated that, ‘of my eleven Tanks, nine had received direct
hits and two were missing.’ He pointed out that the sudden change of
plans between April 10th and 11th had proved somewhat upsetting, that
the crews were composed of tired men, that a blizzard was blowing, and
that the snow proved bad cover. He added that the Australian troops
were turned distrustful of Tanks for some months, and that a British
Brigadier, to whom he was paying a farewell visit, told him, ‘with
natural emphasis, that Tanks were “no dammed use.”’ Further than this,
we need not pursue the question. A day was to come very soon when the
new weapon would outpace the Infantry, and help effectively to win its
battles. At Bullecourt, on April 11th, the co-operation was not adequate.
At 11 o’clock that morning, Colonel Hastings, ruling out the Tanks,
expressed his deliberate conviction that the village could not be
captured by daylight, except by very great sacrifices. The wire was
uncut, the snipers were active, and there was very little cover. Three
hours later, Brigade orders arrived to withdraw the patrols, and at dusk
the Battalion relieved the 2/7th Battalion of their own Regiment in the
right sector of the front facing Bullecourt. The relief was completed
at 1 a.m. on April 12th, and another long and trying day was spent in
tapping the Bullecourt defences, which were found to be still formidable.
By 5 a.m. on the morning of the 13th, the relief of the Battalion in
its turn by the 2/7th West Ridings was completed, and they returned to
Ervillers on the Bapaume-Arras road.
They had suffered badly during this experience. On the 11th, Lieut. C.
F. R. Pells, 2/Lieut. A. G. Harris and 31 other Ranks were killed, and
the wounded amounted to 30. Fine work was done by the 174th Tunnelling
Company, R.E. (Major Hutchinson, M.C., Commanding), in digging out the
victims of a collapsed house in which two Officers were killed: they
worked thirty hours continuously and rescued nine men alive.
Meanwhile, Bullecourt had not been captured. If a detailed map be
consulted again, it will be seen that the British lines of April 16th and
24th both met at their southern extremity on the wrong (north) side of
the River Sensée, and formed a dangerous salient, or inward bulge, with
the British line running south from Croisilles. The Hindenburg Line at
Bullecourt still guarded the switch-line at Quéant; and this failure was
the more disappointing in view of the easterly advances along the River
Scarpe behind Arras, and, further north, behind Vimy and its woods and
hills. Tanks had shown fine capacity during that fortnight. The gallant
Infantry had accomplished by their aid what it took them nearly as many
months to accomplish with much worse casualties on the Somme in 1916. For
the missing weapon had been found, though its full use was still to be
discovered, and obstacles even more formidable than had held up the 49th
Division at Thiepval were levelled or reduced.
We pass at once to the renewed assault on Bullecourt between May 3rd and
17th.
The 62nd Division was once more engaged. The new weapon was brought again
to the attack, and, though further experience was still wanted before
its masterly employment at Cambrai in November, the last phase of the
Battle of Arras clearly demonstrated to all those who chose to see the
immense value of co-operation between Infantry and Tanks. That the brunt
of the Infantry fighting in these experimental days fell on the troops
from the West Riding, will find a place in military history as well as in
Yorkshire records.
[Illustration]
Brigade Orders with reference to the fresh assault were received
immediately after the old. Already on April 15th, the plan of operations
was to hand, and the intervening seventeen days was spent mainly in
rehearsals. The order of advance from the right was the 185th Infantry
Brigade (de Falbe), the 186th (Hill) in the centre, and the 187th
(Taylor) on the left. Each Brigade had its definite objective, and they
advanced to the attack side by side. The Third Army operated eastwards
in the direction of Fontaine-les-Croisilles, with the 2nd Australian
Division on the right. Tanks were to crawl up in sufficient numbers.
The day was fixed for May 3rd. Zero hour was 3-45 a.m. Once more we may
quote Major Watson[77] as to the part borne by the Tanks in this attack.
‘A costly failure,’ is his description of the day’s work. Major R. O.
C. Ward, D.S.O., who was killed in the following November, was out with
his Tanks in front, ‘but the Infantry could not follow,’ he complained.
‘Attack unsuccessful. Casualties heavy,’ is the bare statement in one of
the Battalion diaries. Before consulting a more expansive authority, it
will be interesting to examine the accompanying photograph of Hendecourt
from the air. Above the village, we see the main road from Arras to
Cambrai, which runs from north-east to south-west. Crossing that road, we
see the switch trench-line from Drocourt to Quéant, which ran roughly,
from north to south. The trenches guarding the village, Orix, Opal, Hop,
Morden, are indicated on the face of the photograph, and are still more
clearly displayed in the ground-plan sketch which we also reproduce (p.
133). Turning back now to May 3rd, we have the advantage of some notes
by an Officer of the 62nd, who watched the opening barrage from the top
of the railway embankment. It was an unforgettable sight. ‘Shells of
all sizes screamed through the air, and bullets from our machine-guns
sped towards the enemy lines. The noise was deafening and appalling.
Then the Tanks went forward to do their part in the attack. Hundreds of
Very lights and coloured signals were sent up by the enemy all along
his line’; and to the careful watcher and time-keeper, these lights and
signals brought evil tidings. For after two Companies of one Battalion of
the 62nd should have been in the enemy second-line trench, ‘enemy lights
were still sent up from that direction.’
We turn to a Company record. Take, for instance, B Company of the
2/5th West Ridings. They advanced steadily to the attack, and fought
their way up the slope to the ridge on the left of Bullecourt. But they
met very formidable opposition. Some think that the sound of the Tanks
deploying in their assembly positions may have reached acute enemy ears;
but, whether or not this was the case, and, on the whole, the evidence
is against it, a devastating machine-gun fire and a terrific barrage
of high explosive and shrapnel were suddenly opened on the advancing
Company, while hidden concrete emplacements protected the enemy guns.
The survivors gallantly rallied, and pressed on into the Hindenburg
Line through a ‘tornado of bullets.’ Lieut. O. Walker was killed at
this point, as he was charging at the head of his platoon, rifle in
hand, through the German wire. Two enemy machine-guns were captured, and
their crews killed by our bombers. Captain J. Walker, M.B.E., Commanding
the Company, with a mere handful of men, still pushed on and forced a
broken way to the next strong point of hidden emplacements. Here the
little party held out for three awful days and nights. They had no water
and only their iron rations, and they were bombed and shelled all the
time. On the second day, the enemy tried to take them prisoners, but
the attempt was repulsed. On the third day, when the position was blown
in through our own Batteries having shortened range, this very brave
Officer and his few surviving wounded men contrived to fight their way
back through the German outpost line, in broad daylight and fired at from
every side. A nine hours’ struggle brought them home ‘by a miracle.’[78]
Bullecourt was still uncaptured, but its blood-soaked ridges and trenches
had taught the Prussians the meaning of Yorkshire grit.
[Illustration: HENDECOURT FROM THE AIR.]
The story may be repeated, if it is not clear enough, from the diaries of
other Battalions. Take the 2/4th York and Lancasters, for example. It is
a vivid narrative, which may be quoted almost verbatim:
By Zero hour on May 3rd, the men had marched on to the tape line,
extended, and formed waves, as ordered, each man fixing his bayonet and
lying down directly he got into his place. Just as the head of the 6th
line came into its alignment, a shell burst close by, wounding Lt.-Col.
