to the bank, the river thrusts suddenly north-westward, in a very
noble great horse-shoe, the bend of which comes at Fargny where our
lines touched it. The enemy line touched the horse-shoe close to our
own at a curious wooded bank or slope, known (from its shape on the
map, which is like a cocked hat) as the Chapeau de Gendarme. Just
behind our lines, at the bend, the horse-shoe sweeps round to the
south. The river-bed at once broadens to about two-thirds of a mile,
and the river, in four or five main channels, passes under a most
beautiful sweep of steep chalk cliff, not unlike some of the chalk
country near Arundel. These places marked the end of the British
sector at the time of the beginning of the battle. On the south or
left bank of the Somme River the ground was held by the French.
* * * * *
Such was our old front line at the beginning of the battle, and so the
travellers of our race will strive to picture it when they see the
ground under the crops of coming Julys. It was never anything but a
makeshift, patched together, and held, God knows how, against greater
strength. Our strongest places were the half-dozen built-up
observation posts at the mines near Fricourt, Serre, and La Boisselle.
For the rest, our greatest strength was but a couple of sandbags deep.
There was no concrete in any part of the line, very few iron girders
and not many iron "humpies" or "elephant backs" to make the roofs of
dugouts. The whole line gives the traveller the impression that it was
improvised (as it was) by amateurs with few tools, and few resources,
as best they could, in a time of need and danger. Like the old,
hurriedly built Long Walls at Athens, it sufficed, and like the old
camps of Cæsar it served, till our men could take the much finer lines
of the enemy. A few words may be said about those enemy lines. They
were very different lines from ours.
The defences of the enemy front line varied a little in degree, but
hardly at all in kind, throughout the battlefield. The enemy wire was
always deep, thick, and securely staked with iron supports, which were
either crossed like the letter +X+, or upright, with loops to take the
wire and shaped at one end like corkscrews so as to screw into the
ground. The wire stood on these supports on a thick web, about four
feet high and from thirty to forty feet across. The wire used was
generally as thick as sailor's marline stuff, or two twisted
rope-yarns. It contained, as a rule, some sixteen barbs to the foot.
The wire used in front of our lines was generally galvanized, and
remained grey after months of exposure. The enemy wire, not being
galvanized, rusted to a black colour, and shows up black at a great
distance. In places this web or barrier was supplemented with
trip-wire, or wire placed just above the ground, so that the artillery
observing officers might not see it and so not cause it to be
destroyed. This trip-wire was as difficult to cross as the wire of the
entanglements. In one place (near the Y Ravine at Beaumont Hamel) this
trip-wire was used with thin iron spikes a yard long of the kind known
as calthrops. The spikes were so placed in the ground that about one
foot of spike projected. The scheme was that our men should catch
their feet in the trip-wire, fall on the spikes, and be transfixed.
In places, in front of the front line in the midst of his wire,
sometimes even in front of the wire, the enemy had carefully hidden
snipers and machine-gun posts. Sometimes these outside posts were
connected with his front-line trench by tunnels, sometimes they were
simply shell-holes, slightly altered with a spade to take the snipers
and the gunners. These outside snipers had some success in the early
parts of the battle. They caused losses among our men by firing in the
midst of them and by shooting them in the backs after they had
passed. Usually the posts were small oblong pans in the mud, in which
the men lay. Sometimes they were deep narrow graves in which the men
stood to fire through a funnel in the earth. Here and there, where the
ground was favourable, especially when there was some little knop,
hillock, or bulge of ground just outside their line, as near
Gommecourt Park and close to the Sunken Road at Beaumont Hamel, he
placed several such posts together. Outside Gommecourt, a slight
lynchet near the enemy line was prepared for at least a dozen such
posts invisible from any part of our line and not easily to be picked
out by photograph, and so placed as to sweep at least a mile of No
Man's Land.
[Illustration: Sleighs used for conveying the Wounded through the
Mud]
When these places had been passed, and the enemy wire, more or less
cut by our shrapnel, had been crossed, our men had to attack the enemy
fire trenches of the first line. These, like the other defences,
varied in degree, but not in kind. They were, in the main, deep, solid
trenches, dug with short bays or zigzags in the pattern of the Greek
Key or badger's earth. They were seldom less than eight feet and
sometimes as much as twelve feet deep. Their sides were revetted, or
held from collapsing, by strong wickerwork. They had good,
comfortable standing slabs or banquettes on which the men could stand
to fire. As a rule, the parapets were not built up with sandbags as
ours were.
In some parts of the line, the front trenches were strengthened at
intervals of about fifty yards by tiny forts or fortlets made of
concrete and so built into the parapet that they could not be seen
from without, even five yards away. These fortlets were pierced with a
foot-long slip for the muzzle of a machine gun, and were just big
enough to hold the gun and one gunner.
