The 56th Division

Then there were dumps to be made at convenient points, and many miles of railway line, both standard and narrow gauge, to bring the stores within reach of the fighting troops. Roads had to be constructed, and in some places causeways had to be built over marshy valleys. Wells were sunk, over a hundred pumping stations were installed, and a hundred and twenty miles of water-mains laid.

The whole country behind this vast front was teeming with men and horses, with wagons and motor lorries. At night it was as though an army of gigantic ants were at work, stretched out in long lines, building and excavating, marching in solemn silent processions with grim, determined purpose in the slowness of their gait, and bowed down under loads of material. They passed and repassed in never-ending streams; the roads were congested with motor and wagon traffic; paths across the open country could be traced by the shadowy silhouettes of men in single file. And the horizon flickered with the flash of guns as with summer lightning, while shells passed overhead with a long-drawn, ghostly wail, or fell with a sharp swish and a crash. The line, that maze of foul mud-filled ditches constructed in a belt of shell-pounded and festering earth, was indicated at night by floating starlights rising irregularly as sparks, bursting into brilliancy, and remaining for a moment, suspended in the blackness of the sky like arc lamps, then dying once more to so many sparks before they fell to the ground.

Sometimes the nights would be quiet—that is to say, quiet except for occasional crashes at intervals of several minutes—although the constant flickering on the horizon would never cease; at others they would be “lively,” one might almost say there would be a sensation of hustle, so swift would be the wailing passage and so continuous the crash of bursting shells. This might last all through the night as an organised “shoot,” or would come suddenly, without warning, a swift artillery attack on roads, working parties, or billets—what was afterwards known as “harassing fire” though it was in a more intense form—and shifting from one point to another, from front line to roads, from roads to billets, from billets to some spot where troops were suspected to be working. Or there would be a raid with an angry concentration of artillery from both sides.

And night after night the preparation for the “Big Push” went on.

* * * * * * *

The 56th Division, now trained and “shaken together,” arrived in the Hébuterne sector, on the right of the Gommecourt salient and towards the left of the front under preparation for the British effort. The 167th Brigade took over the front-line system held by the 145th Brigade, 48th Division, on the 4th May. The 168th Brigade marched from their billets in the Doullens area on the 6th, and the 169th Brigade followed on the 7th May. Divisional Headquarters were established at Hénu.

First blood was drawn for the division by the 167th Brigade on the 18th May. A German patrol attempted to bomb a sap held by the 3rd London Regt., and was beaten off with the loss of one officer and one N.C.O. killed. These proved to be of the 169th Infantry Regt., 52nd Division, one of the divisions of the XIV German Corps and a normal identification.

The system of holding the line was one of “grouping.” On the 22nd May Brig.-Gen. Coke, 169th Brigade, was in command of the line, which was held by two battalions of the 169th Brigade and two battalions of the 168th Brigade. In support was Brig.-Gen. Nugent, with his headquarters at Souastre, having under his command his own four battalions and one of the 169th Brigade. Brig.-Gen. Loch, 168th Brigade, with his headquarters at Grenas, had two of his own battalions and one of the 169th Brigade.

Plans were now in preparation for a very remarkable achievement.

We have seen that the scheme for the big British offensive included an attack on the Gommecourt salient. This was to be undertaken by the Third Army, and the task fell to the VII Corps (Gen. Snow), holding the front in question. For the moment we will confine ourselves to the point that the 56th Division was to be one of the attacking divisions.

When Gen. Hull was informed of what he was expected to do, he was at once confronted with an obvious difficulty—the front line of his sector was some seven hundred yards away from the enemy! It was not impossible to shorten this distance, but, with one exception, the several ways of doing it must result in heavy casualties; the enemy would be bound to see what was afoot, and would try by every means in his power to prevent and to hinder its execution, and render it as costly as he could. It would also be a lengthy business unless it was boldly tackled. Gen. Hull decided on the boldest of all courses.

