The Great War

by Peter Hart

  Machine guns and rifles opened on us the moment we topped the rise behind which we had formed up. I remember thinking that the sound of the crackling bullets was just like a hailstorm on an iron-roofed building, so you may guess what the fusillade was. A whole heap of men and horses went down 20 or 30 yards from the muzzles of the guns. The squadron broke into a few scattered horsemen at the guns and then seemed to melt away completely. For a time I, at any rate, had the impression that I was the only man left alive. I was amazed to discover we were the victors.6

  Lieutenant Wilfred Mercer, Warwickshire Yeomanry

  They had been concealed by a rise in the ground until they were just 800 yards away but it was still a remarkable achievement to run over the Turkish guns. What was certain was that cavalry could promote total panic once they broke through.

  Suddenly the terrific din of shrieking and exploding shells ceased, and we knew that the end had come. A wonderful and terrible sight met our view: in addition to the casualties which had already occurred, the ground was strewn with horses and fallen yeomen, many of whom were lying close to, and some beyond, the batteries. Twelve guns, three 5.9-inchers and nine field guns, were in various positions, surrounded by Austrian and German gunners, many of whom were dead or wounded. About 300 yards behind the rearmost battery a mass of enemy infantry were retreating, a few of whom were still firing occasional shots from various directions. Our squadrons had not fired a shot, and every single casualty we inflicted was caused by our sword thrusts. The German and Austrian gunners fought gamely round their guns when cornered, for a few moments, although the mass of the Turkish infantry had broken. Some enemy machine guns were seized and turned on the latter. We commenced to dress the wounded at once, and found them scattered in all directions. Wounded Turks came crawling in, and one could not help contrasting their clean wounds, caused by our sword thrusts, with the ghastly wounds sustained by our men from shell fire and saw-bayonet.7

  Captain Oscar Teichmann, Warwickshire Yeomanry

  Despite such successes, the bulk of the Turks still managed to escape encirclement, pulling back to fight again. In the end Allenby had to rein back and reorganise his forces, aware of the need to counter the threat posed by the German inspired Yilderim commanded by the ubiquitous Falkenhayn. This force, composed of the Seventh and Eight Turkish Armies, was intended to revitalise operations in Mesopotamia but had been diverted towards the Palestine campaign. In the event even Falkenhayn proved unable to cope with the superior mobility, logistical resources and operational strength of Allenby’s forces. The Turkish counter-attacks in late November were held at bay.

  Allenby had pushed along the Palestinian coast to the port of Jaffa, then swung inland through the Judean Hills towards Jerusalem. There were still manifold difficulties with organising enough transport, supplies and water for the huge numbers of men involved in the pursuit. The situation became easier once the British had broken through into Palestine, where, though still not easy, there were plentiful water supplies and far better communications. The Turks were in some disarray but still capable of administering a painful rebuff. The fall of Jerusalem on 9 December 1917 was a significant moment with a huge propaganda value. Both sides had avoided fighting in the Holy City, but Allenby received some splendid advice from the gruff Robertson back in London based on memories of the pomp and ceremony surrounding the Kaiser’s visit there back in 1898.

  In the event of Jerusalem being occupied, it would be of considerable political importance if you, on officially entering the city, dismount at the city gate and enter on foot. German emperor rode in and the saying went round, ‘A better man than he walked’. Advantage of contrast in conduct will be obvious.8

  General Sir William Robertson, Imperial General Staff

  In fact Jerusalem was surrendered by the city authorities under farcical conditions – a surrender that would pass into legend within the unit concerned.

