Part 2 (2/2)
Nor must we fail to remember with grat.i.tude the three cavalry officers who were attached to us during the winter for periods of one month: Captain A. L. Friend and Lieut. Ansell, of the 7th Dragoon Guards, and Captain M. Simmonds, Indian Cavalry. All did their best to relieve the short-handed company officers, while Captain Simmonds, although a senior captain, took charge of a platoon, and shared all fatigue duties with the subalterns of the Battalion.
When we were back in reserve the various amus.e.m.e.nts and relaxations, which a stationary warfare permits, were elaborated for the benefit of the men.
Christmas Day was fortunately spent at Authie, and the various companies sat down in comfort in the estaminets to a splendid dinner.
Three pigs had been killed for the Battalion's consumption, a plum pudding was presented to each N.C.O. and man by the C.O., and others arrived from the _Daily News_ Fund. A tin of cigarettes came from Messrs. H. and G. Simonds', a packet of cigars from the Maidenhead Fund. Each man received a s.h.i.+rt, m.u.f.fler, socks and chocolate, the produce of a fund most energetically collected from Berks.h.i.+re by Mrs.
Serocold and Mrs. Hedges. The officers spent an equally happy evening at the chateau, whose owner, Madame De Wailly, kindly provided a room and all other requisites.
A Divisional Football Cup was given by the G.O.C., which was competed for by all units of the 48th Division under a.s.sociation rules. We were beaten in the first round by the 5th Gloucesters, who scored the winning goal just on time, after an exciting game, in which Sergt.
Hedges distinguished himself. The 'Varlets' of the 1st/1st South Midland Field Ambulance, and the Divisional Variety Troupe, of which Private Cooter (B Company) was a well-known member, performed for our benefit, and perhaps most attractive of all was Major Barron's cinematograph entertainment, which was always sure of the warmest reception.
Thus the first winter pa.s.sed in the normal alternations of trench welfare.
CHAPTER VIII
THE NEW TRENCH AND THE RAID
The spring of 1916 was slow in coming. The German attack at Verdun had coincided with a long spell of deep snow and bitter cold. An officer going on leave at the end of February vividly remembers his experiences on the frozen roads, and the sight of a column of French troops of all arms 20 miles long, making their way painfully along the great 'Route Nationale' to Amiens to join in the defence of Verdun.
But towards the end of March the weather grew warm and genial and the wild daffodils began to appear in all the fields around Sailly.
Meanwhile the preliminaries for the Somme offensive became increasingly significant. The forward villages such as Sailly and Bayencourt were cleared of the civil population, and handed over entirely to the Army. Still more monstrous guns came crawling up, and in place of the old battery of 60-pounders, the orchard at the western outskirts of Sailly, in the angle of the Bayencourt road, harboured two 15-inch howitzers. Gun-pits and enormous new dugouts were constructed in Hebuterne. The single-line railway which served the 48th and 4th Division with railheads at Acheux and Louvaincourt was supplemented by numbers of light lines. Troops grew thick upon the ground; the 56th Division appeared upon our left, the 31st on the right, and in May the front held by the Division scarcely exceeded that allotted to a single battalion during the winter. A 4th Army had been formed, of which the 48th Division was on the left in the 10th Corps. Conferences were held by the G.O.C. with C.O.'s and Adjutants two or three times a week, while parties were constantly detailed to witness demonstrations of gas, smoke and flame throwers. At last, also, the drafts so badly needed and so long overdue appeared in fairly adequate numbers; in March alone 202 men joined the Battalion for duty, which brought our total strength up to 874.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Map.]