In the forward wall of the trenches were the openings of the shafts
which led to the front-line dugouts. The shafts are all of the same
pattern. They have open mouths about four feet high, and slant down
into the earth for about twenty feet at an angle of forty-five
degrees. At the bottom of the stairs which led down are the living
rooms and barracks which communicate with each other so that if a
shaft collapse the men below may still escape by another. The shafts
and living rooms are strongly propped and panelled with wood, and this
has led to the destruction of most of the few which survived our
bombardment. While they were needed as billets our men lived in them.
Then the wood was removed, and the dugout and shaft collapsed.
During the bombardment before an attack, the enemy kept below in his
dugouts. If one shaft were blown in by a shell, they passed to the
next. When the fire "lifted" to let the attack begin, they raced up
the stairs with their machine guns and had them in action within a
minute. Sometimes the fire was too heavy for this, for trench,
parapet, shafts, dugouts, wood, and fortlets, were pounded out of
existence, so that no man could say that a line had ever run there;
and in these cases the garrison was destroyed in the shelters. This
happened in several places, though all the enemy dugouts were kept
equipped with pioneer tools by which buried men could dig themselves
out.
The direction of the front-line trenches was so inclined with bends,
juts, and angles as to give flanking fire upon attackers.
At some little distance behind the front line (a hundred yards or so)
was a second fire line, wired like the first, though less elaborate
and generally without concrete fortlets. This second line was usually
as well sited for fire as the front line. There were many
communication trenches between the two lines. Half a mile behind the
second line was a third support line; and behind this, running along
the whole front, a mile or more away, was the prepared second main
position, which was in every way like the front line, with wire,
concrete fortlets, dugouts, and a difficult glacis for the attacker to
climb.
The enemy batteries were generally placed behind banks or lynchets
which gave good natural cover; but in many places he mounted guns in
strong permanent emplacements, built up of timber balks, within a
couple of miles (at Fricourt within a quarter of a mile) of his front
line. In woods from the high trees of which he could have clear
observation, as in the Bazentin, Bernafay, and Trones Woods, he had
several of these emplacements, and also stout concrete fortlets for
heavy single guns.
All the enemy position on the battlefield was well gunned at the time
of the beginning of the battle. In modern war, it is not possible to
hide preparations for an attack on a wide front. Men have to be
brought up, trenches have to be dug, the artillery has to prepare, and
men, guns, and trenches have to be supplied with food, water, shells,
sandbags, props, and revetments. When the fire on any sector increases
tenfold, while the roads behind the lines are thronged with five times
the normal traffic of troops and lorries, and new trenches, the attack
or "jumping-off" trenches, are being dug in front of the line, a
commander cannot fail to know that an attack is preparing. These
preparations must be made and cannot be concealed from observers in
the air or on the ground. The enemy knew very well that we were about
to attack upon the Somme front, but did not know at which point to
expect the main thrust. To be ready, in any case, he concentrated guns
along the sector. It seems likely that he expected our attack to be an
attempt to turn Bapaume by a thrust from the west, by Gommecourt,
Puisieux, Grandcourt. In all this difficult sector his observations
and arrangements for cross-fire were excellent. He concentrated a
great artillery here (it is a legend among our men that he brought up
a hundred batteries to defend Gommecourt alone). In this sector, and
in one other place a little to the south of it, his barrage upon our
trenches, before the battle, was very accurate, terrible, and deadly.
Our attacks were met by a profuse machine-gun fire from the trench
parapets and from the hidden pits between and outside the lines. There
was not very much rifle fire in any part of the battle, but all the
hotly fought for strongholds were defended by machine guns to the
last. It was reported that the bodies of some enemy soldiers were
found chained to their guns, and that on the bodies of others were
intoxicating pills, designed to madden and infuriate the takers before
an attack. The fighting in the trenches was mainly done by bombing
with hand-grenades, of which the enemy had several patterns, all
effective. His most used type was a grey tin cylinder, holding about a
pound of explosive, and screwed to a wooden baton or handle about a
foot long for the greater convenience of throwing.
* * * * *
Early in the spring of 1916, it was determined that an attack should
be made by our armies upon these lines of the enemy, so as to bring
about a removal of the enemy guns and men, then attacking the French
at Verdun and the Russians on the eastern front.
Preparations for this attack were made throughout the first half of
the year. New roads were cut, old roads were remetalled, new lines of
railways were surveyed and laid, and supplies and munitions were
accumulated not far from the front. Pumping stations were built and
wells were sunk for the supply of water to the troops during the
battle. Fresh divisions were brought up and held ready behind the
line. An effort was made to check the enemy's use of aeroplanes. In
June, our Air Service in the Somme sector made it so difficult for the
enemy to take photographs over our lines that his knowledge of our
doings along the front of the planned battle was lessened and
thwarted. At the same time, many raids were made by our aeroplanes
upon the enemy's depots and magazines behind his front. Throughout
June, our infantry raided the enemy line in many places to the north
of the planned battle. It seems possible that these raids led him to
think that our coming attack would be made wholly to the north of the
Ancre River.
