THE SECOND BATTLE OF BULLECOURT.
(_May 3, 1917._)
When the First Battle of Bullecourt had been fought in the office
as well as in the field, when all the returns and reports had been
forwarded to the next higher authority, and all the wise questions from
the highest authority had been answered yet more wisely, we obtained
lorries and made holiday in Amiens.
It was my first visit, and I decided whenever possible to return.
It rained, but nobody minded. We lunched well at the Restaurant des
Huîtres in the Street of the Headless Bodies. It was a most pleasant
tavern--two dainty yellow-papered rooms over a mean shop. The girls who
waited on us were decorative and amusing, the cooking was magnificent,
and the Chambertin was satisfying. Coming from the desolate country
we could not want more. We tarried as long as decorum allowed, and
then went out reluctantly into the rain to shop. We bought immense
quantities of fresh vegetables--cauliflowers, Brussels sprouts, new
potatoes, and a huge box of apples, also a large "paté de canard,"
as recommended by Madame de Sévigné. A shampoo enabled us to consume
chocolate and cakes. We put our last packages in the car and drove back
in the evening.
At Behagnies we made ourselves comfortable, now that the strain was
removed of preparing against time for a battle. Our tents mysteriously
increased and multiplied. Odd tarpaulins were fashioned into what were
officially termed "temporary structures." My orderly-room was cramped.
I gave a willing officer the loan of a lorry, and in the morning I
found an elaborate canvas cottage "busting into blooth" under the
maternal solicitude of my orderly-room sergeant. The piano, which for
several days was ten miles nearer the line than any other piano in the
district, was rarely silent in the evenings. Only a 6-inch gun, two
hundred yards from the camp, interrupted our rest and broke some of
our glasses. It was fine healthful country of downs and rough pasture.
We commandeered horses from our troop of Glasgow Yeomanry, and spent
the afternoons cantering gaily. Once I went out with the colonel, who
was riding the famous horse that had been with him through Gallipoli,
but to ride with an international polo-player has its disadvantages.
Luckily, my old troop-horse was sure-footed enough, and if left to his
own devices even clambered round the big crater in the middle of Mory.
A few days after the first battle, Ward's[11] company detrained at
Achiet-le-Grand and trekked to Behagnies. They came from the Canadians
at Vimy Ridge, and were full of their praises. The Canadians left
nothing to chance. Trial "barrages" were put down, carefully watched
and "thickened up" where necessary. Every possible plan, device, or
scheme was tried--every possible preparation was made. The success of
the attack was inevitable, and the Germans, whose aeroplanes had been
busy enough, found their way to the cages without trouble, happy to
have escaped.
Ward's company, filled with the unstinted rations of the Canadians,
who had thought nothing of giving them a few extra sheep, were gallant
but unsuccessful. The ground was impossible and the tanks "ditched."
They were dug out, hauled out, pulled out, one way or another under a
cruel shelling, but they never came into the battle. It was naturally a
keen disappointment to Ward, and he and his company at Behagnies were
spoiling for a fight.
The third company of the battalion under Haskett-Smith had been
fighting in front of Arras with great dash and astonishingly few
casualties. "No. 10" was a lucky company, and deserved its luck, until
the end of the war. In sections and in pairs the tanks had helped the
infantry day after day. At Telegraph Hill they had cleared the way,
and again near Heninel. The company was now resting at Boiry, and we
drove over to see Haskett-Smith and congratulate him on his many little
victories.
It will be remembered that there were two phases to the battle of
Arras. In the first phase we gained success after success. The enemy
wavered and fell back. At Lens he retired without cause. Then his
resistance began to stiffen, and we were fought to a standstill. Men
and guns were brought by the enemy from other parts of the front,
and the German line became almost as strong as it had been before
the battle, while we were naturally handicapped by the difficulty of
bringing up ammunition and supplies over two trench systems and a
battlefield. In the second phase we attacked to keep the Germans busy,
while the French hammered away without much success away to the south.
