by Robin Prior
At this point the realities of the battlefield, the weather and the perennial difficulties in arranging an attack with the French intervened to impose delay. The three divisions opposite Guillemont were too worn down to attack and one of them (the 35 Bantam Division) was physically inadequate for the task. It was therefore decided to replace these divisions with the relatively fresh 5, 20, and 7 Divisions, a transition that was bound to take time.37 Then on 25 August it began to rain and the rain's continuing for a number of days made immediate operations impossible.38 Finally, there was the matter of co-ordinating operations with the French. After a number of tentative dates had been set and then abandoned, 3 September was finally chosen as the day of the combined attack.
While planning for this large operation was proceeding, the Germans seized the initiative. On 29 August Haig was offering the judgement that the enemy troops were suffering ‘an all-round loss of morale’.39 Two days later, they launched their largest counter-attack of the Somme campaign. On the salient around Delville Wood, the newly arrived 7 and the recently positioned 24 Divisions were subjected to a shattering bombardment.40 The 4 Bavarian and 56 German Infantry Divisions, whose morale seemed quite intact, then advanced, pushing the British back into the ruins of the wood.41 Within a few hours, all ground gained in the area in the latter half of August by the British had been lost.
Undeterred, the British command pushed ahead with preparations for the large operation on 3 September. From right to left, the French would attack north and south of the Somme, the British Fourth Army would employ five divisions to assault from the south of Guillemont to High Wood, and four divisions from the Reserve Army would launch a major effort from Pozières to the Ancre Valley.
But in many respects this operation promised no more than those which had preceded it. The artillery bombardment was no heavier than that of 18 August, and so was again well below that of the successful 14 July operation.42 And an attempt to take the strongpoint of Falfemont Farm in a preliminary operation served no purpose but to alert the enemy that a major attack was imminent.
This preliminary attack started at 9 a.m. on 3 September and was a predictable disaster. The bombardment missed the target and the creeping barrage failed equally. Seeing this the French refused to attack, but the British went ahead. The contrast is well demonstrated in a letter quoted in the 2 King's Own Scottish Borderers War Diary:
I don't think a man of any regiment would have gone to certain death the way ours did – having seen as they did the failure of both preliminary bombardment and creeping barrage. The beautiful [!!!] thing about it is that they all knew when they went over that this would happen and not a man flinched.43
In the main attack to the left of Falfemont Farm affairs went much more smoothly for the British. There the left brigade of 5 Division (95) made a surprisingly swift advance. They were soon 3,500 yards deep into enemy territory. Where other divisions in the same area had hardly managed to get further than their own front line, this unit had outflanked Guillemont and joined hands with 20 Division on its eastern side.44
Three factors appear to have contributed to this success. First, the German machine-gunners in the ruins of the village who had previously taken such a toll on attacks from this direction were now pinned down by the assault of 20 Division to their north. Second, a gap existed in the German defences, probably as a result of one German division being in the process of relieving another just as 95 Brigade happened to attack.45 Third, the bombardment this time managed to create havoc among those German defenders still clinging to trench lines.46
To the north, meanwhile, 20 Division had at long last captured Guillemont. Again there were three reasons for this success. First, to the north the attacking forces constructed a series of trenches within a few hundred yards of the village. Not having attacked from this direction before, they did not arouse the suspicions of the Germans and covered the short distance to their objectives before the German machine-guns could become engaged.47 Second, the British had finally accounted for most of the deep dug-outs beneath the village.48 Third, the Germans, accustomed to small-scale attacks, had thinned out their defences. Hence they were not equipped to withstand a concentrated attack by three brigades delivered in depth and with powerful artillery support.49
Success on this flank was not confined to the capture of Guillemont. The few Germans in the area were so disorganised that they were unable to prevent further advances by Rawlinson's troops. In short order Falfemont Farm and Leuze Wood fell.50 All told, the advance in this area amounted to 4,500 yards on a 2,000 yard front.
