THE DIVISION IN FRANCE: OCTOBER 1915 TO JUNE 1916
General Nugent and his Staff arrived at Boulogne at midnight on the
3rd of October. Between the 5th and the 9th of the month the Division
concentrated in the area round Flesselles, where, some ten miles
north of Amiens, Divisional Headquarters were established. Here the
troops realized for the first time that France did not always mean
the firing-line. The sound of guns was, strangely enough, heard less
than it had been at Seaford, though the Vérey lights that could be
seen by night against the sky were evidence of the proximity of the
trenches. The countryside of the Somme was poor of soil, though
the industry of the inhabitants extracted good crops from it, and
curiously unlike that of the North of Ireland in its absence of
pasture. It was, however, pleasant enough, high and rolling, the
sites of the little villages in the uplands determined by the scanty
water supply, but traversed by numerous streams in the valleys, full
of beautiful panoramas wherever woodland interposed to break the
monotony of its contours. The villages were not uncomfortable so long
as troops could be widely spread. When, however, they were used as
"staging areas" and billeting was at all close, their poverty was
only too apparent.
Of this, some portions of the Division had early experience. On
October the 9th the 107th Brigade and the 1st/1st London Brigade
R.F.A. moved up for attachment to the 4th Division, and instruction
in trench warfare. The 4th Division at this time held a wide and
comparatively quiet front north of the River Ancre, which had been
taken over from the French during the previous summer. The general
method of instruction in vogue was the attachment of formations and
units to those next larger; that is, a battalion to an infantry
brigade, a company to a battalion, a battery to a brigade of
artillery. The troops in this preliminary experience of trench
warfare suffered less from the enemy than the elements. The weather
was bad, roads and trenches were wet; the billeting accommodation
_en route_ was scanty, and while in rest behind the line, consisted
almost entirely of war-worn tents without floor-boards. The men in
those first days scarce seemed to notice these things, so intense
was their eagerness and curiosity. The conventional and traditional
grumble of the British private soldier, a _sotto voce_ accompaniment
to the most generous efforts and the most unselfish devotion, was
forgotten here. One of the Brigadiers of the 4th Division said of
them:
"The men are extraordinarily quiet, and I thought at first somewhat
subdued, and put it down to the big marches they had had. But when I
came to talk to them I found they were like new schoolboys, taking
in everything, deadly keen, and only afraid of one thing--letting
down their unit in any way. I have never seen any men with such quiet
confidence in themselves, in spite of their efforts to hide it."
The attachments lasted five days, the 107th Brigade being the only
one which was not divided between two divisions in the line. Its
attachment being complete, the 108th was sent up, two battalions to
the 4th Division and two to the 48th, further north. Then, towards
the end of the month, the 109th Brigade had its turn with the same
two Divisions. Meanwhile the R.E. Headquarters and the three Field
Companies had moved to Arquèves, to work on the new Third Army Line,
later to become important as the Amiens Defences. At this task they
were soon joined by the 16th Rifles (Pioneers), while they also
had as companions French Territorials. All worked hard and well,
though in the light of subsequent experience their trenches were
far too narrow, and their traverses too small by half. The troops
not under instruction in the line were kept hard at work training,
officers from the 4th Division having come to initiate them into the
mysteries of bombing--mysteries to which they took in kindly fashion.
One instructor declared that the national sport of the Ulsterman,
the throwing of kidney-stones in street riots, was an admirable
preparation for bombing. Another introduction was to gas helmets,
the horrible bags of those days without even mouth-pieces. Passing
through a gas-chamber in these bags was unpleasant, though accepted
as a necessity, but "doubling" and marching in them, as ordered by
some zealous instructors, was purgatory, and resulted in some of
the men being violently sick. On October the 21st the Division,
except for such infantry and artillery as were under instruction in
the line, moved slightly further west, toward Abbeville, to a more
comfortable and spacious area about Bernaville and Canaples, with
Headquarters at Domart-en-Ponthieu.
