VCs of the First World War 1914

by Gerald Gliddon

  In November 1992 Bruce’s VC came onto the market at Christies. A group of old boys decided to try and buy it and present it to the college. The sum required for the purchase was £20,000 which was raised and at a special service the medal was duly handed over by Mr Dixie Landick, an ex-pupil of the college. On receiving the decoration, the Headmaster said, ‘… its acquisition was a tribute to the strength of support among Old Victorians and to their enduring pride in the college.’ It was decided that the medal would be displayed at the Jersey Militia Museum, Elizabeth Castle, and on special occasions at the college. At the presentation ceremony the head boy, Neil Hussey, carried the medal on a cushion to a display table for the boys and other members of the congregation to have an opportunity to look at it.

  P. NEAME

  Near Neuve Chapelle, 19 December

  Lt. Philip Neame arrived in France as a subaltern with the 15th Field Company (Royal Engineers), 8th Division, which began its war service in France in early November 1914. The Division occupied positions between Neuve Chapelle and Armentières, in a dreary, waterlogged and desolate landscape.

  On 27 November, Neame with a small party of Royal Engineers under the protection of 2nd Lt. L.M.J. Kerr and nine men of the 2nd (the Prince of Wales’ Own) West Yorkshire Regiment (23 Brig., 8th Div.) went across to the German lines near Neuve Chapelle and blew up a farm building called Moated Grange, which was being used by German snipers. The explosion was successful. For the next three weeks the Division carried out a series of attacks on the enemy positions. On the 18/19 December the 2nd Devonshire Regiment (23rd Brig., 8th Div.) accompanied by a section of the 15th Field Company, RE, under a Subaltern attacked the enemy positions at the Moated Grange. The sappers had first to cut the barbed wire in front of the enemy trenches and then attempt to link the German trench system to the British one by digging new trenches in No Man’s Land.

  During the night the West Yorks relieved the Devons and began to consolidate the British position but at dawn the enemy began to counter-attack using bombs. Subsequently Neame was sent for and told by the Commanding Officer of the 2nd West Yorks to consolidate the position. So with a party of Royal Engineers he went up to the captured enemy trenches close to the Moated Farm. Nearing the front line Neame heard fighting and bombing, which in effect was caused by hand-grenades. Leaving a sergeant in charge of his party of thirty-six sappers, Neame crawled forward along a ditch in order to find out what was going on. He was informed by the forward infantry commander that the Germans were indeed throwing bombs but that his own bombers had all been wounded so he was unable to retaliate.

  Neame sought out one of the wounded bombers and discovered that he had been unable to throw the bombs owing to a lack of fuses. Furthermore, he had not known how to light a safety fuse without a proper fusee. Neame knew that the bombs could in fact be used without a fuse. This could be done by holding a match head on the end of the fuse on the bomb and striking a match-box across it.

  The position was meanwhile hectic and the trench was overcrowded and movement restricted. Neame gave orders to gather up all the bombs available so that he could then try and throw them accurately at the two German positions which were giving trouble. He concentrated on the position directly to the front and had to stand up on the fire-step and expose himself before throwing each bomb. Each time he did this a German machine gunner would fire at him but always a moment too late. It appeared by the sound of German screams and a lessening of the enemy bombing that Neame’s one-man attack was paying dividends. Eventually the enemy bombing petered out and finally stopped altogether. During the time of his action Neame had been protected by three members of the 2nd West Yorks and he held on to this advanced position with his three infantrymen until he received orders to move back.

  Despite Neame’s heroism there had been heavy casualties especially of men wounded or killed before he arrived on the scene. He then met up with his original party of sappers. At one point he tried to help a wounded man along a road ditch which became impossible and consequently he risked taking him along a road in full view of the enemy who did not fire. He then handed over the injured man to stretcher bearers. Next Neame reported at Battalion Headquarters where the Colonels of the Devons and West Yorks were based. He told them that he had completed his task which included preparing the captured German trenches for defence. The colonel of the West Yorks then told him to take a party up to repair the British front line defences, as they were worried that the Germans might begin a counter-attack at any time.

