Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated)

by SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE

  The really serious situation was to the south of Bapaume upon the old Somme battle-field, where the Germans had made sudden and alarming progress. Their temporary success was due to the fact that the losses in the British lines had contracted the ranks until it was impossible to cover the whole space or to prevent the infiltration of the enemy between the units. The situation required some complete and vigorous regrouping and reorganisation if complete disaster was to be avoided. Up to this point the British Higher Command had been unable to do much to help the two hard-pressed armies, save to supply them with the scanty succours which were immediately available. Now, however, it interfered with decision at the vital spot and in the vital moment. To ensure solidity and unity, Congreve’s Seventh Corps, which had been the northern unit of the Fifth Army, became from this time onwards the southern unit of the Third Army, passing under the command of General Byng. With them went the First, Second, and Third Cavalry Divisions, which had been doing really splendid service in the south. Everything north of the Somme was now Third Army. At the same time the three fine and fresh Australian Divisions, the Third, Fourth, and Fifth, were assembling near Doullens in readiness to strike, while the Twelfth British Division was also hurried towards the place of danger. The future was dark and dangerous, but there were also solid grounds for hope.

  On the morning of March 25 the line of the Third Army, which had defined itself more clearly during the night, ran from Curlu near the Somme, east of Bazentin, west of Longueval, east of Martinpuich, through Ligny Thilloy, Sapignies, Ervillers, and hence as before. The enemy, whose cavalry were well up and in force, at once began his thrusting tactics in the southern section of the field, and may have expected, after his advance of the day before, to find some signs of weakening resistance. In this he was disappointed, for both the 47th Londoners in front of Contalmaison and the Second Division at Ligny Thilloy beat off several attacks with very great loss to the assailants. The units were much broken and mixed, but the spirit of the individuals was excellent. The pressure continued, however, to be very great, and in the afternoon the line was once more pushed to the westwards. There was severe fighting between Bapaume and Sapignies, where mixed and disorganised units still held the Germans back, but in the late afternoon three distinct gaps had appeared in the line, one between the Seventh and Fifth Corps, one in the Fifth Corps itself in the Pozières area of the Sixty-third Division, and one between the Fifth and the Fourth Corps. Fortunately, the resistance had been so desperate that by the time the Germans had their opportunity they were always so bedraggled themselves that they could not take full advantage of it. The general order of divisions in this area, counting from the south of Contalmaison, was Seventeenth, Forty-seventh, Sixty-third, Second, upon the morning of March 25.

  The Seventh Corps, the previous adventures of which will be described under the heading of the Fifth Army, had now become the right wing of the Third Army. It had been strengthened by the advent of the Thirty-fifth Division, and this unit now covered from west of Curlu to east of Maricourt, where it touched the right of the Ninth Division — if the thin ranks of that gallant band can be dignified by so imposing a title. The Highlanders covered the front to Montauban, where they touched the First Cavalry Division, but beyond that the enemy were pouring round their flank at Bernafoy and Mametz Woods. It was under these trying conditions that the Twelfth Division was ordered up, about noon, to secure the left of the Seventh Corps and entirely stopped the dangerous gap.

  Another had formed farther north. The Seventeenth Division, who were on the right of the Fifth Corps, held from Mametz to Contalmaison. Thence to Pozières was held by the Forty-seventh. A gap existed, however, upon their left, between them and the Sixty-third Division, who were gradually falling back upon Courcelette. The left of the Naval Division was also in the air, having lost touch with the right of the Second Division who were covering Le Sars. North of them the Nineteenth Division extended from the west of Grevillers to the south of Bihucourt. The 57th Brigade in the north, under the local command of Colonel Sole, fought a fine rearguard action as the enemy tried to debouch from Grevillers. Considering how terribly mauled this brigade had been a few days before, this was a really splendid performance of these brave Midlanders, and was repeated by them more than once during the day. From their left flank to the north stretched a new division, Braithwaite’s Sixty-second, which had upheld the honour of Yorkshire so gloriously at Cambrai. Their line ran west of Sapignies and joined the Forty-second Division at the point where they touched the Sixth Corps, east of Ervillers.