This second phase was infinitely the deadlier. We made little headway,
and our casualties were high. We had not yet begun our big attack of
the year. We were losing time and losing men.
The left flank of the German Armies engaged rested on the Hindenburg
Line. As the Germans retired, their left flank withdrew down the
Hindenburg Line, until, at the end of April, it rested on the
Hindenburg Line at Fontaine-lez-Croisilles. West of Fontaine the
Hindenburg Line was ours, and east of it German.
[Illustration]
Ward's company and mine were concerned with the "elbow" from Chérisy
to Bullecourt. Ward's company was detailed to renew the attack on
Bullecourt, and a section of mine under Haigh was allotted to the
Division which was planning to attack Fontaine itself. At first it
was decided to clear the Hindenburg Line in front of Fontaine by a
preliminary operation, but the picture of two lone tanks working down
the trenches in full view of German gunners on higher ground did not
appeal to the colonel, and nothing came of it. The grand attack, the
Second Battle of Bullecourt, was scheduled for May 3rd.
On 29th April Cooper and I went reconnoitring. It was a blazing hot
day, with just enough wind. First we drove to St Leger--a pleasant
half-ruined village, surrounded by German horse lines under the
trees, where the Glasgow Yeomanry had been badly shelled in the
days before the first battle, when we were attacking Croisilles
and Ecoust. We visited Haigh's section, who had come up overnight
from Behagnies,--they were snugly hidden under the railway
embankment,--then, putting on our war-paint, we strolled up the hill to
the right. It was most open warfare for the guns. They were drawn up on
the reverse side of the hill, with no particular protection. Most of
them were firing. The gun crews who were not on duty were sitting in
the sun smoking or kicking a football about.
Further back our big guns were carrying out a sustained bombardment,
and in the course of it experimenting with "artillery crashes," at
that time a comparatively new form of "frightfulness." There is some
particular point, an emplacement, or perhaps an observation post, which
you want to destroy utterly and without question. Instead of shelling
it for a morning with one or two guns, you concentrate on it every gun
and howitzer that will bear, and carefully arrange the timing, so that
all the shells arrive together. It is extravagant but effective--like
loosing off a ship's broadside. The noise of the shells as they come
all together through the air, whining and grumbling loudly and more
loudly, is wonderfully exhilarating. We employed the "artillery crash"
in the Loos salient with the 16th Division during the summer of '16,
but we had not too many shells then.
The Germans were firing little and blindly as we struck across to the
Hindenburg Line, having planned to walk alongside it, as far as we
might, down towards Fontaine. The enemy, however, suddenly conceived a
violent dislike to their old trenches and some batteries near. So we
dropped first into a shell-hole, and then, jumping into the trench,
found a most excellent concrete machine-gun emplacement, where we sat
all at our ease and smoked, praising the careful ingenuity of the
German engineer.
We saw much from a distance, but little near, and returned along the
upper road by Mory Copse.
Cooper and I made another expedition on the 30th, driving to Heninel
and walking up the farther side of the Hindenburg Line. We pushed
forward to the ridge above Chérisy and Fontaine, but we could see
little of the enemy lines on account of the convexity of the slope.
Gunner officers were running about like ants searching for positions
and observation posts.
On the way back to the car we were resting and looking at our maps
when we saw a characteristic example of the iron nerves of the average
soldier. A limbered waggon was coming along a rough track when a small
shell burst on the bank a few yards behind the waggon. Neither the
horses nor the drivers turned a hair. Not the slightest interest was
taken in the shell. It might never have burst.
On the night of the first of May Haigh's section moved forward from
St Leger. The night had its incidents. Mac's baggage rolled on to the
exhaust-pipe and caught fire,--it was quickly put out and no harm done,
except to the baggage. The tanks stealthily crossed the Hindenburg
Line by an old road and crept to the cover of a bank. Close by was a
large clump of "stink" bombs, Very lights, and similar ammunition.