  Two of our London cooks, wanting water to brew drinks for the officers, picked up a couple of dixies and departed to seek a well, a pond or a stream. Unsuccessful in their search they plodded on and wandered about until they arrived at the outskirts of the City. Much to their surprise they were met, received and had a warm welcome from the Mayor and his little party, white flag and all. The Keys of Jerusalem were ceremoniously handed over for safe keeping to the grimy, travel-stained cooks in token of surrender. This was altogether too much for the poor chaps. They had not been taught how to conduct such diplomatic ceremonies, so they grabbed the keys, saluted and then retreated to try and find their cookhouse again. When they did eventually reach home the next day they were too scared to say anything about their amazing adventure to the officers. They thought they would ‘catch a packet’ for being away so long; might even be run for absent without leave. Wise counsel made them report to the officers and the keys were handed over for safe custody.9

  Private Bernard Livermore, 2/20th London Regiment

  Allenby would make his formal entrance into Jerusalem – on foot – at noon on 11 December. For the British, coming from what was still largely a Christian country, there were distinct echoes of a new Crusade. Of far greater importance, however, it was a solid victory that brightened up the scene after a year that had been a terrible disappointment.

  A brief lull ensued before Allenby commenced operations moving towards Jericho, planning to push across to the Jordan River. The campaign was placed in context by the German offensives commencing on 21 March on the Somme which forced the recall of the 52nd and 74th Divisions. Suddenly it was brutally apparent that Palestine was only ever a sideshow; the real war was being fought against the Germans. Gradually Allenby rebuilt his stripped-down units with the addition of the 3rd and 7th Indian Divisions. A sensible commander, he devoted much time to training his raw troops and laying his plans.

  Meanwhile the Turks had appointed General Otto Liman von Sanders, of Gallipoli renown, to command in Palestine from late February 1918. He pulled back his forces and had them dig in along a line stretching from the coast across to the Jordan Valley. This time Allenby resolved to drive north and attack along the coast, but he tried to deceive the Turks into thinking that he was going to attack far inland. It was ensured that the camps behind the front near the River Jordan were to all appearance expanding, while the camps on the coastal plain used pre-built spare capacity and carefully concealed locations where no daylight movement was allowed. All deployments from east to west were carried out at night, all movements in the opposite direction done visibly during the day. Some battalions found themselves marching east all day, only to be returned to their starting points by lorry at night, ready to repeat the journey next day. Countless patrols by the newly formed Royal Air Force fended off Turkish and German aerial reconnaissance machines, allowing them to see only what Allenby wanted them to see. Every possible subterfuge was used, from maintaining wireless traffic for units that had already moved to planting false evidence. The ruses worked and Allenby managed to amass a formidable 35,000 infantry, 9,000 cavalry and 383 guns to face just 8,000 Turkish infantry with 130 guns in the coastal strip. He had secured a decisive superiority where it mattered; along the rest of the front across to the Jordan the two sides were more equally matched. When Allenby attacked at 04.30 on 19 September the Turkish line crumbled before them in what became known as the Battle of Megiddo.

  The Turks are breaking, everywhere. I left here, at 4.30 am, and motored to Arsuf. There was General Shea, whose division attacked the Turkish right, on the coast. All was going well; and the head of the cavalry was just pushing along the beach, below the castle, making for the Nahr Falik. Two destroyers of ours were shelling the coast road. Then I motored to the Headquarters of the other Divisions; all doing well, too. Now my cavalry is many miles north of Arsuf, making for the Turks’ communications in the Valley of Esdraelon. His infantry and artillery are falling back; hunted by my airmen, with machine gun fire and bombs. So far, many guns and 2,500 prisoners have been caught, but there will be many
more. My losses are light. I bombed the Headquarters of Liman von Sanders and his two Army Commanders last night … Liman von Sanders has lost his only railway communication with the outer world. I really don’t know what he can do, and I am beginning to think that we may have a very great success. The weather is perfect, not too hot, and very clear, just right for my artillery and my aeroplanes in pursuit. My horses are very fit, and there is plenty of water on the route which they will follow, and they are in sufficient strength to be irresistible.10

  General Sir Edmund Allenby, Headquarters, EEF

  The British infantry advanced some fourteen miles, while the cavalry surged through the gap to raise hell far and wide behind the lines. They seized the crucial rail junctions, threatened the Turkish command headquarters and generally made a thorough nuisance of themselves. Meanwhile, the modern ‘cavalry’, the aircraft of the RAF and Australian Flying Corps, tore into the retreating Turkish troops. It was a slaughter as Lieutenants Stan Nunan and Clive Conrick in their Bristol Fighter swooped down on the Turks threading their way through the Wadi Fara Pass which led to the only Jordan River crossing not already blocked to the Turks. The road was a teeming mass of transport, horses and hapless Turkish soldiers, pressing along an old Roman road hacked out of the precipitous hills and with a sheer drop to the other side.