  The front of the Sixty-second stretched from Bucquoy to Puisieux. The enemy kept working round the right flank, and the situation there was very dangerous, for everything to the immediate south was in a state of flux, shreds and patches of units endeavouring to cover a considerable stretch of all-important country. South of Puisieux there was a gap of four or five miles before one came to British troops. Into this gap in the very nick of time came first the 4th Brigade of the Second Australian Division, and later the New Zealand Division in driblets, which gradually spanned the vacant space, It was a very close call for a breakthrough without opposition. Being disappointed in this the Germans upon March 26 spent the whole afternoon in fierce attacks upon the Sixty-second Division, but got little but hard knocks from Braithwaite’s Yorkshiremen. The 186th Brigade on the right threw back a flank to Rossignol Wood to cover the weak side.

  Meanwhile the enemy had made a spirited attempt to push through between the Seventh Corps and the Fifth. With this design he attacked heavily, bending back the thin line of the Ninth Division, who were supported by the Twenty-first Division, numbering at this period 1500 men. At four in the afternoon the German stormers got into Maricourt, but they were thrust out again by the Thirty-fifth Division. They had better success farther north, where in the late evening they got round the left flank of the Forty-seventh Division and occupied Pozières. The Londoners threw out a defensive line to the north and awaited events, but the general position between the Fifth and Fourth Corps was serious, as the tendency was for the gap to increase, and for the Fourth Corps to swing north-west while the other turned to the south-west. The Twelfth Division was transferred therefore from the Seventh to the Fifth Corps, and was given a line on the west bank of the Ancre from Albert to Hamel. This move proved in the sequel to be a most effective one. In the evening of this day, March 25, the line from Bray to Albert exclusive was allotted to the Seventh Corps, which was directed to leave a covering party as long as possible on a line from the River Somme to Montauban, in order to safeguard the retirement of the Fifth Army. Then came the Twelfth Division covering Albert, then the remains of the Forty-seventh and of the Second from Thiepval to Beaumont Hamel, all moving across the Ancre. It is said that during the retreat from Moscow an officer having asked who were the occupants of a certain sledge, was answered: “The Royal Regiment of Dutch Guards.” It is in a somewhat similar sense that all mentions of battalions, brigades, and divisions must be taken at this stage of the battle. The right of the Fourth Corps was threatened by an irruption of the enemy at Pys and Irles, who threatened to get by this route round the flank of the Sixty-second Division, but found the Twenty-fifth Division still had vitality enough left to form a defensive flank looking south. At the same time the Forty-second Division had been driven back west of Gomiecourt, and was out of touch with the right of the Sixth Corps. Things were still serious and the future dark. Where was the retreat to be stayed? Was it destined to roll back to Amiens or possibly to Abbeville beyond it? The sky had clouded, the days were mirk, the hanging Madonna had fallen from the cathedral of Albert, the troops were worn to shadows. The twilight of the gods seemed to have come.

  It was at that very moment that the first light of victory began to dawn. It is true that the old worn divisions could hardly be said any longer to exist, but the new forces, the Yorkshiremen of the Sixty-second in the north, the New Zealanders and the Twelfth in the centre, and very particularly the three Sple
ndid divisions of Australians in the area just south of Albert, were the strong buttresses of the dam which at last held up that raging tide. Never should our British Imperial troops forget the debt which they owed to Australia at that supreme hour of destiny. The very sight of those lithe, rakish dare-devils with their reckless, aggressive bearing, or their staider fresh-faced brethren with the red facings of New Zealand, was good for tired eyes. There was much still to be done before an equilibrium should be reached, but the rough outline of the permanent positions had even now, in those hours of darkness and danger, been traced across the German path. There was but one gap on the morning of March 26, which lay between Auchonvillers and Hébuterne, and into this the New Zealand Division and one brigade of the Second Australians were, as already stated, hurriedly sent, the New Zealanders supporting and eventually relieving the Second British Division, while the Australians relieved the Nineteenth. The line was attacked, but stood firm, and the New Zealanders actually recaptured Colincamps.

