THE BOIS FRANÇAIS TRENCHES
This is a chapter of maps, diagrams, and technicalities. There are
people, I know, who do not want maps, to whom maps convey practically
nothing. These people can skip this chapter, and (from their point of
view) they will lose nothing. The main interest of life lies in what
is done and thought, and it does not much matter exactly where these
acts and thoughts take place. Maps are like anatomy: to some people it
is of absorbing interest to know where our bones, muscles, arteries
and all the rest of our interior lie; to others these things are of no
account whatever. Yet all are alike interested in human people. And
so, quite understanding (I think you are really very romantic in your
dislike of maps: you associate them with the duller kind of history,
and examination papers!), I bid you mapless ones farewell till page
117, promising you (again) that you shall lose nothing.
* * * * *
Now to work. We understand each other, we map-lovers. The other folk
have gone on to the next chapter, so we can take our time.
[Illustration:
_To face page 97_
MAP II.]
Now look at Map II. The River Ancre runs down west of the Thiepval
ridge, through Albert, and then in a south-westerly course through
Méricourt-l’abbé down to Corbie, where it joins the Somme on its way to
Amiens. On each side of the Ancre is high ground of about 100 metres.
The high ground between the Ancre and the Somme forms a long tableland.
There is no ridge, it is just high flat country, from three hundred and
thirty to three hundred and forty feet, cultivated and hedgeless. Now
look at Fricourt. It is a break in this high ground running on the left
bank of the Ancre, and this break is caused by a nameless tributary of
that river, that joins it just west of Méaulte. And now you will see
that this little streamlet was for over a year and a half the cause of
much thought and labour to very many men indeed: for this stream formed
the valley in which Fricourt lies; and right across this valley, just
south of that unimportant little village, ran for some twenty months or
so the Franco-German and later the Anglo-German lines.
Now look at the dotted line (--·--·) which represents the trenches.
From Thiepval down to Fricourt they run almost due north and south;
then they run up out of the valley on to the high ground at Bois
Français (a small copse, I suppose, once; I have never discovered any
vestige of a tree-stump among the shell-holes), and then abruptly run
due east. It is as though someone had appeared suddenly on the corner
of the shoulder at Bois Français, and pushed them off, compelling
them to make a détour. After five miles they manage to regain their
direction and run south again.
It is these trenches at Bois Français that we held for over four
months. I may fairly claim to know every inch of them, I think! It is
obvious that if you are at Bois Français, and look north, you have
an uninterrupted view not only of both front lines running down into
Fricourt valley, but of both lines running up on to the high ground
north of Fricourt, and a very fine view indeed of Fricourt itself,
and Fricourt wood. It is also quite clear that from their front lines
north of Fricourt the Germans had a good view of _our_ front lines and
communications in the valley; but of Bois Français and our trenches
east of it they had no enfilade view, as all our communications were
on the reverse slope of this shoulder of high ground. So as regards
observation we were best off. Moreover, whereas they could not possibly
see our support lines and communications at Bois Français, we could get
a certain amount of enfilade observation of their trenches opposite
from point 87, where was a work called Boute Redoubt and an artillery
observation post.
The position of the artillery immediately becomes clear, when the
lie of the ground is once grasped. For field artillery enfilade fire
is far most effective, as the trajectory is lower than that of heavy
artillery. That is to say, a whizz-bang (the name given to an 18-lb.
shell) more or less skims along the ground and comes _at_ you; whereas
howitzers fire up in the air, and the shell rushes down on top of you.
To be explicit at the risk of boring:--
If a battery of eighteen-pounders can fire up a trench like this:--
[Illustration: (_a_)]
it has far more effect against the nine men in that trench than if it
fires like this:
[Illustration: (_b_)]
The same applies of course to howitzers, but as howitzers drop shells
down almost perpendicularly, they can be used with great effect
traversing along a trench, that is to say, getting the exact range of
the trench in sketch (_b_), and dropping shells methodically from right
to left, or left to right, so many to each fire-bay, and dodging about
a bit, and going back on to a bit out of turn so that the enemy cannot
tell where the next coal-box is coming. Oh! it is a great game this for
the actors, but not for the unwilling audience.
