Our Friends Beneath the Sands

  As the light increased, down in the camp Major Velly led a counter-attack by the Legion and turco companies, and at the third attempt they succeeded in driving the Berbers out beyond the perimeter again, where they could be brought under steady fire. Some were shot down while burdened by their loot, and by about 6am the rest had withdrawn. The Berbers’ total losses were reckoned to be about 100; French casualties were reported as 19 killed and 101 wounded, of whom 11 and 57 respectively were from the Legion companies. The total of 120 casualties was the highest in any single frontier battle yet, and Pierron presumably had to face some stinging questions about sentries and outposts.30

  THE BERBERS DISPERSED with their loot, doubtless spreading the word of a great victory, and no longer interested in continuing to Colomb Béchar; one source states that they got away with Spahi horses and saddles, mules, nearly 100 rifles, crates of ammunition and tinned food.31 General Vigny assembled his columns into a 5,000-strong punitive force, and although unable to catch up with the dissolving harka, on 5 May this Upper Guir Column shelled and destroyed Moulay Ahmad Lahsin’s headquarters at Dairs Saba. The holy man was not present: glowing with baraka from his success, he was gathering tribesmen about 40 miles to the south.

  In the absence of the wounded Captain Maury, the 24th (Mounted) was led by Lieutenant Jaeglé, the cheerful young parodist who drew word-pictures of senior officers. Sergeant Lefèvre’s diary describes the villages of the peaceful Ouled Nahcer tribe along the Oued Haiber as delightful, shaded by olive trees and lush with figs, grapes and grenadines. The twittering chaffinches around his tent gave him ‘just for an instant the impression that I was gazing over a little laughing corner of France’. The légionnaires’ appreciation of these surroundings was tempered by the fact that they had run out of tobacco and soap, their uniforms were in rags, and they were breaking their teeth on hard-tack.32 General Vigny needed resupply badly, and when, on 8 May, rumours reached the column that anything between 8,000 and 20,000 tribesmen (perhaps with cannon) were gathering at Boudenib south-west across the mountains, he was in no shape to march directly towards them. It cost him two days to hook east and down the Bou Anan pass to meet a convoy at El Hajjoui, where, on 11 May, the troops were finally able to enjoy a pipe again after their soupe. On 12 May they marched due west along the north bank of the Oued Guir (some men of the mule company still in worn-out sandals, and trousers made from feed-sacks). At 1pm the next day the 24th (Mounted) were providing the left flank guard as the column approached on their left the palm-groves of Beni Ouzien, about 6 miles short of Boudenib.

  THERE IS NOTHING OF ‘LAUGHING FRANCE’ about the terrain surrounding Boudenib (see Map 16). The Oued Guir cuts through the parched east – west wall of the Djebel Mechmech to emerge southwards from the Tazuguerte pass, and then swings eastwards across a flat, desolate plain – the Djorf. The palmerie of Boudenib, perhaps 2 miles from end to end and a mile across, enclosed a large kasbah built amid cultivated ground close to the north bank of the broad riverbed, facing a series of red rock garas jutting up perhaps 1,500 yards away south of the Guir.

  Marching towards Boudenib from the east, the 24th (Mounted) would have passed over many miles of featureless flats, tawny or rust-coloured under a scabby skin of coarse gravel and dotted with the usual low clumps of grey weeds. Over any distance the ground tilts and sinks in subtle gradients, so that extensive palm-plantations only become visible when they are little more than 1,000 yards away; until they do, the lack of any vertical feature for the eye to seize upon makes it remarkably difficult to judge distances. Occasionally the légionnaires would have crossed shallow streams running down towards the river on their left, their beds of pale grey water-rounded pebbles contrasting with the angular brown-black gravel of the desert. In the far distance off to the right the receding djebel shows yellowish-cream, marked with swirls of darker strata like chocolate ripples in pale fudge. On the left, the otherwise indistinct edge of the shallow riverbed is marked by a straggling line of vegetation; as you approach the small village and palm-groves of Beni Ouzien the near bank is lined intermittently with feathery fresh-green tamarisk trees, plumed grasses and occasional canebreaks. Water flows slowly in a broad band close to the south bank of the Guir, hundreds of yards away, but except during the winter floods and spring run-off most of its wide bed is a confusing succession of whale-backs of pale shingle, sandbars with occasional whiskers of grass, and stretches of unstable mud. Beyond the south bank, a succession of Devon-red cliffs grow closer as you move westwards.

