Somme
Page 7
When the British took over the line on the Somme front from the French they found that an unofficial policy of ‘live and let live’ had undoubtedly prevailed between the French and the German front-line troops. Such a mutually convenient and apparently sensible arrangement was anathema to the British High Command who firmly believed that their inexperienced troops needed to be blooded and given experience in the grim business of war. The overall level of artillery fire rose inexorably month by month and the battalions at the front were ordered to probe and test the Germans in every way possible. One simple method was to increase the level of sniping at German soldiers unwise enough to expose themselves for a moment of two within sight of the British lines. The better shots amongst the men were given carte blanche to try their luck. But this was a dangerous task for it was soon two-way traffic as German snipers responded in kind.
If you get a little gap about as square as a matchbox, you get a good view in front of you. The least thing you see move; you let go, you’d be aiming at anything that bloody moved. Sometimes you’d strain and strain. You’d see tree trunks that had been shattered, you’d look at that and you could see it move. The more you stare the more it moves. But you’ve got to be very careful, because if you let go at a thing like that there might be one of their snipers watching where the shot comes from and have a go at you. But you can see things move in the dark. You take it for granted that you’ve aimed and you’d hope that it hit a German. You’d easily tell if you don’t get any trouble after. If you get trouble with a sniper firing occasionally and you just mark and weigh up what position he comes from. Then you fire at that—if you don’t hear no more after that you know you’ve done your job. Of course you can’t guarantee it, you can’t be certain in the dark.1
Private Ralph Miller, 1/8th Battalion, Warwickshire Regiment, 143rd Brigade, 48th Division
At night the British sent out numerous small reconnaissance patrols to swarm all over No Man’s Land in an effort to probe the German defences. Creeping out after dusk had fallen they were nakedly vulnerable to devastating bursts of fire. Sometimes German patrols were also out and it could be an extremely tense business.
I was out on patrol one night in No Man’s Land, eight of us under a young officer named Lieutenant Jones. We crawled through the mud right across to the German lines and then crept along the outside of their barbed wire entanglements. We got so far without being spotted and we could hear them talking. Our object was to gain, if possible, some idea of the strength of the enemy at that point, and any other information that might be useful. So far, so good! Then, horror of horrors, we heard shouts in German, and found that we were practically surrounded. There was one enemy patrol only about 100 yards away to our left, another a similar distance away to our right and a third patrol almost right in front of us, but on their side of the wire! We had, of course, been spotted and it seemed certain that our game was up, that we would either be taken prisoner of shot out of hand. But strangely enough, the Jerries seemed suddenly to disappear! Just as we were preparing to make a run for it, the reason for their withdrawal from the scene became obvious. Up in the sky went a number of Very lights which lit up the place brighter than daylight—and then—all Hell was let loose! They opened fire on us with rifles and machine guns and I shall always remember lying flat on the ground pressing myself and my face as deep as possible into the mud, with hundreds of machine-gun bullets zipping just inches above my head! Not content with that, they also opened up with ground shrapnel, that is, shells timed to explode a few feet above us. After about ten or fifteen minutes of this strafing, they ceased fire, evidently believing that they had successfully annihilated us. Anyway, when quietness and darkness once more returned, like ‘Phoenix’ we rose again, and running, slipping and sliding in and out of shell holes full of water, we eventually got safely back to our own front line. There we found that, by an absolute miracle, not one of us had even been wounded! Our guardian angels must have been watching over us that night—I am sure!2
Private Albert Atkins, 1/7th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, 167th Brigade, 56th Division
As the British raised the tempo of the war the Germans were soon stung into retaliatory action with the result that what had been a fairly quiet front soon became a deeply threatening environment.