  The chief fighting both of this day and of the next fell upon Scott’s Twelfth Division, which lay before Albert, and was occupying the western side of the railway line. So vital was the part played by the Twelfth in this quarter, and so strenuous their work, that a connected and more detailed account of it would perhaps not be out of place. The 37th Brigade was in the north-east of Mesnil and Aveluy Wood, the 36th in the centre, and the 35th on the west bank of the Ancre, with outposts to cover the crossings at Albert and Aveluy. The men were fresh and eager, but had only their rifles to trust to, for they had neither wire, bombs, rifle-grenades. Very lights, or signals, having been despatched at the shortest notice to the battlefield. Their orders were to hold their ground at all costs, and most valiantly they obeyed it. It is only when one sees a map of the German forces in this part of the field, with the divisions marked upon it like flies upon fly-paper, that one understands the odds against which these men had to contend. Nor was the efficiency of the enemy less than his numbers. “The Germans scouted forward in a very clever manner, making full use of the old chalk trenches,” says an observer. In the north upon the evening of March 26 the enemy crept up to Mesnil, and after a long struggle with the 6th Queen’s forced their way into the village. Shortly after midnight, however, some of the 6th Buffs and 6th West Kents, together with part of the Anson battalion from the Sixty-third Division, won back the village once more, taking twelve machine-guns and a number of prisoners. The other two brigades had not been attacked upon the 26th, but a very severe battle awaited them all upon March 27. It began by a heavy shelling of Hamel in the morning, by which the garrison was driven out. The Germans then attacked southwards down the railway from Hamel, but were held up by the 6th West Kents. The pressure extended, however, to the 9th Royal Fusiliers of the 36th Brigade upon the right of the West Kents, who had a long, bitter struggle in which they were assisted by the 247th Field Company of the Royal Engineers and other elements of the 188th Brigade. This brigade, being already worn to a shadow, was withdrawn, while another shadow, the 5th Brigade, took its place, one of its battalions, the 24th Royal Fusiliers, fighting stoutly by the side of the West Kents. There was a time when the pressure was so great that all touch was lost between the two brigades; but the and line was held during the whole of the day and night of the 27th and on into the 28th. At eleven o’clock in the morning of this day a new attack by fresh troops was made upon the West Kents and the 7th Sussex, and the men of Kent were at one time driven back, but with the aid of the 24th Royal Fusiliers the line was entirely re-established. The whole episode represented forty-eight hours of continual close combat until, upon March 29, this front was relieved by the Second Division. Apart from the heavy casualties endured by the enemy, this gain of time was invaluable at a crisis when every day meant a thickening of the British line of resistance.

  The fight upon the right wing of the 36th Brigade had been equally violent and even more deadly. In the fight upon March 27, when the Royal West Kents and 9th Fusiliers were so hard pressed in the north, their comrades of the 5th Berks and 7th Sussex had been very heavily engaged in the south. The Germans, by a most determined advance, drove a wedge between the Berkshires and the Sussex, and another between the Sussex and the Fusiliers, but in each case the isolated bodies of men continued the desperate fight. The battle raged for a time round the battalion headquarters of the Sussex, where Colonel Impey, revolver in hand, turned the tide of fight like some leader of old. The losses were terrible, but the line shook itself clear of Germans, and though they attacked again upon the morning of March 28, they were again beaten off, and heavily shelled as they plodded in their sullen retreat up the hillside to La Boisselle.