So you can see now why a battery of field artillery was stationed in
the gully called Gibraltar, and another just west of Albert (at B):
each of these batteries could bring excellent enfilade fire on to the
German trenches. There was another battery that fired from the place
I have marked C, and another at D. The howitzers lived in all sorts
of secret places, as far back as Morlancourt some of them. One never
worried about them. They knew their own business. Once, in June, on our
way into the trenches we halted close by a battery at E, and I looked
into one of the gun-pits and saw the terrible monster sitting with its
long nose in the air. And I saw the great shells (it was a 9·6) waiting
in rows. But I felt like an interloper, and fled at the approach of a
gunner. All these howitzers you see firing on the Somme films, we never
saw or thought about; only we loved to hear their shells whistling and
“griding” (if there is no such word, I cannot help it: there is an “r”
and a “d” in the sound anyway!) over our head, and falling “crump,”
“crump,” “crump” along the German support trenches. There were a lot
of batteries in the Bois des Tailles; the woods were full of them, and
grew fuller and fuller. I do not know what they all were.
As one brigade contains four battalions, we almost invariably had
two battalions in the line, and two “in billets.” So it was usually
“six days in and six days out.” During these six days out we also
invariably supplied four working-parties per company, which lasted
nine hours from the time of falling in outside company headquarters
to dismissing after marching back. Still, it was “billets.” One
slept uninterruptedly, and with equipment and boots off. Now we were
undeniably lucky in being invariably (from February to June, 1916)
billeted in Morlancourt, which, as you can see from the map, is
situated in a regular cup with high ground all round it. I have put in
the 50-metre contour line to show exactly how the roads all run down
into it from every quarter. It was a cosy spot, and a very jolly thing
after that long, long weary grind up from Méaulte at the end of a weary
six days in, to look down on the snug little village waiting for you
below. For once over the hill and “swinging” down into Morlancourt,
one became, as it were, cut off from the war suddenly and completely.
It was somewhat like shutting the door on a stormy night: everything
outside was going on just the same, but with it was shut out also a
wearing, straining tension of body and mind.
Yes, we were very lucky in being billeted at Morlancourt. It was just
too far off to be worth shelling, whereas Bray was shelled regularly
almost every day. So was Méaulte. And there were brigades billeted
in both Bray and Méaulte. There were troops in tents in the Bois des
Tailles, and this too was sometimes shelled.
Now just look, please, at the two thick lines, which represent
alternative routes to the trenches. We were always able to relieve
by day, thanks to the rolling nature of the country. (Where the line
is dotted, this represents a trench.) We always used to go by the
route through Méaulte at one time, until they took to shelling the
road at the point I have marked Z; whether they could see us from
an observation post up la-Boiselle way, or whether they spotted us
by observation balloon or aeroplane, one cannot say. But latterly
we always used the route by the Bois des Tailles and Gibraltar.
In both cases we had to cross the high ground S.W. of point 71 by
trench, but on arrival at that point we were again in a valley and
out of observation. All along this road were a series of dug-outs,
and here were companies in reserve, R.E. headquarters, R.A.M.C.
dressing-station, field kitchens, stores, etc. And here the transport
brought up rations every evening viâ Bray. One could walk about here,
completely secure from view; but latterly they took to shelling it, and
it was not a healthy spot then. It was also enfiladed occasionally by
long-range machine-gun fire. But on the whole it was a good spot, and
one had a curious sensation being able to walk about on an open road
within a thousand yards of the Germans. The dug-outs called “71 North”
were the best. The bank sloped up very steeply from the road, thus
protecting the dug-outs along it from anything but shell-fire of very
high trajectory. And this the Germans never used. However, one did not
want to walk too far along the road, for it led round the corner
into full view of Fricourt at X. There was a trench at the side of the
road that ought to be hopped down into, but it could easily be missed,
and there was no barrier across the road! I saw a motor-cyclist dash
right along to the corner once, and return very speedily when he found
himself gazing full view at Fricourt!
[Illustration:
_To face page 103_
MAP III.]
* * * * *
Map III is an enlargement of the area in Map II, and gives details of
our trenches and the German trenches opposite. I wish I could convey
the sense of intimacy with which I am filled when I look at this
map. It is something like the feelings I should ascribe to a farmer
looking at a map of his property, every inch of which he knows by
heart; every field, every copse, every lane, every hollow and hill are
intimate things to him. With every corner he has some association;
every tree cut down, every fence repaired, every road made up, every
few hundred yards of shaw grubbed up, every acre of orchard enclosed
and planted--all these he can call back to memory at his will. So do
I know every corner, every turning in these trenches; every traverse
has its peculiar familiarity, very often its peculiar history. This
traverse was built the night after P----’s death; this trench was dug
because “75 Street” was so marked down by the enemy rifle-grenades;
another was a terrible straight trench till we built those traverses
in it; another was a morass until we boarded it. How well I remember
being half buried by a canister at the corner of “78 Street”; and the
night the mine blew in all the trench between the Fort and the Loop;
what an awful dug-out that was at Trafalgar Square; how we loathed the
straightness of Watling Street. And so on, _ad infinitum_. We were in
those trenches for over four months, and I know them as one knows the
creakings of the doors at home, the subtle smell of the bath-room,
the dusty atmosphere of the box-room, or the lowness of the cellar
door. Particularly intimate are the recollections of dug-outs, with
their good or bad conveniences in the way of beds and tables, their
beams that smote you on the head as regularly as clockwork, or their
peculiarly musty smell. One dug-out invariably smelt of high rodent;
another of sand-bag, nothing but sand-bag.