Very lights lit the place up just like one of those Christmass cards, but death lurked there waiting for anybody who was foolish enough to admire the scenery. The long nights I spent on sentry alone in the fire bay at night straining my eyes peering at the German lines in the distance. I could even hear their transport behind the village; sounds carry a long way at night. The large black rats disturbed the empty bully beef tins out in front of the wire causing them to tinkle, made my hair stand on end. Sometimes thinking a German patrol was cutting the wire, I would fire off a round or two to scare them off. Every now and again a lone machine gun would traverse the parapet and then I would hear a soft plop from the trenches in the distance. Then I would scan the night sky and watch an object like a comet coming towards our trenches. These mortars, which we named ‘flying pigs’, caused havoc if they fell in one of the fire bays.3
Private Albert Conn, 8th Battalion, Devonshire Regiment, 20th Brigade, 7th Division
Inevitably, as the level of fighting increased so did the day-to-day losses. Each and every death in those early days seemed excruciatingly painful to men forced to watch their young friends dying for the first time. Each victim was still an individual; this was not yet a crude mass slaughter. Private Davie Starrett was heartbroken when one of his best friends was badly hit and obviously dying from his wounds.
As I went to him he opened his eyes. He was all in. He put out a weak hand and I held it, wanting to grip it and afraid too lest I hurt him more. ‘Hard luck!’ I managed to say, and he whispered, ‘Thanks, Davie ...’ Then he smiled and they took him away. I am not ashamed to say I blundered back to the dugout without seeing where I was going. Telling the Colonel, he said, ‘Always the best who go, Starrett, always the best. The best friends, the best soldiers, the best fighters.’ He added fiercely, ‘And while they go west others at home grow fat in security—the cowards!4
Private Davie Starrett, 9th Battalion, Royal Irish Rifles, 107th Brigade, 36th (Irish) Division
Slowly, but surely, the rolling Somme countryside surrendered to the bleak embrace of total war. One young private in the Devonshire Regiment witnessed what seemed to him a deeply significant incident.
A small bird sang on a stunted tree in Mansell Copse. At the break of dawn we used to listen to it and wonder that amongst so much misery and death a bird could sing. One morning a corporal visiting the fire posts heard the bird singing and muttering, ‘What the hell have you got to sing about?’ fired and killed it. A couple of the lads told him to fuck off out of it. We missed the bird.5
Private Albert Conn, 8th Battalion, Devonshire Regiment, 20th Brigade, 7th Division
The needless slaughter of the harmless bird was an obvious harbinger of what was to come. Soon Mansell Wood would be a place of mass death and destruction and far too many of the men of the 8th Devons would find their last resting place under its splintered trees.
Despite the overall failure of the Loos offensive, Haig had retained his trust in General Sir Henry Rawlinson and was impressed by the overall vigour shown by General Sir Hubert Gough. As a result he appointed Rawlinson to command the new Fourth Army formed to conduct the initial stages of the Somme offensive and decided to appoint Gough to command the not yet constituted Reserve Army (later known as the Fifth Army) charged with the important task of energetically exploiting the anticipated breakthrough. Rawlinson, who had both the greater experience and the greater responsibility, had certainly realised many of the prerequisites for success on the Western Front. After his appointment to the Fourth Army on 1 March 1916, Rawlinson began to prepare his plans. Inevitably these plans passed through many versions, but the dilemmas that he had to resolve can usefully be simplified. He ha
d to decide where exactly to attack, what length and type of bombardment to use, how far he was to attempt to go in the first phase, what delay before the second phase, and whether he was to attempt any kind of a breakthrough or merely secure the Somme ridges by use of ‘bite and hold’ tactics. Having toured the front line and examined the aerial photographs that revealed the intimidating strength of the German defences, Rawlinson had no doubt that a cautious approach would be wise.
