The Devil's Chariots
Page 7
Comm. Samson said I was to form my store depot for 200–250 packing cases at St. Pol in spite of there only being room for my stores in the open. I saw Major Risk on his arrival and his account confirmed all the information I had obtained. It was quite impossible for him to keep in any way to the approved organisation as orders were given direct to sections without his knowledge, and owing to sections being split up he had no Officers to take charge. I tried to get some information as to the way in which stores were being supplied, and was informed this is war and a car took what it wanted and if it did not return with it – it had expended it, and that nothing else was necessary. There seems to be a complete lack of organisation of every description, not only in this branch but in every branch of the force operating here. No arrangements are made for rations and I cannot find any definite arrangements about pay. Cars are sent out without any rations at all on journeys of 120 miles. No man has an identity disc.
… It is evident that if the present lack of organisation continues in the Armed Motor Aeroplane Support unit it will not exist as a useful force in a month. The men are more or less living on the country, and the cars have no lines of communication for supplies with an organised base. The cars are being driven at excessive speed…7
And so it went on. Hetherington added a list of recommendations, the last of which proposed that if Samson required ‘more cars for his own use’ then he should be given 1 Squadron together with his brother Felix, and the three squadrons still to be equipped should be removed from his command to ‘form a proper mobile and self-contained unit’. Scarlett forwarded Hetherington’s indictment to Sueter with a note supporting his recommendations, adding that ‘for the good name of the AIR SERVICE, Commander Samson should immediately be informed that it is not the proper thing, when conducting operations in a friendly country, to live on that country’ (Scarlett’s emphasis). Hetherington’s report had cellar-to-roof repercussions ranging from the immediate issue of ID tags for the men, to the reduction of Samson’s own command.
Samson never let secondary considerations get in the way of a good scrap. He was not a great administrator, a handicap which held back his later promotion, but he was a born leader whose superiors assessed him as ‘a brilliant pilot and a gallant officer’.8 The disorganized departure for Antwerp which Hetherington witnessed had followed days of intensive action by the unit. Samson had just provided road guard and fire cover for the withdrawal of French forces from Douai, he and his men having to fight their way out of the town which was surrounded by then, and sustaining heavy casualties in the process. For this action on 1 October he was mentioned in despatches by Brig Gen Paris. Risk and Wedgwood were busily engaged during the evacuation of Lille a day or so later. Those deadly days were lightened by Samson’s laconic approach with its echoes of rough shoots at home. Their pursuit of German cavalry patrols was ‘Uhlan-hunting’, or ‘ewe-lamb’ hunting as Samson called it.
The general situation could hardly have been worse. The Allied stand on the Marne in September had been followed by French counter-attacks which drove Gen von Bülow’s First and Second Armies back to the Aisne where they scraped shallow trenches and stood firm. Ominously, though, their defensive machine-gun fire proved too strong for a frontal breakthrough. The stalemate precipitated a series of moves by each side to envelop the exposed western flank of the other in the so-called ‘race to the sea’. The Channel ports of Calais, Boulogne and the entire coast south to Havre had lain open since their evacuation by the British in the earlier retreat. Gen von Moltke could have scooped them up in his advance, isolating the BEF and sealing his sea flank against future attack. He ignored the opportunity and was replaced by Gen Falkenhayn who was determined to reach and secure the coast ahead of the Allies. But first he had to reduce Antwerp’s fortress from which the Belgian Army was threatening his lines of communication. He began a sustained bombardment of its defences on 28 September.
The threat to the Channel ports persuaded Kitchener to despatch two divisions led by Maj Gen Sir Henry Rawlinson to stiffen Antwerp’s defence. Churchill contributed a brigade of marines and two brigades of half-trained reservists which were rushed to the city. Samson was to stand by to proceed to Antwerp with his entire force of armoured vehicles and aircraft. Hetherington watched their departure. Eleven armoured cars and both the soft-plated lorries were to escort a fleet of some 55 hastily requisitioned London buses and their volunteer crews plus lorries from Dunkirk, to Antwerp to evacuate the marines. They arrived in good order on 4 October. Risk brought up another 16 buses next day. Churchill and Sueter were already in the city. The First Lord had been sent by the Cabinet to promise support to the King of the Belgians and to persuade him not to withdraw his troops. The defenders held out against punishing fire from 173 heavy guns until the 9th. For the last time Samson took advantage of Antwerp’s forward location to get off two aircraft that day for the long flight to bomb Zeppelins in sheds at Cologne and Düsseldorf, with complete success at the latter.
Samson was indignant that his recommendations for armouring the cars had been ignored – the unprotected crews were becoming casualties. Sueter learned of the problem from Lt Arthur Nickerson, Samson’s gunnery officer, before the cars caught up with him in Antwerp. He at once ordered Scarlett to cease shipments pending modifications, and called for 1,000sq ft of armour plate to be sent to the Dunkirk yard for ad hoc conversion of the existing vehicles. He also instructed Sheerness to make up and despatch 60 bullet-proof Maxim shields. Nickerson was recalled to London to advise on the redesign. Sueter maintained that ‘At that time the former war experience [in South Africa] of Captain Nickerson was most valuable as we had so few Officers or men who had ever been under rifle fire before…’9 Samson’s now considerable battle experience was disregarded.