Blacker, Commanding, and about six other Ranks. ‘Don’t mind me, get the
lines out,’ was the gallant Officer’s order, which was instantly obeyed:
though the shelling was heavy all the time, the operation was completed
as if in a practice-attack. The Adjutant found the lines absolutely
correct, and men lying close to shell-holes had in many instances
refrained from taking cover for fear of spoiling their interval. It was
this kind of spirit which beat the Germans, though they kept us out
of Bullecourt on May 3rd. Colonel Blacker, with the assistance of his
servant, returned to Battalion Headquarters, and Major Richardson arrived
from Brigade to take over the Command of the Battalion. A rum-ration was
served out at 3 a.m., and the first line advanced at Zero (3-45 a.m.)
less eight minutes. In order to understand what followed, it must be
borne in mind that there were 900 yards to be traversed before the first
German trench was reached: 900 yards through the heavy smoke and dust of
the barrage depicted above. To keep intervals, distance and direction was
not an easy task even for the best-trained troops. Still, all was going
well, till some confusion was caused by another unit crossing their front
between the 4th and 5th lines. These troops were ordered to withdraw
and re-form, but the order was mistaken by about 70 men of the right
rear Company of the invaded Battalion. They thought it was addressed to
them, and withdrew, accordingly, to the railway embankment. The rest,
steadily led, despite the mixture of units, pushed on to the first German
trench, but the waves had lost their formation before the second line
was reached. Major Richardson was killed in a courageous attempt to
find out exactly what was happening, and, later, Brigade orders arrived
to parade all available personnel for a second attack in two lines. It
ended miserably in shell-holes, which afforded insufficient protection
from casualties out of proportion to the result, and about 4 o’clock in
the afternoon of the long day the order came to retire to the railway
cutting. The 7th Division relieved the 62nd.
We need not multiply the records. ‘The attacking troops eventually
withdrew to the railway cutting’; ‘finally forced to retire about 11-30
a.m. on the railway embankment’; these entries and entries like these
recur with maddening iteration in the narratives of the units on this
date, and the loss of life was terribly high. But Bullecourt fell in the
end. Ten men had been left in the coveted village by troops which had
reached it on May 3rd, but had fallen back from all but its fringes, and
these ten men were rescued on May 8th. Day by day, the stubborn fight was
waged, with attack and counter-attack of intense ferocity and varying
fortune, till at last, on May 17th and following days, Territorial Troops
of the County of London and the West Riding drove out the last remnants
of the German garrison from their last stronghold in front of Quéant. Let
Sir Douglas Haig tell the tale of these successes, which brought to a
victorious close the series of fighting known as the Battle of Arras:
‘At 3-45 a.m. on the 3rd May, another attack was undertaken
by us.... While the Third and First Armies attacked from
Fontaine-les-Croisilles to Fresnoy, the Fifth Army launched a
second attack upon the Hindenburg Line in the neighbourhood
of Bullecourt. This gave a total front of over sixteen miles.
Along practically the whole of this front our troops broke
into the enemy’s positions.... To secure the footing gained
by the Australians in the Hindenburg Line on the 3rd May, it
was advisable that Bullecourt should be captured without loss
of time. During the fortnight following our attack, fighting
for the possession of this village went on unceasingly....
On the morning of the 7th May, English troops (7th Division,
Major-General T. H. Shoubridge) gained a footing in the
south-east corner of Bullecourt. Thereafter gradual progress
was made, in the face of the most obstinate resistance, and on
the 17th May, London and West Riding Territorials[79] completed
the capture of the village.... On the 20th May fighting was
commenced by the 33rd Division (Major-General R. J. Pinney) for
the sector of the Hindenburg Line lying between Bullecourt and
our front-line west of Fontaine-les-Croisilles. Steady progress
was made until by the 16th June touch had been established by
us between these two points.’[80]
[Illustration: COLISEUM MADE OUT OF A GERMAN CRATER.]
We had intended to close here the present chapter. But our impression
of life at the front with the 62nd Division is incomplete without
reference to the mimic warfare and the relaxation from war which likewise
formed part of its experience. On that very day, June 16th, when the
Bullecourt sector was finally consolidated, Divisional Sports were being
held at Achiet-le-Petit. In a Coliseum made out of a German crater,
which we illustrate from a pencil-sketch on the spot, the Divisional
Band was playing on June 14th, and boxing contests were being fought.
Two days later, a Gymkhana was held, in which some of the chief events
were dribbling a football on horseback,[81] driving a pair of mules
tandem,[82] and collecting stones to drop into a bucket.[83] On June
20th, three Officers of the 2/5th West Ridings rode from Achiet-le-Petit
to Thiepval, and went over the ground which had been fought by the 1st
Line Battalion of their Regiment nearly a year before. ‘Forsan et haec
olim meminisse juvabit,’ they may have thought, as they contrasted their
leisurely ride with the heat of battle which the site recalled; and the
same thought, applied to their own experience, may have revealed the hope
of a future day when Bullecourt, like Thiepval, would be remembered as a
past stage in a victorious advance.
CHAPTER X
I.—THE NORTHERN RIDGES
Between the Battle of Arras in the Spring and the Battle of Cambrai in
the Autumn came the Third Battle of Ypres in the Summer. This middle
battle in time (with which, in the history of the West Riding, we shall
not be much concerned) was the northernmost battle in space, and its
success, if it had been fully successful, would have been amphibious in
kind. It would have rendered untenable by Germany the sea-bases of her
submarine campaign, thus relieving the food-problem for the Allies, and
it would have removed the military peril, fought out to a standstill in
1915, which threatened Paris and the Channel ports. On this account, as
we saw in the last Chapter, the northernmost battle of the three was
originally the chief in significance according to Sir Douglas Haig’s
plans. If we may regard the long Allied line, say, from Reims to the
sea, throughout, and even beyond, the fighting season of 1917, as the
scene of a single battle, we must add that the course of that battle
did not follow Sir Douglas Haig’s wishes. We read above of a ‘revised’
scheme, of ‘restricted’ preparations for the attack in Flanders, and we
infer (indeed, we are informed) that, if Haig had been in sole Command
of the Allied Forces on the Western front, he would have disposed the
programme a little differently. Happily, it is not our business to judge
the strategy of the war. Our task is to narrate the part which was played
by a few thousand Yorkshiremen in bringing the war to a victorious close.
Strategy was not in their contract: the Colonel obeyed his Brigadier, the
General his Corps Commander; and even in a larger sphere, Sir Douglas
Haig was less than supreme. In the triple battle of 1917 many factors
entered into account. To burn out the submarine nests, to countervail
Italy’s fate of arms, to anticipate Russia’s defection, to release French
industry and railways: these were a few of the considerations which
affected the movements of the Allied Armies between Verdun and Ypres, the
two flagstaffs of French and British ardour. That they were, primarily,
political considerations does not mean that they were wrongly brought
into account. Always the strategical initiative, as distinct from the
tactical, lies partly outside the control of the fighting men. But there
was worse than this in the series of conditions which determined the
fighting of 1917. The sequence of battle-areas (Arras, Ypres, Cambrai)
might be dictated by causes which prevailed over the best-laid plans;
the course of the battles themselves, especially of the Summer-battle
about Ypres, was dictated by less calculable chances. Among these were
the ‘pill-boxes’ and the mud, the solid and the fluid conditions. When to
break off that last battle was almost more difficult a problem than when
to engage it; and if its commencement was postponed by causes outside
Haig’s control, we can read between the lines of his Fourth Dispatch the
hesitation with which he carried it on:
‘After weighing these considerations, as well as the general
situation and various other factors affecting the problem,
among them the desirability of assisting our Allies in the
operations to be carried out by them on the 23rd October in the
neighbourhood of Malmaison, I decided to continue the offensive
further....
‘Though the condition of the ground continued to deteriorate,
the weather after this was unsettled rather than persistently
wet, and progress had not become impossible. I accordingly
decided to press on while circumstances still permitted....
‘By this time the persistent continuation of wet weather had
left no further room for hope....[84]’
it would be unnecessary to complete this final sentence, except that it
closes with the definite statement, that, ‘in view of other projects
which I had in view, it was desirable to maintain pressure on the
Flanders front for a few weeks longer.’ Once more, we are not required to
judge, but, at least, we may note the implication that, even when there
was ‘no further room for hope’ (surely, a grave obstacle to progress) it
was still necessary to ‘maintain pressure for a few weeks longer.’
