OPERATIONS OF THE SECOND AND FIFTH ARMIES
September 28-November 11
King Albert in the field--Great Belgo-Franco-British advance--The
last act on the old stage--The prophet of 1915--Renewed
advance--Germans desert the coast--Relief of Douai and Lille--The
final stage of the subsidiary theatres of war.
We have followed the operations of the three southern British Armies
from the first blow on August 8--a blow which Ludendorff has stated
made him surrender the last hope of ultimate victory--through all
their uninterrupted progress of victory until the final armistice.
We shall now turn to the northern end of the British line, where the
two remaining Armies, the Fifth in the Nieppe district and the Second
in the area of Ypres, were waiting impatiently for their share in the
advance. Flanders was a convalescent home for divisions, and there
was not a unit there which was not stiff with half-healed wounds, but
these Armies included many of the grand old formations which had
borne the stress of the long fight, and they were filled with the
desire to join in the final phase. Their chance came at last, though
it was a belated one.
[Sidenote: July.]
There were many indications in the third week of July that the
Germans had planned one of their great attacks upon the front of
Birdwood's Fifth Army in {282} the Nieppe district. The succession
of blows which rained upon Hindenburg's line in the south made it
impossible, however, for him to attempt a new offensive. There was
considerable activity along the British line, and a constant nibbling
which won back by successive ventures much of the ground which had
been gained by the Germans in April. Early in July the Fifth
Division, forming the left unit of the Fifth Army, advanced from the
edge of Nieppe Forest, where they had lain since their return from
Italy, and gained a stretch of ground--the first sign of the coming
recoil in the north. To the left of them lay De Lisle's Fifteenth
Corps, which moved forward in turn, effecting a series of small but
important advances which were eclipsed by the larger events in the
south, but reacted upon those events, since they made it impossible
for the Germans to detach reinforcements. On July 19 the Ninth
Division with a sudden spring seized Meteren with 453 prisoners,
while on the same date the First Australian Division occupied Merris
to the south of it. On August 9 the movement spread farther south,
and the Thirty-first Division took Vieux Berquin. There was a slow
steady retraction of the German line from this time onwards, and a
corresponding advance of the British. On August 30 the ruins of
Bailleul passed into the hands of the Twenty-ninth Division. On
September 1 Neuve Eglise was submerged by the creeping tide, while on
the 3rd Nieppe also was taken. Finally on September 4 two brigades
of the Twenty-ninth Division, the 88th under Freyberg and the 86th
under Cheape, captured Ploegsteert by a very smart concerted movement
in which 250 prisoners were taken. Up to this date De Lisle's
Fifteenth Corps had {283} advanced ten miles with no check, and had
almost restored the original battle line in that quarter--a feat for
which M. Clemenceau awarded the General special thanks and the Legion
of Honour.
[Sidenote: Sept. 28.]
All was ready now for the grand assault which began on September 28
and was carried out by the Belgians and French in the north and by
Plumer's Second British Army in the south. The left of this great
force was formed by nine Belgian and five French infantry divisions,
with three French cavalry divisions in reserve. The British Army
consisted of four corps: Jacob's Second Corps covering Ypres, Watts'
Nineteenth Corps opposite Hollebeke, Stephens' Tenth Corps facing
Messines, and De Lisle's Fifteenth Corps to the south of it. The
divisions which made up each of these Corps will be enumerated as
they come into action. To complete the array of the British forces
it should be said that Birdwood's Fifth Army, which linked up the
First Army in the south and the Second in the north, consisted at
that date of Haking's Eleventh and Holland's First Corps covering the
Armentières-Lens front, and not yet joining in the operations. The
whole operation was under the command of the chivalrous King of the
Belgians, who had the supreme satisfaction of helping to give the
_coup de grâce_ to the ruffianly hordes who had so long ill-used his
unfortunate subjects.
