The Eton-educated Lieutenant Evelyn Jack Needham of the Northamptonshire Regiment was mentioned in despatches for his work on the Chemin des Dames on 14 September. He retired with the rank of major having spent the final period of the war in the RFC and wrote The First Three Months – The Impressions of an Amateur Infantry Subaltern in 1936. His brother Robert also served in the same regiment but was taken prisoner later in the war, Evelyn died in 1956 aged 68 and his brother – who remained unmarried – twelve years later in 1968.
Christopher Baker-Carr the volunteer driver with the Royal Automobile Club also recorded his story in print after the war and wrote From Chauffeur to Brigadier in 1930. The former Rifle Brigade officer was soon brought back into service and after establishing the Machine Gun School at St Omer he laid the foundations for the formation of the Machine Gun Corps. By 1916 he was in command of a battalion of tanks and a year later was appointed a brigadier general in command of the first brigade of tanks. Awarded the DSO in 1916 he survived the war and died near Norwich in January 1949. Cranley Onslow’s brief appearance on the Aisne with the Bedfordshires led to a period of recuperation before he was back in France in January 1915 commanding the 2nd Battalion. Awarded the DSO and a CMG in the King’s Birthday Honours list of 1915, he was wounded again at the Battle of Loos. He was back again in January 1916 commanding the 1st Battalion, finally being promoted to full lieutenant colonel in February. At the Battle of Messines he commanded 7 Brigade. Brigadier General Onslow was mentioned in despatches three times and died in December 1940. Tragically his son Captain Geoffrey Onslow was killed on 1 June 1940 at Dunkirk.
The irrepressible Lieutenant James Hyndson who had played cricket for England and Surrey before the war, was promoted to captain in March 1915 and survived the war to write his experiences of serving with the Loyal North Lancs in From Mons to the First Battle of Ypres which was published in 1932. Sadly he died three years later in February 1935 aged only 42. Another cricketer was Lieutenant Hon Lionel Tennyson who was captain of the Hampshire side from 1919–1932. He succeeded his father to the title of Lord Tennyson in 1928 having retired from the army with the rank of major. He was wounded on three occasions and mentioned in despatches twice. In 1933 he published his autobiography From Verse to Worse. He died in 1951 aged 61. The title went to his son Mark Aubrey Tennyson.
Gerald Whittuck of the Somerset Light Infantry rose to become brigade major of 129 Brigade in 1918 and finished the war as a major. He was described as a, ‘capable officer, with a sangfroid that nothing could disturb’, an accolade earned in May 1918 when he once again found himself on the Aisne. He remained in the army and served in the Second World War as a brigadier general.
Lieutenant Gerald Lowry who served with the Royal Irish Rifles was shot in the head and blinded on 25 October 1914. Promoted to captain two days after he was wounded he was taken off the active list and placed on half pay in 1915. In 1925 he qualified as an osteopath and wrote of his experiences in From Mons to 1933. John Lucy who served with Lowry as a corporal in the Irish Rifles was commissioned shortly afterwards and rose to become a lieutenant colonel. Lucy’s commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Wilkinson Bird was less fortunate, he was badly wounded on the Aisne resulting in the loss of a leg, a misfortune shared by Major Tom Bridges who had a leg amputated in 1917 when commanding the 19th Division at Ypres. Whereas Wilkinson Bird was content to retire, Bridges was clearly not. In 1922 Lieutenant General Sir George Tom Molesworth Bridges was appointed governor of South Australia, a position he held until 1927. Bridges died in November 1939 but not before he had written several books including his autobiography Alarms and Excursions. Young Ben Clouting who followed Bridges up the hill at Paissy on 20 September also survived the war and lived to the ripe old age of 93, finally passing away in August 1990.
Alexander Johnston, the 7 Brigade signalling officer, eventually rose through the ranks to command 10/Cheshires in August 1916, a year later he was promoted again and appointed to command 126 Infantry Brigade but within days of taking up his new post he was badly wounded. He finished his war having been mentioned in despatches five times and with a DSO and bar. A first-class county cricketer before the war, Johnston’s legacy of the Great War was a permanent limp; nevertheless he continued to play cricket after the war until 1933. He died in December 1952. Lieutenant Arthur Acland, the adjutant of 1/DCLI, also rose to battalion command but had to wait until 1934 before he was appointed. Prior to that he was mentioned in despatches seven times and won a Military Cross and the DSO. He was appointed lieutenant general in 1941, retiring from the army a year later. He died in 1980.