The West Yorkshire troops did not come in till close to the end of this
middle battle, and we shall presently be more fully concerned with the
‘other projects’ elsewhere. But we can imagine what it meant to those
spent and battle-weary soldiers to ‘maintain pressure’ beyond the hope of
progress. ‘Physical exhaustion,’ we read, ‘placed narrow limits on the
depth to which each advance could be pushed’; and how far those limits
should be forced was a matter of very difficult discretion. ‘Time after
time,’ runs the Despatch, ‘the practically beaten enemy was enabled to
re-organize and relieve his men, and to bring up reinforcements behind
the sea of mud which constituted his main protection’; and at what point
a ‘practically beaten’ enemy should be left behind his barrier of mud
was, again, very hard to decide. Hard and difficult decisions for the
High Command; but the hardship and the difficulty of the fighting fell
heavily on the fighting men, and the Summer-battle of 1917, which was
prolonged far beyond the Summer, entailed, as Sir Douglas Haig tells us,
‘almost superhuman exertions on the part of the troops of all arms and
services.[85]’ The great Commander chose his word well. If the triple
battle of 1917 were to be fought out again, with all the conditions
constant except those which strategists could vary, there would be,
conceivably, a new time-table and a new distribution of effort at Arras,
Passchendaele and Cambrai: there would still be the ‘superhuman’ effort
to overcome the German advantage of irregular, murderous blockhouses,
like Martello-towers sunk in a sea of mud, and of not less irregular rain.
We come to closer quarters with this middle battle. It opened on June 7th
with an explosion of nineteen mines, which caused enormous rents in the
enemy front-line trenches, and which effectively assisted the Artillery
and the Air Force in their preparations for the Infantry advance.
Impressive from a spectacular point of view, it was no sudden thing, this
explosion. It represented many months of patient labour by highly-skilled
miners and engineers, the memory of whose devotion to duty, under
conditions of constant horror, should help, in industrial times, to
soften acerbities at home. It was, further, the great surprise of the
attack. British enterprise had to burrow underground in order to escape
the observation of an enemy, who, since 1915, when the Ypres salient was
inevitably contracted,[86] had occupied all the commanding ground in a
stretch of country where 60 feet was the measure of a mountain. Messines,
Wytschaete and Oostaverne were all captured on that first day (June 7th),
together with more than 7,000 prisoners and 450 pieces of Artillery.
General Sir Herbert Plumer and the Second Army, who had acted as wardens
of these marches through so many weary and exacting months, reaped a
swift reward in the second week of June.
Unfortunately, it did not end as it began. The obliteration of two
Battalions on the Yser between Nieuport and the sea on July 10th belongs
to the history of the Northamptons and the King’s Royal Rifles, whose
heroic defence of a position cut off from succour or support is Homeric
in its quality.[87] Canadian historians will tell the tale of the
capture of Hill 70 from the Prussian Guard, and of the long struggles
in the outskirts of Lens. The season was still young, however; the
initial operations had been successful, and the results achieved in June
encouraged Sir Douglas Haig to extend the area of his attack right along
the ridges and their spurs from Messines to Houlthulst Forest. These
movements started on the last day of July, with the Fifth Army under
General Sir Hubert Gough and the Second under General Sir Herbert Plumer.
Slowly, resolutely, painfully, a way was forced up the difficult slopes.
After twenty days a big advance could be recorded, but the going had
been hard and expensive, and already the pace began to tell. The halt
called in mid-August by exhaustion was employed for further preparation,
and a month later, when the full attack was re-commenced, the highest
points were still in enemy hands. It was now the middle of September:
battle had been joined in the first week of June, but Glencorse Wood and
Inverness Copse and a series of minor positions had still to be won, in
order to render Passchendaele untenable and so to complete the capture
of the ridges. The programme, we see, was out of gear; the price paid
was out of proportion to the gains. The battle-fury surged up and down
in gusts and lulls, and ebb and flow, shaped less to a regular advance
than to a series of shocks and withdrawals, with the battle-mark always a
little higher, but, behind it, in an ascending scale, loss of life, and
devastated country, rain and ruin, and desperate endeavour. Was it worth
while? was one urgent question. How long could it be kept up? was another.
Every Battalion of the 49th Division was engaged: the West Ridings, the
King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, the York and Lancasters, and the
West Yorkshires, and at last they reached the top of the main ridge. The
date was October 9th-10th, and the 49th was moved to the attack with the
66th Division on their right and the 48th on their left. The St. Julien
road lay behind them, Passchendaele was a mile or two ahead. Three stout
Infantry Brigades, eager to crown the Summer’s struggle, took part in the
front of the operation: the 146th in the centre, the 148th on the right,
and the 144th (48th Division) on the left. The 147th was the Reserve
Brigade. The centre Battalion of the centre Brigade was the 1/7th West
Yorkshires; they found the 1/5th of the same Regiment on their right, and
the 1/8th on their left: the 1/6th was their Reserve Battalion. The heavy
casualties in these two days’ fighting made exact information hard to
collect: in three Companies of the middle Battalion all the Officers and
senior N.C.O.s had been permanently or temporarily disabled, and as early
as 7-30 on the first morning (October 9th) the Reserve (147th) Brigade
was ordered to be ready at an hour’s notice. In these circumstances, an
hour to hour narrative could not be accurately compiled. The details
were too much confused. Touch was lost between Companies and between
Battalions, and one Officer’s summary of a part must stand for the record
of the whole: ‘The Brigade (the 146th) reached its first objective, but
was unable to proceed further.’ Still, an advance was made on these two
days, which count among the worst experiences on the Western front,
and the Troops very thoroughly merited the congratulations of the
Corps Commander, Sir Alexander Godley, on their achievement ‘under the
extremely adverse conditions.’
The congratulations were renewed a few days later (October 18th) when
Major-General Perceval, C.B., took leave of the 49th Division, which,
despite the ‘adverse conditions’ and the ‘almost superhuman exertions,’
which we have read of, he had commanded so gallantly and with so much
hope. We are told that, at the Brigade Parade, he appeared to feel the
parting very keenly, and we know how warmly his regret was reciprocated
by the whole Division. He had succeeded to the Command in 1915, when
General Baldock was injured by a shell,[88] and he had led the 49th
Division in the Battles of the Ancre and the Somme, culminating in
the capture of Thiepval, during 1916.[89] He was succeeded now by
Major-General Neville J. G. Cameron, C.B., C.M.G. (1916), of the Cameron
Highlanders, who had served on the Nile and in South Africa, and whose
proud privilege it became, as an Infantryman, to command a Territorial
Infantry Division till the end of the war.
We return from this personal note, arising out of the change of Command,
to the intense struggle outside Houlthulst Forest. It was renewed three
times in October, a bloody October for the 49th Division, as for the
British Army as a whole, and, at last, on the last day of that month,
the British line had been carried, foot by foot, till within about 300
yards of the contested village of Passchendaele. One more week of effort
was demanded of the Troops exhausted by four months’ bloodshed, and the
final assault was delivered on November 6th, when the village fell to
the Canadians. In the course of four days’ further fighting the last
crests of the ridges were secured, and the long Third Battle of Ypres was
definitely terminated.
Who had won it? Counting July 31st as the first day of that phase of
the Third Battle, it had cost the Germans over 24,000 prisoners. They
had lost positions from Messines to Passchendaele, roughly, on a front
of twelve miles, the value of which, small in area, had been recognized
as cardinal in three great battles in three years. Because they had lost
the positions, we may conclude that they had lost the Third Battle, as
they had lost the First (1914) and had been stalemated in the Second
(1915). But this conclusion does not contradict another, that Sir
Douglas Haig had not won. He had not won the victory which he sought.
