‘Back to billets: singularly quiet day up to 3.00 pm. From then for about one and a half hours the [Germans] subjected us to a terrific bombardment in the village, shrapnel and high explosive. It was quite like old times at Soupir and we couldn’t work out what had woke the beggars up, they simply plastered the village and some came so close we got orders to be ready to move out of the village at once. Luckily this did not happen. Result: three transport horses killed and a lot of tiles and roofs not looking their best Strolled up to the Coldstream Guards [3rd Battalion] billets about 6.30 and saw Tony [possibly Lieutenant A F Smith, Adjutant]who told me the reason of their peevishness. They apparently have a big trench 500 yards in front of the Coldstream with a lot of men in it. The Coldstream Guards got up an RA officer to have a look at it. He telephoned down to the big howitzers and they planted their very first shot right into the middle of the trench. Tony tells me he never heard such a squealing and sqorking (sic) and howling and moaning which went on for the best part of an hour … the result was the [Germans] became very peevish and let us have it for all they were worth. One of our transport men had a lucky escape. He was standing beside a horse when a high explosive took the horse’s head clean off: man untouched.’
At Hazebrouck the Grenadiers were met by four new officers and a new draft of NCOs and men, some of whom were returning from base hospitals having been casualties in the August fighting. Carleton Tufnell had taken over as the battalion machine-gun officer, Michael Stocks was by now a seasoned platoon commander in Number 4 Company, Harry Parnell commanded a platoon in Number 3 Company and Cholmeley Symes-Thompson was second-in-command of Number 1 Company. Bernard Gordon Lennox, the senior major in the battalion, remained in command of his Number 2 Company. Fortunately the battalion was not deployed immediately and after a short rest period, early on 20 October they marched to St Jean, a small village to the north of Ypres. Here they assembled with the remaining Guards battalions of 4 Brigade. Brigadier General the Earl of Cavan, himself an old Grenadier, had been in command of 4 Brigade since 19 September and was now commanding operations as the brigade received its orders to advance northeast towards Passchendaele.
Advancing across the flat, featureless fields in open artillery formation, 4 Brigade passed over the Zonnebeke – Langemarck road where the ground rises slightly towards Hill 32. Progress was slow over a landscape that was intersected by numerous streams and hedgerows and dotted with small farms and cottages; nevertheless, the leading formation of 3/Coldstream Guards was in sight of the church spire at Passchendaele before any significant resistance was experienced. Observing as part of the cavalry screen, Regy Wyndham’s diary recorded the Guards’ advance:
‘Saw the Guards attacking today. They advanced in open order with men dropping, but no one turned or stopped. They went on steadily in spite of a heavy fire.’
Captain Richard Dawson, who was commanding the advance company of the Coldstream Guards, came under fire soon after reaching a wooded area near Aviatik Farm running east-west on the ridge ahead. Aware that he had probably advanced too far ahead of the battalion, and unsure of the strength of the enemy forces in front of him, he sent a runner back to report his situation and ask for support. His company was not alone in losing touch, by this stage in the afternoon the remaining companies of the 3rd Battalion had also lost touch with 5 Brigade on their left and 2/Coldstream Guards on the right, and although Lord Cavan took immediate steps to support 3/Coldstream Guards’ right flank, contact with increasing numbers of German Fourth Army units had effectively brought the advance to a halt. This was the first real indication of the large numbers of German forces that were advancing through the Fôret d’Houthulst on a wide front towards them, certainly in greater numbers than the single German corps that Sir John French believed was in the vicinity.
Having dug in along a line that ran roughly parallel to the Stroombeek, the brigade was attacked on several occasions during the night. Bernard Gordon Lennox’s diary recorded an attack on the Grenadiers’ positions by ‘about 200 Germans who got it in the neck about 70 yds off, and retired precipitately.’ The next morning there were no further infantry assaults but they were heavily shelled; the German gunners keeping up their harassing fire for most of the next two days with the inevitable casualties. On 23 October, the same day that Robert Rising and the Gloucesters were fighting on the outskirts of Langemarck, Bernard Gordon Lennox recorded the death of 22-year-old Lieutenant Frederick Miller who had been with the battalion since landing in France and had fought all through the retreat from Mons and at Chavonne on the Aisne:1
‘With great grief I had to record the death of poor old ‘Donald’ Miller this evening in the advanced trenches. He was blown to bits by a shell, poor lad: a most excellent officer and a real good friend and companion.’