  They had little chance of escape from my guns as we were so close to them. As I fired I saw chips of rock fly off the cliff face and red splotches suddenly appear on the Turks who would stop climbing and fall and their bodies were strewn along the base of the cliff like a lot of dirty rags. When Nunan was climbing again to renew his attack, I had a better opportunity to machine gun the troops and transports on the road. I saw my tracer bullets hit the lead horses pulling a gun-carriage. As they reared up, they turned away from the cliff side of the road and their heads were turned back towards me, so that I could see the terror in their faces as their forefeet came down and, missing the road altogether, they plunged over the cliff dragging the carriage with them. Their driver, realising what was happening, jumped back towards the road, but he was late, far too late. He seemed to float just above the gun-carriage, as it rolled over and over with the horses until the transport hit the cliff face, when he was thrown far out into the valley and his body disappeared in the haze far below.11

  Lieutenant Clive Conrick, 1st Australian Squadron, AFC

  By 25 September the Turkish armies that had occupied the coastal lines had effectively ceased to exist. The British had taken over 50,000 prisoners and what remained of the Turkish forces were in no fit state to put up an organised resistance. Allenby set his men marching for Damascus, hard on the heels of the demoralised Turks. Linking up with Lawrence’s Arab forces they took the city on 1 October. But even that was not the end. By now the Central Powers were collapsing and Allenby was required to push on to Aleppo a further 200 miles to the north. After a brief period of consolidation, his advance continued and Aleppo fell on 26 October. Four days later the Turks signed the Armistice on 30 October. The war with Turkey was over.

  OVER FOUR YEARS THE CAMPAIGN IN PALESTINE had sucked in nearly 1,200,000 men from all over the British Empire. In all the British suffered 51,451 casualties in battle and lost a sobering further 550,000 through disease. It is difficult to weigh up what had been achieved, but such an enormous investment of military resources cannot be justified by specious sentimentality over the capture of Jerusalem. As in Gallipoli, this was another example of fighting the Turks simply because they were there. If the intention had been to knock Turkey out of the war then surely the Egyptian Expeditionary Force failed as Turkey only surrendered a month before the Germans. Was that month really worth such an effort? There were Imperial expansionist interests to be considered but first the war had to be won. As with Gallipoli, Mesopotamia and Salonika, Palestine proved to be a waste of resources. The strategic objectives – control of the Dardanelles at Gallipoli, oil in Mesopotamia, the survival of the Serbian Army at Salonika and the security of the Suez Canal in Egypt – could all have been secured with a far smaller investment of precious resources. The Easterners had believed that they had another way to win the war, one that could avoid the necessity of facing the German Army on the Western Front. But there was no easy way to victory and as a direct result of the proliferation of sideshows the BEF would be left starved of troops when it needed them on the Western Front during the great German offensives of 1918.

  18

  THE WESTERN FRONT, 1918

  ‘There comes a time when war ceases to be an adventure and the young regard it cynically, disillusioned and disenchanted. I do not suppose any generation ever marched to war with the stars in their eyes as my generation did, but after the Somme and the even worse slaughter at Third Ypres there were no more stars. We continued to fight, and I think we fought well.’1

  Lieutenant Richard Dixon, 251st Battery, 53rd Brigade, Royal Field Artillery

  THE ALLIES WERE REELING at the start of 1918. The overall situation in the war had not really changed: Germany was still likely to lose, but the Bolshevik Revolution and collapse of Russia had given her just a small window of opportunity in which she might possibly wrest victory from the clutches of defeat. The Russians had fought hard, but now they were finished, torn apart internally by competing visions of society and about to enter a nightmare that would envelop the country for decades. The collapse of the Eastern Front freed the German High Command from the two-front conundrum that had racked it since the Kaiser had wrenched Bismarck’s ageing hand from the tiller in 1890. By the spring of 1918 when the German divisions had transferred from the Eastern Front to the Western Front, they were able to deploy some 192 divisions opposing only 156 Allied divisions. Numerically the situation had never been more promising for the Germans, but the American forces were gathering and casting a long shadow across German plans.