He traced out a new line which was, on an average, four hundred yards in advance of the old one. This meant working, in some spots, within two hundred and fifty yards of the enemy. And he decided to dig it in one night! It meant that at least three thousand yards of trench must be constructed in a few hours, a task of appalling magnitude; and it must be remembered that every effort was always made to limit the number of men in any working party required for No Man’s Land. When he announced his intentions there was something like consternation at Corps Headquarters.

The task was allotted to Brig.-Gen. Nugent and the 167th Brigade. He had at his disposal, over and above the five battalions of his “group,” one company of the 5th Cheshire Regt. with a half of the 2/2nd London Field Coy. R.E.

So that the men might know the lie of the land, the 167th Brigade was sent on ahead of the rest of the division and straight into the line, which it held for a fortnight. The Engineers, the company officers of battalions concerned, and the brigade staff made most careful reconnaissance, patrolling every night, noting landmarks, getting acquainted with that silent, eerie tract separating the two lines of combatants. Conversations throughout the day were punctuated with references to “the strong point,” “the lonely tree,” the “May bush,” “the Z hedge,” “the head of Sap 4,” as landmarks became familiar. Sometimes German patrols were met, sometimes imagined.

It was decided to divide the whole front into four sections—A, B, C, and D. The only difficulty was the junction between B and C, but this was eventually marked by a heap of white stones—a small heap.

Four days before the date fixed for the operation, the brigade was relieved, and during the following days the whole of the arrangements were rehearsed—with the exception of the actual digging—first by day and then by night.

Meanwhile the artillery were warned that nothing was to be done by them to rouse the enemy while the work was being carried out, but that all batteries must be manned and ready for instant action. All known machine-gun emplacements were carefully registered, and arrangements were made with the Brigadier-General commanding the Corps heavy artillery to register on all German batteries whose zone of fire included the area of the work. Two of the Divisional 4·5 howitzers were to assist in the counter-battery work.

Although the trench was dug in one night, the whole operation required three nights to complete. On the first night, the 25-26th May, covering parties crept out and took up positions in advance of the selected line. Then engineers followed, quiet and certain in all that they did, and marked out the line with string and pegs. On the left they got to work speedily: the pegs were about nine inches long and made from small round stakes from which the bark had not been removed; the string was ordinary jute twine which had been prepared with loops at the proper intervals to mark the angle of bays and traverses. They were undisturbed, and C and D sections were marked out.

But in A and B sections the night was one of excursions and alarms. First of all there was great difficulty in getting the covering party through our own wire, which suggests an unfortunate oversight; and then German patrols were encountered. The latter occurrence was a contingency which had always been reckoned with. A game of hide and seek ensued, but meanwhile time passed. There was no question of clearing No Man’s Land when other parties were working on the left, and so the marking had to be abandoned. It did not, however, cause any serious inconvenience.

The next night each battalion marched from billets fully armed for digging. Ten per cent. carried picks, and the remainder carried shovels which had been carefully sharpened. Each man had three sandbags, one being wrapped round the shovel or pick to prevent noise, and between them they also carried a quantity of white tape.

In the line ten exits had been made by cutting through our wire and constructing steps out of the trench—trench ladders had also been provided by the engineers in case the steps should be impassable through rain. White boards were hung on the wire to mark these gaps for the withdrawal.

The communication trenches to be used by the working battalions were left quite clear by the troops holding the line, and, at the appointed time, the head of each battalion was at the selected entrance and advanced in the following order: covering parties, taping parties, working parties.

The covering parties, consisting of sixty officers and men in six groups, had orders to use rifle fire as sparingly as possible, but to make full use of the bayonet if enemy patrols were encountered.

When the covering parties had been given time to get out, the two other groups of parties followed at short intervals. And half an hour after the digging parties had left the trench, wiring and carrying parties, about a hundred men to each battalion, went out. There were three thousand men in No Man’s Land!