  Some 6,000 tribesmen had gathered around Boudenib, and through binoculars their tents could be seen crowding the flats west of the main palmerie about 6 miles away. At mid-afternoon on 13 May a courier from Major de Barry (the cavalry officer commanding this left wing) warned Jaeglé that tribesmen were waiting in the Beni Ouzien palm-grove, where the artillery would try to search them out. The 75mm batteries opened fire, both on the main camp at Boudenib and at much shorter range into the thick palm trees close on the Mounted Company’s left front. This provoked heavy rifle fire; Sergeant Lefèvre saw white smoke-puffs against the dark green and heard bullets snapping over his head. In order to clear this flank for cavalry to pass down the plain, the company were ordered to assault the palmerie.

  The légionnaires advanced towards the treeline over exposed ground now broken by shallow gulleys in the yellow clay, and men began to drop – seven in Lefèvre’s platoon alone. The Algerian Skirmishers following the company on their right were still some way off; the 24th (Mounted) were isolated outside the palm-grove, taking fire from tribesmen concealed behind trees and in irrigation ditches, and the légionnaires’ advance had obliged the artillery to switch targets. Jaeglé kept them moving and at last they reached the trees, killing several warriors face-to-face, but now that visibility was reduced to a few yards they were vulnerable to surprise attack at point-blank range. Sergeant Lefèvre knew that they had to cling on, because if they were driven out into the open again they would be easy targets. The 24th (Mounted) were on their own at the far left point of the French advance; on the plain north of them Moroccan cavalry had charged, some even reaching the gun line and forcing the crews to make use of their carbines.

  At about 6pm, when Captain Clavel’s turcos had at last come up on their right flank to form something like a battle-line, the Legion company pressed on westwards towards the far fringe of the palm trees. Lieutenant Jaeglé led a rush by the 2nd Half-Company through deepening shadows and towards the glare of sunset, against Berbers holding a wide gulley. He fell, shot in the body; Lieutenant Huot took over, but a bullet ripped across his left ribs almost at once, and in Sergeant Lefèvre’s words ‘he was obliged to take himself to the rear’. A machine gun came into action and swept the enemy off a low crest, and as night fell the 24th (Mounted) were ordered to fall back towards the baggage column, still under intermittent sniping. In his later post-mortem, General Bailloud, GOC 19th Army Corps, would criticize Vigny for committing this elite mobile company in the role of heavy assault infantry in closely wooded ground; the 24th (Mounted) had lost 15 out of the 25 dead suffered by the whole column that day.

  Eventually the company took their place in the west face of a big defensive square on the plain facing Boudenib, and Sergeant Lefèvre went back to the field ambulance to check on his wounded, who numbered 15 out of the column’s total of 68. Lieutenant Jaeglé died that night; he would be buried at Colomb Béchar beside his inseparable friend Lacoste, killed at Menabha the previous month. Lieutenant Huot turned out to be less seriously hurt than his sergeant had assumed. It was 10pm when Lefèvre returned to his squad; they had to dig shallow trenches for defence – there were no rocks large enough for a murette on this sandy billiard-table – and men slept with weapon in hand. Fires were forbidden, the wind was blowing hard out of the desert, and the légionnaires had nothing but hard biscuit to chew on.

  THE NEXT MORNING the advance on Boudenib itself resumed; 24th (Mounted) were given the easier task of forming a stop
-line at the edge of the palmerie, while their comrades of Captain Bertrand’s 3rd (Mounted)/1st RE moved into the vanguard. From a range of a mile and a half the kasbah was shelled, but neither the shrapnel shells nor the melinite high explosive seemed to be very effective. A squadron of Africa Light Horse charged into the palm trees – supposedly without orders – and took several casualties before scattering out again. Captain Bertrand’s men (including Lieutenant Paul Rollet) went into action against Berber riflemen from mid morning on 14 May and captured some buildings, but a general assault was avoided when, in late afternoon, the harka was seen streaming away to the west and north, and a white flag was raised on the minaret of the mosque.