The Higher Command had decided that the 36th Division was not to
enter the line as a formation for the present. The Battle of Loos
was not long past, when troops fresh from England had been pushed
into the fight at its fiercest and after very long marches, with
disastrous results. It was determined that in future divisions should
be given a chance gradually to accustom themselves to the conditions.
Another decision which had been arrived at was that New Army and
Territorial Divisions should receive an admixture of thirty per cent.
of regular infantry by the transfer of brigades. Orders were received
for the transfer of one brigade to the 4th Division. The 107th, in
the command of which General W. M. Withycombe, C.M.G., had succeeded
General Couchman, was selected to go. The 12th Brigade of the 4th
Division was transferred to the 36th Division in exchange.
By November the 4th the 107th Brigade, with its Light Trench Mortar
Battery, which had just arrived from England, and the 110th Field
Ambulance, were clear of the 36th Divisional area. On the 7th the
12th Brigade marched in to take its place. The 2nd Lancashire
Fusiliers of this Brigade were transferred to the 108th Brigade in
exchange for the 11th Rifles, and the 2nd Essex to the 109th in
exchange for the 14th Rifles. These inter-divisional changes lasted a
month only. Any advantages they may have had were found insufficient
to counterbalance the dislike of the break-up of their old formations
felt by battalions of both Divisions.
The Division as now constituted passed a winter very different
from that of its expectations. Late in November it moved down to
Abbeville, with Headquarters at Pont Remy, on the bank of the Somme
just outside that city. For the time it was concerned more with
sanitation than with war. Never was such cleaning of streets, such
draining of middens, such wholesale carting away of manure-heaps,
as when the Ulster Division marched into an area. The inhabitants
wondered and gaped, and a humorist wrote home that the troops "were
sweeping onward through village after village in the North of France."
Some writers--among them, it is to be regretted, a well-known
dramatist and critic of Ulster birth--have spoken unfavourably of the
French peasant and his attitude to the troops. There can be few men
of the 36th Division who look back upon the peasant-farmer of the
Somme with anything but affection and admiration. For their part,
the villagers testified by their letters and expressions of regret,
whenever a unit moved, how good had been the terms between troops and
civilians. The Calvinistic Ulsterman was sometimes a little startled
and pained at first on finding a countryside so liberally besprinkled
with shrines and crucifixes, but, if he were a countryman,
especially, he made the surprising discovery that these countrymen of
the Somme were very like himself. They thought twice before speaking
once; they had a certain dourness; they did not wear their hearts on
their sleeves, though they were furnished with those organs in the
proper places.
On November the 26th two of the Field Companies, the 121st and
150th, were returned by the Third Army, and began to assist and
supervise the infantry at work in the villages. In view of the
projected spring offensive, not actually launched till after
midsummer, all these back areas were being prepared to accommodate
large bodies of troops in some comfort. Bunks were put into barns,
the holes which had appeared in the lath and mud walls, through
shortage of male labour in the villages, were repaired, and excellent
horse-lines, with standings of chalk and stone, were built. The
timber was cut locally and sawn by the troops themselves, using their
own saw-mill.
On November the 27th the Ulster Divisional Artillery, so called at
that date to distinguish it from the London Territorial Artillery,
which was known as the 36th Divisional Artillery, landed at Havre,
and joined the Division in the area east of Abbeville. It had
remained at Bordon since the departure of the Division. Its training
was not yet complete, and it was to have a course of gunnery at
Cayeux, on the coast, south of the mouth of the Somme, before
entering the line. The only other important event, from the military
point of view, to be recorded before February, was the formation of
the 108th and 109th Machine-Gun Companies, from personnel and guns
withdrawn from the battalions. To replace the guns each battalion was
issued with four Lewis guns, which number was gradually increased
till, a year later, it had been quadrupled.
Christmas 1915 was celebrated by the troops in their billets with
sport and festivities. Many units had bought suckling pigs from
the farmers, and fattened them in anticipation of the event; none
had failed to provide some luxuries. The villagers took part in
the merrymaking, and in most of the officers' messes the people of
the house drank with their guests the toast of victory. For very
many of the men in those Somme villages it was one of the happiest
Christmases they had ever spent, and one on which they looked
back in after years with delight. Within a few days the services
of the Pioneers were lost for a long period to the Division. They
were ordered to construct, under the Chief Engineer of the Third
Army, a broad-gauge railway line between Candas and Acheux. For the
rest, there was little change in the daily life of the Division.