The boldness of Gen. Hull’s enterprise was amply justified. By 2.30 a.m. the trench had been made and was held by posts, found from the covering parties, reinforced with Lewis guns; they had rations, water, and shovels to improve their positions, and were in telephonic communication with the old trench, and all the working parties had filed away as silently as they had come.

During the ensuing day the Royal Flying Corps successfully prevented any enemy aeroplanes from approaching our lines, but our airmen photographed the new line themselves, and at noon Gen. Hull was able to see from a photograph what work had been done.

On the night of 27-28th the same number of men were out working again, improving the front-line trench and wire, digging support lines and two other communication trenches. The new work had been pegged out the previous night by the engineers.

The 56th Division had then started its career with the astounding feat of having in the space of forty-eight hours constructed and wired a new system of trenches, comprising 2,900 yards of fire trench and 1,500 yards of communication trenches, in No Man’s Land and within 250 yards of the enemy. Casualties were 8 killed and 55 wounded. A little luck had waited on audacity, but the success of the whole operation was undoubtedly due to the intelligence and keenness of the men. They had nothing much to help them. Gen. Hull had, indeed, ordered two or three wagons, loaded with empty shell-cases and biscuit tins, to drive up and down the roads in rear of his lines, and the artillery fired an occasional round from a howitzer as a means of distracting the attention of the enemy, but it only required one foolish man to lose his head and disaster would have descended on the whole brigade.

It is interesting to note the dress. The covering parties were in full fighting kit and carried one day’s ration; the taping, digging, and wiring men had no equipment, but carried a rifle, loaded with ten rounds, and one bandolier; the wire-carrying party had no arms or equipment.

The first stage was over. There was, however, still an enormous lot of work to be done—the trenches had to be improved, deepened, revetted, emplacements had to be made for machine guns and trench mortars, stores for ammunition of all sorts had to be constructed, cables had to be buried—it is but a repetition of what was going on everywhere on that front.

* * * * * * *

Gen. Hull and his G.S.O.1, Lieut.-Col. J. E. S. Brind, an artilleryman, were considering the problem of attack. The main features of it are noted by Gen. Hull as follows:

(a) The village of Hébuterne, which affords concealment from view to within a short distance of our present line and good observation of the German positions between Gommecourt and the spur north of the sunken road (K17a and b) on the right of the divisional front.

(b) The valleys west of Hébuterne, which afford good artillery positions and cover from view, except from the trees in Gommecourt Park.

(c) The spur running eastward from Hébuterne just north of the Hébuterne-Puisieux Road, which defilades the area, north of the spur, from the German trenches, south of the spur.

(d) Gommecourt Park and village, which, to a certain extent, dominate the ground to the south.

(e) The spur running from E29c (north-east of Gommecourt) through K5a and b to the Rossignol Wood along the southern portion of which spur runs the German fourth line.

This spur commands the eastern edge of Gommecourt, dominates the German trench system south-east and south of Gommecourt, and affords concealment, both for battery positions in the valley to the east and for a covered means of approach for a counter-attack against the captors of Gommecourt.

(f) The valley south-east of Nameless Farm, in which runs the Puisieux-Gommecourt Road, a line of approach covered from view from our present line.

It was once asked after a severe action for the capture of some rising ground, “What is the use of turning Fritz off a hill? There is always another hill behind it.” Which was true enough. But it is as well to remember that the high ground to the left as far as Blairville, held at this date by the Germans, was in 1918 in our hands, and it enabled Sir Douglas Haig to turn the whole of the old Somme position.

Of the German line Gen. Hull says:

“The German position south-east of Gommecourt Park and village consists of three lines of trenches, of which the first is heavily wired, the second lightly wired, the third does not appear to be wired at all unless there is sunken wire on the road. All three lines are visible from our present position except the second and third lines behind the strong point K11c and d. The northern flank of this system of trenches rests on the southern edge of Gommecourt Park, the trenches along which are organised to fire south. The southern flank of the system rests on the strong point K11c.

