World War I - 9 Book Collection: Nelson's History of the War, The Battle of Jutland & The Battle of the Somme. Buchan John
Gallipoli could show. For their task not gallantry only but perfect discipline and perfect coolness were needed. The splendid troops were equal to the call. They won the high road after desperate fighting in the ruined houses, and established a line where the breadth of the road alone separated them from the enemy. A famous division of British regulars on their flank sent them a message to say that they were proud to fight by their side.
When all were gallant it is hard to select special incidents, but in their record of personal bravery the Australians in the West rivalled their famous attack on the Lone Pine position in Gallipoli. The list of Victoria Crosses awarded is sufficient proof. Second-Lieutenant Blackburn led four parties of bombers against a German stronghold and took 250 yards of trench. He then crawled forward with a sergeant to reconnoitre, and, returning, led his men to a capture of a further 120 yards. Private Thomas Cooke, a machine-gunner, went on firing when he was the only man left and was found dead beside his gun. Private William Jackson brought in wounded men from no-man’s-land till his arm was blown off by a shell, and then, after obtaining assistance, went out again to find two wounded comrades. Private Martin O’Meara for four days brought in wounded under heavy fire, and carried ammunition to a vital point through an incessant barrage. Private John Leak was one of a party which captured a German stronghold. At one moment, when the enemy’s bombs were outranging ours, he leaped from the trench, ran forward under close-range machine-gun fire, and bombed the enemy’s post. He then jumped into the post and bayonetted three German bombers. Later, when the party was driven back by overwhelming numbers, he was at every stage the last to withdraw. “His courage was amazing,” says the official report, “and had such an effect on the enemy that, on the arrival of reinforcements, the whole trench was recaptured.”
On Monday and Tuesday the battle continued, and by the evening of the latter day most of Pozières was in our hands. By Wednesday morning, July 26th, the whole village was ours, and the Territorials on the left were pushing northward and had taken two lines of trenches. The two divisions joined hands at the north corner, where they occupied the cemetery, and held a portion of the switch line. Here they lived under a perpetual enemy bombardment. The Germans still held the Windmill, which was the higher ground and gave them a good observation point. The sight of that ridge from the road east of Ovillers was one that no man who saw it was likely to forget. It seemed to be smothered monotonously in smoke and fire. Wafts of the thick heliotrope smell of the lachrymatory shells floated down from it. Out of the dust and glare would come Australian units which had been relieved, long lean men with the shadows of a great fatigue around their deep-set far-sighted eyes. They were perfectly cheerful and composed, and no Lowland Scot was ever less inclined to expansive speech. At the most they would admit in their slow quiet voices that what they had been through had been “some battle.”
An observer with the Australians has described the unceasing bombardment:—
“Hour after hour, day and night, with increasing intensity as the time went on, the enemy rained heavy shell into the area. Now he would send them crashing in on a line south of the road—eight heavy shells at a time, minute after minute, followed by a burst of shrapnel. Now he would place a curtain straight across this valley or that till the sky and landscape were blotted out, except for fleeting glimpses seen as through a lift of fog. . . . Day and night the men worked through it, fighting the horrid machinery far over the horizon as if they were fighting Germans hand to hand; building up whatever it battered down; buried some of them, not once, but again and again and again. What is a barrage against such troops? They went through it as you would go through a summer shower, too proud to bend their heads, many of them, because their mates were looking. I am telling you of things I have seen. As one of the best of their officers said to me : ‘I have to walk about as if I liked it; what else can you do when your own men teach you to?’”
Meantime there had been heavy fighting around Longueval and in Delville Wood. On Thursday, the 27th, the wood was finally cleared of the enemy, and next day the last enemy outpost in Longueval village was captured. In this action we accounted for the remains of the Brandenburgers, taking prisoner three officers and one hundred and fifty-eight men. The British had not met them since that day on the Aisne, when they had been forced back by our 1st Division behind the edge of the plateau.
Early on the morning of Saturday, the 29th, the Australians attacked at Pozières towards the Windmill, and after a fierce hand-to-hand struggle in the darkness advanced their front to the edge of the trench labyrinth which constituted that position. Next morning, we attacked Guillemont from the north-west and west, while the French pushed almost to the edge of Maurepas. Our farthest limit was the station on the light railway just outside Guillemont village.
Little happened for some days. The heat was now very great, so great that even men inured to an Australian summer found it hard to bear, and the maddening haze still muffled the landscape. The French were meantime fighting their way through the remnants of the German second position north of the Somme between Hem Wood and Monacu Farm. There were strong counter-attacks against Delville Wood, which were beaten off by our guns before they got to close range. Daily we bombarded points in the enemy hinterland and did much destruction among their depots and billets and heavy batteries. And then on the night of Friday, August 4th, came the final attack at Pozières.
We had already won the German second position up to the top of the village, where the new switch line joined on. The attack was in the nature of a surprise. It began at nine in the evening, when the light was still strong. The Australians attacked on the right at the Windmill, and troops from South England on the left. The trenches, which had been almost obliterated by our guns, were carried at a rush, and before the darkness came we had taken the rest of the second position on a front of 2,000 yards. Counter-attacks followed all through the night, but they were badly co-ordinated and achieved nothing. On Saturday we had pushed our line north and west of the village from 400 to 600 yards on a front of 3,000. Early on Sunday morning the Germans counter-attacked with liquid fire and gained a small portion of the trench line, which was speedily recovered. The position was now that we held the much contested Windmill, and that we extended on the east of the village to the west end of the Switch, while west of Pozières we had pushed so far north that the German line was drooping like the eaves of a steep roof. We had taken some 600 prisoners, and at last we were looking over the watershed.
The following week saw repeated attempts by the enemy to recover his losses. The German bombardment was incessant and intense, and on the high bare scarp around the Windmil our troops had to make heavy drafts on their fortitude. On Tuesday, August 8th, the British right closed farther in on Guillemont. At Pozières, too, every day our lines advanced, especially in the angle toward Mouquet Farm, between the village and Thiepval. We were exposed to a flanking fire from Thiepval, and to the exactly ranged heavy batteries around Courcelette and Grandcourt. Our task was to break off and take heavy toll of the many German counter-attacks and on the rebound to win, yard by yard, ground which made our position secure.
In the desperate strain of this fighting there was evidence that the superb German machine was beginning to creak and falter. Hitherto, its strength had lain in the automatic precision of its ordering. Now, since reserves had to be hastily collected from all quarters, there was some fumbling in the direction. Attacks made by half a dozen battalions collected from three divisions, battalions which had never before been brigaded together, were bound to lack the old vigour and cohesion. Units lost direction, staff-work was imperfect, and what should have been a hammer-blow became a loose scrimmage. A captured letter written by an officer of the German 19th Corps revealed a change from the perfect coordination of the first year of war. “The job of relieving yesterday was incredible. From Courcelette we relieved across the open. Our position, of course, was quite different to what we had been told. Our company alone relieved a full battalion though we were only told to relieve a company of fifty men weakened through casualties. Those we relieved had no idea where the enemy was, how far off he was, or if any of our own troops were in front of us. We got no idea of our supposed position till 6 o’clock this evening. The English were 400 metres away, the Windmill just over the hill. We shall have to look to it to-night not to get taken prisoners. We have no dug-outs; we dig a hole in the side of a shell-hole and lie and get rheumatism. We get nothing to eat and drink. Yesterday each man drew two bottles of water and three iron rations, and these must last till we are relieved.