Jock Marden after being wounded near Paissy on 20 September, was back with the regiment on 30 October in time to take part in the last attempt by Allenby’s cavalry to hold the Messines Ridge. Wounded again in the head on 19 November he was invalided to England where he remained for the rest of the war. Invalided out of the army at the end of hostilities, Marden turned his attention to skiing, winning the British Championship in 1926. Two years later in 1928 he died attempting to make the first winter ski ascent of Mount Aconcagua in South America which, at 6,962 metres, is the highest mountain beyond the Himalyas. He is buried in the small Climber’s Cemetery at Punte del Inca.
Others were content to forget the war years as much as they could and, barring Second World War service, attempted to settle down to a more normal existence. Lieutenant Cecil Brereton, the gunner subaltern who served with 68 Battery, retired as a major and died on his 65th Birthday in October 1953, whilst Jack Hay continued to serve as a dispatch rider until 1917 when he joined the RFC as an observer. He saw service in the Second World War as a squadron leader, retiring with the rank of wing commander in 1946. Hay died in 1978. Sergeant Reeve ended his war as BQMS in 315 Brigade RFA, Sergeant Bradlaugh Sanderson of the KRRC was wounded at Ypres and after leaving the British Red Cross hospital at Hale near Altrincham he arrived home at Holmfirth on sick leave early in 1915. His diary was first published in the Holmfirth Express. Corporal Cuthbert Avis who fought with the Queen’s on the Chemin des Dames returned to the battalion after recovering from his wounds, was promoted to sergeant and discharged in 1921. Another diarist, Sergeant John McIlwain of the Connaught Rangers ended his war with the rank of colour sergeant having been awarded the French Médaille Militaire which was gazetted in August 1918. He was wounded at Ypres in November 1914 and later served with the 5th Battalion on the Gallipoli Peninsula in 1915.
Of the seven Victoria Cross winners, three were later killed in action and four went on to survive the war. Apart from Captain Harry Ranken who is buried in Braine Communal Cemetery, Captain William Johnston was killed by a sniper on 8 June 1915 south of Ypres and is buried at Perth Cemetery (China Wall) and Ernest Horlock was drowned on 30 December 1917 when the SS Aragon was sunk 10 miles off Alexandria. Battery Sergeant Major Horlock – as he was then – was one of the 610 on board who were drowned. He is buried at Alexandria War Memorial Cemetery. As for the survivors, if we exclude William Fuller who was discharged in 1915 as unfit for further service and lived until he was 90, the other VC recipients did not fare so well. Ross Tollerton was promoted to sergeant and after the war became the janitor at Bank Street School, Irvine. He died in May 1931 aged 41. The man whose life he saved, James Matheson also died a young man in February 1933. George Wilson died of tuberculosis in Craigleigh Hospital, Edinburgh, in April 1926 aged only 39 and eight years later, William Dobson, the Coldstream guardsman, who won his cross near Cour de Soupir Farm, died aged 49. He is buried at Ryton Cemetery, County Durham.
Lieutenant Cyril Martin, the RE officer who first inspected the bridge at Vailly won the Victoria Cross at Spanbroekmolen in 1915 when he volunteered to lead a bombing party, despite being wounded before he started; he continued the attack and held a section of enemy trench for two and a half hours until ordered to retire. He later achieved the rank of brigadier general serving in the Second World War as Chief Engineer in Iraq. He died in August 1980. Kenneth Godsell the youn
g RE officer who took such delight in watching Brigadier Gleichen’s horse swimming the river won a DSO and MC and survived the war as did Jim Pennyman, the KOSB officer who was badly wounded at Missy. Bernard Young of 9/Field Company, who wrote so descriptively of his experiences and spent most of his time on the Aisne building and repairing bridges, was another survivor and eventually, after an illustrious career spanning two world wars, retired as a major general and died in 1969.