If we compare the close with the opening of this long and brilliant
Despatch (‘the Campaigns of 1917’), we see clearly by how much he had
contracted his original bold design, and how grievously his large hopes
had been disappointed by extraneous events. ‘The general conditions
of the struggle this year,’ he recorded, ‘have been very different
from those contemplated at the conference of Allied Commanders held in
November, 1916. The great general and simultaneous offensive then agreed
on did not materialize.’ We turn back to the plans at that Conference,
so far as the British Commander reveals them.[90] They ‘comprised a
series of offensives on all fronts, so timed as to assist each other
by depriving the enemy of power of weakening any one of his fronts in
order to reinforce another.’ The Arras battle was not to be pursued
beyond its first objective: ‘it was my intention to transfer my main
offensive to another part of my front.... I hoped, after completing my
spring offensive further south, to be able to develop this Flanders
attack without great delay, and to strike hard in the north before
the enemy realized that the attack in the south would not be pressed
further.’ But it ‘did not materialize,’ as has been said. The task of
the British and French Armies had proved far heavier than was originally
anticipated, and, on the other hand, the enemy’s means of resistance had
proved ‘far greater than either he or we could have expected.’ We shall
see in a later chapter how these disappointments imposed a change from
the offensive to the defensive in the renewed campaign of 1918. Here
we observe that, to this extent, the Summer battle of 1917, protracted
almost too long for the endurance even of British soldiery, could not be
counted victorious. Nor was the final outlook better, when the results
on a wider front were added to those of the Third Battle of Ypres. On
no front had we suffered defeat; on none, as German reports prove, was
the enemy free from anxiety or confident of military success. But our
great efforts were frustrated by outside causes: military opinion is
hardening to the conviction that the Western battles of 1917 worked out,
on a balance, to our disadvantage, and the dark shadow of the Russian
Empire in solution fell across the concluding pages of the British Field
Marshal’s Fourth Despatch.
II.—BETWEEN THE BATTLES.
While the 49th Division was struggling up the northern ridges, the 62nd
was spending a brief and busy interval between the Battle of Arras in the
Spring and the Battle of Cambrai in the Autumn.
Not an hour of that interval was wasted. The noise of the guns was never
ceasing; and it is especially interesting to observe how admirably the
Divisional Training, set on foot at once between the battles, fitted the
daily calls which were to be made on all units of the Division.
But first, for the sake of its pleasant reading, and as a proof that
merit found reward, take Lord Harewood’s statement to the West Riding
Association in October, 1917, of the Honours awarded to their Troops.
The 62nd had figured in an Honours List as early as the previous April,
and there had been a good sprinkling from its units in June. Now, every
unit had been fighting, and every unit had won distinction. Thus, we
met Lieut.-Colonel Hastings at Bullecourt, and we read here of his
well-merited D.S.O., and of as many as sixteen Military Medals awarded
to gallant men in his Battalion. In point of fact, the Honours which
were awarded were far fewer than the Honours which were deserved;
and, confining ourselves to figures only, since it is not seemly to
select names[91], we observe that, out of fourteen Military Crosses
which fell to the 62nd Division, four went to subaltern Officers in a
single Battalion of the West Ridings. In the 49th Division, there were
twenty-four awards of the Military Cross; four men received Bars to their
Military Medals; and there were over a hundred fresh Military Medals and
other decorations. Many mothers and maids in the West Riding had cause to
be proud of their sons and lovers.
So much in this place for the past fighting. Meanwhile, let us follow one
unit of the 62nd to its interval of rest between the fights. Here, too,
we need not particularize. We noted at the end of the last chapter how
quickly sport succeeded war, and in all units alike, at Achiet-le-Petit
and elsewhere, the typical Battalion Sports Officer would ‘get a move on’
very quickly. We may imagine the kind of man he was; say, a subaltern
Officer with a wound-stripe, perhaps recently rejoined, and wearing,
no doubt, the ribbons of a Military Cross and a Croix-de-Guerre. We
may imagine, too, the shell-pocked field, which, in order to exercise
his men, he would set himself to convert into a football ground, with
its holes neatly patched and darned, and its goal posts and other
appurtenances requisitioned as urgently as ammunition. Or take the signal
example of the great crater-coliseum,[92] on which a whole Battalion had
been set at work, and which was ingeniously constructed to accommodate
about two thousand spectators. It was chiefly used for boxing contests,
and the R.E. took a hand in erecting its 18-foot ring. The next step
was to find and train the teams, and special mention is due to the
middleweight champion of the 62nd Division, Company Sgt.-Major Schofield,
D.C.M., of the 2/5th West Ridings, whose fight with Pte. Hayhurst, of
the 2/6th Duke of Wellington’s, filled the Coliseum one fine day. They
were not too particular about the seasons. When the weather was hot,
they played cricket; when it was not, they played football, and an
inter-Brigade Summer football match resulted in the victory of a team
composed of the R.E. and R.A.M.C.; the 2/4th West Ridings being second,
and the 2/5th West Ridings third. Later, a Divisional Cup was competed
for at Beaulencourt, and was won by the 2/5th West Ridings, who beat the
R.E. and R.A.M.C. by the handsome score of six goals to one.
The old saying about the playing-fields at Eton and the Battle of
Waterloo recurs to memory as we write. The preparation for war in sport
was illustrated again and again. Three times in the course of this
Summer, a certain Company out of a Battalion of the 62nd was stationed
in a position known as the Apex, which had formed part of the Hindenburg
Line, south-south-west of Riencourt. The first occasion was towards the
end of June, and the Company Officers found cause to bless the foresight
of the authorities who had organized so many forms of sport. Take their
excellent shooting, for example. A party of the enemy, about six in
number, had been observed on the sky-line walking in single file on
the top of a communication-trench. The range was, approximately, 1,200
yards. Six men were sent out in a good lying position, and the sights
were harmonized between 1,000 and 1,400 yards. After the third round,
we are told, the enemy rapidly dispersed, and contracted their sphere
of activity. Or, take the raid on the Apex on September 13th, which was
shown by prisoners’ testimony to have been carefully rehearsed by a
considerable enemy force of Storm-Troops, Infantry, and others, under
orders to destroy all dug-outs near the Apex and to inflict as much
damage as possible on our garrison. The attack fell on the 2/6th West
Yorkshires, and was very gallantly repulsed; chiefly by the courage
and determination of Captain G. C. Turner, who was killed, and of
L.-Sergt. W. Pearson (No. 241038), who lived just long enough for General
Braithwaite to recommend him for the award of the D.C.M. It was a typical
‘No surrender’ exploit, and merits special recognition. Or, another
incident at the Apex back in August. On this occasion a private soldier
distinguished himself, and was awarded the M.M., in a voluntary patrol to
clear up an obscure position. In full daylight he went, unaccompanied, up
a gulley some 35 to 40 yards, and located an enemy party. He reported the
position to his Officer, who dealt with it successfully the same night by
the aid of some rifle-grenadiers. It was the same private, by the way,
the crack shot in his own crack company, who brought down some partridges
in September, within a few yards of the enemy posts. Either for the game
or for other causes, the men of this Company became so keen on patrol
work at the Apex, that they petitioned for a double tour duty and stayed
out eight consecutive nights. Insignificant details, perhaps, but good
shooting and keen soldiership won the war; and the Division thoroughly
earned the compliments of the Commander-in-Chief and Army Commander on
their exploits during this period, which showed ‘skill and enterprise.’
They were as good at salving as at sniping. The tale is told of a
Platoon near Bullecourt, which had become liable to a complaint that
Salvage orders were being neglected. The complaint was quickly set
to rights, and within a very short time a remarkable collection was
accumulated outside Company Headquarters. A derelict Tank had been found
hidden fast in high undergrowth, and as many as seven Lewis guns and some
forty magazines in more or less bad condition were brought to join the
Battalion dump. By the side of another Tank the bodies were identified
of four men of the Royal Warwicks, and, as the Yorkshiremen themselves
had once been engaged in the same sector, they began an organized search,
which resulted in at least forty casualties being transferred from
‘missing’ to ‘killed.’