  On the 15th the village was searched, and prisoners were sorted into three groups: women and children were left free, the men of Boudenib itself were given the aman, but those from the Tafilalt and elsewhere were questioned. One source reported that among them were Marrakesh men in Sultan Moulay Hafid’s uniform, and others from as far afield as Rabat, and the Sous plain behind Agadir. 33 General Vigny sent cavalry, mule companies and lightened Algerian infantry to follow the heavy tracks left by the harka, but without success (a staff officer’s attempt to take a short cut resulted in the troops becoming lost in waterless terrain). It was decided to establish a base at Boudenib.

  On 16 May, on the other side of the Atlas, Moulay Hafid made a triumphal entry into Meknes, and – far from being deterred by the defeat at Boudenib – in the south-east unprecedentedly large numbers of tribesmen began to gather. From the Tafilalt – only about 70 miles from Boudenib – the Ait Khabbash Berbers and Ziz valley Arabs who had previously held back now rallied to Moulay Ahmad Lahsin’s banner, together with men from the High and even the Middle Atlas. By 20 August 1908, various groups totalling more than 15,000 tribesmen were reportedly assembling at the marabout’s headquarters at Tazuguerte, less than 20 miles north-west of Boudenib.34

  THE FRENCH HAD BUILT a ‘redoubt’ on rolling ground about a mile north-west of the kasbah in the palm-groves. This was an irregular quadrilateral of dug ditches and spoil ramparts, large enough to accommodate 1,500 men and 550 animals, with corner bastions mounting 75mm field and 80mm mountain guns. Perhaps 2,000 yards due south of this camp, on the northern lip of a 150-foot high tabletop gara above the south bank of the Guir, a small fort had been built for observation (it is intriguing that well before the First World War the French were using the German term blockhaus).35

  Photos suggest that the blockhouse was an irregularly shaped quadrilateral of roughly dressed stone slabs, with loopholed walls rising about 25ft on the southern faces, but only about 10 feet high and unloopholed around the north, where there was only a narrow gap between the wall and the cliff edge. There seem to have been internal towers at the south-east and north-west corners, with walled sentry-balconies protruding at the top of each, resembling theatre-boxes. The building was set on a levelled rock platform, and at the west side the edge of this terrace dropped off in a chest-high step. A couple of rows of thin barbed wire had been strung along the stony slopes about 25 yards from the walls, but there was no outwork to protect the modest-sized door in the east wall. While the east, north and west sides of the gara were cliffs, a steep slope up the southern side gave access to the summit. In one photo signalling-lamp equipment can be seen in an exposed position on a northern parapet, facing the oasis and the French camp below.36

  From 29 August onwards, lookouts in the blockhouse watched a mass of Moroccans pouring out of the mouth of the pass and spreading slowly across the Djorf plain towards Boudenib. The main redoubt to the north was occupied by VI/2nd RE, two companies from 2nd RTA, a Spahi squadron and gunners, all commanded by Major Fesch. (The leader of the harka sent in an envoy with a letter, challenging him in superbly medieval terms to come out from behind his walls and fight in the open – see the epigraph to this chapter.) The blockhouse above the south bank was held by Lieutenant Vary and Sergeant Koenig with 75 men – 40 légionnaires and 35 Skirmishers. They had no heavy weapons, but they did have some melinite charges and fuses, and a box of dynamite sticks presumably left over from the quarrying of stone for the construction.37

  THE MISSION OF THE BLOCKHOUSE GARRISON was to spot and signal enemy movements for the commander of the low-lying main camp. On the late afternoon of 31 August 1908, Vary and his artillery-observer sergeant flashed the news of several tented camps being pitched north and west of the redoubt; this continued on the morning of 1 September, when groups of riders were moving around constantly and men on foot were converging towards the redoubt and the palm-groves south of it, surrounding the camp on three sides. By 3.30pm, Moroccans were also massing to the south of the blockhouse itself, masked from the direction of the redoubt, and Vary asked for artillery ranging shots.