Rawlinson’s first plan was put forward to Haig on 3 April 1916. It was soundly rooted in the lessons he had assimilated in the battles of 1915. He had noted that the one advantage the British had in the Somme sector was that most of the German First Line system was under observation from the British lines, lying as it did on the forward slopes of the ridge. The long white chalk scars snaking across the green hills were obvious targets for his gunners. However, he equally noted that not only was the reverse slope Second Line system only visible by use of aerial observation but it was well out of range of the British field artillery—indeed, only the longest range guns could hope to reach it. He therefore proposed an advance in the first instance of just 2,000 yards to seize the German frontline system from Serre to Maricourt. Then, after a suitable gap to allow the guns to move forward and register their targets, a second stage would attempt another ‘bite’ of about 1,000 yards and include a limited section of the German Second Line system from Serre via Pozières to Contalmaison before ‘rolling up’ the line to the south. In spirit this was pure ‘bite and hold’. As to the bombardment, although he tended to the hurricane bombardment theory, he felt that he still had too few guns for such a length of front to guarantee cutting the wire and smashing the German front line. He was inclined to ignore the possibilities of gas attacks—undoubtedly chastened by his experiences at Loos. He did, however, hope to explore the potential of smoke screens to screen the passage of his infantry across the open wastes of No Man’s Land.
These plans were not considered anywhere near bold enough by Haig and his General Headquarters staff.
I studied Sir Henry Rawlinson’s proposals for attack. His intention is merely to take the enemy’s first and second system of trenches and ‘kill Germans’, He looks upon the gaining of three or four kilometres more or less of ground immaterial. I think we can do better than this by aiming at getting as large a combined force of French and British across the Somme and fighting the enemy in the open!6
General Sir Douglas Haig, General Headquarters, BEF
Haig proposed that the first step should be much more ambitious and incorporate within the objectives all the German Second Line system from Serre via Pozières and right down to the ridge facing the British held village of Maricourt. He wanted a short hurricane bombardment to provide an element of surprise and allow the infantry to rush forward and be on the German defenders in the First and Second Line systems before they knew what was happening. He feared that caution might cause missed opportunities if the German front showed signs of collapse. North of the Ancre they were to seize possession of the ridge as it ran from Serre to Miraumont to provide a strong defensive flank for the main attack. The second phase would then be a push forward to take the sector of the ridge stretching from Bazentin-le-Grand to Ginchy, before driving further eastwards towards Combles. Meanwhile the French would thrust forward to take from Maurepas to Hem, some 10 miles to the north of the Somme, and the Flaucourt ridge facing Péronne to the south of the river. Haig also proposed a diversionary attack on the Gommecourt salient a little further to the north to try and engender some measure of tactical surprise. This additional, almost throwaway scheme would eventually mature as the simultaneous attack carried out by the Third Army under the command of General Sir Edmund Allenby.
What Haig was proposing was emphatically not ‘bite and hold’; this would be an attempt at an outright breakthrough. Haig had been seduced by the potential of massed artillery as demonstrated at least in part by the early German operations at Verdun. But questions remained: even in 1916, had the British Army sufficient guns and shells to carry out this kind of devastating bombardment on such a wide 25,000-yard front? Did they have enough heavy guns to reach deep behind the front line to destroy a complete Second Line system that could not even be seen except from the air? By including the Second Line system as a first day objective, Haig also included it in the prior bombardments. Unless the amount of artillery was increased—and it was not—it was plain that every shell fired into the German Second Line trenches and the wire that would bar their way, was one less fired at the German First Line—which, after all, would have to be overcome before the advancing troops could make any progress at all.
Rawlinson’s response was interesting—and all too redolent of his willingness the previous year to sway with the breeze during the planning process that preceded the Battle of Neuve Chapelle. Privately he remained convinced that slow and steady was best, and although he was brave enough to restate his objections, ultimately he was all too willing to kowtow to Haig’s request for a redrafted plan.