The first of two more Vickers 3-pdr semi-automatics was fitted on a Daimler– Mercedes lorry in the Chantiers yard on 16 October. It was unarmoured save for a lightly plated driver’s cab and was in action next day with the Life Guards, getting off 16 rounds per minute, its jumping gunsight routinely blacking the eye of RM Lt Tom Warner. As the unit was now short of transport, two lorries were acquired that week from a halted Army Service Corps convoy. Samson’s men painted ‘RNAS’ on the sides before making off with them. This freed a ‘B’ Type for fitting with the remaining 3-pdr. Samson signalled for two more Mercedes lorries and guns.
The coast had been reached soon after Antwerp fell on 10 October but the Channel ports were held safe. Sueter’s new road squadrons had barely started training at home when Samson’s cars went short of work with the onset of trench warfare. The general expectation was that this was a temporary stalemate, and in the interval Forges et Chantiers got on with modifying the Wimborne/Macnamara hulls. Angled extension panels were fitted to heighten the fighting compartment and drivers were given Scarlett’s vision flap. Sueter’s gun shields were less necessary because the Maxims on the rebuilt cars were mounted only just above the raised hull and could be operated by one man, thanks to the Sheerness belt-carrier attachment. The shields were accordingly designed for optional removal and disposal over the side. The first five Dunkirk conversions were completed in November, with eight more in hand.10
The roads began to disintegrate under prolonged autumn rains, immense traffic and shellfire. For Samson’s overladen vehicles, broken leaf-springs were routine. A squadron of 25 armoured and support cars was getting through 120 tyres and tubes each week. Studded tyres were fitted and an attempt was made to convert them to semi-solid with a filling of Rubberine compound in place of air, but to little effect. (This was one of several patent fillers, another being Phleumatic Jelly in which Col Crompton had an interest.) Detachable footboards served as dual bridging/mudboards, but cross-country movement on wheels remained unthinkable.
At home the armoured car force had outgrown the Sheerness training facility. It transferred to the cathedral-like Daily Mail Airship Garage at Wormwood Scrubs. Built by Lord Northcliffe in 1909 as London’s first airf
ield, the site of the shed is now occupied by the Linford Christie Sports Stadium. Training began there on 8 October, huts for offices and stores sprouting like mushrooms in the corrugated iron cavern. Wg Cdr Frederick Boothby arrived from RN Airships to command the unit. He was another of the navy’s first flyers and a fine test pilot. The force was renamed the Royal Naval Armoured Car Division and its strength was increased to 15 squadrons. Five of them were equipped as motorcycle machine-gun units with a job lot of 300 Bradford-built Scott machines and 200 sidecars, originally earmarked for the Royal Naval Division. Half the sidecars mounted a Maxim, the others being ammunition limbers. Recruitment was handled from RNAS HQ at the Crystal Palace. Of 4,000 applicants to join the division in September 1914, 400 were accepted. That winter Boothby had 110 officers and 1,474 men under his command, most of them trainees.
Churchill’s relations with Kitchener and the War Office deteriorated sharply after the navy’s humiliating reverse on the fall of Antwerp. In the confusion of the withdrawal most of the 1st Naval Brigade had been cut off. The 2,000 reservist sailors had no alternative but to enter neutral Holland, lay down their arms and accept internment. Kitchener resented Churchill’s increasing and largely uninvited naval presence on the Western Front, dismissing Samson’s force as an ‘irregular formation’. Churchill became notorious for his well-intentioned interference in the affairs of other ministries, but a determination to make a significant contribution to final victory in France was his goal of goals. It was an almost uncontrollable urge, his naval responsibilities notwithstanding. Kitchener had asked the Admiralty to provide home air defence and could hardly dispute Churchill’s entirely logical decision to fight from French airfields, but for him the rot set in with the appearance in France of itinerant shooting parties of marines, armed to the teeth and racing around in outlandish vehicles. They were soon joined by three armoured Admiralty trains mounting 4.5in guns, and the fleet of London buses. Adm Bacon and his naval howitzers were expected in January.
In reality the navy units were working in close support of the army, from which they took their orders while remaining subject to the Naval Discipline Act. However, Kitchener became convinced that Churchill was, wittingly or not, undermining his command. The Secretary of State insisted that all naval assets in France be turned over to the army or shipped out, leaving only an Admiralty air squadron at Dunkirk. Churchill was shaken but defiant. He had no intention of letting Kitchener throw him out of France but concessions were called for.