Sadly the two RFC pilots who worked so hard to introduce the use of wireless transmission from the air did not survive. Both men remained with the RFC and continued their work in developing wireless, Captain Baron Trevenen James MC was killed on 13 July 1915 during a solo test flight over enemy lines in an aircraft from 6 Squadron and Lieutenant Colonel Donald Swain Lewis DSO was killed on 10 April 1916 by the very guns which he had been spotting for – a tragic case of ‘friendly fire’. Lewis is buried at Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery and James is commemorated on the Arras Flying Service Memorial. Sergeant Major Victor Laws who was attached to the ‘Pom-Pom’ unit at Bucy-le-Long, returned to 3 Squadron and began a long career developing air photography. After serving in both world wars, he retired in 1946 with the rank of group captain and died in 1975. Kenlis Atkinson returned to the RFA and won a Military Cross in September 1918 near Cambrai whilst in command of a battery of CLXXVII Brigade guns. William Read remained in the RFC becoming commanding officer of both 45 and 216 Squadrons. He won an MC in 1916 and the new award of the DFC was made in 1919 and a year later he was awarded the Air Force Cross and bar. James McCudden, the young mechanic who flew with Baron James, became one of the most celebrated air aces of the war. He was killed on 9 July 1918 whilst in command of 60 Squadron. On his death, aged 23, he had accounted for fifty-four enemy aircraft and had been awarded the Military Medal, Military Cross and bar, DSO and bar and in March 1918 was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross.
Captain Henry Jackson returned to the ground in 1915 and a year later was commanding 8/Bedfords, he finished his war as a major general in command of 50th Division where he found himself once again on the Aisne in May 1918, this time facing the German Blücher-Yorck offensive. He was awarded the DSO and mentioned in despatches on eight occasions. Sir Henry Jackson died in 1972 having reached the grand old age of 93. Captain Hubert Rees, a company commander with 2/Welch, was another officer who would return to the Aisne in 1918, this time in command of 150 Brigade and serving under Henry Jackson in the 50th Division. On the opening day of the Blücher-Yorck offensive 150 Brigade was surrounded giving Rees little alternative but to surrender. Before he was transferred to Germany and captivity he was taken to meet the Kaiser on the Craonne plateau, a meeting during which the Kaiser was said to have been amused that Rees was Welsh – the same nationality as Lloyd George. Rees died in 1948.
Captain Arthur Osburn, the medical officer attached to 4/Dragoon Guards, won a DSO and retired from the RAMC as a lieutenant colonel. He wrote of his experiences in Unwilling Passenger and died in 1952 aged 75. Gerard Kempthorne was eventually repatriated in 1915 as was Captain Robert Dolbey who was captured near La Bassée with the KOSB in October 1914. Dolbey also wrote a book describing his time on the Aisne and his subsequent captivity, A Regimental Surgeon in War and Prison was published in 1917. Bertie Ratcliffe the West Yorkshire officer who was captured on 20 September and later escaped from the train near Crefeld, was awarded the Military Cross and apparently had tea with the king who wanted to hear of his escapades. Private John Cooper was not invited to tea neither was Sergeant Edward Facer but both men received the Military Medal in 1920 in recognition of their successful escape.
Sir John French who commanded the BEF on the Aisne continued clinging to command until the failures at Aubers Ridge, Festubert and Loos forced Lord Kitchener to replace him with Sir Douglas Haig in December 1915. Ideally this should have taken place before the BEF moved to Flanders. Sadly for General Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien 1915 was not a good year either. The tensions between him and Sir John came to a head after Smith-Dorrien advocated a tactical withdrawal in April 1915 to consolidate the front line at Ypres. Sir John was still bearing a grudge over Le Cateau and used Smith-Dorrien’s suggestion of a withdrawal to remove him, accusing him of having a pessimistic outlook. To add insult to injury, several days later Sir John accepted the advice of General Herbert Plumer – Smith-Dorrien’s replacement – to perform a withdrawal almost identical to the one which Smith-Dorrien had recommended. Smith-Dorrien died in August 1939 following a car accident.
If there is a final line which can be drawn under the Aisne campaign of 1914 it is perhaps contained in the words of Frederick Coleman, the RAC volunteer driver as he headed towards Flanders with 2 Cavalry Brigade: ‘The Aisne we had reached with such sanguine hopes twenty-one days before was still the high water mark of our advance’.
Notes on Sources
Introduction
1. For a greater understanding of the Battle of Mons and Le Cateau see Retreat and Rearguard 1914 by Jerry Murland.
Chapter 1
2. Sergeant Evelyn Guy Whiteman is buried at Perreuse Château Franco British National Cemetery at Signy-Signets. Grave Reference: 1.D.34. Lance Corporal William Ticehurst is buried at Pécy Communal Cemetery.
3. Bridges, Alarms and Excursions, p.93.
4. Herwig, The Marne 1914, The Opening of World War 1 and the Battle Which Changed the World, p.xii.
5. Ibid, pp.221–2.
6. Ibid, p.222.
7. Cited in Barnett, The Sword Bearers, p.98.
8. Ibid, p.101.
9. Colin Robert Ballard was commanding officer of the 1st Norfolks in August 1914 when, along with the 1st Cheshires, 2nd Cavalry Brigade and 119 Battery, RHA, he fought in the rearguard action at Audregnies on 24 August. He was wounded in 1916 whilst commanding 57 Infantry Brigade. He retired from the army in 1923 and died in 1941. His book, Smith-Dorrien was published in 1931.