[Illustration: The Assault on July 1, 1916, at La Boisselle]
During the latter half of June, our armies concentrated a very great
number of guns behind the front of the battle. The guns were of every
kind, from the field gun to the heaviest howitzer. Together they made
what was at that time by far the most terrible concentration of
artillery ever known upon a battlefield. Vast stores of shells of
every known kind were made ready, and hourly increased.
As the guns came into battery, they opened intermittent fire, so that,
by the 20th of June, the fire along our front was heavier than it had
been before. At the same time, the fire of the machine guns and trench
mortars in our trenches became hotter and more constant. On the 24th
of June this fire was increased, by system, along the front designed
for the battle, and along the French front to the south of the Somme,
until it reached the intensity of a fire of preparation. Knowing, as
they did, that an attack was to come, the enemy made ready and kept on
the alert. Throughout the front, they expected the attack for the next
morning.
The fire was maintained throughout the night, but no attack was made
in the morning, except by aeroplanes. These raided the enemy
observation balloons, destroyed nine of them, and made it impossible
for the others to keep in the air. The shelling continued all that
day, searching the line and particular spots with intense fire and
much asphyxiating gas. Again the enemy prepared for an attack in the
morning, and again there was no attack, although the fire of
preparation still went on. The enemy said, "To-morrow will make three
whole days of preparation; the English will attack to-morrow." But
when the morning came, there was no attack, only the never-ceasing
shelling, which seemed to increase as time passed. It was now
difficult and dangerous to move within the enemy lines. Relieving
exhausted soldiers, carrying out the wounded, and bringing up food
and water to the front, became terrible feats of war. The fire
continued and increased, all that day and all the next day, and the
day after that. It darkened the days with smoke and lit the nights
with flashes. It covered the summer landscape with a kind of haze of
hell, earth-coloured above fields and reddish above villages, from the
dust of blown mud and brick flung up into the air. The tumult of these
days and nights cannot be described nor imagined. The air was without
wind yet it seemed in a hurry with the passing of death. Men knew not
which they heard, a roaring that was behind and in front, like a
presence, or a screaming that never ceased to shriek in the air. No
thunder was ever so terrible as that tumult. It broke the drums of the
ears when it came singly, but when it rose up along the front and gave
tongue together in full cry it humbled the soul. With the roaring,
crashing, and shrieking came a racket of hammers from the machine guns
till men were dizzy and sick from the noise, which thrust between
skull and brain, and beat out thought. With the noise came also a
terror and an exultation, that one should hurry, and hurry, and hurry,
like the shrieking shells, into the pits of fire opening on the hills.
Every night in all this week the enemy said, "The English will attack
to-morrow," and in the front lines prayed that the attack might come,
that so an end, any end, might come to the shelling.
It was fine, cloudless, summer weather, not very clear, for there was
a good deal of heat haze and of mist in the nights and early mornings.
It was hot yet brisk during the days. The roads were thick in dust.
Clouds and streamers of chalk dust floated and rolled over all the
roads leading to the front, till men and beasts were grey with it.
At half-past six in the morning of the 1st of July all the guns on our
front quickened their fire to a pitch of intensity never before
attained. Intermittent darkness and flashing so played on the enemy
line from Gommecourt to Maricourt that it looked like a reef on a
loppy day. For one instant it could be seen as a white rim above the
wire, then some comber of a big shell struck it fair and spouted it
black aloft. Then another and another fell, and others of a new kind
came and made a different darkness, through which now and then some
fat white wreathing devil of explosion came out and danced. Then it
would show out, with gaps in it, and with some of it level with the
field, till another comber would fall and go up like a breaker and
smash it out of sight again. Over all the villages on the field there
floated a kind of bloody dust from the blasted bricks.
In our trenches after seven o'clock on that morning, our men waited
under a heavy fire for the signal to attack. Just before half-past
seven, the mines at half a dozen points went up with a roar that shook
the earth and brought down the parapets in our lines. Before the
blackness of their burst had thinned or fallen the hand of Time rested
on the half-hour mark, and along all that old front line of the
English there came a whistling and a crying. The men of the first wave
climbed up the parapets, in tumult, darkness, and the presence of
death, and having done with all pleasant things, advanced across the
No Man's Land to begin the Battle of the Somme.
THE END
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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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| Typographical errors corrected in text: |
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| Page 61: siegneurial replaced with seigneurial |
| Page 84: protuding replaced with protruding |
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| Interesting words in this document: |
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| A rampike is an erect broken or dead tree. |
| Eyrie is an alternate spelling for Aerie. |
| Tetter is a generic name for a number of skin diseases, |
| such as eczema, psoriasis, or herpes, characterized by |
| eruptions and itching. |
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