The operations of the Belgians and of the French to the north of the
line do not come within the scope of this narrative save in so far as
they affected the British line. General Plumer's attack was directed
from the Ypres front, and involved on September 28, two Corps, the
Second on the north and the Nineteenth on the south. The order of
divisions {284} from the left was the Ninth (Tudor) and the
Twenty-ninth (Cayley), with the Thirty-sixth Ulsters (Coffin) in
reserve. These constituted Jacob's Second Corps, which was attacking
down the old Menin Road. South of this point came the Thirty-fifth
(Marindin) and the Fourteenth Division (Skinner), with Lawford's
Forty-first Division in support. These units made up Watts'
Nineteenth Corps. On the left of Jacob's was the Belgian Sixth
Division, and on the right of Watts' the British Tenth Corps, which
was ordered to undertake a subsidiary operation which will presently
be described. We shall now follow the main advance.
This was made without any bombardment at 5 in the morning of
September 28, behind a heavy barrage which swept eastwards at the
rate of 100 yards every three minutes. The Germans had clearly sent
away reinforcements to the south and were weak in numbers as well as
in spirit. The result was a very complete victory all along the
line, and before evening Plumer's men had passed over all the ground
which had been previously contested. For the last time the roar of
battle went down the old Menin Road and rose from historic Gheluvelt.
The Ninth and Twenty-ninth Divisions swept everything before them,
and before evening it was not only Gheluvelt but Zandvoorde,
Kruiseik, and Becelaere which had passed into their possession. The
Belgians on the left had cleared the whole of Houthulst Forest, that
lowering menace which had hung so long before their line. Zonnebeke
and Poelcappelle had also passed into the hands of the Allies. It
was a great victory, and it was not marred by heavy losses to the
victors. Those of Jacob's Corps were not more than 1100, while their
prisoners {285} were 2100. The total of prisoners came to 10,000,
with more than 100 guns.
[Sidenote: Sept. 29.]
On September 29 the advance was resumed with ever-increasing success
all along the line. The Scots of the Ninth Division, working in
close liaison with the Belgians, got Waterdamhoek, and detached one
brigade to help our Allies in taking Moorslede, while another took
Dadizeele, both of them far beyond our previous limits. The
Twenty-ninth Division still pushed along the line of the Menin Road,
while the Thirty-sixth Ulsters fought their way into Terhand. In
this quarter alone in front of Jacob's Second Corps fifty guns had
been taken. Meanwhile the Nineteenth Corps on the right was gaining
the line of the Lys River, having taken Zandvoorde and Hollebeke;
while the Thirty-fourth and Thirtieth Divisions of the Tenth Corps
were into Wytschaete and up to Messines, and the Thirty-first
Division of the Fifteenth Corps was in St. Yves. In these southern
sectors there was no attempt to force the pace, but in the north the
tide was setting swiftly eastwards. By the evening of September 29
Ploegsteert Wood was cleared and Messines was occupied once again.
The rain had started, as is usual with Flemish offensives, and the
roads were almost impossible: but by the evening of October 1 the
whole left bank of the Lys from Comines southward had been cleared.
On that date there was a notable hardening of the German resistance,
and the Second Corps had some specially fierce fighting. The Ulsters
found a tough nut to crack in Hill 41, which they gained twice and
lost twice before it was finally their own. The Ninth Division
captured Ledeghem, but was pushed to the west of it again by a strong
counter-attack. Clearly {286} a temporary equilibrium was about to
be established, but already the advance constituted a great victory,
the British alone having 5000 prisoners and 100 guns to their credit.
[Sidenote: Oct. 2, Oct 14.]