On New Year's Day it moved back again to the area about Domart,
roughly that in which it had been previously billeted. The same
work--wood-cutting, repairing and "bunking" of barns, construction
of horse-lines--continued, with the exception that it was done in
different villages. When the work was well in hand some training was
interspersed with it. Not till January the 30th was the Division
ordered to hold itself in readiness to take over a portion of the
line. It had passed the worst of the winter by no means disagreeably.
The 107th Brigade had existed in a fashion less idyllic. On arrival
in the 4th Division area two of its battalions, the 8th and 15th
Rifles, were transferred to the 10th and 11th Brigades respectively,
while in exchange it received three battalions, the 1st Rifle
Brigade, 1st Royal Irish Fusiliers, and 2nd Monmouths. Three days
later it took over the left sector of the 4th Division front, astride
the Mailly-Maillet--Serre Road, the Brigade Headquarters being in
the former village. Here for upwards of two months it remained,
alternating with the 10th Brigade in six-day tours in the line. In
November the weather was indifferent; by December it became very
bad indeed. Men sank in the mud so that they had to be dug out by
their comrades with spades. The communication trenches were so deep
in water that they were for the most part impassable. Movement from
front to rear had to take place after dark, in the open. "Trench
feet," a disease then generally known as "frost-bite," though caused
by constant immersion of the feet in water far above freezing-point,
became prevalent. Rubber thigh boots, most precious of boons to men
in such sectors, were all too rare as yet, and had to be doled out
with parsimony. Battle casualties were light in this sector, but
the life in it was very far from pleasant. On New Year's Day the
Brigade, now returned to its original formation, exchanged it for
the right sector of the front held by 4th Division, south of the
Mailly-Maillet--Serre Road. Of this sector the chief peculiarity was
a tiny parallelogram of trenches jutting out from the British line
on the high ground east of Beaumont Hamel, known as the Redan. It
was a most unpleasant corner. In the first place, it was not more
than fifty yards from the German lines, and the mine-craters which
fringed its eastern edge, which were occupied at night by British
posts--a doubtful policy, as it appears to-day--were in constant
danger of surprise. During the 107th Brigade's tour one post was,
indeed, bombed by the enemy and a man taken out of it. In the second
place, the Redan was the scene of constant mining, and the bugbear of
battalions in reserve, which had to send up large working-parties to
carry sandbags filled with chalk for the miners. It was the one point
in our trenches which received fairly constant attention from German
gunners, and the average weekly casualties in this tiny lozenge were
probably higher than on the whole of the rest of the 4th Division's
front. One of the best pieces of work performed by the 107th Brigade
during this period was the construction, by the 8th Rifles, in one
night, of a trench a hundred yards in length and protected by a
double "apron" of wire, which denied to the enemy ground which would
have given him important observation. The digging and wiring were
carried out without arousing the least suspicion among the German
sentries.
The Brigade had during these three months established an excellent
reputation, both for work and for demeanour under fire. General
Nugent had suggested the reconstitution of the 36th Division on its
old basis on the grounds that, with three Brigades of Ulstermen, it
would be more homogeneous and of greater fighting value than as at
present constituted. This suggestion was favourably received. The
men had not been unhappy in the 4th Division, but feelings of local
patriotism were still strong in them, and they were most anxious to
return. It was announced that the reconstitution--the first of any
division so dismembered, and the only one which occurred for some
time--would take place simultaneously with the Division taking over
a portion of the front.
The 1st/1st London Artillery had departed, two howitzer batteries to
the East, and the remainder to the 38th Division in Flanders. The
original Artillery, henceforth the 36th Divisional Artillery, was
completing its training on the coast. With its exception the whole
Division now marched linewards, between the 2nd and 6th of February.