This success resulted in a considerable improvement in the tactical position of the Fourth Army. The right angle around Delville Wood had at last been eliminated and the wood itself would soon fall as out-flanking operations forced the Germans to evacuate it. Thereby the German artillery was denied the advantage of converging fire, sometimes in enfilade, on exposed British troops. It would also make any infantry advances from this area less complicated because the attacks now need not diverge. As a result, artillery support would be a relatively straightforward matter.
To the north of Guillemont, the 7 Division was to capture Ginchy. But the change in tactics which were in evidence in the last assault on Guillemont were not to be found here. The attack did not possess weight, and it was lacking in depth in the form of moppers-up to deal with the unsubdued machine-gunners and survivors in cellars. Nor had the artillery paid sufficient attention to the threat from enemy machine-guns on the flank of the attack.51 As a consequence the attack failed.
But the command of 7 Division persisted. Over the next three days they launched a series of small attacks of the sort which had already failed against Guillemont: 3,600 casualties were suffered without reward.52 The 7 Division was then withdrawn.
Further left, few advances were made. The 1 Division was directed against a key target, High Wood, yet the scale of attack was quite inadequate.53 As a result, High Wood remained in German hands. So this considerable obstacle, intended to be eliminated ahead of Haig's major battle, remained as an objective which would require much endeavour in the coming operation.
No further attempt would be made on High Wood in advance of the new operation but Haig was determined to seize Ginchy. So a new division, the 16 (Irish) was given the job. The omens were not good. Rain was now falling and many battalions in the division were under strength. But their plan of attack possessed some originality. So far, all the attacks against Ginchy had come from the direction of Delville Wood. The new endeavour was to be made from the south, around the newly won ground near Guillemont. And the attack was to be made in greater strength this time – six battalions as against only two employed by 7 Division. Good fortune also favoured the Irish. Just before the attack the Germans brought into this sector two new divisions who somehow did not manage to establish contact with each other, so leaving the defenders in Ginchy village entirely unsupported. So when, on 9 September, the Irish assaulted in some weight from an unexpected direction, and with the support of a particularly heavy creeping barrage (fired by the field artillery of no less than two divisions) they overran their objectives.54 In two hours the ruins of Ginchy were securely in the hands of the Fourth Army.
III
The British command does not emerge well from the operations in August. Haig is the main culprit. His memorandum of 2 August, which was intended to set the scene for what was to come, was so riddled with ambiguities as to render it almost incomprehensible. Rawlinson certainly endeavoured to put what he took to be the gist of Haig's instructions into effect. But muddled thinking translated into action can hardly result in anything but muddle. So the source of the confused operations which characterise this intermediate period of the Somme was not Rawlinson but the Commander-in-Chief.
Rawlinson, however, hardly emerges with great credit. When, for one section of the front at least (around Guillemont) Haig eventually divined what was required, Rawlinson proved incapable of translating his chief ‘s orders
into action. In the end even Haig's boys' own guide to fighting a battle' did not redeem Rawlinson's command. What did was only a series of accidents (sickness, weather), which delayed the operation long enough for a thorough plan to be developed.
As for the concept of the ‘last reserves’, applied by Haig to the enemy, this was always pure fantasy. The German manpower position in the autumn of 1916 was hardly so perilous that Haig could materially affect it in the course of six weeks' fighting on the Somme. Had by some miracle the enemy line been breached in mid-September the Germans could have sealed it in short order with troops taken from unattacked sections of the Western Front and then moved troops from other less critical fronts to make up for any deficiencies. Haig's plans for a climactic battle in September with his new weapon required an enemy down to its last reserves of manpower. The reality would prove very different.