  When Neame returned, Col. Travers of the 2nd Devons told him that he would make sure that Brig. R.J. Pinney would hear about his outstanding work during the day. Two days later the Corps Chief Engineer visited the position and he told Neame that he would make sure that the corps commander was informed. Six days later, on Christmas Day, the divisional commander, Maj. Gen. F.J. Davies, came to the Engineers’ billets to wish them a Happy Christmas and told Neame that he had recommended him for the VC.

  In later life when Neame was interviewed by David Lance of the Imperial War Museum he was asked, ‘Did you find that having the VC was a significant help to you in your later career in any way at all?’ Neame replied that he supposed it had helped a little, especially when it came to promotion on the Staff.

  Neame was made captain in February 1915 and took part in the Battle of Neuve Chapelle in March. On 30 March he became Adjutant, Royal Engineers, 8th Division. In May he fought in the first Battle of Fromelles and Festubert. His VC was gazetted along with about ten others on 18 February 1915. On Saturday 17 July 1915 he returned home to Faversham, in Kent, to a hero’s welcome together with a civic reception. His train arrived at about mid-day and he was greeted at the station and taken, together with his parents, in an open horse-drawn carriage to the town centre. A band preceded the carriage and a mounted escort was provided by a contingent from the Royal East Kent Mounted Rifles. The carriage was greeted by a cheering crowd and drove down Preston Street and then into the Market Place. The square and the windows of the local shops and houses were full of spectators and in front of the Guildhall, a dais had been erected to take the local dignitaries. Here the mayor, town clerk and Lord Harris in uniform were awaiting the hero’s arrival. Lord Harris described the incident ‘as a bomb-throwing match with the enemy’.

  A Territorial Guard of Honour made up from men who were billeted in the Faversham area, was arranged around the dais. Neame was addressed by several ‘local worthies’ and despite drizzling rain the crowd continued to roar its approval of their hero. In his reply Neame made kind remarks about the Territorials and the New Army raised by Lord Kitchener. He talked of the war effort in general and made a local reference to the nearby explosive works as doing a valuable job. At the end of the speeches, the National Anthem was sung and three further cheers were called for Neame. He and his parents were then taken by car to the mayor’s house at Gatefield House in Preston Street, where they were entertained for lunch.

  Neame had not yet received his decoration and was wearing the ribbon only. At the local cinema, the Empire Picture Hall in Tanners Street, a well-known local singer, Bert Holmes, included in his recital a song called ‘The Victoria Cross’ as a reflection of the moment.

  Two days later Neame travelled by train from Paddington to Windsor, with a group of other servicemen, to an investiture at Windsor Castle. The King asked Neame about the fight and afterwards the servicemen were entertained to lunch by some of the King’s equerries.

  Philip Neame came from yeoman stock, descending from a family that had lived in East Kent for several hundred years. He was the son of Frederick Neame, JP, of Luton House, Selling, and his wife Kathleen. He was born on 12 December 1888 in the historic house of Macknade near Faversham, which had been re-built in the eighteenth century. He was the youngest son of six children – five boys, four of whom were to serve in the First World War, and one girl. In 1908 when the agricultural and hop industries both slumped Frederick Neame moved his family to Colkins, a smal
l house on one of the family farms. The local brewing industry and foundation of the Shepherd-Neame Brewery dynasty revived shortly afterwards and he therefore moved his family back to Luton House, which was later demolished.

  Philip was educated at St Michael’s School, Westgate, and at Cheltenham College from 1903–1906. He then went to the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, passing out seventh in his year. The Boer War had influenced the young man when deciding to follow a career in the army. He was commissioned into the Royal Engineers as second lieutenant at the age of nineteen on 29 July 1908. He was made a full lieutenant on 18 August 1910, and served with 56 Field Company at Bulford Camp on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire.