From February, then, to June we kept on going into these trenches drawn
on Map III, and then back to Morlancourt for rest and working-parties,
all as regular as clockwork. Once or twice the actual front line held
by our battalion was altered, so that I have been in the trenches all
along from the Cemetery (down in the valley) to the end of the craters
opposite Danube Trench. But every time except twice my company held
part of the trench between 83 B (the end of the craters) and the Lewis
gun position to the right of 76 Street. The usual distribution of the
battalion was as follows:--
A Company. From 80 A to L. G. (Lewis gun)
on right of 76.
B ” Maple Redoubt.
C ” 71 North.
D ” L. G. on right of 76 to 73 Street.
(After three days A and B, and C and D,
relieved each other.)
Battalion Headquarters, }
Headquarter Bombers, } Maple
M.O. and H.Q. Stretcher-bearers} Redoubt.
R.S.M. }
Maple Redoubt was what is known as a “strong point.” In case of an
enemy attack piercing our front line, the company in Maple Redoubt held
out at all costs to the last man, even if the enemy got right past and
down the hill. There was a dug-out which was provisioned full up with
bully-beef and water (in empty petrol cans) ready for this emergency.
There was a certain amount of barbed-wire put out in front of the
trenches to N., W., and E.; and there were two Lewis-gun positions at
A and B. Really it was not a bad little place, although the “Defences
of Maple Redoubt” were always looked on by us as rather more of a big
joke than anything. No one ever really took seriously the thought of
the enemy coming over and reaching Maple Redoubt. Raid the front line
he was liable to do at any moment; but attack on such a big scale as
to come right through, no, no one really ever (beneath the rank of
battalion commander, anyway) worried about that. Still, if he did,
there was the redoubt anyway; and there was another called “Redoubt
A” on the hill facing us, as one looked from Maple Redoubt across the
smoke rising from dug-outs which could just not be seen under the
bank at 71 North. Here was rumoured to be bully-beef and water also,
and the Machine-gun Corps had some positions in it which they visited
occasionally; but even a notice “No one allowed this way,” failed to
tempt me to explore its interior. One saw it, traced out on the hill,
from Maple Redoubt, and there I have no doubt it still is, with its
bully-beef intact and its water a little stale!
So much for Maple Redoubt. In case of attack, as I have said, it was
a strong point that must hold out at all costs, while the company
at 71 North came up to Rue Albert, and would support either of the
front companies as the C.O. directed. The front companies of course
held the front line to the last man. Meanwhile, the two battalions
in billets would be marching up from Morlancourt, to the high ground
above Redoubt A (that is, just east of D on Map II). Up there were a
series of entrenched “works,” known as the “intermediate line.” (The
“second line” ran a little north of point 90, N.E. of Morlancourt. But
no one took _that_ seriously, anyway.) The battalions marching up from
billets might have to hold these positions, or, what was more likely,
be ordered to counter-attack immediately. Such was the defence scheme.
“Six days in billets: three days in support. Not particularly hard,
that sounds,” I can hear someone say. I tried to disillusion people
in an earlier chapter about the easiness of the “rest” in billets,
owing to the incessant working-parties. These were even more incessant
during these four months. Let me say a few words then, also, about life
in support trenches. I admit that for officers it was not always an
over-strenuous time; but look at Tommy’s ordinary programme:--
This would be a typical day, say, in April.
4 a.m. Stand to, until it got light enough to clean your rifle;
then clean it.
About 5 a.m. Get your rifle inspected, and turn in again.
6.30 a.m. Turn out to carry breakfast up to company in front
line. (Old Kent Road very muddy after rain. A heavy dixie to be
carried from top of Weymouth Avenue, up viâ Trafalgar Square, and
76 Street to the platoon holding the trench at the Loop.)
7.45 a.m. Get your own breakfast.
9 a.m. Turn out for working-party; spend morning filling sandbags
for building traverses in Maple Redoubt.
11.30 a.m. Carry dinner up to front company. Same as 6.30 a.m.
1 p.m. Get your own dinner.
1 to 4 p.m. (With luck) rest.
4 p.m. Carry tea up to front company.