Just as the first tanks were passing a shell exploded the dump. It
was a magnificent display of deadly fireworks, and the enemy, as
usual, continued to shell the blaze. There is no spot on earth quite
so unpleasant as the edge of an exploding dump. Boxes of bombs were
hurtling through the air and exploding as they fell. Very lights were
streaming away in all directions. "Stink" bombs and gas bombs gave out
poisonous fumes. Every minute or two a shell dropping close added to
the uproar and destruction. With great coolness and skill the crews,
led and inspired by Haigh, brought their tanks past the dump without a
casualty.
Mac's tank had been delayed by the burning of his kit. When he arrived
on the scene the pandemonium had died down, and the great noisy bonfire
was just smouldering. Mac's tank came carefully past, when suddenly
there was a loud crackling report. A box of bombs had exploded under
one of the tracks and broken it. There was nothing to be done except
send post-haste for some new plates and wait for the dawn.
When, on the afternoon of the 2nd, the colonel and I went up to see
Haigh, the mechanics were just completing their work, and Mac's tank
was ready for the battle a few hours after the plates had arrived.
Ward had moved his tanks forward to Mory Copse, where we had hidden
ourselves before the trek through the blizzard to the valley above
Noreuil. He was to work with the division detailed to attack the
stronghold of Bullecourt. The front of the grand attacks had widened.
On the 3rd of May the British armies would take the offensive from east
of Bullecourt to distant regions north of the Scarpe. This time the
Australians were without tanks.
I had given Haigh a free hand to arrange what he would with the brigade
to which he was attached, and, not wishing to interfere with his little
command, I determined to remain at Behagnies until the battle was well
under way, and content myself with a scrutiny of his plans.
It was agreed that his section should "mother" the infantry, who were
attacking down the Hindenburg Line, by advancing alongside the trenches
and clearing up centres of too obstinate resistance. I endeavoured to
make it quite clear to the divisional commander that no very great
help could be expected from a few tanks operating over ground broken up
by a network of deep and wide trenches.
At 3.45 A.M. the barrage woke me. I might perhaps have described the
tense silence before the first gun spoke, and the mingled feelings of
awe, horror, and anxiety that troubled me; but my action in this battle
was essentially unheroic. Knowing that I should not receive any report
for at least an hour, I cursed the guns in the neighbourhood, turned
over and went to sleep.
The first messages began to arrive about 5.30 A.M. All the tanks had
started to time. There was an interval, and then real news dribbled in.
The Australians had taken their first objective--the front trench of
the Hindenburg system. We had entered the trenches west of Bullecourt.
Soon aeroplane reports were being wired through from the army. A tank
was seen here in action; another tank was there immobile. Two tanks had
reached such-and-such a point.
With what tremulous excitement the mothers and fathers and wives of the
crews would have seized and smoothed out these flimsy scraps of pink
paper! "Tank in flames at L. 6. d. 5. 4." That might be Jimmy's tank.
No, it must be David's! Pray God the airman has made a mistake! We, who
had set the stage, had only to watch the play. We could not interfere.
Report after report came in, and gradually we began, from one source or
another, to build up a picture of the battle.
The division attacking Bullecourt could not get on. Furious messages
came back from Ward. His tanks were out in front, but the infantry
"could not follow." His tanks were working up and down the trenches on
either side of Bullecourt. One tank had found the Australians and was
fighting with them. Tanks went on, returned, and went forward again
with consummate gallantry, but the infantry could not get forward. They
would advance a little way, and then, swept by machine-gun fire, they
would dig in or even go back.
One of his officers, commonly known as "Daddy," was sent back in Ward's
car. "Daddy" was dirty, unshorn, and covered with gore from two or
three wounds. He was offered breakfast or a whisky-and-soda, and having
chosen both, told us how he had found himself in front of the infantry,
how the majority of his crew had been wounded by armour-piercing
bullets, how finally his tank had been disabled and evacuated by the
crew, while he covered their withdrawal with a machine-gun.
These armour-piercing bullets caused many casualties that day. We were
still using the old Mark I. Tank, which had fought on the Somme, and
the armour was not sufficiently proof.
Bullecourt remained untaken, though the Australians clung desperately
to the trenches they had won. The British infantry returned to
the railway embankment. The attack had not been brilliant. It
required another division to reach the outskirts of the village,
but the division which failed on the 3rd of May became a brilliant
shock-division under other circumstances, just as "Harper's Duds"
became the most famous division in France.
Ward's company was lucky. Several of his tanks "went over" twice, one
with a second crew after all the men of the first crew had been killed
or wounded. The majority of his tanks rallied, and only one, the tank
which had fought with the Australians, could not be accounted for when
Ward, wrathful but undismayed, returned to battalion headquarters at
Behagnies.
Meanwhile little news had come from Haigh. Twice I motored over to
the headquarters of the division with which his tanks were operating,
but on each occasion I heard almost nothing. The attack was still
in progress. The situation was not clear. The air reports gave us
scant help, for the airmen, unaccustomed to work with tanks, were
optimistic beyond our wildest dreams, and reported tanks where no tank
could possibly have been. I had given such careful orders to my tank
commanders not to get ahead of the infantry, that with the best wish in
the world I really could not believe a report which located a tank two
miles within the German lines.
At last I drove up to see Haigh. I remember the run vividly, because
four 9.2-in. howitzers in position fifty yards off the road elected
to fire a salvo over my head as I passed, and at the same moment an
ambulance and a D.R. came round the corner in front of us together.
Organ, my driver--I had hired his car at Oxford in more peaceful
days--was, as always, quite undisturbed, and by luck or skill we
slipped through. I left the car by the dressing station outside the
ruins of Heninel, which the enemy were shelling stolidly, and walked
forward.
A few yards from Haigh's dug-out was a field-battery which the enemy
were doing their best to destroy. Their "best" was a "dud" as I passed,
and I slipped down, cheerfully enough, into the gloom. Haigh was away
at brigade headquarters, but I gathered the news of the day from Head,
whose tank had not been engaged.
The tanks had left the neighbourhood of the destroyed dump well up
to time. It had been a pitch-black night at first, and the tank
commanders, despite continual and deadly machine-gun fire and some
shelling, had been compelled to lead their tanks on foot. They
had discovered the "going" to be appalling, as, indeed, they had
anticipated from their reconnaissances.
When our barrage came down, Mac's tank was in position one hundred and
fifty yards from it. The enemy replied at once, and so concentrated
was their fire that it seemed the tank could not survive. Twice large
shells burst just beside the tank, shaking it and almost stunning the
crew, but by luck and good driving the tank escaped.
The tank moved along the trench in front of our infantry, firing drum
after drum at the enemy, who exposed themselves fearlessly, and threw
bombs at the tank in a wild effort to destroy it. The gunners in the
tank were only too willing to risk the bombs as long as they were
presented with such excellent targets.
Mac was driving himself, for his driver fell sick soon after they had
started. The strain and the atmosphere were too much for his stomach.
You cannot both drive and vomit.
The tank continued to kill steadily, and our infantry, who had been
behind it at the start, were bombing laboriously down the trenches.
Suddenly the tank came to a broad trench running at right angles to the
main Hindenburg Line. The tank hesitated for a moment. That moment a
brave German seized to fire a trench-mortar point-blank. He was killed
a second later, but the bomb exploded against the track and broke it.
The tank was completely disabled. It was obviously impossible to repair
the track in the middle of a trench full of Germans.
The crew continued to kill from the tank, until our infantry arrived,
and then, taking with them their guns and their ammunition, they
dropped down into the trench to aid the infantry. One man of them was
killed and another mortally wounded. The infantry officer in command
refused their assistance and ordered them back, thinking, perhaps, that
they had fought enough. They returned wearily to their headquarters
without further loss, but by the time I had arrived, Mac had gone out
again to see if the attack had progressed sufficiently to allow him to
repair his tank. He came in later disappointed. The fight was still
raging round his tank. The German who fired the trench-mortar had done
better than he knew. The disabled tank was the limit of our success for
the day.