The 4th Division had meanwhile extended its right flank, and had
the 11th Brigade on the right of the 107th, its outer flank on the
River Ancre, just east of Hamel. As the new divisional boundaries
were to be the Ancre and the Mailly-Maillet--Serre Road, all that was
necessary to complete the relief and reconstitute the Division was
for the 108th Brigade to relieve the 11th. The 36th Division then
took over, at noon on February the 7th, its first line, with the
108th Brigade on the right, the 107th on the left, and the 109th in
reserve. Headquarters were at the large village, or small town, of
Acheux.
Of the next six weeks there is little of interest to report, save
a heavy bombardment of the left flank of the 107th Brigade and of
the 12th Brigade to the north of it. Shelling with 210, 105, and
77-mm. howitzers and field guns lasted for about half an hour, after
which the artillery lifted range to rear lines and communication
trenches. The 9th Rifles at once manned their battered trenches,
some men getting out beyond the wire and opening rapid fire. There
was no attack, though a party of the enemy succeeded in entering the
trenches of the 12th Brigade, to be quickly ejected. It was curious
that in this, its first bombardment, and a not inconsiderable one,
the Division did not suffer a casualty.
A mine exploded in front of the Redan cost the lives of three men
of an attached Tunnelling Company, who were buried in a blown-in
passage. Otherwise, during this period the weather was probably an
opponent more formidable than the Germans. The men in the trenches
lived under conditions of the deepest discomfort. For weeks together
the communication trenches were knee-deep in water. Previous troops
had dug deep sumps in the bottoms of the trenches, covering them with
boards, with the idea of draining off the water. But the water soon
filled these and rose till it floated off the boards. Then would
come some unfortunate fellow splashing his way along the trench,
to plunge into the hole and be soused in icy water to the waist or
higher. Some of the ills then endured were, it must be admitted,
not unavoidable. There was a certain lack of revetting material, it
is true. Few of those who were compelled to use it will forget one
notorious communication trench, "Jacob's Ladder," which ran from the
village of Mesnil to that of Hamel, down a forward slope completely
exposed to the enemy. By night the road could be followed without
worse risk than occasional bursts of machine-gun fire, so that large
bodies of men had seldom to use this trench. By day, however, men
clawing their way through its mud experienced the sensations of flies
in treacle. When time and material had become available for the
revetting of its sides, all this was changed, and "Jacob's Ladder"
lost much of its evil reputation. But on the front line trenches more
could have been done than was accomplished. The chief methods of
drainage employed were the digging of large sumpholes in the parados
of the trench to carry off the water, and the pumping of it out over
the parapet with hand-pumps, whence, of course, it presently filtered
back to the trench bottom. Scientific trench drainage, by means of
trenches cut for the purpose, had as yet made little progress, though
the undulating character of the country was suitable to it. It is
scarcely an exaggeration to say that the Division suffered more from
the wet at this time than during the following winter in Flanders, in
flat country and on a water-logged soil, simply because in the latter
case the R.E. and infantry had learnt by experience how to deal with
it.
If the 36th Division had yet something to learn by way of prevention
in these matters, it had little as regards cure. When rubber
boots--"gum-boots, thigh," in the parlance of the Ordnance--became
commoner, "trench feet" almost disappeared. The men laughed at the
special grease with which they were provided to rub their feet, but
they used it as they were ordered to do. Contrary to legend, but a
small proportion was really used for the frying of food. They laughed
also at the foot drill, each man rubbing the feet of his next number
once a day, but to a great extent they carried it out. Excellent as
these things were, the best remedy of all was found to be dry socks.
Drying them in the trenches was difficult, but it was easy to send up
dry ones by the ration parties at night, who took back the wet ones
with them and dried them during the following day.