  In October 1913 he was sent on his first foreign tour to Gibraltar where he was stationed when the war began in August 1914. He was very keen to get to France and he sailed with 15th Field Company in a convoy of ships bringing troops from India and the Middle East for service in France and Flanders. They were to be part of the 8th Division and reached France in November just missing the last great assault of the Germans in the First Battle of Ypres. They went into the line close to Ploegsteert. Neame was made captain in February 1915 (seniority 30 October 1914) and was Adjutant, Royal Engineers, 8th Division, from 30 March to 10 October 1915. On 11 October he became GSO3, 8th Div. In January 1916 he was created a Companion of the DSO for work carried out with the 8th Division since his VC in December 1914. On 13 February 1916 he became brigade major with the 168th Infantry Brigade (56th (London) Div.), in time to witness the attack on Gommecourt on the Somme on 1 July 1916. He took part later in the battles at Ginchy, Combles and Les Boeufs. On 29 November he was promoted to GSO2, and joined the staff at 15th Corps Headquarters.

  On 1 January 1917 he became brevet major and took part in the advance to the Hindenburg Line in the spring of that year. He later participated in the coastal operations around Nieuport which was part of the Third Battle of Ypres. In December Maj. Neame joined the staff of 1st Army Headquarters and was with them at the time of the German breakthrough on the Lys. In June he became GSO1, 30th Div., and was promoted lieutenant colonel. He took part, with his division, in the final operations of the war in Flanders, during September to November. Armistice Day found Neame 25 miles from Brussels.

  In June 1919 Neame was made brevet lieutenant colonel and then full colonel in 1926. He was awarded the Belgian and French Croix de Guerre and the French Legion of Honour, in addition to his VC and DSO for services in the First World War. It was the French General Nollet who presented Neame with the Croix de Guerre, which he pinned on his chest. When the war was over Neame served as an instructor at the Staff College and then moved to India. He became part of the army revolver team and in 1925 was member of the Olympic Games team which won a Gold and Bronze medal for shooting a moving target. He joined the King’s Own Bengal Sappers and Miners and in 1930 became the GSO1, Waziristan District.

  He spent his leave in exploration, big game hunting and in climbing expeditions. In 1933 he fought with a tiger which badly mauled him. He was taken to Lansdown Hospital where he was tended by a nurse named Miss H. Alberta Drew. The couple subsequently became engaged in December and married in Bombay in April 1934. Neame became Commandant of the Royal Military Academy 1938–9, and was now an expert on Tibet and the North West Frontier. He was a keen polo player and point-to-point rider.

  Neame was Deputy Chief of the General Staff and was involved in the BEF in France in 1939/40. He then had various appointments in the Middle East including major-general commanding the 4th Indian Division in the Western Desert of Egypt. Next he was lieutenant-general, general officer commanding Palestine and Trans-Jordan. Finally he was GOC and Military Governor of the former Italian Colony, Cyrenaica, in 1941. In the Western Desert he was in command of the British, Australian and Indian Forces against Rommel’s first attack on Cyrenaica. He was later taken prisoner, along with Gen. Sir Richard O’Connor in rather unfortunate circumstances, by a group of armed German motor-cyclists. The British senior officers were captured just off the main Derna road in April 1941, and flown to detention in Italy. The two generals along with two staff officers had left for their new headquarters further eastwards, but chose not to follow the main Derna road as there was demolition work in progress on it. Instead they took an alternative route and came across a stationary British convoy at about midnight. The two cars were attempting to thread a way through the convoy when a German patrol of motor-cyclists and sidecars which had travelled from the direction of Mechili suddenly appeared taking the staff by surprise. It was to be a typical desert incident, the like of which was to occur many times with the opposing armies so close to each other. According to a British Army witness, a German with a tommy-gun approached the staff cars and ordered the generals to get out. A British soldier nearby challenged him and was promptly shot, another British soldier fired back. In the confusion the two generals disappeared. Meanwhile, the staff cars carrying the two generals’ aides-de-camp got through to headquarters by using the main Derna road with no trouble at all.