It was becoming increasingly obvious that the I Corps advance had been stopped in its tracks by the weight of the German Fourth Army and as more and more units became engaged with the enemy, so the list of friends from other regiments that had been killed and wounded began to filter through. One of these was Bernard’s elder brother Major Esme Gordon Lennox, who had been badly wounded by shell fire while serving with 2/Scots Guards at Zandvoorde on 21 October.
Further advance by British troops in this sector was now checked and on 24 October the brigade was relieved by units of the French Sixth Army and moved into reserve at Eksternest. There was to be little respite; the following morning the 2nd Division received orders to advance on Reutel. The attack began with the usual artillery bombardment on German positions in the village and despite the rather late start and stiff resistance, the Irish Guards made enough progress to gain a foothold on the Passchendaele-Becelaere Ridge. 4 Brigade had been ready to move at 6.00 am, Bernard Gordon Lennox noting with some disgust that:
‘We did not move until about 9am when we advanced towards Reutel. On the way saw Gerry Ruthven [Major Hon W Hore-Ruthven, Brigade Major, 4 Brigade] who gave me very encouraging news of Esme. We got to a big wood [Polygon Wood] and remained there until midday when we got the usual orders to be prepared to resume the offensive. The idea was that the Irish Guards were to go for Reutel from the north-west while we should work up a small stream [Reutelbeek] through a big wood and come at it from the south-east … we managed to get about 150 yards along the stream when we came under a heavy cross fire which luckily did remarkably little harm. We stopped where we were and Dowling [Lieutenant C M Dowling] came in to report the situation to me. The situation was my company was attacking a strongly fortified position on a one man front which didn’t seem quite sound’
The brigade came under a very heavy fire after leaving the shelter of the wood towards Reutel, a position which was strongly held by the enemy posted in force on the high ground north of the village. At 5.00 pm the Irish Guards on the left, with 3/Coldstream Guards in support, had succeeded in getting within 200 yards of the northern exits of the village, but came under heavy rifle fire from concealed enemy trenches on the right. Night fell before any further progress was made and the Grenadiers found themselves occupying a line formed by the edge of the grounds of Polderhoek Chateâu. Their situation was not improved by strong winds and torrential rain; Bernard Gordon Lennox recalled:
‘A fearfully dark night, raining and blowing also and I don’t think I have spent such an unpleasant night for a long time. Feet absolutely wet through and I have not had my boots off since leaving Boescheppe on the 21st.’
Their overnight positions were in the woodland to the southeast of Polygon Wood. In 1914 the area of woodland west of Reutel was more extensive than it is today and punctuated by sections of open ground and wide rides. The dense woodland prevented the Grenadiers from pinpointing exactly where the enemy trenches were situated and for that matter, exactly where the remainder of the brigade was. But from the volume of fire being directed at them, they had a notion of how strongly the German trenches in front of them were held. During the night they were attacked three times:
‘At a
bout 9.00 pm, 12 midnight, and 3.00 am, (sounds like a prescription on a medicine bottle.) Very heavy firing each time, but I don’t think they really meant to come on. The last attack however was so strong that I felt justified in sending back to Headquarters suggesting a [company] being sent up in support … as they would probably come on again at dawn if at all.’
Fortunately there was no dawn attack on the 26th and 4 Brigade consolidated its line with 2/Coldstream Guards moving into position between the Grenadiers and the Irish Guards and later 3/Coldstream Guards taking up new positions on the right of the Grenadiers. This gave them some respite from the fighting of the previous twenty-four hours enabling Gordon Lennox to comment in his diary on the performance of other battalions:
‘Same position all day, a lot of sniping on both sides, and the chateâu heavily shelled and knocked about. We improved our trenches, but this difficult as the ground low lying and wet … digging like mad to improve them. Can’t make out why every battalion doesn’t dig itself in properly. If they did they might never be turned out of their trenches like some of them have been lately.’