As this History is intended not alone for men who fought in the war,
but also for their relatives and friends at home, a few remarks
on the routine of holding a line of trenches, commonplace to the
soldier as they may be, are perhaps permissible. Let us imagine a
division with two brigades in line, and one in reserve. Each of the
brigades in line would have two battalions in the trenches, relieved
at regular intervals, though never on the same night, by the other
two. These intervals were from four to eight days, according to the
weather and state of the trenches. The distance of the rest billets
from the front line, again, depended upon accommodation, the enemy's
command of the country from his observation posts, and the activity
of his artillery. They might be three or four miles back. At this
time the battalion which held the line at Hamel, on the right bank of
the Ancre, rested in Mesnil, little more than a mile from the German
lines. The battalion in the trenches had probably two companies in
the front line, one in support and one in reserve, and carried out
inter-battalion reliefs in the course of its tour. The front and
support lines were held by posts consisting of sections, about ten
or twelve men in these early days, half as many later on. These
posts furnished each a single sentry by day, and double sentries by
night. For half an hour before and half an hour after dawn, the hour
of surprise attacks, the troops would "stand to" in their trenches.
In winter months this was the hour of the rum-ration--very welcome
after a cold or wet night. Each company had one officer permanently
on duty in the trench, night and day. In the trenches these periods
were practically reversed. Night was the time when most of the work,
all the wiring, all the patrolling of "No Man's Land," was carried
out. Roughly speaking, the battalion in the line was responsible for
the work as far back as its headquarters, with the expert assistance
of a few sappers. Behind that worked the resting battalion--though
parties from this had frequently to assist the battalion in line
also--under the direction of the R.E., of which one Field Company
was in general attached to each brigade. It was important that the
infantry should know the sappers, and look upon them as assistants
rather than task-masters. The Pioneer battalion had generally some
special task of importance allotted to it under the direction of the
C.R.E.
A Machine-Gun Company at this time formed part of each brigade. The
guns were distributed in depth in the trenches, but much further
forward than was the case later on, when the number of Lewis guns
with the infantry had been increased. Such subtleties as machine-gun
barrages, indirect fire, the linking of guns by telephone to
battalion headquarters, had as yet scarce been conceived. Machine
gunners and infantry had their ammunition and bombs in boxes let into
the parapet, these stores increasing in size from front to rear.
The artillery, in rear, was also distributed in depth. Covering two
brigades, as we have imagined, it would probably be divided into two
groups, the group commander living at or near the headquarters of
his infantry brigade. For this purpose the present formation, four
artillery brigades, of which one was a howitzer brigade, was clumsy
and extravagant. The howitzer brigade, for example, was invariably
split between the groups, and its commander "functioned" as an
administrator, but not as a combatant. This system was to be modified
later. The guns were in pits, hidden as well as possible among trees
or houses, or if in the open covered with "camouflage" to match the
surrounding fields. The dug-outs of their detachments were close
at hand, and, close at hand also, were pits containing from two
to four hundred rounds per gun. At dusk the guns were laid on the
"night-lines"; that is to say, each was set so as to fire upon a
certain zone, in accordance with a previously arranged plan. A sentry
in an observation post watched the line. Within a few seconds of a
telephone call or an "S.O.S." rocket going up, the guns could open
fire. An artillery liaison officer lived with each battalion in the
trenches.
The rations arrived each day for all these people in the following
manner: The Divisional Supply Column went daily to railhead with
its lorries to meet the "pack train," bringing up the supplies to
the "refilling point," and dividing them into four groups, one for
each infantry brigade and one for all the rest of the divisional
units. Here, under the supervision of the Brigade Supply Officer, the
supplies were parcelled out, loaded into the horsed supply wagons,
and taken to the transport lines of the units, where they came into
the keeping of the Quartermaster. In a very quiet part of the front,
when the railhead was far advanced, the supply wagons could draw
direct from the railhead, cutting out altogether the Supply Column
and its lorries. Divisions were urged to do this when possible to
save petrol. Let not the innocent, however, imagine that uses were
not found for the lorries thus set at liberty!
The food we need follow no further, except in the case of a
battalion in the trenches. For all other units its preparation was
comparatively simple. But to supply the man on the fire-step with
hot food at regular intervals was a problem of some difficulty.