16 ‘A Hell of a Time’: Pozières and Mouquet Farm, July–August
I
It will be recalled that on 2 July the two northern corps of the Fourth Army (VIII and X) had been placed under the command of General Gough and designated the Reserve Army. These formations would play little role in the fighting in late July and August. The VIII Corps facing Serre was too shattered to undertake anything but patrolling for some time. And, in any case, 1 July had demonstrated that the German defences in that area were too formidable to be attacked frontally. Much the same could be said of the X Corps and the defences around Thiepval. Moreover, most of the heavy artillery was now supporting Rawlinson's efforts further south. The artillery position of the Reserve Army improved somewhat in the following weeks but never to the extent of placing it on an equal footing with the Fourth. So, for most of the period 15 July to 4 September, Gough's operations were confined to attacks by just two divisions from the southern section of X Corps and then from II Corps. It is much more accurate, therefore, to consider the Reserve Army as a corps operating on the flank of the Fourth Army.
If this is so why should we not consider the operations of the Reserve Army in conjunction with the Fourth? The answer is both straightforward and melancholy. Hardly ever were major attacks by the two forces co-ordinated. Only twice in the period under discussion were substantial operations conducted by the two armies simultaneously, and in one case (22/23 July) this came about by accident. On other occasions operations between adjoining battalions might be co-ordinated by the actions of their respective commanders but that was all. It was not until 3 September that the two forces planned and conducted a major attack on the same day. To all intents and purposes then, the Reserve Army in this period fought its own battles and can be considered separately.
From Pozières to Mouquet Farm, 23 July–31 August
So, for most of the middle period on the Somme, the Reserve Army confined its attacks to one or two divisions operating on but not with the left flank of the Fourth Army. The main area of these operations was around Pozières, a fortified village standing high on the Thiepval Ridge and behind which ran the German second line. Rawlinson's forces had gained some ground towards Pozières in the first two weeks of July but then Haig adjusted the boundaries between his two armies and on 15 July the area was handed over to Gough.
Haig's instructions to Gough were sketchy in the extreme. He merely stated that
Reserve Army will carry out methodical operations against Pozières with a view to capturing that important position with as little delay as possible.1
Note that once more there was the usual contradiction at the heart of Haig's instructions. Gough was to conduct ‘methodical operations’ but with ‘as little delay as possible’. To conduct them Haig assigned to Gough the newly arrived Australian Corps while X Corps, which was already in the line, was given some fresh divisions.
Why was the capture of Pozières important? There were three reasons. First, it stood in the path of any force attempting the capture of the German second line in this area. Second, the ground to the immediate rear of the village stood on the very summit of the Thiepval–Ginchy Ridge, so that possession of this ground would secure the flank of any major advance by Fourth Army. Third, the possession of this ground, and especially that around Mouquet Farm, would allow observation over the German positions around Thiepval from the rear.
As was his wont, Gough seized on the section of Haig's instructions urging that there be no delay in attacking Pozières. On the same day that he received the Commander-in-Chief ‘s letter, he summoned General Walker, the Commander of? Australian Division, to his headquarters, told him that his unit was now under the direct command of Reserve Army (thus bypassing the corps commander, General Birdwood), and ordered him to attack Pozières at once.2
Walker, a British Regular officer and a veteran of eight months’ fighting at Gallipoli, was too cautious to be rushed. He asked for time to reconnoitre the position to establish from which direction it might be best attacked. His reconnaissances revealed that he faced an unenviable situation. If he attacked Pozières from the south-west, his left flank would be open and vulnerable to flanking fire from the high ground around Thiepval and he would be attacking directly up a steep hill. On the other hand, if he attacked from the south-east, his assembly area would crowd into the area on the left of Fourth Army and as his troops advanced they would face flanking fire from trenches just to the north of Pozières, called OG1 and OG2. Nevertheless, the terrain to the south-east of the village avoided an uphill attack and the flanks of the Australian advance, left and right, could be covered by British troops. For these reasons Walker decided on the south-east.3
It was immediately obvious to Walker that some basic information needed to be collected before attack could commence. So he sent his staff officer, Lt-Col. Blamey, to discuss the problem of Pozières with some units (7 and 19 Divisions) who had already unsuccessfully attacked it. What Blamey returned with formed the basis of the Australian attack.4 First, as no man's land in the area of attack was 600 yards wide Walker required that new trenches be dug forward to reduce this killing zone to 200 yards.5 Second, and most importantly, was the artillery. Walker insisted on the maximum support available, with the result that his troops would be assisted by their own divisional artillery, the 25 Divisional artillery, and the entire heavy guns of X Corps.6
All this meant delay, so instead of attacking on the 19th as Gough had wanted, the Australians would assault Pozières on the night of the 22nd/23rd. By chance this brought it in line with the operations of the Fourth Army.