5 p.m. Get your own tea.
5.15 to 7.15 p.m. (With luck) rest.
7.15 p.m. Clean rifle.
7.30 p.m. Stand to. Rifle inspected.
Jones puts his big ugly boot out suddenly, just after you have
finished cleaning rifle, and upsets it. Result--mud all over
barrel and nose-cap.
8.30 p.m. Stand down. Have to clean rifle again and show platoon
sergeant.
9 p.m. Turn out for working-party till 12 midnight in front line.
12 midnight. Hot soup.
12.15 a.m. Dug-out at last till
4 a.m. Stand to.
And so on for three days and nights. This is really quite a moderate
programme: it is one that you would aim at for your men. But there are
disturbing elements that sometimes compel you to dock a man’s afternoon
rest, for instance. A couple of canisters block Watling Street; you
_must_ send a party of ten men and an N.C.O. to clear it at once: or
you suddenly have to supply a party to carry “footballs” up to Rue
Albert for the trench-mortar man. The Adjutant is sorry; he could not
let you know before; but they have just come up to the Citadel, and
must be unloaded at once. So you have to find the men for this on the
spur of the moment. And so it goes on night and day. Oh, it’s not all
rum and sleep, is life in Maple Redoubt.
Three days and nights in support, and then comes the three days in the
front line.
Now we will take it that “B” Company is holding from 80 A to the
Lewis-gun position to the right of 76 Street. You will notice at once
that almost the whole of No Man’s Land in front of this sector of
trenches is a chain of mine craters. No one can have much idea of a
crater until he actually sees one. I can best describe it as a hollow
like a quarry or chalk hole about fifty yards in diameter and some
forty or fifty feet deep. (They vary in size, of course, but that is
about the average.) The sides, which are steepish, and vary in angle
between thirty and sixty degrees, are composed of a very fine thin
soil, which is, in point of fact, a thick sediment of powdered soil
that has returned to earth after a tempestuous ascent into the sky. A
large mine always causes a “lip” above the ground level, which appears
in section somewhat like this:--
[Illustration]
There is usually water in the bottom of the deeper craters. When a
series of craters is formed, running into one another, you get a very
uneven floor that appears in lengthwise section thus:--
[Illustration:
The dotted line is the ground level: the uneven line is the course
that would be taken by a man walking along the bottom of the chain of
craters, and keeping in the centre. Actually, of course, (on patrol)
one would not keep in the centre where the crater contained water, but
would skirt the water by going to one side of it. The “bridges” are
important, as they are naturally the easiest way across the craters; a
bombing patrol, for instance, could crawl over a bridge, without having
to go right down to the bottom level, and (which is more important)
will not have a steep climb up over very soft and spongy soil. These
bridges are the “lips” of the larger craters where they join the
smaller; looking at a crater-chain _in plan_ X is a “bridge,” whereas
Y and Z are “lips” rising above ground level.
[Illustration]
This crater-chain being understood, the system of sentries is easily
grasped. Originally, before mining commenced, our front line ran
(roughly) from left to right along Rue Albert up 80 A Street and along
to the top of 76 Street in a straight line. Then began the great game
of mining under the enemy parapet and blowing him up; and its corollary
countermining, or blowing up the enemy’s mine galleries before he
reached your parapet. Such is the game as played underground by the
tunnelling companies, R.E. To the infantry belongs the work (if not
blown up) of consolidating the crater, whether made by your or an enemy
mine, that is to say, of seizing your side of the crater and guarding
it by bombing-posts in such a way as to prevent the enemy from doing
anything except hold his side of the crater.
[Illustration: German front line
Our front line]
For instance, take a single crater, caused by us blowing up the German
gallery before it reaches our parapet. If we do nothing, the enemy digs
a trench into the crater at A, and can get into the crater any time he
likes and bomb our front line, and return to his trench unseen. This,
of course, never happens, as we dig a sap into the crater from our
side, and the result is stale-mate; each side can see into the crater,
so neither can go into it.
That is all. 83 B, 81 A, the Matterhorn sap, the Loop, the Fort--they
are all saps up to crater-edges, in some cases joined up along the edge
(as between 83 B and 83 A, or at the Loop and the Fort.) And these saps
are held by bombing-posts. Where there are no craters in front (as, for
instance, between the Fort and the Loop), there the trench is held by
sentry groups in the ordinary way. The most important bombing-posts are
at the “bridges,” which are the points that most want guarding.
