World War I - 9 Book Collection: Nelson's History of the War, The Battle of Jutland & The Battle of the Somme. Buchan John
by old trenches and dug-outs; think of the hundreds of tons of wire, sand-bags, timber, galvanized iron, duck-boards, revetting stuff, steel, iron, blood and sweat, the rum jars, bully beef tins, old trench boots, field dressings, cartridge cases, rockets, wire stanchions and stakes, gas gongs, bomb boxes, S.A.A. cases, broken canteens, bits of uniforms, and buried soldiers, and Boehes—all in the old lady’s two little fields. Think how she must have felt, after two years, to know we’d got them back. She’s walked over them by now, I daresay.”
THE STRUGGLE FOR THE WOODS.
To turn to the southern sector, where the problem was to clear out the fortified woods which intervened between us and the German second line. From the crest of the first ridge above Fricourt and Montauban one looks into a shallow trough, called Caterpillar Valley, beyond whieh the ground rises to the Bazentin-Longueval ridge. On the left, toward Contalmaison, is the big Mametz Wood; to the right. beyond Montauban, the pear-shaped woods of Bernafay and Trônes.
On Monday, the 3rd, the ground east of Fricourt Wood was cleared, and the approaches to Mametz Wood won. That day a German counter-attack developed. A fresh division appeared at Montauban, which was faithfully handled by our guns. The “milking of the line” had begun, for a battalion from the Champagne front appeared east of Mametz early on Monday morning. Within a very short time of detraining at railhead the whole battalion had been destroyed or made prisoners. In one small area over 1,000 men were taken. A wounded officer of a Highland regiment has described the scene:—
“It was the finest show I ever saw in my life. There were six hundred Boches of all ranks marching in column of route across the open back towards our rear. They were disarmed, of course. And what do you think they had for escort? Three ragged Jocks of our battalion, all blood and dirt and rags, with their rifles at the slope, doing a sort of G.O.C.’s inspection parade march, like pipers at the head of a battalion. That was good enough for me. I brought up the rear, and that’s how I got to a dressing-station and had my arm dressed. I walked behind a six hundred strong column of Boches, but I couldn’t equal the swagger of those three Jocks in the lead.”
Next day, Tuesday, July 4th, we were well established in the Wood of Mametz, 3,000 yards north of Mametz village, and by midday had taken the Wood of Bernafay. These intermediate positions were not acquired without a grim struggle. The woods were thick with undergrowth which had not been cut for two seasons, and though our artillery played havoc with the trees it could not clear away the tangled shrubbery beneath them. The Germans had filled the place with machine-gun redoubts, connected by concealed trenches, and in some cases they had machine-guns in positions in the trees. Each step in our advance had to be fought for, and in that briery labyrinth the battle tended always to become a series of individual combats. Every position we won was subjected at once to a heavy counter-bombardment. During the first two days of July it was possible to move in moderate safety almost up to the British firing-lines, but from the 4th onward the enemy kept up a steady bombardment of our whole new front, and barraged heavily in all the hinterland around Fricourt, Mametz and Montauban.
On Saturday, July 8th, we made our first lodgment in the Wood of Trones, assisted by the flanking fire of the French guns. We took 130 prisoners, and broke up the German counterattacks. For the next five days that wood was the hottest corner in the southern British sector. Slowly and stubbornly we pushed our way northwards from our point of lodgment in the southern end. Six counter-attacks were launched against us on Sunday night and Monday, and on Monday afternoon the sixth succeeded in winning back some of the wood. These desperate efforts exactly suited our purpose, for the German losses under our artillery fire were enormous. The fighting was continued on Tuesday, when we recaptured the whole of the wood except the extreme northern corner. That same day we approached the north end of Mametz Wood and took a “dump” of German stores. The difficulty of the fighting and the strength of the defence may be realised from the fact that the taking of a few hundred yards or so of woodland meant invariably the capture of several hundred prisoners.
By Wednesday evening, July 12th, we had taken the whole of Mametz Wood. Its 200 odd acres, interlaced with barbed wire, honeycombed with trenches, and bristling with machine-guns, had given us a tough struggle, especially the last strip on the north side, where the German minenwerfers were thick, and their machine-gun positions enfiladed every advance. At 4 o’clock in the afternoon we broke out of the wood, and were face to face at last with the main German second position. Meantime, the Wood of Trones had become a Tom Tiddler’s Ground, which neither antagonist could fully claim or use as a base. It was at the mercy of the artillery fire of both sides, and it was impossible in the time to construct shell-proof defences.
In the French section the advance had been swift and continuous. At the beginning of the battle they had been faced with 27 German battalions, principally of the 17th Corps. The attack, as we have seen, was a complete surprise, for half-an-hour before it began on July 1st, an order was issued to the German troops, predicting the imminent fall of Verdun, and announcing that a French offensive elsewhere had thereby been prevented. On the nine-mile front from Maricourt to Estrées the German first position had been carried the first day. The heavy guns, when they had sufficiently pounded it, ceased their fire; then the “75’s” took up the tale and plastered the front and communication trenches with shrapnel; then a skirmishing line advanced to report the damage done; and finally the infantry moved forward to an easy occupation. It had been the German method at Verdun; but it was practised by the French with far greater precision, and with far better fighting material. On Monday, July 3rd, they were into the German second position south of the Somme. By the next day they had taken Belloy-en-Santerre, a point in the third line. On Wednesday they had the better part of Estrèes and were within three miles of Peronne. Counterattacks by the 17th Bavarian Division achieved nothing, and the German rail-head was moved from Peronne to Chaulnes. On the night of Sunday, July 9th, they took Biaches, a mile from Peronne, and held a front from there to Barleux—a position beyond the German third line. There was now nothing in front of them in this section except the line of the Upper Somme. This was south of the river. North of it they had attained points in the second line, but had not yet carried it wholly from Hem northwards.
The next step was for the British to attack the enemy second position before them. It ran, as we have seen, from Pozières through the Bazentins and Longueval to Guillemont. On Thursday, July 13th, we were in a condition to begin the next stage of our advance. The capture of Contalmaison had been the indispensable preliminary, and immediately following its fall Sir Douglas Haig issued his first summary. “After ten days and nights of continuous fighting, our troops have completed the methodical capture of the whole of the enemy’s first system of defence on a front of 14,000 yards. This system of defence consisted of numerous and continuous lines of fire trenches, extending to various depths of from 2,000 to 4,000 yards, and included five strongly fortified villages, numerous heavily wired and entrenched woods, and a large number of immensely strong redoubts. The capture of each of these trenches represented an operation of some importance, and the whole of them are now in our hands.” The summary did not err from over-statement. If the northern part of our front, from Thiepval to Gommecourt, had not succeeded, the southern part had steadily bitten its way like a deadly acid into as strong a position as any terrain of the campaign could show. We had already attracted against us the bulk of the available German reserves, and had largely destroyed them. The strength of our plan lay in its deliberateness, and the mathematical sequence of its stages.
CHAPTER III.
THE SECOND STAGE.
At dawn on Friday, the 14th, began the second stage of the battle.
The most methodical action has its gambling element, its moments when a risk must be boldly taken. Without such hazards there can be no chance of surprise. The British attack of July 14th had much of this calculated audacity. In certain parts—as at Contalmaison Villa and Mametz Wood—we held positions within a few hundred yards of the enemy’s line. But in the section from Bazentin-le-Grand to Longueval