So, the pause between the battles were filled up. With raids and
counter-raids, and martial exercises, and military sports, and play
imitating work, the exhaustion after Bullecourt was repaired, and the
spirit of Bullecourt was renewed. Field-work on the open fighting
system completed the training at Beaulencourt where a move was made
into hutments in October, and it is noted that the shooting was so
much improved that one Platoon, at the end of its intensive practice,
scored a total of 405 out of 450 points in a ‘mad minute’ competition.
Early in November, a new Brigadier was appointed to the 186th Brigade
in succession to Brig.-General Hill, whose gallantry and leadership had
won him the affection of all ranks, when the limits of age compelled his
retirement. The veteran’s place was taken by a very junior Officer, R.
B. Bradford, V.C., who fell in action at the end of the same month, and
whose name may stand, on the eve of the Autumn fighting, to typify the
_personnel_ of the Division, certain units of which we have visited here
and there in the training period between Arras and Cambrai. Roland Boys
Bradford was born in 1892; he joined the Durham Light Infantry in 1912,
and went out to the war two years afterwards. Thus, his chance came early
in life, and he made the fullest use of every phase of it. His promotion
was as rapid as his valour was remarkable. He won the M.C. and the V.C.
(1916), and was several times mentioned in Despatches, and accounts agree
that this youthful Brigadier, when he reached that military rank at
the early age of twenty-five, was a soldier of very brilliant promise.
He died young, according to civil standards, but he achieved a fine
professional record under exacting conditions of active service; and
General Braithwaite’s 62nd Division was fortunate, in November, 1917, in
possessing, on the Cambrai front, Brigadiers so thoroughly conversant
with their duties and so fully qualified to lead their men as General
Viscount Hampden, commanding the 185th, General Taylor, commanding the
187th, and General Bradford, commanding the 186th, whose swift death is
the just pretext for this brief excursus.
III.—THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI (FIRST PHASE)
We reach now the final stage of the campaign, which had been planned with
such hopeful anticipations at the November conference just a year before.
There are several ways of regarding the Battle of Cambrai. We may look
at it through big, strategic spectacles, as a means, opportune, but
timely, of engaging and distracting German Forces which might otherwise
have been sent to Italy. This view is not without authority, and it is
stated with his usual lucidity by Mr. Buchan in his popular narrative:
‘Italy, fighting desperately on the Piave, deserved by all the
laws of war some relief in the shape of an Allied diversion.
Weary as his troops might be, Sir Douglas Haig was not able to
grant them the rest which they had earned and most urgently
required.’[93]
It is not within our province to strike a balance between this assumption
of ‘all the laws of war’ and the degree of weariness of Sir Douglas
Haig’s troops.
Again, we may look at this battle through the narrower spectacles of a
tactician. It was designed in the nature of a surprise. It was unexpected
in time and place, and it brought into operation a new weapon in the
form of a mass attack of Tanks in lieu of Artillery preparation. In this
aspect the Battle was victorious: it evoked von der Marwitz’s Order to
the German Second Army (November 29th):
‘The English, by throwing into the fight countless Tanks on
November 20th, _gained a victory_ near Cambrai. Their intention
was to break through; but they did not succeed, thanks to
the brilliant resistance of our troops. We are now going to
turn their embryonic victory into a defeat by an encircling
counter-attack. The Fatherland is watching you, and expects
every man to do his duty.’
Once more, we shall not attempt to strike a balance. We gained a victory,
according to this Order, but it was embryonic and not a success. At the
same time, we know that things were serious when the Fatherland was said
to be watching.
A third way of looking at this battle, and the way best suited to our
present purpose, is to regard it as a very gallant enterprise, worthy of
the finest traditions of the British Army, and not less worthy because a
large part of its hardest demands fell on Territorial Troops. They might
muffle the joy-bells in England when the full story of the battle was
revealed, but at least they had rung them spontaneously in recognition of
a brilliant feat of arms, and the bells still peal in celebration of the
dash and heroism of British soldiers.
We turn back for a moment to the sketch on page 116, especially to A B
C, the road from Albert through Bapaume to Cambrai. The British line has
swallowed up the eleven miles (A B), where the fighting was so intense
in 1916, and it struck now (November 20th) across that road at a point
just east of Boursies, about half-way between Bapaume and Cambrai. Thence
it forged right into the triangle, of which Arras is the apex, leaving
Quéant in German occupation on the east, and Bullecourt in British on the
west, to the northerly country where we have been adjourning. Turning
next to the position before us, we see what advantage would accrue from
a deeper bite on the same road. Not primarily to capture Cambrai, though
this, too, might enter calculation, but to roll up the British forces
from below the road in such a way as to threaten Cambrai and to disturb
the German Winter dispositions, was a hazard worth the stake in late
November. Roughly, the scheme of the attack was to push out between
Boursies and Gonnelieu in a north north-easterly direction, lapping
up the strong positions like a flame, and to spread in a converging
semi-circle up to the main road (Bapaume-Cambrai) and beyond.
The troops at Sir Julian Byng’s disposal[94] were, first, a fleet of
four hundred Tanks, commanded by General Hugh Elles; next, the following
six Infantry Divisions: the 36th (Ulster), 62nd (West Riding), 51st
(Highland), the 6th, 20th and 12th; next, four Cavalry Divisions; and,
finally, three more Infantry Divisions (3rd, 16th and 29th), of which
the 29th, of Gallipoli fame, was actively engaged. It will be seen that
the 62nd had a place of honour in the attack, and it was allotted the
task of capturing Havrincourt, the strong point of the enemy’s line.
This task required all the powers the Troops could bring: unfaltering
leadership, indomitable mettle, and untiring endurance. The methods and
needs of the attack had been the subject of constant discussion since the
original scheme of operations had been laid before Divisional Commanders
at a conference on October 31st. The 51st and 62nd Divisions had been
trained close to one another in order to facilitate co-operation, and the
preparation of Artillery positions, begun on November 4th, was carried
out night and day till the 19th. No detail was too small to engage the
personal attention of the Officers in charge of the operation, various
features of which were modified from day to day in accordance with
practical experience.
On the night of November 17th-18th, the two leading Brigades of the
62nd Division took up their battle front; the 185th on the right, and
the 187th on the left. Detachments of the 36th Division were kept in the
outpost line, so as to avoid any chance of the enemy spotting the relief;
and, though he rushed one of these posts, and captured two men of the
36th, he was not made aware of the date or time of the attack, or of the
fact that Tanks were to be used. These lumbered off from the advanced
Tankodrome at the south-west corner of Havrincourt Wood, and reached
their lying-up places by midnight on Y Z night, November 19th-20th.
The pace of the Tanks was calculated, after practical experience, at a
hundred yards in five minutes, and the Artillery barrage and Infantry
advance were regulated accordingly. The two leading Infantry Brigades
were to attack on a two-Battalion front, preceded by twenty-two Tanks.
The remaining two Battalions of each Brigade, preceded by eight Tanks,
were to leap-frog through the leading Battalions, picking up all
surviving Tanks on their way.