Meanwhile the G.O.C. was planning for the execution of the 145th Brigade a task, which sounds prosaic enough on paper, but which demanded for its success minute organisation and a high state of discipline in all concerned--namely, the digging of a forward trench in front of our own wire. Our line between Hebuterne and Serre sagged back in a westerly direction from Trench Hoche to Trench Bouillon, thereby interposing 800-900 yards between ourselves and the Germans, with an intervening rise in No Man's Land. This configuration of the ground presented three obvious defects for offensive operations. It was impossible for the gunners to get direct observation on the sector of enemy trench opposite; it meant that troops deploying for the attack would get out of trenches facing in three directions, and would have to cross an unnecessary depth of sh.e.l.l-swept ground before getting to the a.s.sault. It was, therefore, determined to straighten out the line between the two points mentioned above. The battalions concerned a.s.siduously practised wire-cutting, filing silently through the gaps, and night-digging. Our Battalion, which was to find the covering parties, took over the part of the line affected (J Sector, from Serre road to Trench La.s.salle) a week beforehand, and every effort was made by means of patrols, two or three of which went out each night, to locate any forward posts or rifle pits from which the enemy might get wind of or interfere with the digging of the new trench. On the night of the 9th-10th April the scheme was carried out under the direction of Major Clissold (1st/1st Field Company, South Midland R.E.'s), an unfailing friend of the infantry, who was killed in the autumn of 1917. About 1,500 men in all were engaged; the digging was done by the 4th Oxfords and the 5th Gloucesters, while covering parties and fatigues were provided by the Bucks Battalion and ourselves. About six hours were allotted for the completion of the work, from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. The moon, which was near the full, shone brilliantly, though at times obscured by clouds, so that there was no fear of the confusion which arises from darkness, but rather of detection by the enemy's posts. Soon after 8.30 p.m. A Company, who were responsible for the protection from the right to the Puisieux road, strung themselves out into groups of three, some 20 yards apart, about 70 paces in front of the tape which marked the course of the proposed trench. While Captain Crouch, of the Bucks, was similarly employed on the left, some of his men, losing touch, ran into the vision of Hun sentries at the Poplars and were received with shots and bombs, which caused uneasy antic.i.p.ations of discovery, happily unfulfilled. The diggers got to work behind their screen, and ate into the ground with remarkable speed, for stray rounds of shrapnel, intermittent sniping, and the constant discharge of Verey lights throughout the night, suggested that the Hun had some uneasy suspicion that all was not quite as usual; and indeed it seems almost incredible that the clash of the tools, the whispered orders, and the movements of the wiring parties should have entirely failed to strike the ear of a vigilant sentry at 250 yards. By 2 a.m. the work was almost finished; nothing remained but to strengthen the parapet of the new trench and to fill up the s.p.a.ces between the knife-rests, which defended it some 40 yards in front, with screw pickets and loose strands of wire. By 3.20 a.m. all the diggers had returned to the old line, and the weary covering party, who had lain out for seven tedious hours, came home to get a hot drink, which they had well earned. Only 15 casualties were reported from the whole Brigade, none of which fell to the share of our Battalion. The trench was held by a few posts until dawn and then evacuated. About noon next day an enemy aeroplane flew along it, and the observer could be plainly seen leaning out and taking photographs of this mushroom growth. Almost immediately every battery from La Brayelle to Serre began to register upon it, and for weeks it was rendered unwholesome by the constant attention of artillery and mine-throwers. A poem of Lieut. Downs' preserves the air of mystery in which the whole scheme was so fortunately conceived and executed.
A whisper wandered round Of a plan of the G.O.C's, And figures surveyed the ground In stealthy groups of threes; But the whole Brigade were there, Or pretty well all the lot, When we dug the trench at Never-mind-where, On April the Never mind-what.
The What's-a-names dug the trench, The Who-is-its found the screen, And we mustn't forget to mench The Thingumies in between; The Tothermies built the fence, And the R.E.'s ”also ran,”
For we didn't spare any expense, With labour a s.h.i.+lling a man.
There isn't much else to tell, Though the enemy made a song.
And tried to blow it to h.e.l.l, But got the address all wrong; For you'll find it's still out there In the bally old self-same spot, That trench which we built at Never-mind-where, On April the Never-mind-what.
After these excitements the Battalion moved back on the 12th, half to Sailly, half to the huts in the park of Couin Chateau, which were leaky and surrounded by a pathless mora.s.s of mud several inches deep.