In the meantime Birdwood's Fifth Army, which had remained stationary
between the advancing lines of the Second Army in Flanders and of the
First Army south of Lens, began also to join in the operations. The
most successful military prophet in a war which has made military
prophecy a by-word, was a certain German regimental officer who was
captured in the La Bassée district about 1915, and who, being asked
when he thought the war would finish, replied that he could not say
when it would finish, but that he had an opinion as to where it would
finish, and that would be within a mile of where he was captured. It
was a shrewd forecast based clearly upon the idea that each side
would exhaust itself and neither line be forced, so that a compromise
peace would become necessary. For three years after his dictum it
still remained as a possibility, but now at last, within six weeks of
the end, La Bassée was forced, and early in October Ritchie's
Sixteenth Division, the Fifty-fifth West Lancashire Territorials, and
the Nineteenth Division under Jeffreys, were all pressing on in this
quarter, with no very great resistance. South of Lens the Twentieth
Division (Carey) had been transferred from the left of the First Army
to the right of the Fifth, and this had some sharp fighting on
October 2 at Mericourt and Acheville. Both north and south of the
ruined coal capital the British infantry was steadily pushing on,
pinching the place out, since it was bristling with machine-guns and
very {287} formidable if directly attacked. The Twelfth Division
(Higginson), fresh from severe service in the south and anaemic from
many wounds, occupied 11,000 yards between Oppy and Lens from October
7 onwards. Their orders were to press the enemy at the first sign of
retreat. All three brigades were in the line, each with its own
artillery, to give greater independence. The German withdrawal was
gradual but there was some hard rearguard fighting, especially at the
strong line of the Haute Deule Canal. There was little cover for the
troops at this point save where some ruined hamlets screened their
ranks. These flat levels leading up to wire and water could have
been made a Golgotha had the Germans been of the old temper, but they
were oppressed by the general wilting of their line. The 1st
Cambridge captured Auby on October 14 and so got to the edge of the
Canal. On the 16th the 5th Berks got across the broken bridge at
Pont-a-Sault, though they could hardly deploy upon the farther side.
After this date the only obstacle to the advance was the supply
question, for the villagers were all clamouring for food and sharing
the scanty rations of the soldiers. On October 23 the Scarpe was
crossed, Lieutenant Egerton of the 87th Field Company R.E. gallantly
bridging the stream and losing his life in the effort. The 6th West
Kents got across at Nivelle, but had the misfortune to lose their
splendid commander, Colonel Dawson, who had already been wounded six
times in the course of the war. Upon October 23 the Twelfth was
relieved by the Fifty-second Division upon this front.
The attack in the north had been held partly by the vile weather and
partly by the increased German {288} resistance. The Twenty-ninth
Division had got into Gheluvelt but was unable to retain it. The
enemy counter-attacks were frequent and fierce, while the impossible
roads made the supplies, especially of cartridges, a very serious
matter. The worn and rutted Menin Road had to conduct all the
traffic of two Army Corps. No heavy artillery could be got up to
support the weary infantry, who were cold and wet, without either
rest or cover. Time was needed, therefore, to prepare a further
attack, and it was October 14 before it was ready. Then, as before,
the Belgians, French, and British attacked in a single line, the
advance extending along the whole Flemish front between the Lys River
at Comines and Dixmude in the north, the British section being about
ten miles from Comines to the Menin-Roulers Road.
Three British Corps were engaged, the Second (Jacob), the Nineteenth
(Watts), and the Tenth (Stephens), the divisions, counting from the
south, being the Thirtieth, Thirty-fourth, Forty-first, Thirty-fifth,
Thirty-sixth, Twenty-ninth, and Ninth. The three latter divisions,
forming the front of Jacob's Corps, came away with a splendid rush in
spite of the heavy mud and soon attained their immediate objectives.
Gulleghem, in front of the Ulsters, was defended by three belts of
wire, garnished thickly with machine-guns, but it was taken none the
less, though it was not completely occupied until next day. Salines
had fallen to the Twenty-ninth Division, and by the early afternoon
of October 15 both divisions were to the east of Heule. Meanwhile
Cuerne and Hulste had been cleared by the Ninth Division, the 1st
Yorkshire Cyclists playing a gallant {289} part in the former
operation. The net result was that in this part of the line all the
troops had reached the Lys either on the evening of September 15 or
on the morning of September 16.