In rear of this system is another consisting of two lines of trenches running from the south-east corner of Gommecourt along the ridge in 5Ka, b, and c, to Rossignol Wood. The front trench of this system is heavily wired and visible.”

In a most interesting paper on the proposed attack Gen. Hull says:

“The object of the VII Corps attack will be to establish itself on the line 16 Poplars-Nameless Farm-Little Z-Tree at E23a12.

The 46th Division will attack from the north and the question was discussed:

(a) Should we endeavour to secure a footing on the ridge E29c-K5a in the initial assault, or

(b) Should the 56th Division first secure the German third line from the south-east corner of Gommecourt Wood and then, under Corps direction, launch a second attack to secure the ridge?

Whichever solution the Corps Commander considers it wisest to adopt, there is one point which I wish to urge: that no advance through the village or park of Gommecourt should be attempted until the ridge E29c-K5a is secured.

The clearing of the village and wood is bound to be a costly enterprise if the enemy makes any attempt to fight it out. It is to be hoped that the heavy bombardment will very seriously affect the moral of the garrison of the village and park, and I consider that the knowledge that they were cut off from escape and from reinforcements might have so great an effect on the German troops as to make them surrender and so save us valuable troops for further operations.

I was, and still am, in favour of the first solution, i.e. to secure the Quadrilateral in the first assault. The reasons which have been urged against this course are:

(a) That at Loos no success was achieved after a certain limited distance had been carried.

(b) That in the event of either the 46th or the 56th Divisions failing to achieve their objective, the detachment of the other would be in an extremely isolated position.

I have carefully considered both these arguments, and do not think there is any reason to alter my opinion.

At Loos the 47th Division was the only division to which a definite objective was given. Its rôle was to form a defensive flank on the right of the IV Corps. Its left flank advanced nearly 2,500 yards behind the German front line without serious loss or difficulty. In the present case I am proposing an advance, at one point on each divisional front, of only 800 yards, in the case of the 56th Division, and less in the case of the 46th Division. In the present case, too, we have the additional advantage of much heavier artillery, more ammunition, and a salient to attack.

As regards the second argument, that in the event of one or other attack failing the detachment of the other division would be isolated:

In the event of my reaching my objective in K5a, and the 46th Division failing to reach E29c, I should consider it my duty to put in troops (if necessary from my reserve brigade) to help the 46th Division.

Troops at K5a would be within 500 yards of the unit at the south-eastern edge of Gommecourt, and in direct communication by visual signalling with my present trench system, so that they can hardly be considered isolated, and the risk, if any, is, I consider, worth running in order to isolate completely the enemy troops in Gommecourt Park and village.

I do not like the idea of delay and a second attack to capture the Quadrilateral in K5a. The second attack would have to be launched from our front line trenches, as I do not consider it would be feasible to organise and launch an attack from the newly-captured trenches. Any delay would enable the enemy to put his barrage in front of our front-line system, as if there is a weak point in our organisation, it is in the number of counter-batteries available to deal with the enemy guns. If we delay we lose the advantage surprise would give us.”

While these problems were being discussed, Sir Douglas Haig had decided to hurry on his preparations. We have seen that his desire was to delay as much as possible and perfect his machine, also that every day meant to him added strength. But meanwhile the Entente Powers were being pressed in another direction. The Austrians had attacked the Italians with great initial success. By the end of May the situation on that front was so serious that the Russian offensive was opened in the early days of June in order to relieve the pressure.

The Germans accuse the Austrians of having drained their front in Galicia of artillery for their Italian offensive, and also of holding the line with troops of poor quality. However that may be, Gen. Brussiloff’s army, “after a relatively short artillery preparation … got up from their trenches and simply marched forward.” Falkenhayn has a delightful observation on the whole business: “A ‘reconnaissance’ like Brussiloff’s was only possible, of course, if the General had decisive reason for holding a low opinion of his enemy’s power of resistance. And on this point he made no miscalculation.”