The infantry plan for the capture of Pozières was simple. The troops would advance in three stages to capture the three lines of trenches guarding the village and the bombardment would lift from each line as the attack went in. Then, while the infantry consolidated their hold on the Pozières–Bapaume road, a standing barrage falling some 200 yards ahead of them would protect then from counter-attack. Meanwhile a battalion would advance to the right of the main attack to capture the OG lines and thus protect the main body from flanking fire. And on their left flank the British 48 Division from X Corps would launch an attack to keep down fire from that direction.7
The bombardment opened on the 19th and was one of the heaviest yet seen on the British front in support of an attack by a single division. At 12.30 a.m. on the 23rd it lifted from the first German trench line and the infantry assault began. Most troops had crawled to within 60 yards of their objective and when the artillery lifted they rushed forward, ‘meeting opposition’, in the words of one account, ‘but taking no prisoners’.8 The remaining two lines were soon captured in similar fashion. By 2.30 a.m. the Australians were digging in along what was thought to be the Pozières–Bapaume road.9 Pozières, one of the strongest positions in the German second line, had certainly been captured.
The success was due to the meticulous infantry plan devised by Walker and the stunning effect of the heavy bombardment on the defending troops. But there had also been an element of luck. At the time of the attack the German command was in the process of replacing the division which had
held Pozières from the beginning of the Somme offensive with a fresh unit brought south from Ypres. The tired troops were still in occupation of the south-eastern section of the village when the Australians struck. They immediately gave way.10
There was no such collapse in the OG lines to the north of the village. Here the German dug-outs had survived the bombardment intact. The attacking Australian battalion ran into heavy machine-gun fire and could make little progress. A reinforcing battalion had no more success. A few hundred yards of trenches were captured, but that was all.11
On the left, the 48 Division attack in the area of the Reserve Army failed. The bombardment in this area was described by one unit as ‘quite useless [as] not a single shell burst along the front to be attacked’.12 The account continued: ‘the result of this was that the enemy M.G.s had nothing to worry them & were able to fire on the assaulting troops as they pleased’.13 By the end of the day contact had not been made with the Australians, so leaving a gap in the front to the south of the village.14
Despite these setbacks, and considering the lack of success on the front of Fourth Army on 22/23 July, the capture of Pozières could be counted as a success. Yet it was at this point that events turned Pozières into a nightmare for the troops and did much to negate its easy capture.
Ironically, these events were brought about by the failure of German attempts to recapture the village by counter-attack. In line with German policy during this phase of the Somme battle, immediate orders were given to retake the village. The first attempt was made at 5.30 a.m. on the 23rd but was beaten back by the already entrenched Australian machine-gunners on the Pozières–Bapaume road.15 A second was then stopped by the 48 Division.16 The Germans decided to postpone any further action until the 24th and bring forward a fresh division to carry it out. The 18 German Reserve Division was the unit selected and its 86 Regiment was designated to carry out the attack. But as each battalion of this regiment was sent forward it was caught in a murderous crossfire by troops from the Fourth Army on its flank and from the Australian troops in Pozières itself. Three German battalions ceased to exist before they had even come within rifle shot of their objective. Hearing of the fate of these troops the army commander (von Boehm) instructed that further attempts to retake Pozières were to cease and that the village was to be rendered uninhabitable by constant heavy shelling. It was this decision that would prove so costly to the Australian troops occupying the village in the subsequent days and weeks.17