The final line of the 4 Brigade advance, which allowed the 2nd Division to close up with the hard pressed units of the 7th Division, became home for the two battalions of Coldstream Guards for the next three weeks. For Captain Richard Dawson and Lance Corporal James Whitfield the next twenty-two days would be spent in waterlogged trenches, often up to their knees in water, under ceaseless shell fire and continual sniping. 3/Coldstream Guards’ trenches zigzagged along the extreme eastern edge of Polygon Wood, which in places was little more than 300 yards from the outskirts of Reutel; while those occupied by James Whitfield and 2/Coldstream ran through the wood itself. To add to the general unpleasantness, the woods in front of their lines were thick with unburied German infantrymen. In describing the conditions in which the battalion found itself, 2 /Coldstream Guards war diary inadvertently provided a glimpse of the future of warfare on the Western Front:
‘Throughout this period innumerable attacks and demonstrations were made against the line and a great deal of annoyance and loss was caused by the enemy’s snipers and rifle bombs, as well as their artillery. The position was improved from day to day, elaborate rifle pits and communication trenches were constructed, wire entanglements and other obstacles erected and so forth … the enemy continually sapped closer to us and in two places their trenches were eventually scarcely 20 yards from our own … The composition of the line was frequently altered, the troops on either flank being moved repeatedly, but the line held by the battalion remained unaltered throughout this period.’
On 30 October the battle for Gheluvelt was one day away from its nail-biting climax and the four battalions of 4 Brigade found themselves temporarily broken up. Responding to an urgent request for support, Lord Cavan took the Grenadiers and the Irish Guards to Klein Zillebeke to protect the right flank of General Bulfin’s 2 Brigade in order to reinforce the cavalry who were holding the line north of Hollebeke. The remaining two battalions of Coldstream Guards were destined to occupy the Polygon Wood positions under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Cecil Pereira. Pereira would soon be joined by the shattered remnants of the 1st Battalion which had suffered enormously at the Kruiseke crossroads and the subsequent fighting on the outskirts of Gheluvelt, leaving just eighty men standing and able to bear arms.
In spite of the bitter fighting of the previous day on the Menin Road, the morning of 30 October was relatively quiet on the Gheluvelt front. The Grenadier Guards were in their reserve positions at Nonne Bosschen Wood and although they had not been involved in the desperate fighting at the Kruiseke crossroads the previous day, they had witnessed the storm of German shell fire that was gradually reducing Gheluvelt to rubble and fully expected to be moved up in support of the 1st Division who were now in hastily dug trenches on the outskirts of the village. However, the anticipated resumption of the German attack did not fall on Gheluvelt that morning; instead von Fabeck focused his attentions on Zandvoorde.
From Nonne Bosschen Wood the German artillery attack on the Zandvoorde Ridge would have been all too obvious and it came as no surprise when the orders arrived later in the afternoon for the Grenadiers to be ready to move. Their route took them past 1/Gloucesters’ reserve trenches at Veldhoek, over the Menin Road and south towards Klein Zillebeke. By 5.00 am Cavan’s half brigade of Grenadier and Irish Guards had relieved the Royal Horse Guards and were astride the Klein Zillebeke-Zandvoorde road. The Grenadiers were on the right and in touch with 4/Hussars on the opposite bank of the Ypres-Comines Canal while the Irish Guards took up positions on the left. Bernard Gordon Lennox described the move south:
‘We got our orders to move in support of the 7th Division. We started off about 4.00 pm blobbing towards Hollebeke and arrived there after dusk and proceeded to take over the cavalry trenches and the junction of canal and railway. The first person I saw was Harold Brassey: delighted to see each other. The cavalry had been hard pressed and the Irish Guards and ourselves came up to support them … We proceeded to dig in, the Royals being ahead of us about 300 yards. It started raining hard which did not improve matters, but we eventually got it done just before daylight.’2
Captain Harold Ernest Brassey was an old friend.3 The two men had first met as boys at Eton in 1891 and after passing through Sandhurst together continued their friendship. More recently, Bernard’s brother, Charles, had married Harold’s sister, Hilda Madeline Brassey. One of the last occasions they had seen each other was at the Household Brigade Steeplechases at Hawthorn Hill in April 1914. This annual event was one of the foremost social highlights of the year and was widely reported in the society pages. The weather had been unusually good that April and the event had been well attended by officers and their ladies from the Household Brigade and the Brigade of Guards. Sadly many of the individuals who had enjoyed the April sunshine at Hawthorn Hill, including Harold Brassey, Harry Parnell and Bernard Gordon Lennox, would soon feature in the casualty lists.