The immediate effect of the Russian success was the transfer of three divisions from the Western Front, and later more followed; but the Germans were still very strong in numbers, and there was no slacking off of their efforts on Verdun. They were able to help the Austrians to check the Russian advance and eventually to repulse it, but, on the other hand, the Italian counter-attack met with success and drove the Austrians back.

Sir Douglas Haig says that

“The heroic defence of our French Allies had already gained many weeks of inestimable value and had caused the enemy very heavy losses; but the strain continued to increase. In view, therefore, of the situation in the various theatres of war, it was eventually agreed between Gen. Joffre and myself that the combined French and British offensive should not be postponed beyond the end of June. The object of that offensive was threefold:

(1) To relieve the pressure on Verdun.

(2) To assist our Allies in the other theatres of war by stopping any further transfer of German troops from the Western Front.

(3) To wear down the strength of the forces opposed to us.”

We begin to see now the dominating influence of Verdun. In any case the offensive could not have been postponed much longer, and if it was an alteration of plan forced by the enemy, it was not to be compared with the abandonment by the Germans of their offensive—which Falkenhayn says he had prepared against the British with the object of forestalling the Entente blow on the Western Front—due to the uncomfortable situation of the Austrians.

Probably, however, the date did influence the approaching action of the 56th Division. The new front line was still a long way from the enemy. The Queen’s Westminster Rifles succeeded in advancing a small sector of the line by a hundred yards and, had there been time, the whole division would have crept closer before jumping on the enemy.

The weather, too, was very bad.

In due course Gen. Hull issued his preliminary instructions, from which it will be seen that the decision to attempt the capture of the Quadrilateral in one operation had been taken:

“The attack of the 56th Division will be carried out by the 168th and 169th Brigades, whose tasks will be as follows:

(a) The objective of the 168th Brigade will be to capture the German line from Fair Trench, about K11d13, along Farm, Fame and Elbe, Felon, to a point in Fell fifty yards north-west of the trench junction at K5c52, and to establish itself in three strong points:

(1) About Farmyard, Farmer, Farm.

(2) About Elbe, between Et and Felon.

(3) About cross-trenches of Fell and Felon with Epte.

168th Brigade will be responsible for the construction of a fire trench facing south-east to connect the right flank of the captured line to our present line in W47.

(b) The task of the 169th Brigade will be carried out in three phases. The object of the 169th Brigade in the first phase will be to capture the line of German trenches from the left of the 168th Brigade along Fall, Fellow, the Cemetery, Eck, the Maze, Eel, and Fir, and to establish strong points:

(1) From Feud through Ems to the Cemetery inclusive.

(2) About the Maze.

(3) About the south-east corner of Gommecourt Park.

The second phase of the 169th Brigade attack will take place immediately after the first phase.

The objective of the second phase is the Quadrilateral of the trenches in the south-east portion of K5a. The artillery lifts will be timed on the assumption that the infantry will reach Ems (between Etch and Fillet) twenty-five minutes after zero; and Exe (between Etch and Fillet) twenty-seven minutes after zero time.

The third phase will take place directly after the Quadrilateral is captured, and will consist of the securing of the cross-trenches at K5a78 (where Indus crosses Fill and Fillet) and joining hands with the 46th Division along Fill. Fillet will be consolidated facing east.

The following will be carried on the man:

200 rounds S.A.A.;

Waterproof sheet;

Haversack;

Iron ration and current day’s ration;

Two to three sand-bags;

Two tube helmets;

Proportion of wire-cutters, bill-hooks, tools.”

The instructions for the 167th Brigade are practically embodied in the following paragraphs:

“One company 167th Brigade will be placed at the disposal of the Brigadier-General commanding 169th Brigade, to hold sectors Y49 and Y50.

Seven officers and 200 men of the 167th Brigade will be detailed for the control of smoke, and will be under the orders of the Divisional Gas Officer. Approximately 1,200 men will be required for work under the C.R.E. on communication trenches across No Man’s Land and for carrying parties.”