Henry Rawlinson, now a Corps commander, was glad to be given the additional command of all naval cars, trains and aircraft, leaving only Samson’s reduced air and road force at Dunkirk. Sueter instructed Samson on 12 October to transfer five armoured Talbots, newly arrived that day, to the Queen’s Own Oxfordshire Hussars. He was to retain just sufficient officers to service his remaining squadron of 15 armoured cars and another of eight aeroplanes; the rest of his officers were to return home immediately. He was to place himself at Gen Rawlinson’s disposal.11 Operational control of Samson’s force passed from the Admiralty to GHQ on 11 November, by which time his air activities were directed largely in support of the BEF. He was widely respected by the field commanders including Rawlinson, who wrote to Churchill on 14 October:
… a line to express my very sincere thanks for your kindness in allowing me to keep the armoured motors and aeroplanes under Samson. They have all done excellent work. The armoured cars pick up half a dozen prisoners a day and have instilled a holy terror into our opponents. We could do with double the number of them. Samson and his aeroplanes have obtained us the most valuable information… Samson himself earns more of my respect and appreciation daily.12
Hostility came also from the Admiralty Board. Murray Sueter’s activities were disparaged by all but one of the Sea Lords who considered his aerial and automobile sorties to be little better than self-promoting stunts, of no relevance to the maritime tasks and traditions of the navy. The RNAS was the responsibility of the Fourth Sea Lord, Cdre Cecil Foley Lambert, who gave his low opinion of the armoured car operations in an official paper after Churchill’s departure – ‘Motor cars have nothing to do with the Naval Service.’13 He told Boothby they were all ‘damned idlers’. The Second Sea Lord, Vice Adm Sir Frederick Tower Hamilton, was incensed to see the White Ensign being flown from jackstaffs on the tails of armoured cars and lorries. Vigorous support came only from the new Third Sea Lord, Rear Adm Frederick Charles Tudor-Tudor, whose appointment that September followed two years as Director of Naval Ordnance & Torpedoes.
For Churchill these were domestic irritations but on 14 November French told him that now that the lines of battle were continuous there was no possibility of using armoured cars. French recommended their immediate return to England for refit together with all the RNAS aircraft. Churchill had cultivated French and the request appears out of character. It may have been sent at Kitchener’s insistence. Churchill undertook only to withdraw his remaining aircraft and cars to Dunkirk in order to keep clear of the British Army and its communications. By mid-December he had eight armoured car squadrons under training, two of which were nearing completion. (In January 1915 Sueter would be turning them out at the rate of one a week.) When Churchill tried to persuade French to take more, Kitchener suspected the two were conducting operations behind his back and complained to the Prime Minister. Asquith wrote to Churchill on 18 December: ‘I have no objection to your going to Dunkirk to look into naval matters, but after talking to Kitchener who came to see me this morning I am clearly of opinion that you should not go to French’s HQ or attempt to see French.’14 He went on to say that such meetings had produced profound friction between French and Kitchener and their staffs. Churchill reproached Kitchener for going to Asquith, reminding him that he had ensured that the naval units in France were placed under military command. There is no doubting Kitchener’s anger. He replied on the 23rd:
I am sorry to see by your letter that you have gone back upon what was agreed between us with regard to the future of the various formations that you have raised at different times for service with the Army. The Navy and the Army have each their definite role to perform, and I think it is a good rule that the Admiralty and the War Office shall confine themselves to the supply of the services required by their respective Departments. Armoured trains, ’bus transport, armoured motor cars are, or can be, provided by the War Office when required…
If these irregular formations are only a means to enable certain officers and gentlemen without military experience and training, to get to the front and take part in the war, then I think it is even more important, if they are to be kept on, that they should form part of the Army, and not claim to be separate entities under the control of the Admiralty; by control I mean what you yourself state, viz;– that they cannot be broken up or used in any other way than as complete Naval units, even though the exigencies of the service may require this to be done.
I know how anxious you are to do all in your power to promote the success of our arms in France, and when I tell you that the morale of the Army in the Field is affected by these irregular Naval additions and therefore its fighting power impaired, as well as that they cause discontent and give trouble to the staff entirely out of proportion to their utility, I think you will agree with me that it is essential that something should be done to regularise the situation.15
It was a churlish dismissal of the work of Samson’s road force and the still very active armoured trains under Cdr Scott Littlejohns, both units having earned the praise of Kitchener’s commanders in France. The volunteer bus fleet remained in demand by the BEF long after Antwerp and was equally undeserving of Kitchener’s imputation that because the army did not provide any of these outfits they could not have been required in the first place. He was careful to confine his objections to Churchill’s armoured cars and other ‘irregulars’, avoiding reference to the RN Division which was shortly to be attached to the BEF. In a pained reply Churchill pointed to the long tra
dition of naval detachments serving alongside and receiving their orders from the army. As for the armoured cars:
This is a very good force. It arose out of the practical experiences in connection with the need of establishing flying bases in Northern France while the Army was still near Paris… Altogether there are fifteen squadrons, the majority of the cars being light and mounting Maxims and the others being heavy and mounting 3-pounders… The quality of the officers and men is high… If Sir John French at any time wants these cars abroad, and the War Office apply to the Admiralty for them, they will be placed at the disposal of the Army… I can assure you that nothing is further from my thoughts or intentions than ever in any circumstances being lured into attempting to add to the number of naval units serving with the Army.16
Churchill proposed that an agreement should be prepared which reflected past precedents and which gave the fullest disciplinary and administrative control of all naval detachments to the army for as long as they were in the field. Among Kitchener’s papers is an undated draft of that period in his own hand and intended for Churchill. It seems unlikely that it was ever sent.