Rations were brought up to battalion headquarters after dusk by the
transport. In a well-organized battalion--and battalions varied
much in this respect--the maximum was done before the food left
the transport lines, the minimum when it arrived. That minimum
was the heating. In some sectors of the front it used to be said
that cooking was impossible. As a fact, there never was a sector
wherein, with resource and ingenuity, at least the _heating_ of food
already prepared was impracticable. For extras, the stock-pot was the
soldier's best friend; and unhappy was he if his battalion did not
possess it. Ration biscuit, soaked in stock and put through a mincing
machine, made "dough" which produced cheese biscuits, sausage rolls,
jam tarts. As for the dry rations, tobacco, etc., they were put into
a sandbag for each section, labelled with the number of that section.
So, at least, marched affairs in a battalion of which the internal
economy was at a high stage of efficiency.
The evacuation of wounded may also be briefly described. On a
casualty occurring the wounded man was brought by the regimental
stretcher-bearers to the Regimental Aid Post, a dug-out or shelter
near a communication trench, generally in the neighbourhood of
battalion headquarters. A mile or two further back was the Advanced
Dressing Station, to which the Field Ambulance stretcher-bearers
carried "lying-down" cases and conducted "walking" cases. If
possible, wheeled stretchers or a trench tramway were here employed.
At the A.D.S. food in some form was always ready; wounds were
re-dressed if necessary, morphia given if required, and the soothing
cigarette added. Then the cars of the Field Ambulance conveyed the
casualty to the Main Dressing Station; _i.e._, the headquarters of
the Field Ambulance. This was to all intents and purposes a temporary
hospital, where the wounded man might obtain rest, and further
surgical aid if required. It was the last stage in the divisional
chain. From it the cars of the Motor Ambulance convoy took him to the
Casualty Clearing Station, whence a hospital train bore him to the
base hospital or, during an offensive, direct to the hospital ship.
The above is an attempt to sketch, without entering into its ten
thousand complications, some of the main features of the life of a
man in the trenches. War, at that time and in such a sector as this,
had not acquired many of the horrors that were to come. Bombing
by aeroplanes was in its infancy; so was the use of gas shell.
Long-range shelling of villages with high-velocity guns was almost
unheard of hereabouts. With regard to all shelling there would appear
to have been conventions. Those who have seen German shells at
Mailly-Maillet dropping at dusk, the hour when the transport started
for the line, on to the Serre and Auchonvillers Roads, but never
closer than one hundred yards to the first houses of the village,
will agree with this opinion. The surroundings were far less grisly
and depressing than they afterwards became. There was, it must be
remembered, save that at Ypres and that which at the moment was being
fashioned at Verdun, no devastated area wider than a narrow ribbon
from the coast to Switzerland. From the Mesnil Ridge, where the
observation posts of the Division were manned by the Cyclist Company,
the country behind the enemy's lines showed green and smiling.
Villages which the troops were not to see at close hand save as
ruins, Irles, Pys, Grévillers, Bihucourt, were intact. The time could
be read with the aid of a telescope by the church clock of Bapaume.
On the British side, villages a couple of miles back were little
disturbed. Martinsart was no farther from the enemy, and here it was
possible to call on Brigade headquarters at their château as one
returned from the trenches, and drink a cup of tea poured out by the
daughter of the house, who rang for a British orderly to bring hot
water. Mediæval idyll! With spring appearing, the trenches drying,
and the grasses above them filled with field flowers; with the Valley
of the Ancre taking on a new beauty as its trees were feathered
green; with nature bursting into life, man's thoughts could not be
ever fixed upon death. Warfare, to many of the men in the Division,
must have seemed less than terrible in these days. But they were the
last of the good days. The terrible was not far off.
In the first week of March the Division extended its front, the
109th Brigade taking over the sector south of the Ancre, known by
the name of Thiepval Wood. At the same time the 36th Divisional
Artillery, back from its final training at Cayeux, took over the
defence of the long line. By the last day of the month the latter
had been shortened to the two-battalion front astride the Ancre, the
31st Division having come into line on the left. The two sub-sectors
were known as Thiepval Wood and Hamel respectively. The Hamel
sub-sector was comfortable and quiet, troubled by nothing worse than
the aggressions of a new long-range medium trench mortar, which
often smashed in its communication trenches, but seldom caused many
casualties. The battalion which held it was responsible for the
defence of the Ancre and its swampy valley, filled with miniature
lakes. This was carried out by the reserve company in the village,
which found a platoon for small and isolated posts, the most advanced
being at the bridge on the Thiepval-Hamel Road. The men enjoyed this
duty better than any other. They were never shelled, they had no work
to do, and they could employ their leisure fishing in the stream,
with the chance of an occasional shot at wild duck or widgeon.