The advance in the south had been equally successful, though there
were patches where the resistance was very stiff. The 103rd Brigade
on the left of the Thirty-fourth Division enveloped and captured
Gheluwe and were afterwards held up by field-guns firing over open
sights until they were taken by a rapid advance of the 5th Scottish
Borderers and the 8th Scottish Rifles. The 102nd Brigade made a
lodgment in the western outskirts of Menin, which was fully occupied
on the next day, patrols being at once pushed across the Lys. These
were hard put to it to hold on until they were relieved later in the
day by the Thirtieth Division. Wevelghem was cleared on the 15th,
and on the 16th both the Ninth and Thirty-sixth Divisions established
bridge-heads across the river, but in both cases were forced to
withdraw them. In the north the Belgians had reached Iseghem and
Cortemarck, while the French were round Roulers. By the night of
October 15 Thourout was surrounded, and the Germans on the coast,
seeing the imminent menace to their communications, began to blow up
their guns and stores preparatory to their retreat. On October 17
the left of the Allied line was in Ostend, and on the 20th it had
extended to the Dutch border. Thus after four years of occupation
the Germans said farewell for ever to those salt waters of the west
which they had fondly imagined to be their permanent advanced post
against Great Britain. The main tentacle of the octopus had been
disengaged, {290} and the whole huge, perilous creature was shrinking
back to the lairs from which it had emerged.
[Sidenote: Oct. 20.]
Events were now following each other in very rapid succession as the
pressure upon the flanks increased. On the one side it was Ostend;
on the other, as already recorded, it was Douai, which the Eighth
Division had entered on October 17. Finally, on the morning of
October 18, Haking's Eleventh Corps from Birdwood's Army held Lille
in their grasp. The Fifty-seventh and Fifty-ninth Divisions were
north and south of the town, which was occupied before evening, to
the immense joy of the liberated inhabitants. Meanwhile De Lisle's
Fifteenth Corps pushed on in the north and occupied both Roubaix and
Tourcoing. There was little resistance to these operations, for the
Flemish advance on one side and that to Le Cateau on the other had
made the position of the German garrisons impossible. By October 22
the troops were on the line of the Escaut from Valenciennes to
Avelghem.
[Sidenote: Oct. 25.]
Though the advance of Birdwood's Army was comparatively bloodless
there was still some obstinate fighting in the north, and the
divisions which forced the Lys had by no means a holiday task. This
operation was carried out on October 20 and 21, and owing to some
delay on the part of the French Seventh Corps in getting into
position the flank of the Thirty-sixth Ulster Division was exposed to
enfilade fire which caused great loss. As the Ulsters advanced
across the river they had to throw back a defensive flank 6000 yards
deep before evening of the 21st. On the 22nd the Germans were still
fighting stoutly, and delivered at least one {291} dangerous
counter-attack by storm-troops, while on the 25th they brought a new
division, the Twenty-third Reserve, an old opponent of early Ypres
days, into the line, and held their ground well. There were changes
in the British fighting line also, as the Thirty-first relieved the
Twenty-ninth, while the Thirty-fourth, coming from the south, took
the place of the Ulsters.
These two divisions attacked once more on October 31, the
Thirty-first surrounding Caster while the Thirty-fourth captured
Anseghem, the 8th Scottish Rifles forcing their way into the town,
and joining up with the French at Winterkan. That evening the enemy
retired across the Escaut, and the line was definitely made good.
The bridges over the river had been destroyed, but the French were
advancing rapidly from the north, and on November 2 had reached
Driesen and Peterghem. They then extended south and took over the
whole front of the Second Corps, joining up with the left of the
Nineteenth Corps. The Second Corps drew out from its last battle,
having since the advance began captured 7500 prisoners and 150 guns,
at a loss to itself of 11,000 casualties. At this period the
operations of the north may be said to have reached their term.
The weight of the campaign never fell fully upon Birdwood's Fifth
Army, but it was comprised of divisions which had been knocked to
pieces elsewhere and which would not have been battle-worthy at all
had they not been of splendid individual material. Some of them were
actually called B divisions, but upon one of them doing thirty-three
miles in thirty hours it was decreed by their General {292} that such
an invidious title must cease. The Portuguese troops accompanied the
British in the Fifth Army. There was a good deal of discontent in
the ranks of this contingent, largely due to the fact that it was
impossible to grant the men the same privileges in the way of leave
as were given to the officers. By a great concession they were
broken up, however, among the British brigades, with the result that
they did very well during the last phases of the fighting. The fact
that General Birdwood with his depleted and inexperienced divisions
was able to drive the Germans through Merville, Estaires, La Bassée,
and on over the Aubers Ridge and out of Lille, forcing the Scheldt
and reaching as far as Ath, will always be a memorable military
exploit. It is on record that the last bag of prisoners by this Army
was at 10.57 on the 11th November, three minutes before time.