  Neame and his fellow prisoners were handed over to the Italian authorities and spent six months in Sulmona on Sicily before being sent to the Castello di Vincigliata near Florence. As a prisoner of war, Neame assisted other officers to escape before attempting to do so himself. One of his fellow prisoners was Carton de Wiart who gained the VC on the Somme in 1916. During this period of confinement Neame wrote his autobiography and he subsequently hid it from his captors; miraculously it was found and returned to him after the war. In September 1943 he left the Castello di Vincigliata, with a group of Allied officers and other ranks, having negotiated their departure with his Italian jailers. This was during the period that Italy changed sides in the war which resulted in reprisals from both the advancing Germans and Italians still loyal to the Fascist cause.

  In his autobiography Neame writes of four very adventurous months, during which he and his colleagues continuously risked being captured. He finally reached home with O’Connor and Air Marshal O.T. Boyd, on Boxing Day 1943, having been a prisoner of war for two years.

  After the Second World War Neame retired in 1947. He was lieutenant-governor of Guernsey between 1945 and 1953, and in addition he was also colonel commandant of the Royal Engineers during this time. He served as President of the Institution of the Royal Engineers from 1954 to 1957. He was a member of the Council of the National Rifle Association. In 1939 he had been made a commander of the British Empire (CBE) and a Knight of the British Empire (KBE) in 1946. Neame’s name was mentioned in despatches no fewer than five times.

  The Neames had three sons and one daughter. He found time to publish two books, German Strategy in the Great War in 1923, and his autobiography Playing with Strife in 1946.

  In the 1930s he had bought the house Woodlands in Selling to which he gave its original name of Brookes Court. In 1955 he became deputy lieutenant of Kent. In April 1967 he was involved in a serious car crash in his MG 1100. He crashed into another car killing his brother, A. Bruce Neame, and injuring his sister-in-law. The Georgian Macknade Manor where Neame was born later became Read’s Restaurant.

  On 28 April 1978 Sir Philip Neame died at his home at Selling. His funeral was held at Selling church, St Mary the Virgin. It was attended by a large and distinguished congregation. During the service two trumpeters from the Royal Engineers at Chatham played the ‘Last Post’.

  Sir Philip’s career in the British Army had been extremely successful. In a transcript of an Imperial War Museum interview by David Lance with Lt. Gen. Sir Philip Neame, VC, KBE, CB, DSO, DL, Neame expressed support for the senior staff in the Great War including Haig, Plumer, Rawlinson and Horne, but Gough and his 5th Army had a poor reputation and Neame mentions that soldiers dreaded being posted to that army. Gough did have a reputation as a slaughterer and his division was considered a bit of a slaughterhouse. On Douglas Haig, Neame never found him shy and the field marshal was quite at home talking to officers and men alike. Indeed Neame considered
him to be a ‘very great commander’. He was the last man from the Royal Engineers to win the VC in 1914, and the only 1914 VC to have his autobiography published. It is more than clear that he was a resourceful and intelligent man, and perfectly suited to an army career. His VC and medals are held by the Imperial War Museum.

  J. MACKENZIE

  Rouges Bancs, France, 19 December

  The 7th Division was continuously involved in the First Battle of Ypres which officially lasted from 19 October to 22 November. On 18/19 December it found itself at Rouges Bancs to the north-west of Neuve-Chapelle. The 20th Brigade consisted of 1st Battalion the Grenadier Guards, 2nd Battalion Scots Guards and 2nd Battalions of the Border Regiment and the Gordon Highlanders.

  An attack carried by the 2nd Borders to establish a lodgement, failed, according to the divisional history ‘mainly to the impossibility of hearing the signal for the start of the assault’. They had moved forward when they heard shouts and saw movements to their right where the Guards had begun, but their attack was a mixed success. The Germans had received adequate warning and had manned their trenches accordingly. As a result when the Borders did advance they faced murderous fire at point blank range suffering heavy losses. Capt. Askew, the company commander, was able to reach the enemy trenches but was killed when still brandishing his revolver. A German counter-attack drove the rest of the attackers back to their start lines. A second attack, under Maj. Warren, was later organized but it was soon realized that it was hopeless to continue. The failure of the attack by the Borders led to the collapse of the supporting attack of the Scots Guards. It was during this fighting that Pte. James Mackenzie of the 2nd Scots Guards gained the VC. It was gazetted on 18 February 1915. The citation read as follows: