MONT ST. QUENTIN
It was on the bank of the Somme Canal in the early morning, Peronne
in the distance, and a light railway track at our feet. The place was
Brie. We had arrived there the previous night.
The railway track was torn and twisted, rails sticking into the air
at oblique angles, sleepers charred, chairs smashed, the bed of the
four-foot way churned and broken, with the waggons and trucks which
once ran along them smashed to fragments, thrown hither and thither,
out into the canal on the right or into the fields on the left side
of the line. Looking at the riverscape one could see in the near
distance a broken bridge with the sluggish water rippling lazily
round the buttresses which yet remained, and near at hand, though
the day was chilly, three naked soldiers stood on a boat making ready
to dive into the oily water.
On the other side of the Somme canal was a spread of marshland
on which could be seen lines of duckboards running hither and
thither, round pools and clumps of osiers, but all going in the same
direction, towards the town of Peronne. It was on August 29 that
the German rearguards were driven back across this portion of the
Somme. British troops then seized several crossings of the canal in
this locality, but the marshes beyond being impassable it was found
impracticable to cross and seize Peronne.
It was therefore decided to turn the Somme barrier by an attack from
the north, and to do this entailed seizing the steep promontory of
Mont St. Quentin. It was from the north across a thousand yards of
level pasture land pitted with shell holes and criss-crossed with
trenches and lines of wire entanglements that the Australians made a
famous advance, fighting all the way and seizing Mont St. Quentin.
The task was a herculean one, adding undying glory to the men who
accomplished it.
Our party was allowed to visit Mont St. Quentin and standing on
its summit I saw the field across which the Australians made their
advance. Looking from a German observation post on the promontory
I could see the green field, smooth as the cover of a book, lying
in front of me. Nothing could escape a vigilant eye on its broad
expanse. Shorn of grass a rabbit could be seen if it crawled across
the levels. It was here that the German machine gunners had their
nests, and it was here that an observation post sunk into the rock
gave a complete field of observation to the watcher. The post was
cunningly made with a ladder leading down a shaft ten feet in
depth. At the bottom was a field telephone with wires running back
to battalion headquarters. All that the observer had to do was to
clamber up the ladder, take stock of the field in front, go back
again and 'phone his report to headquarters in Peronne.
The town, although of little industrial import, has a history dating
back to the days of Clovis II. It is the burial-place of Charles the
Simple, who died of starvation in a dungeon in the castle of Peronne,
which castle was also the prison of Louis XI for some time. But the
castle is now no more, the Germans have slashed it to pieces. The
church of St. Jean, built in 1509, is also ground to dust. In 1870 it
was greatly damaged by the Boche when he laid siege to the place, but
it was restored afterwards. Now, however, it is beyond restoration.
A famous incident was still, prior to this war, celebrated by the
natives of Peronne. The town was once besieged by Charles V, and
a woman named Marie Fouré greatly distinguished herself in the
defence of the place. After a period of stiff fighting the siege was
raised and Charles V departed. The anniversary of the raising of the
siege was, until 1914, annually celebrated by the inhabitants, and
offerings were laid at the feet of Marie Fouré, whose statue stood
in the town. But now the statue, like the Castle of Peronne and the
church of St. Jean, is no more.
The present war, however, has given something to replace the memory
of Marie Fouré. Outside the town at the foot of Mont St. Quentin can
be seen a tract of ground set apart as a site for the memorial which
is to be raised to the second Australian Division in commemoration
of the men who fought and died for a great cause under the ramparts
of Peronne. And in the days to come it is probable that once a year,
on August 31, the townsfolk will repair thither and lay garlands of
flowers at the base of the memorial that will remind them of the
brave boys who fought and died for the freedom of France and for a
yet greater freedom--the freedom of the world.
The capture of Mont St. Quentin was an operation second to none in
the great summer drive of 1918. This natural fortress, strong as
any on the Western Front, stands high over the Somme marshland and
dominates all the surrounding country. On its south-eastern slope is
a dense wood, now stumped and shivered, but at that time its trees
stood high and green, burdened with a dense foliage that made it a
splendid hiding-place for machine-gun nests. Though at that time
the Germans were falling back at several points of the line it was
unbelievable that they would give up Mont St. Quentin, a point of the
utmost strategical value, as key to the whole Peronne area, without a
bitter struggle.
That they prepared themselves to hold it is shown by the fact that
the place was garrisoned by a force of 1500 men, and after the
battle captured Germans stated that they specially volunteered to
hold the line against an Australian advance.
On August 29, at noon, the British held all the southern banks of the
Somme, but the Australians, fired with a long chain of victories,
decided to advance further. Up till then in the Somme fighting they
had recovered over 125 square miles of country and forty villages.
Fifteen thousand prisoners had fallen to them, 301 officers, two
regimental commanders, five battalion commanders and staffs, 161
guns, 3,000 machine guns, the whole transport of one battalion and
miles of light railway trackage.
On the night of August 29, when darkness fell the Australian
engineers busied themselves throwing bridges across the Somme canal,
south of Peronne, and some of these bridges, broken and battered,
are to be seen there yet. Working hard in the gloom, despite the
continuous rifle and machine gun fire of the enemy, the engineers
completed their task, and in the morning of the 30th patrols essayed
to cross the canal and advance through the marshes towards Peronne.
No practicable path could be found across the swampy morass; the
enemy kept up a stubborn resistance and the Diggers had to desist
from attempting further headway at the moment.
Meanwhile, fighting was proceeding elsewhere, and at every point the
Australians were making gradual headway towards the ancient town. In
the forenoon of August 30 the Omiecourt peninsula east of the village
of Clery had been cleared and a bridge head held by the Germans was
taken. This opening a route to the town, it was decided to advance in
this direction and lay siege to Mont St. Quentin, attacking it from
the north and west instead of the south.
By three o'clock in the afternoon the Australians came into contact
with the German advanced positions and fierce hand-to-hand fighting
took place and continued far into the night. Every inch of the ground
was disputed, every path, every gully and bank became the scene of
desperate fighting. Brave men went forth to meet death calmly and
proudly, doing their duty with the consciousness of Right to sustain
them, enduring all the risks of the night with a grim fortitude and
bearing all its discomforts as if they loved war solely for its own
sake.
But it is too much to say that the men love war. No man of normal
pattern loves war as it is fought here, hip deep in slush all through
the day and night in an atmosphere suffocating and gaseous. If a
man loves war, he is no more to be complimented on fighting than a
man who loves a good dish is to be complimented on eating. But one
thing is true. The Australians, certain of the cause for which they
are fighting, are keen on keeping at it until a successful finish is
reached, knowing that the German method of warfare, waged with all
its attendant despotism and tyranny, has for its aim, not alone the
breaking of the Allies, but the shattering of the moral frontier of
civilization. The Australians are out, not so much to make war for
its own sake as to wage it for something that is straight and clean.
And never was this purpose made more manifest than at the taking of
Mont St. Quentin.
In the early morning of August 31, the infantry from New South Wales,
Victoria and Tasmania, got orders to attack. The men were then in
the locality of Clery-sur-Somme, and by a strange coincidence
rations came to hand just as the attack was about to start. The mail
also arrived with letters and parcels from home, but war cannot
stop for matters of such little import as the reading of letters
and the filling of hungry stomachs. Leaving the hot steaming dixies
of tea behind them and stuffing their letters in their pockets the
Australians in the cold damp morning, unaided by tanks or barrage,
set out to attack. Peronne was in flames, Mont St. Quentin was
impregnable, the Germans were offering a stubborn resistance. But no
faltering for the "Diggers" when they were "up against it"!
The day cleared as they swept out from Clery-sur-Somme and made their
way across the level stretch of land that lies between that village
and their objective, fighting all the road and clearing the enemy
from the old Somme trenches which lined the way. And as they fought
they could see a hillock in the distance standing blank and bald, and
to all seeming, impregnable. This was the steep promontory of Mont
St. Quentin, the summit of which the brave soldiers of the New South
Wales Brigade had to take. And to-day it presented a most formidable
appearance and inaccessible front. But the men knew no stay, they
prepared their hearts for a sublime suicide. Letters as yet unread
were taken from their pockets, torn to shreds and flung to the winds.
Though confronted with an almost certain death they were not going to
give any information to the enemy.
Wire entanglements unbroken by shell-fire blocked the way of the
soldiers of New South Wales, but undaunted, they sought for openings
and wormed their way through. Some took off their coats, their packs,
lifted props and sandbags that lay by the way, threw these on the
wires and clambered over. The promontory was stormed, the ready
bayonet brought into play and the enemy was cleared off Mont St.
Quentin. At this one swift assault they scooped in most of the whole
German rearguard north of Peronne, and captured the great natural
position overlooking the city and took 1,500 prisoners.
It was here that 250 Australians captured 800 Germans, big soldiers
of the Prussian Guards. In addition to the men the colonel of the
battalion was taken prisoner, an irate individual who was exceedingly
annoyed because the Australians had dared to capture him or his men.
Bristling with arrogance he blustered and swore at the Australian
officer who questioned him. How dared the Australians, the common
Australian soldier, order him about, prod him with a bayonet when he
refused to move and catch him by the collar of his coat and shove
him in front of them towards the cages in the back area. He was a
colonel, a scion of a noble house, an aristocrat.
"If you don't behave yourself," said the officer, "I'll pass you on
to the Diggers. At the present moment you're not with the slaves in
Germany."
The Colonel blazed into another round of abuse, and the officer,
losing his temper, handed the Colonel over to the Diggers, giving
them orders to search the man.
And they searched him, thrust miry hands into his pockets, felt under
his shirt to see if he had any papers on his person. This amused the
men, but did in no way ease the temper of the Prussian aristocrat and
tyrant.
THE FIELD
The sky shows cold where the roof has been,
But the stars of night are none the dimmer.
Where the home once stood are the ruins seen,
But the brazier glows with a cheery glimmer--
The old life goes, but the new life fills
The scene of many a peasant story,
And the bursting shells on the sentried hills
Whisper of death, but shout of glory!
Gutted and ripped the stricken earth
Where the bones of the restless dead are showing,
But the great earth breathes of life and birth
And ruin shrinks from the blossoms blowing.
The old life fails, but the new life comes
Over the ruins scarred and hoary,
Though the thunder of guns and the roll of drums
But make for death while they shout of glory.