Second only, if second, to the Tanks in novelty and effectiveness was
the new, great weapon of surprise, perfected by the lessons of a hundred
mistakes. We may quote the evidence of a contemporary Battalion diarist,
who ascribed the initial success, first, to the Tanks (‘these dealt
extremely effectively with the enemy wire, which was very formidable
in places’), and, secondly, to secrecy (‘even in the marches up to the
line the destination of the Battalion for that night was not made known
to anybody below the rank of an Officer. That this policy paid well may
be judged from the fact that the enemy was obviously taken completely
by surprise’). This record, taken from the account of the 2/4th York
and Lancasters, is repeated in almost every diary. In order to keep the
secret, very elaborate precautions had been taken. Aerial photographers
were deceived by marches on the off-side of roads. Lorries going
northward carried lights, lorries going southward carried none. No fires
were allowed. There was no preliminary bombardment, and, as indicated
above, no one in the Division knew the destination of the Division. Zero
hour on November 20th was 6-20 a.m., and at 6-20, on that foggy morning,
the first intimation to the Germans of the 62nd Division’s attack was
the sight of a sheet of flame from every gun, and of heavy Tanks looming
through the mist. No wonder, that the first bound of the eager Infantry
started with conspicuous success, and was attended by comparatively few
casualties.
That first bound of the Infantry was to carry them to Havrincourt and
Flesquières, and Havrincourt, as we saw, was to be the prize of General
Braithwaite’s Troops. We shall come to the fighting in a moment. Here let
us straightway say that the Division acquitted itself brilliantly. Sir
Douglas Haig, in his Despatch, expressly used this rare epithet. ‘The
62nd (West Riding) Division (T.), (Major-General W. P. Braithwaite),’
he wrote, ‘stormed Havrincourt, where ... parties of the enemy held out
for a time,’ and ‘operating northwards from Havrincourt, made important
progress. Having carried the Hindenburg Reserve Line north of that
village, it rapidly continued its attack, and captured Graincourt, where
two anti-Tank guns were destroyed by the Tanks accompanying our Infantry.
Before nightfall, Infantry and Cavalry had entered Anneux, though the
enemy’s resistance in this village does not appear to have been entirely
overcome till the following morning’ (November 21st). ‘This attack of the
62nd Division,’ added the great Field Marshal, ‘constitutes a _brilliant
achievement_ in which the troops concerned completed an advance of four
and a half miles from their original front, over-running two German
systems of defence, and gaining possession of three villages.[95]’ As a
fact, their advance on that day, the third Tuesday in November, covered
a distance further in actual mileage than any other of Sir Julian Byng’s
Divisions; further, indeed, than any Division of the British Army had
advanced in one day under like conditions since war was engaged in the
Western Front. Starting from a point just below the big bend of the Canal
du Nord, they took Havrincourt by assault (which meant, among other
factors, (1) secrecy, (2) Tanks and, as we show below, (3) Infantry-rush)
pushed straight forward to Graincourt, and reached and occupied Anneux,
at the edge of our B C road, and opposite the south side of Bourlon Wood:
over 7,000 yards, as a crow flies, and a wholly exceptional day’s march
for soldiers fighting every foothold.
We have drawn attention to the secrecy and the Tanks. ‘The measure of
further success,’ so ran an order of the day, ‘is entirely dependent on
the speed with which the operation is carried out. Every minute is of
importance.... Once the enemy is on the run, every man must put forth his
utmost efforts to press on and to prevent his rallying.’ Here, again, the
7,000 yards of the 62nd Division bear witness to exemplary team-work in
training for this Infantry-rush both in the period of Divisional rest and
of intensive preparation. One more detail may be set down in this place.
At the Dinner of the 62nd Division, held at Leeds on September 9th,
1919, when Major-General Sir James K. Trotter took the Chair, General
Braithwaite, on leave from his Command in Cologne, announced that a site
for a Divisional Battle Memorial had been sought and courteously granted
in Havrincourt Park—an announcement which, as we shall see, derived
additional force and appropriateness from the further record of the
Division at Havrincourt in the victorious advance of 1918.
Meanwhile, still on that first day, when the Tanks went crashing
through the fog, the Highlanders (51st Division) were repeating against
Flesquières on the right, the ‘bound’ of the 62nd against Havrincourt.
Its capture was reported about 11 a.m., but two hours later authentic
news arrived, that, though the troops were holding the front trench of
the Hindenburg Support Line in front of the village, machine-gun and
rifle fire had broken the assault; a large number of Tanks had been put
out of action; the Support Line and Flesquières itself were still in
enemy hands. This retardation of the programme affected immediately the
advance of the 186th Infantry Brigade (Graincourt). Its right wing was
dangerously exposed; and the two Field Artillery Brigades to the east of
Havrincourt, deprived of the hope of Cavalry assistance, were also left
hanging. Still, the Infantry pressed on. The results achieved were too
good and too promising to be sacrificed to a risk which might eventuate
either way, and it would at least be practicable to call a halt on the
Graincourt-Cambrai road till the position at Flesquières was clearer.
This plan was exactly carried out, and shortly after 5-30 that afternoon
the 186th Brigade had captured Graincourt, and was resting (or at any
rate not advancing from) a line north of the Cambrai road.
[Illustration: HAVRINCOURT: CANAL DU NORD BRIDGE.
HAVRINCOURT: IN THE PARK.]
We shall come back to the epic battle of November 20th. Passing now to
November 21st, the objective of the Division on the second day was the
high ground west of Bourlon and Bourlon Wood. The gallant 186th Brigade
was entrusted with this attack, and all available surviving Tanks were
put at their disposal. One Regiment of Cavalry was attached to the
Division, and Zero hour was fixed at 10-0 a.m. It had been hoped to push
forward the Artillery during the night of 20th-21st, but the rain which
had been falling since the afternoon interfered with this programme.
However, despite the opposing mud, all four Artillery Brigades were in
action between Havrincourt and Graincourt early in the afternoon of the
21st. The night of the 20th had passed quietly. About 8 o’clock the
next morning, the 51st (Highland) Division had completed their capture
of Flesquières, and were advancing on to the Marcoing-Graincourt Road.
Prisoners’ tales reported that Bourlon Wood (the 62nd’s objective) was
held by the 32nd and 224th Brandenburghers, indicating that a Reserve
Division had been brought up by the enemy. It was time to get on, and
punctually at Zero-hour the 186th Infantry Brigade, with the 185th in
close support and the 187th in reserve, were started on their way,
while the Artillery bombarded Bourlon village and put a smoke barrage
on Tadpole Copse. Eighteen Tanks in all was the number of available
survivors, but, owing to trouble with petrol-supply, etc., not all of
these were ready to time, and some delay ensued in the execution of the
operation.
Before estimating the results of the severe fighting in which the Brigade
was involved, one or two facts may be stated as to the participation of
some of its units.
The 2/4th West Ridings were detailed to capture Anneux and Anneux Chapel.
The village, though strongly held by Infantry and Machine-Guns, duly fell
to their splendid efforts, but further advance was stopped at the edge of
Bourlon Wood. The Company detailed to take the Chapel performed skilful
work with heavy casualties, and, after making good their advance to the
edge of the wood, and capturing at least 300 prisoners, were withdrawn
shortly before dark to the sunken road.
The 2/5th and the 2/7th West Ridings were badly handicapped for lack
of Tanks. Instead of the frontal attack which had been intended, the
uncut wire compelled them to have recourse to an attack by bombs,
with consequent loss of impetus. A single Tank, which arrived in the
afternoon, was utilized to the utmost of its capacity. The 2/6th
Battalion, which was to have been kept in Brigade reserve, and to have
been used for the capture of Bourlon Village as soon as the leading
Battalions had reached their objectives, had to be employed to reinforce
the assault and to fill up gaps in the line. Similarly, the Cavalry were
dismounted in the later hours of the afternoon, and helped to complete
the line held in front of Anneux by the 2/4th West Ridings.
Though Moeuvres and Anneux (inclusive) had been captured, and were held,
it was evident that Bourlon Village would not be taken that day. Orders
were issued, accordingly, to relieve the 186th Infantry Brigade in their
present positions, and their relief by the 185th was duly carried out
that evening.