It still seems to the that an attempt to gain more distant objectives, that is to say the enemy’s Second Line system ...involves considerable risks. I, however, fully realise that it may be necessary to incur these risks in view of the importance of the object to be attained. This will, no doubt, be decided by the Commander in Chief, and definite instructions be sent me in due course.7
Lieutenant General Sir Henry Rawlinson, Headquarters, Fourth Army
Indeed, Rawlinson actually won the point over the length of the preliminary bombardment, but the concluding passage exposed a weakness at the heart of Rawlinson’s generalship. The importance of an objective does not have any effect on the likelihood of a successful attack upon that objective. It merely increased the chance that the Germans would have taken every defensive precaution and be equally willing to risk everything to hold on to the prize.
Rawlinson’s instructions to attempt the German Second Line positions were finally confirmed in writing on 16 May. The fatal decision had been taken. At the same time he was informed that after he had secured the expected breakthrough then General Gough would have two corps for exploitation, either under the aegis of Rawlinson or independently under his own command as a separate Reserve Army.
Throughout the planning process Haig did not relax his pressure on Rawlinson, watching closely for signs of backsliding into an easy acceptance of more limited objectives. At least until it was proved impossible, Haig was determined that they had to be ready to exploit a major breakthrough. The fact that this would involve the use of the cavalry has often been satirised, but the cavalry was, after all, Haig’s only means of rapid exploitation and pursuit in 1916.
I told him to impress on his corps commanders the use of their Corps Cavalry and mounted troops, and if necessary supplement them with regular cavalry units. In my opinion it is better to prepare to advance beyond the enemy’s last line of trenches, because we are then in a position to take advantage of any breakdown in the enemy’s defense. Whereas if there is a stubborn resistance put up, the matter settles itself! On the other hand if no preparations for an advance are made till next morning, we might lose a golden opportunity.8
General Sir Douglas Haig, General Headquarters, BEF
Haig was also greatly concerned to urge Rawlinson to strain every sinew to accelerate the training of the divisions under his command. This was a matter of increasing importance as the British Army began to realise the seriousness of sending in half-trained infantry against experienced German units occupying superbly fortified defensive positions. But before the training process could begin the exact tactics to be employed on the day of the assault had to be decided, and the men trained in their exact roles, so that they would not be overcome by nerves when they went over the top.
The basic plan developed by the Fourth Army was simple and built round the power of the guns amassed for the attack. The industrial might of the British Empire was symbolised by these guns: there were 1,010 fie
ld artillery guns and howitzers (808 18-pounder guns and 202 4.5-in howitzers), 182 medium and heavy guns (32 4.7-in guns, 128 60-pounders, 20 6-in guns, one 9.2-in gun and one 12-in gun) and 245 medium and heavy howitzers (104 6-in howitzers, 64 8-in howitzers, 60 9.2-in howitzers, 11 12-in howitzers and 6 15-in howitzers). In addition there were 100 French guns assigned to the front. This meant an unprecedented total of 1,537 guns and howitzers—in other words one field gun to every 20 yards of front and one heavy gun to every 58 yards of front. Ammunition, so often in short supply in 1915, was now plentiful with each gun having access to hundreds of rounds of ammunition in dumps close to hand, with proper resupply arrangements. The artillery plans prepared by the Fourth Army laid down the general tasks to be achieved by the guns under the subordinate corps’ control during the planned six-day bombardment, but left the actual achievement of those tasks to the individual corps and divisional commanders. Simply put, the guns were to clear away the German barbed wire defences, smash their lines of fortifications and destroy their artillery batteries.
It was clearly recognised that the German artillery would pose a severe threat if it was not dealt with before the infantry exposed themselves in No Man’s Land and therefore special arrangements were made for counter-battery fire. Only the heavier guns and howitzers had the long range necessary to reach the German gun lines and each corps allotted a certain number of heavy and medium batteries to the task. Unfortunately, amidst the many other priorities that fought for their attention, it was inevitable that sometimes there were simply not enough guns to go round. One corps allocated only derisory numbers of shells—as few as six in one case—to deal with target batteries. There was no overall understanding of the absolute necessity for pinpoint accuracy in counter-battery fire and even with the help of artillery observation aircraft the task was often beyond the raw gunners.