  When the United States of America entered the war in April 1917, her situation to some extent mirrored that of Britain in 1914. The American regular army was in the process of expanding from 25,000 to around 142,000 men as part of a programme triggered by the National Defence Act introduced by President Woodrow Wilson in 1916, which envisioned an army of 175,000 regulars backed up by a National Guard of 450,000 by 1921. The Americans would therefore face incredible problems in securing a rapid and massive increase in their Army, their only advantage over the BEF in 1914 being that they were not immediately embroiled in severe fighting, so at least they could draw on a solid core of trained regulars to help training masses of raw recruits. Wilson acted quickly, calling up the entire National Guard and introducing a system of conscription that would ultimately register some 24 million men for the draft, of which 2,800,000 were called up for service. In all, fifty-five divisions would be raised, of which forty-two would serve on the Western Front. However, there were immediate logistical problems. They lacked everything: uniforms, weapons, artillery, tanks, aircraft, transport, munitions, housing and rations. Some of these could be dealt with by the huge American industrial base, but when it came to sophisticated weapons systems such as artillery, aircraft and tanks the Americans were forced to rely on purchasing them off the shelf from their allies. They simply did not have the time to do otherwise. There were nowhere near enough officers or NCOs, not enough trained staff, gunners, signallers or machine gunners, or indeed any of the myriad specialist trades that make up an army. And of course they had no experienced generals qualified to take them into action in a continental war. The British and French suggested a solution, offering to take the American recruits into their own units and train and equip them ready for service. This may have had some logic, but it was not politically acceptable in the United States and was rejected out of hand. This was also the fate of a far more reasonable proposal by the British to include an American battalion in each British brigade, before creating American brigades which would serve in a British division, then an American division in a British corps and so on, until a fully fledged American Army was created. The
American political and military establishment were determined to create their own American Expeditionary Force (AEF) fighting with a separate identity, under American leadership.

  The leader they chose to command the AEF was a formidable character: General John Pershing. Born in 1860, after attending West Point he had participated in several campaigns against Native American tribes. He had also been involved in both the Spanish–American and Philippine–American Wars. He was promoted rapidly to Brigadier General, taking on various staff appointments. His most recent campaign had been on the Mexican border from 1916 to 1917. As a professional soldier Pershing had taken an interest in both the fighting and all the tactical ramifications thrown up on the Western Front, but had not grasped the severity of the problems imposed by trench warfare. He was critical of what he characterised as the defensive approach of the Allied generals, who accepted the restraints of attritional warfare and did not look to the ‘offensive spirit’ and bold manoeuvring to overcome the challenges. As such he had a naive confidence in the ability of the high morale and superior rifle skills of his men to overcome such factors as artillery barrages, machine guns and barbed wire. In harbouring these beliefs he was following a path trodden by many others with little success earlier in the war.

  The AEF grew slowly. The 1st Division was sent to the Western Front almost immediately, in June 1917, but after that the programme stalled under the pressure of training the millions of recruits back home, and only four divisions had arrived by March 1918. They were organised on radically different lines to the Allied divisions and, with some 28,000 men, they were twice their size. Often, as their training and equipment had not yet reached acceptable levels, they required a prolonged acclimatisation and training period before they could be regarded as competent to take their place in the line of battle. In particular, they were taught trench warfare skills only after their arrival in France. Despite the initial intentions of the Americans, units had to be attached to British and French units in order to gain experience in the line, while a series of training schools was established to disseminate the disparate specialist skills required in a modern army. But in essence the AEF was still set on entering the line and making an impact as a separate entity. The Germans were certainly nervously awaiting their arrival.