The general situation on the night of November 21st was somewhat vague,
and next day, though the Division was to have been relieved during the
night of the 21st/22nd by the 40th Division, it was decided to make one
more effort to capture the ridge west of Bourlon Wood, which overlooked
all the ground west and south of Graincourt. They tried, and struggled,
and tried again, but, despite much desperate fighting, no capture
ensued, and, owing to the enemy’s counter-attack and the consequent
disorganization, the attempt had to be abandoned. On the same day, the
51st Division took and lost Fontaine. In the night, the relief of the
62nd was duly effected by the 40th.
We break off here for a moment to set down one or two of the gallant
deeds which were done in the three days’ battle. And, first, we should
quote in full the special Order of the Day, which General Braithwaite,
Commanding the Division, published on November 24th, the first full day
of the relief. The Divisional Commander, it stands written,
‘has the honour to announce that the Commander-in-Chief and the
Army Commander have expressed their high appreciation of the
achievement of the 62nd Division in the battle.
‘The Divisional Commander had the most implicit confidence that
the Division would acquit itself with honour.
‘To have advanced 7,000 yards on the first day, taken all
objectives, held them against counter-attacks and handed over
all gains intact to the relieving Division is a feat of arms of
which any Division may be justly proud.
‘The number of prisoners taken is not far short of 2,000.
Thirty-seven guns have been captured, which include two 8-inch
Howitzers, one complete Battery of 4·2, one complete Battery of
5·9, and the remainder, guns of various calibres, many of which
were brought into action against the enemy.
‘The number of Machine-Guns, Granatenwerfer, etc., etc., which
have fallen into our possession is so considerable that it has
not been possible yet to make an accurate tally of them.
‘The advance of the Artillery to Graincourt, and the accuracy
of the barrage, is worthy of the best traditions of the Royal
Regiment. To C Battalion, the Tanks, all ranks of the Division
express their admiration of the skill, bravery and the splendid
self-sacrifice which made success possible.
‘The discipline, valour and steadiness of all ranks has been
beyond praise.
‘It is with great and legitimate pride that I have the honour
to sign my name as Commander of the 62nd (West Riding)
Division.’
November 24th, 1917—the years that have elapsed and that will elapse
since General Braithwaite signed this Order cannot diminish its praise.
The glowing words breathe and live; they survive the _neiges d’antan_
which cover his gallant men’s graves between the Bapaume road and the
Canal de l’Escaut.
Here, too, is the place to mention the visit on November 22nd of Sir
Douglas Haig himself to the Headquarters of the 62nd Division (a
visit preceded the day before by the dispatch of an A.D.C. by the
Commander-in-Chief), in order personally to congratulate General
Braithwaite, and to tell him to let the Division know how splendidly, in
his opinion, they had acquitted themselves.
Or take the record here and there (it can be but a casual selection)
of the acts which won these praises in the three days’ battle which we
are reviewing. It was at the very beginning of the battle, early in the
morning of November 20th, that the 2/5th Battalion of the West Riding
Regiment, going forward in column of route to try to get through the gaps
in the wire in front of Havrincourt, lost Lt.-Col. T. A. D. Best, D.S.O.,
their Commanding Officer, described by the General at his graveside as
‘one of the finest soldiers and the most perfect gentlemen he had had
under his command.’
The same Battalion, if we may follow it a little further, continued
its advance on the first day to a point on the further (north) side
of the Bapaume-Cambrai road, where it succeeded in establishing touch
with the 36th Division on the Canal bank. This attack was a ‘record
at the time for depth in one day’s advance, the Battalion going about
7,000 yards from the old British Front Line to the final objective for
the day.’ Its captures for the day included more than 350 prisoners,
fifteen Machine-Guns and a Trench Mortar, and the total casualties in the
Battalion were three Officers and ten other Ranks killed, one Officer
and fifty-five other Ranks wounded, and four men missing. Its honours
included two appointments to the Distinguished Service Order, in the
persons of Captains Goodall and C. S. Moxon; and next day, November 21st,
when Major F. Brook was appointed by the G.O.C. to the Command of the
Battalion, in consideration of his gallant conduct and brilliant leading
after the death of Colonel Best, Captain (Temporary Major) Goodall,
Senior Company Commander, became second in command.
Records similar to the above might be lifted out of the Diary of each
and every Battalion engaged on those days. Our selection of a single
example will have sufficed to typify the spirit which animated all units
in all ranks; and when we turn from the exploits of a Battalion to the
exploits of individuals, the same tale of courage is repeated.
Take, for instance, the following record of an exploit by two young
Officers: it is regarded by the Divisional Commander as one of the
most remarkable during the battle. In the 187th Brigade, the G.O.C.,
Brigadier-General Taylor, in his determination to be prepared for all
eventualities, had impressed upon his Officers the necessity of pushing
forward at Zero hour, whether or not the Tanks had arrived. This meant
that the Infantry must know their way, and, consequently, during Y Z
night, two Officers of the 2/5th King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry
crept out between midnight and dawn to reconnoitre the route. They
actually succeeded in creeping up to the enemy’s wire, and marked out
the route which they would have to follow, if the Tanks were late the
next morning, by placing tapes to guide them. It was well that they
did so, for the unexpected happened. The Tanks, which were to lead the
Battalion, were delayed; and it was due to the initiative and enterprise
of these two gallant Officers,[96] that the Battalion was able to start
without the advance-guard of Tanks, and to march straight to their first
objective, which they captured at the point of the bayonet.
Take, again, seven exploits in the ranks, each of which won a Military
Medal. We select them as typical acts, in the various arms of the
Service; and, though the extracts from the records are accurate, we shall
not identify them by names, since many pages of this narrative could be
filled with similar accounts. In each instance, the date of the exploit
is November 20th or 21st, and they all redound to the credit of the 62nd
Division.
(1) A Private displayed great courage and devotion to duty
during the attack on the Hindenburg Support system near
Graincourt. He acted as runner, and was on duty two days
and one night with his Company, often taking messages under
machine-gun fire to Platoons on the Front Line, thereby keeping
his Company Commander in constant touch with what was happening.
(2) A Private displayed great bravery and resolution whilst
acting as Company runner during the operations near the
Hindenburg Support Line. Throughout the day, under heavy fire,
he continued to carry messages to and from Battalion Head
Quarters and Companies on the flanks. He set a fine example of
devotion to duty and showed a complete disregard for his own
safety.
(3) A Private displayed his bravery and coolness during the
attack on the Hindenburg Support Line, north of the Cambrai
road. When his Company was temporarily held up by machine-gun
fire from the Front, and its flank was threatened by a strong
enemy bombing party, this man took up a position in the open,
in front of the German wire, and continued, under heavy fire,
firing off rifle-grenades until incapacitated by wounds. His
gallant action frustrated the attempt to turn the flank of his
Company.
(4) A total disregard to danger and devotion to duty was shown
by a Private, while acting as Stretcher-Bearer during the
attack on the Hindenburg Support system near Graincourt. He
dressed wounds and got back casualties during the whole day
under machine-gun fire, and went out alone next day and brought
in a badly wounded man from the front of the forward line,
thereby undoubtedly saving a life.
(5) A Non-Commissioned Officer showed great bravery and
initiative during the attack on the Hindenburg Support Line.
When the Company was temporarily held up by enemy machine-gun
fire both flanks, he took out a Lewis-gun to the left flank
of the Company, and, though under continuous and heavy fire,
engaged the enemy machine-gun with direct fire, and thus
enabled the Company to advance.
(6) A Non-Commissioned Officer displayed courage and initiative
during the attacks between Anneux and Bourlon Wood. He was in
charge of a Lewis-gun team on the right flank of his Company.
Heavy casualties were being caused by a party of the enemy
firing from the direction of Anneux. Without waiting for
orders, the N.C.O. crept forward under rifle and machine-gun
fire to a commanding position, and opened fire with his
Lewis-gun on the enemy, killing several and dispersing the rest
of the party.