  Meanwhile, the 35th Brigade had also been fighting for its life to the south. Albert had fallen to the Germans, for it was no part of the plan of defence to hold the town itself, but the exits from it and the lines on each side of it were jealously guarded. At 7 P.M. on March 26 the Germans were in the town, but they had practically reached their limit. Parties had crossed the Ancre, and there were attacked by the 7th Norfolks, who were supported in a long fight upon the morning of the 27th by the 9th Essex and the 5th Northants Pioneer Battalion. The line was held, partly by the aid given by the 51st Brigade of the Seventeenth Division, who numbered just 600 men and were led by Major Cubbon. Whilst the line was held outside Albert, the Germans in the town had a very deadly time, being fired at at short ranges by the 78th and 79th Brigades Royal Field Artillery. The 7th Suffolks were drawn into the infantry fight, which became a more and more desperate affair, involving every man who could be thrown into it, including two battalions, the 1st Artists and 10th Bedfords from the 190th Brigade of the Sixty-third Division. These latter units suffered very heavily from machine-gun fire before ever they reached the firing-line. At 8 A.M. upon March 28 the Germans were still pouring men through Albert, but were utterly unable to debouch upon the other side under the murderous fire of the British. A single company of the 9th Essex fired 15,000 rounds, and the whole slope which faced them was dotted with the German dead. The town of Albert formed a covered line of approach, and though the British guns were still pounding the buildings and the eastern approaches, the Germans were able to assemble in it during darkness and to form up unseen in great numbers for the attack. At ten in the morning of the 28th another desperate effort was made to get through and clear a path for all the hordes waiting behind. The British artillery smothered one attack, but a second broke over the 7th Norfolks and nearly submerged them. Both flanks were turned, and in spite of great work done by Captain Chalmers with his machine-guns the battalion was nearly surrounded. The losses were terrible, but the survivors formed up again half a mile to the west, where they were again attacked in the evening and again exposed to heavy casualties, including their commanding officer. Few battalions have endured more. Late that night the 10th West Yorkshires of the Seventeenth Division came to their relief. The whole of the Twelfth Division was now rested for a time, but they withdrew from their line in glory, for it is no exaggeration to say that they had fought the Germans to an absolute standstill.

  We shall now return to March 26, a date which had been darkened by the capture of Albert. Apart from this success upon the German side, which brought them into a town which they had not held for years, the general line in this quarter began to assume the same outline as in 1916 before the Somme battle, so that Hébuterne and Auchonvillers north of Albert were in British hands, while Serre and Puisieux were once more German. The existence of the old trenches had helped the weary army to hold this definite line, and as already shown it had received reinforcements which greatly stiffened its resistance. The dangerous gap which had yawned between the Fourth and Fifth Corps was now successfully filled. In the morning of March 27 all was solid once more in this direction. At eleven on that date, an inspiriting order was sent along the line that the retreat was over and that the army must fight out the issue where it stood. It is the decisive call which the British soldier loves and never fails to
obey. The line was still very attenuated in parts, however, and it was fated to swing and sway before it reached its final stability.

  The fighting upon the front of the Sixty-second Division at Bucquoy upon March 27 was as heavy as on the front of the Twelfth to the south, and cost the Germans as much, for the Lewis guns had wonderful targets upon the endless grey waves which swept out of the east. The 5th West Ridings, east of Rossignol Wood, were heavily engaged, the Germans bombing their way very cleverly up the old trenches when they could no longer face the rifle-fire in the open. There were three separate strong attacks on Bucquoy, which covered the slopes with dead, but the persistent attempts to get round the right wing were more dangerous. These fell chiefly on the 2/4 Yorks Light Infantry between Rossignol Wood and Hébuterne, driving this battalion in. A dangerous gap then developed between the British and the Australians, but a strong counter-attack of the 5th Yorkshire Light Infantry after dark, with the Australians and four tanks co-operating, recovered nearly all the lost ground.

  On March 28 there was again a very heavy attack upon the 1 86th Brigade. The stormers surged right up to the muzzles of the rifles, but never beyond them. Over 200 dead were found lying in front of one company. One isolated platoon of the 5th West Ridings was cut off and was killed to the last man. Farther to the right there were several determined attacks upon the 187th Brigade and the 4th Australian Brigade, the latter being under the orders of the Sixty-second Division. These also were repulsed in the open, but the bombing, in which the Germans had the advantage of a superiority of bombs, was more difficult to meet, and the 5th Yorkshire Light Infantry were driven from Rossignol Wood and the ground which they had so splendidly captured the night before.

  About 11 A.M. on this day the Forty-first Division had been ordered up to man the east of Gommecourt. A brigade of this division, the 124th, co-operated with the 8th West Yorkshires and some of the Australians in a fresh attack upon Rossignol Wood, which failed at first, but eventually, after dark, secured the north end of the wood, and greatly eased the local pressure. On March 29 and 30 the positions were safely held, and the attacks less dangerous. On the evening of the latter date the Sixty-second Division was relieved by the Thirty-seventh.