On 31 October the German attack on Gheluvelt recommenced. Flushed with the success of taking Zandvoorde from the cavalry the previous day, von Fabeck launched his attack north and south of the Menin Road with a massive artillery bombardment. At Klein Zillebeke 4 Brigade trenches were heavily shelled. Bernard Gordon Lennox again:
‘As soon as daylight came we were subjected to a terrific shelling: the enemy’s captive balloon was observing and I regret to say they got the range of No. 2 Company’s trenches which were in the open. Ivor Rose [Lieutenant Ivor St C Rose] had a wonderful escape, a high explosive landed absolutely in his trench and buried the whole lot. He was dug out just in time and dreadfully shaken, with cracked ear-drum. 2 or 3 men killed and others buried. Shortly after another one arrived & demolished another of my trenches … To the left our centre had to give way a bit and I received a message saying “our centre has been driven in: the safety of the Army depends on the Irish Guards and the Grenadier Guards holding on at all costs.” That was all right. The Germans advanced and came into a wood in our front, but No. 1 Company took tea with them and they didn’t advance any further. I have established my own Headquarters in a trench immediately next to the railway, a spot they hammered at incessantly all day and towards evening brought up a couple of field guns and fired point blank at me.’
The original plan for 31 October was to retake the lost cavalry trenches on the Zandvoorde Ridge but von Fabeck’s attack rendered this quite impossible and the Guards were forced to remain on the defensive in their Klein Zillebeke positions. On the other hand, events on 2 Brigade’s front were being dictated by the battle raging in Gheluvelt. When Gheluvelt was taken towards midday, the left flank of General Bulfin’s 2 Brigade became dangerously exposed, forcing him to order his beleaguered men to retire to the Zillebeke crossroads. While 2/Royal Sussex was able to complete its retirement relatively unscathed, 1/Northants and 2/Gordon Highlanders dug in along the Brown Road, (so called after its colour on the 1914 maps), suffered considera
bly and, in retiring, had to cross an exposed area of open ground. But as was recounted above, all was not lost and when news filtered through that the Worcesters had closed the gap at Gheluvelt Chateâu, Bulfin, with characteristic dash, counter-attacked through Shrewsbury Forest and regained much of the lost ground. Bulfin attacked again after dark in an attempt to re-establish the line they had held that morning and although this second counter-attack was successful, 22 Brigade on their left were unable to match the advance and the battalions of 2 Brigade had to fall back once more.
Nightfall on 31 October 1914 ended a day of desperate fighting; the British line had been pushed back practically everywhere except at Klein Zillebeke and Zonnebeke. The recapture of Gheluvelt Chateâu by the Worcesters had been neutralized to some extent by the retirement south of the Menin Road by 22 Brigade, resulting in Gheluvelt being abandoned and the line pulled back to Veldhoek. Although Gheluvelt was considered to be of little material importance, its loss and the subsequent readjustment of the front line now pushed Klein Zillebeke into the limelight in the form of a sharp salient. German interest would now be focussed on the vulnerability of this sector. As for 4 Brigade, the Irish Guards were ordered to remain in their trenches for another night; they had taken 400 casualties during the fighting of the previous two days. Included amongst the eleven officer casualties was the commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Reginald Brabazon, the Lord Ardee. The Grenadiers were relieved after dark by the French XI Corps for what they hoped would be at least a few hours sleep and moved back to a larch plantation (probably Battle Wood) by the railway.
Aristocrats Go to War: Uncovering the Zillebeke Cemetery Page 15