(7) A Non-Commissioned Officer displayed conspicuous bravery
during the attack on the Hindenburg Support Line and Hughes
Switch. A hostile Trench Mortar was in action from a point
slightly in advance of Hughes Switch. This N.C.O. rushed
forward and bayoneted the men in charge of the Trench Mortar,
and took prisoners an officer and eight men who emerged from a
dug-out close at hand.
These seven examples, casually selected from the records of fighting
in the opening phase of the Battle of Cambrai, illustrate what General
Braithwaite meant when he wrote (November 24th) of his ‘implicit
confidence’ in the Division. They illustrate, too, what Sir Douglas Haig
meant when he wrote that it was ‘reasonable to hope’ that his operations
at Cambrai would be successful. For success and confidence in war depend
in the ultimate resort on how the soldier obeys orders. The runner who
takes messages under fire is an essential link between his Company
Commander and Divisional and Army Headquarters. The man who frustrates a
turning movement, or who enables his Company to advance, helps directly
to bring the issue into accordance with the plan of operation, and, in
this regard, these few typical examples are worth more than a chapter of
battle stories, as the spirit is worth more than the letter.
IV.—BATTLE OF CAMBRAI (SECOND PHASE).
We turn back at this point to the main narrative.
The 62nd Division, as we saw, was withdrawn during the night of 22nd/23rd
November, and was relieved by the 40th. This relief proved of short
duration. November 24th, the day of the Special Order, was spent in
necessary re-organization, but shortly before midnight on that day, after
barely thirty-six hours’ pause, Corps orders were received, that the 62nd
were to relieve the 40th during the following evening.
We have the advantage of an impression of that day (November 24th,
1917)—an impression from without, as it were—from the private diary
of Major-General the Earl of Scarbrough, at that time, it will be
remembered, Director-General of the Territorial and Volunteer Forces, and
still Chairman of the West Riding Territorial Force Association. In the
company of General Mends and Captain Atkinson-Clark, the Director-General
was paying a visit to his County Divisions at the Front. He had lunched
on the 23rd at Ypres, with Major-General Cameron, Commanding the 49th
Division, in a dug-out just inside the walls. The Division were then in
the line, with one Brigade (the West Yorkshires) in reserve, and Lord
Scarbrough had visited their camp, and seen their Commanding Officers,
who were ‘living in a sea of mud.’ At 8 a.m. on Saturday, the 24th, the
visitors left the Second Army, travelled by motor-car through Bapaume,
and, passing over a part of the Somme battlefield, where ‘every village
had been shelled out of existence,’ reached the operation area of the
Third Army. Thus, the Chairman and other Officers of the Association
enjoyed the unique experience of taking lunch with Major-General
Braithwaite, Commanding the 62nd Division, on the day following their
visit to the Headquarters of the 49th. Lord Scarbrough notes that the
G.O.C. was ‘immensely pleased’ with the work of his Division, and that
Sir Douglas Haig had visited the General and thanked him for their
‘remarkable success.’ Though the Division only came out the day before,
after three heavy days’ fighting, and were naturally ‘dog-tired,’ they
had just been called upon to be ready to send a Brigade back into the
line at half-an-hour’s notice. The enemy had begun a heavy counter-attack
on Bourlon Wood, ‘which was the key of his position, and which dominated
the Bapaume-Cambrai Road, the main road of supply for his troops in the
line further north.’ The 40th Division, the visitors heard, were reported
to be having a bad time, as the German Artillery had been reinforced, and
a Division brought from the Russian front had been thrown into the line.
These notes, written at the time, are exactly confirmed by the records
prepared more carefully later on when all the available facts had been
ascertained.
If we look at a map once more, we observe that the wider swing-round
on the eastern portion of the Bapaume-Cambrai Road had been held
up at Crèvecoeur and Rumilly. The consequence was (the causes were
uncontrollable, and concern the historian of other Divisions) to increase
the German pressure on Bourlon Wood and on the village beyond. The 40th
Division had attacked and captured the greater part of these positions
during November 23rd, but by reinforcements and counter-attacks the
enemy had succeeded in reversing these successes. Orders were issued,
accordingly, for the 62nd Division, less the Artillery and R.E., to
relieve the 40th Division, less the Artillery, R.E., and Pioneer
Battalion, in the Bourlon Section of the line, with the 186th Infantry
Brigade on the right, the 187th on the left and the 185th in Divisional
Reserve; the Headquarters of the two leading Brigades being located at
Graincourt. The relief was carried out without incident, except for a
considerable amount of shelling, which caused some casualties in the
186th Brigade. Next day (November 26th) there was a Corps Conference at
Divisional Headquarters, where, after long discussion, it was decided
that the Guards and the 62nd should attack the following morning with
the assistance of Tanks, in order to capture Fontaine and the remainder
of Bourlon Wood and Village. The night of the 26th was very cold, with a
blizzard blowing of snow and sleet. Zero-hour next morning was fixed for
6-20 a.m. The Tanks, of which 20 were available (16 being allotted to
the 187th Infantry Brigade for the capture of Bourlon Village), reached
their rendezvous punctually at 2 a.m., and the Infantry were all in
position fifty minutes before Zero-hour. A projected bombardment of the
village during the day of the 26th was not proceeded with, since three
Companies of the Highland Light Infantry (40th Division) were missing,
and it was thought that they might still be holding out in Bourlon.
Coming now to Zero-hour on the 27th, and observing that, about 10 a.m.,
Brigadier-General Taylor, Commanding the 187th Brigade, reported that
his attack had been unsuccessful and that his troops, which had entered
Bourlon, had been compelled under heavy fire to retire, we may enumerate
at least four causes which contributed to this comparative failure. The
first was darkness and mud: the men, and their rifles and Lewis guns,
were covered with mud from the start, and every man in the Brigade was
chilled by his long exposure to the driving snow. Secondly, there were
strong points south of Bourlon, which, owing to heavy machine-gun fire,
had not been dealt with by the Tanks. Thirdly, the village barricades
likewise opposed the Tank advance; and, fourthly, in and beyond Bourlon,
the enemy were able to bring to bear very effective machine-gun fire.
Or we may quote, in illustration of these obstacles, the experience of
a Company Officer, from Zero-hour 6-20 a.m., to the time, a few hours
later, when he, like so many others, became a casualty:
‘Immediately on leaving the forming-up line,’ he wrote, ‘we came under
very heavy machine-gun and rifle fire. We pressed on. The machine-gun
fire became more intense, and the enemy shelling more severe. The
casualties here amongst the Company were very heavy indeed. Despite this,
the Company, with dauntless courage, still pressed on, but my casualties
were appalling, and further progress became impossible.’
It was about this time (say 10 a.m.) that the 185th Infantry Brigade
were ordered to place another Battalion at the disposal of the 187th.
Meanwhile, frequent reports of hard fighting on the front of the 186th
Infantry Brigade had been received, and now they sent a message to
say, that, though their troops had all reached Bourlon Wood, the left
Battalion of the Guards had been driven back to its original line. At
noon it became evident that the advance of this Brigade had left both
flanks dangerously exposed. Partly in order to meet this danger, the
185th Brigade (less one Battalion already sent forward), reinforced
by a Battalion of the 2nd Cavalry Dismounted Brigade, were ordered to
relieve the 187th, and to extend their line round the south edge of
Bourlon Village, so as to keep in touch with the 186th; and the 2nd
Cavalry Dismounted Brigade (less its one Battalion) was ordered to keep
itself in readiness to relieve the front Battalions of the 186th. The
advance of this last-named Brigade was continued during the day, and they
reached practically all their objectives and were consolidating in depth.
By this time, however, they were very tired and were subject to heavy
counter-attacks, and the full effect of the new dispositions were not
felt in time to achieve their aim.