Thiepval Wood, on the other hand, with an appearance of quietude
that deceived visitors and newcomers, was wont to be transformed by
sudden and not infrequent bombardments into a very unpleasant spot
indeed. It was here that on the 10th of March the 10th Inniskillings
suffered their real baptism of fire. At three in the afternoon there
had been ranging shots from all calibres of artillery upon the wood,
strengthening the belief of the man in the line, which was accepted
with some hesitation by the Staff, that the army opposite possessed
a "travelling circus" of heavy artillery, moved from point to point
for the covering of raids. Precisely at midnight came a roar of
explosions, a whistle and screaming of shells, a crash of falling
trees. All telephone lines were cut, and S.O.S. rockets failed to
ignite, but the artillery soon opened fire on its own initiative. On
the right of the battalion front the trenches were pounded beyond
recognition, and soon littered with dead and wounded. The garrison
of the trenches manned their fire-steps and opened rapid fire on
the enemy's front line. Not till 2 a.m. did the shelling die down.
Then it was found that the enemy had penetrated the trenches of the
troops on the right of the Division, killing a number of officers
and men, and taking several prisoners. In a Special Order of the
Day, congratulating the 10th Inniskillings, the Divisional Commander
stated that "there seemed no reason to doubt that the German
bombardment was intended to cover a raid similar to the raid which
actually took place elsewhere the same night." The battalion had the
further honour of mention in the despatches of Sir Douglas Haig. Its
losses amounted to some thirty killed and wounded.
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL SIR O. S. NUGENT, K.C.B., D.S.O.]
From the moment when the Division first entered the line,
preparations had been made for the long-planned offensive. By the
month of May this work was intensified. It is difficult to give in a
few lines an adequate idea of the scope of such preliminary labour.
The mere plans and instructions issued by the Staffs of the Division,
its formations and units, would fill the greater part of this
volume. There were miles of tramway to be laid, gun-pits for the new
artillery to be constructed, roads to be improved, new communication
trenches cut, and innumerable dug-outs excavated. The heaviest task
of all was the building of two causeways over the Ancre and its
marshes; the only communications with our line on the left bank of
the river being some crazy wooden foot-bridges put up by French
troops. As a first step the drainage of the marshes was examined,
and many obstructions in the small streams removed. The flooded area
was thus decreased, but there were at first frantic protests from
the Division on the right when the water rose behind its lines. This
flooding was, however, but temporary. The construction of these
causeways was entrusted to the 122nd Field Company R.E., which
employed large infantry working parties in two shifts, from dusk to
dawn. The causeways were built of sandbags filled with chalk. The
river was constantly swept at night by machine-gun fire, and the
casualties suffered were not inconsiderable, particularly on the
northern causeway. The mainstay of the whole scheme of preparation
was the Pioneer battalion, which had already made its name by the
construction of the Candas-Acheux railway. It was for this battalion
a proud day when railhead for supplies and personnel opened at Belle
Eglise Farm on the line that was its handiwork. But the whole of the
Division worked with a will also. Tasks were nearly always completed
before the allotted time, for which the sole explanation lay not
entirely in the good hearts of the men, but also in the splendid
physique of the Division at this period.[17] The artillery dug on the
Mesnil Ridge an observation trench known as "Brock's Benefit," in
honour of their General, which contained a whole series of "O.P.s,"
and will be very well remembered by a long series of divisions
subsequently inhabiting that sector.