The second tank was unlucky; it set out in the darkness, and, reaching
its appointed place by "zero," plunged forward after the barrage. The
tank reached the first German trench. None of our infantry was in
sight. The ground was so broken and the light so dim that the tank
commander thought he might have overshot his mark. Perhaps the infantry
were being held up behind him. He turned back to look for them, and
met them advancing slowly. He swung again, but in the deceptive light
the driver made a mistake, and the tank slipped sideways into a trench
at an impossible angle. Most tanks can climb out of most trenches,
but even a tank has its limitations. If a tank slips sideways into a
certain size of trench at a certain angle, it cannot pull itself out
unless it possesses certain devices which this Mark I. lacked. The tank
was firmly stuck and took no part in the day's fighting.
The third tank ran into the thick of the battle, escaping by a
succession of miracles the accurate fire of the German gunners. It
crashed into the enemy, who were picked troops, and slaughtered them.
The Germans showed no fear of it. They stood up to it, threw bombs and
fired long bursts at it from their machine-guns. They had been issued
with armour-piercing bullets, and the crew found to their dismay that
the armour was not proof against them. Both gunners in one sponson were
hit. The corporal of the tank dragged them out of the way--no easy
matter in a tank--and manned the gun until he in his turn was wounded.
Another gunner was wounded, and then another. With the reduced crew and
the tank encumbered by the wounded, the tank was practically out of
action. The tank commander broke off the fight and set out back.
While I was receiving these reports in the dug-out, Haigh had returned
from brigade headquarters. The news was not good. The infantry could
make little or no impression on the enemy defences. When attacking
troops are reduced to bombing down a trench, the attack is as good as
over, and our attack had by now degenerated into a number of bombing
duels in which the picked German troops, who were holding this portion
of their beloved Hindenburg Line, equalled and often excelled our men.
Wretched Head, whose tank was in reserve, was waiting most miserably to
know whether he would be called upon to start out alone and retrieve
the battle. It would have been a desperate and foolhardy undertaking
for one tank to attack in broad daylight, and I instructed Haigh
strongly to urge this view. Luckily the brigade commander had never
admired tanks, and now that his attack had failed, he distrusted them.
Head's tank was not used that day.
The Germans were still trying to silence that plucky battery above the
dug-out. So, praising the skill and labour of the enemy, I crawled
along the gallery, which runs the length of the Hindenburg Line, and
came out into the open beyond the danger area.
I found my car intact, for my driver, in a proper spirit of respect for
Government property, had moved to the shelter of a bank. The road was
full of "walking wounded." I had the privilege of giving two officers a
lift in my car. They belonged to battalions which had attacked north of
Fontaine. At first, they told me, the attack went well, but apparently
the enemy had retired to counter-attack the more effectively. Our
battalions, diminished and disorganised by the time they had reached
their first objective, were overwhelmed and sent reeling back with very
heavy casualties to the trenches they had left at "zero."
Apparently the grand attack of the third of May was a costly failure.
North of Chérisy we advanced a little, but later we were compelled to
withdraw. The Australians had entered the Hindenburg Line, and there
they remained with a magnificent obstinacy which it is difficult to
match in all the records of the war. Whether our attack, in spite of
its failure, was successful in occupying the attention of Germans, who
might otherwise have been assisting their comrades elsewhere in holding
up the French, is a question which a humble company commander would not
dare to answer.
The tanks had done their part. It was not the fault of Ward's gallant
company that Bullecourt remained inviolate. His tanks did all that it
was possible to do. At Fontaine, Haigh's section killed more than their
share of Germans. We were satisfied that we had shown our usefulness.
We prayed now with all our hearts that in the big battle of the summer
we might be sent forward in mass on good ground in improved tanks after
further training.