On November 15 Marshal Foch visited the Headquarters of the Fifth
Army, and his remarks on that occasion were meant, no doubt, to apply
to the whole British line. "Your soldiers," he said, "continued to
march when they were exhausted, and they fought, and fought well,
when they were worn out. It is with such indomitable will that the
war has been won. At the moment of ceasing hostilities the enemy
troops were demoralised and disorganised and their lines of
communication were in a state of chaos. Had we continued the war for
another fortnight we might have won a most wonderful and complete
military victory. But it would have been inhuman to risk the lives
of one of our soldiers unnecessarily. The Germans asked for an
armistice. We renounced the certainty of further military glory and
gave it {293} to them. I am deeply sensible of the fact that Lille
was delivered without damage to the town, and I am grateful for the
help given so generously to the inhabitants."
So ended the Great War in the northern sector. It need not be said
that while the British had been attacking again and again in the
manner described, taking no heed of their own losses and exhaustion
so long as they could bring the tottering giant to his knees, the
French and the Americans were advancing in unison. The work of the
latter in the wooded region of the Argonne was especially difficult
and also especially vital, as its effect was to cut in upon the
German rear and to narrow the pass through which the great multitude
must make their escape from the lands which they had so wantonly
invaded. On September 12 the Americans had shown their quality by
their successful attack upon the St. Mihiel salient. In the advance
of the Argonne the American attack extended over several weeks, was
often held up, and furnished more than a hundred thousand casualties,
but General Pershing and his men showed a splendid tenacity which
carried them at last through all their difficulties, so that the end
of the war, which their exertions had undoubtedly helped to hasten,
found them with their line in Sedan and biting deeply into the German
flank.
Before entering upon the terms of the Armistice and describing the
subsequent conditions of peace, representing the final fruits of all
the terrible sacrifices of these years of alternate hope and fear,
one last glance must be cast round at the other fields of the great
struggle--Italian, Salonican, Syrian, and Mesopotamian--all of which
were decided at the {294} same moment. It could almost be believed
that some final spiritual fiat had gone forth placing an allotted
term upon the slaughter, so simultaneous was the hostile collapse on
every front. In Italy General Diaz, who had succeeded General
Cadorna after the disaster of Caporetto, made a grand and victorious
attack on October 25. It was a great military achievement, and
justified those who had always upheld the fine quality of the Italian
Army. The Austrian forces were superior in number, being roughly a
million against nine hundred thousand, but they were inferior in gun
power. Diaz cleverly concentrated his forces so as to have a local
superiority in the central sector, but his difficulties were still
very great, since a stream a mile broad lay before him, shallow in
parts but deepening to five feet even at the best fords. A long
island, the Grave di Papadopoli, lay near the hostile shore, and this
was seized on the night of the 24th October by the 1st Welsh
Fusiliers and the 2/lst Honourable Artillery Company, who held on in
spite of a severe shelling and so established an advanced base for
the Army. Early on October 25 crossings were made at all points, and
though the bridges were frequently shot away by the Austrian guns,
and one corps was unable to get a single man across, none the less
those who had reached the other side, including Babington's
Fourteenth Corps, which had the Seventh and Twenty-third British
Divisions in the line, with the Thirty-seventh Italian Division, made
excellent headway. By the evening of October 29 this Fourteenth
Corps, which had been held up by having its left flank exposed
through the failure of the Eighth Corps to cross the river, found a
brave comrade in {295} the Italian Eighteenth Corps which lined up
with it and crashed its way right through the Kaiserstellung position
forming the battle zone of the Austrian line, It was a very complete
victory, and broadened to such an extent during the next few days
that by November 2 the whole Austrian army had ceased to exist, and
700,000 men with 7000 guns were in the hands of the victors. Not
only had they regained by arms all the ground they had lost a year
before, but Trieste surrendered on November 3 and was occupied from
the sea. Trento had also been taken in the north, so that the two
goals of Italian ambition had both been reached. Every part of the
Italian line had been equally victorious from the Alps to the sea,
and great valour was shown by every formation, as well as by the
French and British contingents. The British Forty-eighth Division
was engaged in the northern sector, far from its comrades, and
carried through its complete objective in a manner worthy of so
veteran a unit, which had learned its soldiering in the hard school
of the Somme and of Flanders. On November 3 the final Armistice was
signed by the Austrians, by which they withdrew into their own
country and waited there for the final terms of the victors.