10. The 3rd and 6th Cavalry Brigades had been detached from the Cavalry Division and were now under the command of Hubert Gough. On 16 September they became part of the 2nd Cavalry Division.
11. Herwig, The Marne 1914, The Opening of World War 1 and the Battle Which Changed the World, p.xv.
12. Captain John Clive Darling was the signalling officer of 20/Hussars in 1914. He was awarded the DSO and mentioned in despatches. He finished the war as a major and wrote the history of the regiment. He died in 1933, aged 45.
13. Wyrall, The History of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry 1914–1918, p.54.
14. Gleichen, The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade, p.62.
15. Dolbey, A Regimental Surgeon in War and Prison, p.33.
16. Figures cited by Sir John French to Lord Kitchener in TNA WO 33/713.
17. Astil, The Great War Diaries of Brigadier General Alexander Johnston, p.19.
18. Anglesey, The History of the British Cavalry Volume 7, p.185.
19. Ibid, Campbell’s account, p.185–6.
20. Lamb, Country Life, Vol. 38.
21. Gleichen, The Doings of the Fifteenth Infantry Brigade, p.62.
22. Private Papers of C L Brereton. IWM Dept. of Documents, 86/30/1.
23. Young, Diary of an RE Subaltern.
24. War Diary of 20/Field Ambulance, TNA WO 95/129.
25. Captain Robin Grey and Captain Robert Albany Boger of 5 Squadron RFC were shot down and taken prisoner on 5 October 1914.
26. Private Papers of C L Brereton. IWM Dept. of Documents, 86/30/1.
27. Astil, The Great War Diaries of Brigadier General Alexander Johnston, p.21.
28. Private Papers of A Reeve. IWM Dept. of Documents, 90/20/1.
29. Ballard, Smith-Dorrien, p.210.
Chapter 3
30. Barnett, The Sword Bearers, p.101.
31. Bidwell & Graham, Fire-Power, p.41.
32. Griffith, Battle Tactics of the Western Front, p.13.
33. Carl Philipp Gottfried von Clausewitz was the son of a retired lieutenant and first encountered war
as a 12-year-old lance corporal in 1793, eventually attaining the rank of major general. He is famous primarily as a military theorist interested in the examination of war. He wrote a careful, systematic, philosophical examination of war in all its aspects, as he saw it and taught it. The result was his principal work, On War, the West’s premier work on the philosophy of war.
34. Clausewitz, On War.
35. Bloem, The Advance from Mons, p.183.
36. Ibid, p.153.
37. Three of these battalions were deployed to escort prisoners.
38. War Diary of Adjutant of IR 53/3 found in TNA WO 95/1566.
39. Von Poseck, The German Cavalry 1914 in Belgium and France, p.122.
40. Further reinforcements would arrive within twenty-four hours in the shape of two battalions released from Maubeuge and two 8-inch howitzer batteries.
41. The I Corps War Diary, TNA WO 95/588.
42. The Private Papers of J L Mowbray, IWM Dept. of Documents, 82/16/1.
43. Brigadier General Phillip Howell was killed in action on 7 October 1916. He is buried at Varennes Military Cemetery, near Albert, grave reference: I.B.37.
44. Evans and Laing, The 4th (Queen’s Own) Hussars in the Great War, p.18.
45. Wilson took over command of the 4th Division on 9 September from Major General Thomas Snow who was injured in a riding accident. Brigadier General Frederick Anley was given command of 12 Brigade.
46. Young, Diary of an RE Subaltern.
47. Captain Frank Fisher, Lieutenant Horatio John Vicat and Sergeant William Burr are commemorated on the La Ferté–sous-Jouarre Memorial.
48. Walker, From the Curragh to the Aisne 1914.
49. The Personal Diary of Kenneth Godsell, RE Archive.
50. 54-year-old Major General Hubert Ian Wetherall Hamilton was killed on 14 October 1914 and is buried at Cheriton (St Mary’s) Churchyard in Kent.
51. Osburn, Unwilling Passenger, p.142.
52. The Private Papers of Captain B J N Marden. IWM Dept. of Documents, 14292.
BEF Campaign on the Aisne 1914 Page 27