The first raid carried out by the Division was on May the 7th, and,
by an extraordinary coincidence, that night was also chosen by the
enemy to raid the troops of the 32nd Division on its right, at a
point about 200 yards west of that of the British raid. The German
barrage opened at 11 p.m.; the British "zero" was midnight. Major
Peacocke,[18] second-in-command of the 9th Inniskillings, had his
party already out in the sunken Thiepval-Hamel Road when the German
bombardment began. He spoke on a telephone which he had taken out
with him to his commanding officer, Colonel Ricardo, and it was
decided to carry through the raid. The British guns, trained on the
barrage lines selected for the raid, held their fire, and a most
uncomfortable hour had to be endured in Thiepval Wood. At midnight
the British barrage opened and the raiders charged in. The enemy was
on the alert, and a fierce struggle followed. The raid was successful
in inflicting heavy casualties on the enemy. No prisoners were taken,
as the Germans in the deep dug-outs showed fight, firing up the
steps. The raiders thereupon bombed the dug-outs till all sounds of
life below had ceased. The casualties were trifling, but there were
a good many more in the sunken road, where the raiding party had to
lie two hours before it could return to its trenches, so heavy was
the German barrage.
Meanwhile, the enemy's intentions with regard to the troops on
the right of the 36th Division being only too clear, six platoons
of the 10th Inniskillings, two from dug-outs on the reverse slope
of Thiepval Wood, and a company from Authuille, moved up to their
support. The former body arrived in the front line of the 1st Dorsets
in time to assist them in repelling the enemy, who left a dead
officer and a wounded prisoner in the hands of the English battalion.
The company from Authuille and two guns of the 109th Machine-Gun
Company also pushed up through a very heavy barrage to the front
line. The Dorsets had suffered very considerable casualties, and
the troops of the Ulster Division assisted to man their line till
morning. The appreciation of the 32nd Division was warmly expressed
by the G.O.C.
In May took place the first reorganization of the Divisional
Artillery, the object of which was to divide the howitzers among
the Brigades, to overcome the disadvantages of which there has been
mention. Three of the Brigades, the 153rd, the 172nd, and the 173rd,
were made up of three four-gun 18-pounder batteries and one four-gun
4.5 howitzer battery. The fourth, the 154th Brigade, which had been
the Howitzer Brigade, thus lost all its howitzer batteries, and was
made up by three 18-pounder batteries, one from each of the other
Brigades, in exchange for the howitzers. Brigade Ammunition Columns
were abolished and the Divisional Ammunition Column largely increased.
At the end of May Brigadier-General Hickman, commanding the 109th
Brigade, returned to England, being succeeded by Brigadier-General R.
Shuter, D.S.O. General Hickman, whose part in the formation of the
Division has been recorded, was the last of the Infantry Brigadiers
who had accompanied the Division to France. General Hacket Pain,
commanding the 108th Brigade, had been succeeded by Brigadier-General
C. R. J. Griffith, C.M.G., D.S.O., on December the 4th.
With the month of June began those more detailed preparations for the
offensive which must be reserved for the chapter that deals with it.
By this time all ranks had become aware of what was brewing. A keen
sense of expectation was in the air. The Division had become a living
soul ere ever it crossed the Channel. The months of trench warfare
had strengthened it to an inestimable extent. The men were keyed up
to a very high pitch of daring and determination. The infantry had
the utmost confidence in itself, and in the artillery which was to
support it. Officers and men of these two arms had known each other
but a short time, but already a personal liaison, unusually close, to
grow even closer during the comparatively quiet months in Flanders,
had been established between them. The Division was to do great deeds
in after days, and upon other fields of battle, but never was there
quite the same generous and noble enthusiasm with which it entered
upon this, its first offensive. That which it was about to accomplish
will live in memory as long as there is a British Empire to honour
the exploits of British arms.
FOOTNOTES:
[17] The writer can recall working parties when the allotted task
was completed a full hour before the allotted time, owing to the
fact that the big countrymen of his company were able to carry two
sandbags full of chalk, one in either hand, at once.
[18] Afterwards Lieutenant-Colonel Peacocke, D.S.O., who was foully
murdered at his home near Cork, on June the 1st, 1921.