On September 12 began the great Franco-Serbian advance on the
Salonican front--a front which had been greatly strengthened by the
accession of the Greek forces. Under General Franchet d'Esperey and
Marshal Misitch there was an advance on a front of sixteen miles,
penetrating occasionally to a depth of four miles. By September 17
this had extended to a depth of twelve miles, and it was clear that a
decisive movement was on foot. On {296} September 18 the British and
Greek troops joined in on the Lake Doiran sector, and the Bulgarians
were retreating along their whole front of a hundred miles. General
Milne's troops were the first to cross the Bulgarian border, after a
very severe action in which some units sustained heavy losses. All
the Allied nations were advancing swiftly, and it was clear that the
end was near. On September 30 the Bulgarian nation, misled by its
own unscrupulous ambitions and by its unsavoury king, sent in its
surrender, retired from the conflict, and waited to hear what the
final punishment of its misdeeds might be. Thus fell the first of
the four pillars of the Central Alliance.
The fate of Turkey was not long delayed. On September 19 General
Allenby, who had halted long upon the line of Jerusalem while he
gathered his forces for a supreme and final effort, gave the word for
a fresh advance. The victory which followed will perhaps be
accounted the most completely scientific and sweeping of the whole
war. With his mixed force of British, Indians, Australians and
smaller Allied contingents, Allenby broke through the enemy's lines
near the coast, and then despatched his splendid cavalry towards
Damascus in a wild pursuit which can hardly be matched for calculated
temerity. Some of the troopers in that wonderful ride are said to
have accomplished seventy to eighty miles in the twenty-four hours.
The result was that a strong force was thrown across the Turkish rear
and that their Seventh and Eighth Armies were practically
annihilated. In the final tally no less than 80,000 men and 250 guns
were in the hands of the victors. It was a shattering blow.
Damascus was occupied, the Turks {297} were driven pell-mell out of
Syria, General Marshall advanced in Mesopotamia, and Turkey was
finally brought to her knees after a battle on the Tigris in which
her last army was destroyed. On October 30 she signed an armistice
by which the Allied fleets might enter the Dardanelles and occupy
Constantinople, while all Allied prisoners should at once be
returned. As in the case of the Germans the feelings with which the
Allies, and especially the British, regarded the Turks were greatly
embittered by their consistent brutality to the unfortunate captives
whom the fortune of war had placed in their hands. There can be no
peace and no sense of justice in the world until these crimes have
been absolutely expiated. The last spark of sympathy which Britain
retained for her old Oriental ally was extinguished for ever by the
long-drawn murder of the prisoners of Kut. It should be added that
the small German force in East Africa still continued to dodge the
pursuing columns, and that it was intact in Rhodesia at the time when
the general collapse compelled it to lay down its arms. It was a
most remarkable achievement, this resistance of four years when cut
away from a base, and reflects great credit upon General von
Lettow-Vorbeck, whose name should certainly shine among the future
reconstructors of Germany.
As to naval matters there is nothing to be said save that the
submarine trouble had been greatly ameliorated by the splendid work
of the Navy, much assisted by the American destroyers. The blockade
was still rigorously enforced, and had much to do with the general
German collapse. There was some hope that the German fleet would
come out and that a more decisive Jutland might adorn the finish
{298} of the war, but the plans of the German officers were marred by
the insubordination of the German men, and there was no heroic
gesture to dignify the end of the great useless fleet, the most fatal
and futile of all Germany's creations, for its possession led her to
her ruin.
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