Here the Battalion was reinoculated, as 18 months had elapsed since the original dose was injected in the autumn of 1914, and spent its mornings in Platoon and Company Drill, until its return to J Sector on the 20th. There was plenty of work and little comfort in the line that tour. The conditions resembled those of the winter at their worst; in the new trench, hastily dug and unrevetted, water and mud engulfed the pa.s.ser-by to the waist. One afternoon a German was reported to have got in, and the Adjutant (Lieut. Ridley) who happened to be on the spot, at once organised a bombing party to deal with him, but after wading laboriously to the point indicated, found that the bird had flown. Meanwhile, the Huns showed their displeasure by sending into the sector 500-1,000 sh.e.l.ls every day, and casualties were naturally higher than the normal, including Lieut. Duff seriously wounded, and Lieut. Calder sh.e.l.l-shock. No one was therefore sorry when on the 25th we returned to Authie, after an interval of three months, to the great delight of the inhabitants, and enjoyed the spring for a short while in that pleasant valley. Before returning to the line the battalion spent a few days at Sailly and Couin, furnis.h.i.+ng working parties for Hebuterne each night and day. On May 8th we relieved the 4th Oxfords in G Sector on the extreme right of the Brigade front. This tour was destined to be memorable in the history of the Battalion. The ground was entirely new to us, and extremely difficult. All rations and supplies had to be brought up from Hebuterne by communication trenches more than a mile long and in bad repair. The whole sector had been the scene of a fierce battle in June 1915, for the possession of Touvent Farm and the outskirts of Serre, and was everywhere cut up by old disused trenches, French and German, and sh.e.l.l holes, and was still littered with bones and skulls. Nor was the front line more attractive; it formed a sharp salient projecting towards Serre, held by disconnected posts, ill defended, close to the enemy, and joined to the support line by only two communication trenches, one at each side of the salient. So vague and difficult of identification was this line of posts that Captain Cruttwell, when visiting them for the first time, nearly walked into the German lines while trying to establish connection with D Company, until warned of his mistake by a shower of rifle-grenades. The whole sector, indeed, closely resembled the crater areas, which the experiences of the Somme were to render familiar. The first week in this dreary spot pa.s.sed uneventfully; the enemy guns and _minenwerfer_, the latter of the largest calibre, whose explosion was deafening, were active, but not unusually so, and up to the 15th the Battalion could congratulate themselves on an absence of casualties during the tour. They were to be relieved next day, and it seemed that the trouble always expected here would be reserved for others. During the 15th, however, the usual sh.e.l.ling seemed to the two Company Commanders in the front line--Captain Cruttwell, of B, and Captain Attride, of D, to be more methodical and to suggest a registration on all tactical points. Still this impression was not definite enough to arouse serious foreboding. Up to midnight all was quiet. Then a heavy bombardment opened upon the 56th Division on the left; our divisional guns, who were helping to cover that sector, opened at once in response to the S.O.S. The two anxious Company Commanders felt convinced that if a raid was intended they would not be the victims of it. But as soon as our guns were securely switched off on to a false target, the enemy showed his hand. His guns ceased to play on the 56th Division and were directed with extreme violence against our front. It was then 12.30 a.m. on the morning of May 16th; the raid had begun.
It is now necessary, in order to understand its course, to describe minutely, with the aid of the map, the dispositions of the two Companies affected. The length of the line was approximately 1,200 yards; on the right B Company had two platoons in the front line strung out into seven posts between Nairne and Wrangel, each containing from six to nine men. Two sections and a Lewis gun team were in Jones Street, which had been chosen as the main defensive line in case of attack. The remaining two sections with another Lewis gun were in Caber, and the fourth platoon in Worcester Street. Company Headquarters were established some 800 yards behind the front line, at Pimlico, where a platoon of A Company was placed in dugouts at the disposal of O.C. Company. The line of D Company on the left stretched from Wrangel to Jena, and was similarly held by two platoons furnis.h.i.+ng eight posts. The supporting platoon on the right was equally divided between Trench Dominique and Oxford Street; that on the left was located in the forward end of Jena. Company Headquarters were in Vauban, and Captain Attride disposed of a reserve platoon of C Company in Vercingetorix. Further two platoons of C Company which were returning from a working party in Wrangel when the bombardment started, were placed in dugouts near Pimlico.