Each platoon has so many posts to “find” men for. No. 5 Platoon has
three posts between the Lewis-gun position and the top of 76 Street;
No. 6 finds two in the Fort and one between the Fort and the Loop;
there is another post before you reach the Loop, found by No. 7, who
also finds two in the Loop itself; while No. 8 finds the Matterhorn
post and the top of 80 A. All these posts are composed of one bomber,
who has a box of bombs with him and his rifle without bayonet fixed,
and one bayonet man. There is no special structure about a “post”: it
is just the spot in the trench where the sentries are placed. Sometimes
one or two posts could be dispensed with by day, if one post could with
a periscope watch the ground in front of both. The sentry groups are
relieved every two hours by the platoon N.C.O. on trench duty. There
is always an N.C.O. on trench duty, going the rounds of his sentry
groups, in every platoon; and one officer going round the groups in
the company. Thus is secured the endless chain of unwinking eyes that
stretches from Dunkirk to Switzerland.
There were two Lewis guns to every company. One had a position at the
Fort, covering the ground between the Fort and the Loop; the other was
just to the right of 80 A, where it had a good position sweeping the
craters. The Lewis-gun teams found their sentries independently of the
platoons, and had their dug-outs. A nice compact little affair was a
Lewis-gun team; always very snug and self-contained.
Company Headquarters were at Trafalgar Square, though later we changed
to a dug-out half-way up 76 Street. Each platoon had a dug-out about
fifty yards behind the front line, and as far as possible one arranged
to get the men a few hours’ sleep in them every day; but only a certain
percentage at a time. There were four stretcher-bearers and two
signallers also at Trafalgar Square. Also a permanent wiring-party had
its quarters here, a corporal and five men; they made up “concertina”
or “gooseberry” wire by day, and were out three or four hours every
night putting it out. They were, of course, exempt from other platoon
duties. Each platoon had a pioneer to attend to sanitary arrangements,
and other odd jobs such as fetching up soup; and each platoon had an
orderly ready to take messages. At Company Headquarters, besides the
officers’ servants, were the company orderly, and company officers’
cook. An officer on trench duty was accompanied by his servant as
orderly.
This was the distribution of the company in the front line. Every
morning from 9 to 12 all men not on sentry worked at repairing and
improving the trenches; and the same for four hours during the night.
Work done to strengthen the parapet can only be done by night. Every
night wire was put out. Every night a patrol went out. Every day one
“stood to” arms for an hour before dawn, and an hour after dusk.
And day and night there was an intermittent stinging and buzzing of
black-winged instruments between the opposing trenches. Of shells I
have already spoken; next in deadliness were rifle-grenades, which are
bombs with a rod attachment that is put down the barrel of an ordinary
rifle. Four of these rifles are stood in a rack fixed to the ground,
and fired by a string from a few yards away, at a very high trajectory.
They are a very deadly weapon, as you cannot see them dropping on to
you. Then there is a multiform genus called “trench-mortar,” being
projectiles of all kinds and shapes lobbed over from close range. The
canister was the most loathed. It was simply a tin oil-can, the size
of a lady’s muff (large); one heard a thud, and watched the beast
rising, rising, then stationary, it seemed, in mid-air, and then come
toppling down, down, down on top of one with a crash--three seconds’
silence--and then a most colossal explosion, blowing everything in
its vicinity to atoms. These canisters were loathed by the men with a
most personal and intense aversion. Yet they were really not nearly so
dangerous as rifle-grenades, as one had time to dodge them very often,
unless enfiladed in a communication trench. They were, moreover, very
local in their effects. A shell has splinters that spread far and wide;
a trench-mortar is a clumsy monster with a thin skin, no splinters,
and an abominable, noisy, vulgar way of making the most of itself.
“Sausages” were another but milder form of the vulgar trench-mortar;
aerial torpedoes were daintier people with wings, who looked so
cherubic as they came sailing over, that one almost forgot their deadly
stinging powers; they, too, were a species of trench-mortar.
It is natural to write lightly of these things; yet they were no light
matters. They were the instruments of death that took their daily toll
of lives. In this chapter describing the system and routine of ordinary
trench warfare, I have tried to prepare the canvas for several pictures
I have drawn in bold bare lines; now I am putting in a wash of colour,
the atmosphere of Death.
Sometimes we forgot it in the interest of the present activity;
sometimes we saw it face to face, without a qualm; but always it was
there with its relentless overhanging presence, dulling our spirits,
wearing out our lives. The papers are always full of Tommy smiling:
Bairnsfather has immortalised his indomitable humour. Yes, it is true.
We laugh, we smile. But for an hour of laughter, there are how many
hours of weariness, strain, and grim agony! It is great that Tommy’s
laughter has been immortalised; but do not forget that its greatness
lies in this, that it was uttered beneath the canopy of ever-impending
Death.