  The message traffic seems to fall into a pattern as the sun slipped towards the west on 1 September: Vary answered repeated requests from Fesch for information about the enemy around the redoubt (4pm, ‘Gulley parallel to your west face full of infantry’), while becoming increasingly conscious of the threat to his own position (4.30pm, ‘75 fire not reaching the hill – you’re firing too far west. Rake crests south of blockhouse, which are very thickly occupied. I don’t have Map Sheets 3 and 4 . . .’ – this presumably in reply to an unhelpful instruction). The 75mm field gun was a magnificent low-trajectory piece with an effective shrapnel round, but it was no howitzer, and from the viewpoint of the gunners in the redoubt the tribesmen threatening the blockhouse were just behind a reverse crest. Firing air-burst shrapnel shells close to an open-topped friendly position, especially after dark, was in any case a delicate task. The 80mm mountain gun could drop shells from a high angle, but (as Rankin had remarked on the Chaouia) this old-fashioned piece recoiled about 10 yards after every shot and had to be laboriously re-laid.38

  Between 5pm and 5.20pm on 1 September, Major Fesch badgered Vary for information on enemy concentrations. The subaltern did his best, but complained that smoke was hiding the camps; he ended with a slightly wistful reminder that the gara summit south of him was now permanently occupied by the enemy in great numbers. Ten minutes later Vary’s patience was clearly strained by a request for his count of how many shells of each calibre had been fired by the redoubt so far: ‘The [enemy on the] summit south of the blockhouse are firing on me and beginning to advance. Request 75 fire if possible.’ As darkness fell, waves of tribesmen moved forward across the rocky summit and brought the parapets and loopholes under constant fire (the edge of the foundation platform on the west gave them excellent short-range cover on that side). Though they could not breach the walls, as the night wore on Vary had no way of knowing if they might not bring up makeshift scaling ladders, and his walls were only 10 feet high at some points. The message log at various times during the night tells its own story, and it is easy to imagine the tones of voice if these signals had been by field telephone rather than by lamp. The following are extracts:7.50pm [Vary]: Blockhouse under assault – request 75 fire behind, right and left.

  8pm [Vary]: Too long – sweep 200 – 300 yards each side.

  8.30pm [Vary – on being asked for an appreciation of the artillery fire]: We are surrounded – this is not the moment to show myself . . . We are surrounded on all sides except the north . . . Your fire is a bit over.

  9pm [Vary – asked to report the last shots]: A bit too far to your right, and 20 – 30 yards short – one round fell close to us . . . [Then] Good – fire for effect.

  The blockhouse garrison had not eaten since morning, but thirst was a worse trial; two Skirmishers took their lives in their hands to take water around the parapets and loopholes. From 10.30pm there was a flurry of fire corrections; this seems to have been the crisis, and at some point the Moroccans came right up to the doorway in the east face. Before they could break in, a couple of légionnaires risked rising above the parapet to drop three pairs of fused melinite charges among them, with great effect. Then:11 pm [Fesch]: Estimated number of enemy around you?
/>
  [Vary]: Impossible to say, but I believe several thousand.

  [Fesch]: Have they reached your wire?

  [Vary]: They are up to the wire – many corpses spread all around the blockhouse.

  [Fesch]: Any losses?

  [Vary]: I am delighted with all my men – one Skirmisher mortally wounded. Continue to fire to the west.

  Asked what was happening, Vary then reported that shouting indicated a renewed assault from the west, and passed a series of fire corrections. At about 2am on 2 September the tiredness of both officers after six hours’ fighting becomes evident in a short-tempered exchange:[Fesch]: Why do you request so much fire when we no longer hear the enemy? The artillery must economize on ammo.

  [Vary]: We have to economize on ammo too, and the enemy are in great numbers – so fire!