[Ill.u.s.tration: 16 May 1916]
The plan of the bombardment, which was a masterpiece of method, was as follows:--From 12.30 to 1 a.m. the whole of our front and supervision line was bombarded with field guns, 5.9-inch howitzers and mine-throwers; but the chief intensity of fire was directed at B Company between Nairne and Cha.s.seur Hedge, with the object, which was practically accomplished, of destroying or burying all the posts included therein. At 1 a.m. a red rocket was shot up from the enemy lines, and the fire from Nairne to Wrangel lifted, but fell with redoubled fury on the support and reserve lines, where every communication trench and dugout was deluged with sh.e.l.ls. At Pimlico, in particular, 5.9-inch sh.e.l.ls were thrown at the rate of 100 a minute, enveloping it in a dense fog of smoke and fumes, and the supporting platoon of A Company lost nearly half its strength.
Meanwhile the fire on either flank covered both front line and support, rendering lateral communication impossible. Thus B Company was isolated, and the enemy infantry immediately entered. Post No. 7 opposed their entry, but was overpowered--none of the nine men who composed it were ever seen again, but the ground about was afterwards found littered with exploded and unexploded German bombs, showing that they had fought a good fight. The Germans then divided into two parties with separate tasks. One party worked along Jones Street towards the right, some moving in the trench, some along the parados.
They destroyed the left post in Jones Street, but were eventually checked by Lance-Corpl. Cooke with his Lewis Gun team, which, reflecting the coolness of its commander, kept up a steady rifle fire when the gun jammed. The Huns then retired and left Jones Street at the point of entry, after fulfilling what was presumably their job of protecting their comrades from attack in the rear. For the other party, working along the fire trench, attacked Posts 6-2 inclusive from the rear. These posts were in sore straits. Their defences had been blown to pieces, their rifles damaged, broken or buried, and their bombs scattered; they had themselves been shaken or buried and were left defenceless. The story of a survivor from Post 2, who escaped, will serve as an example. As they endeavoured to extricate themselves and their weapons from the wrecked post, Germans appeared behind them and ordered them in English to mount the parapet or they would be shot. Private Chapman at once tackled an officer with his fists and, shot by the latter's revolver, died most bravely. Four men were taken, and one alone escaped. However, 12 survivors in all reached Post 1, which remained intact and resisted stoutly. Here Lieut. Ward, who was on duty, took charge, and reorganised the 12, only to find that some were wounded, and that the rifles of the remainder were useless. Accordingly he withdrew towards Nairne, and was fortunate to get them back safely, for at one point four Germans peered into the trench, which was a very deep one, close to the party, but made off when Ward loosed his revolver at them. Meanwhile, No. 1 Post, under Sergt. Holloway, a brave soldier from Abingdon, facing both to front and rear, drove back all the enemy who approached them with rifle and bombs, and effectively staved off their progress towards Nairne, where the position was secured by a post of 13th West Yorks (31st Division) which was promptly moved to the left in answer to Lieut. Ward's request. The support platoon was organised for defence in Caber by Lieut. Field, who remained with his men though seriously wounded. Here he was found by Lieut. Gathorne-Hardy, who, with his usual contempt for danger, had volunteered to go up from Company Headquarters to re-establish connection, which had been broken within five minutes of the commencement of the bombardment.
While B Company was being attacked, fire was still directed with violence on the front line of the left Company, and continued until 1.40 a.m., when it also lifted on to the support and reserve areas.
The damage here had been mainly confined to Posts 1-3, where all the men had been killed or buried; at Post 1 five men were saved by the systematic and collected courage of Private Appleby (4749), who dug them out one after the other. At Post 3, Captain Boyle and Sergt.
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