The Great War

by Peter Hart

  Private James Brady, 43rd Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps

  The British resistance did, however, begin to stiffen in the Battle Zone, although the British lacked the counter-attack divisions to recover lost features of tactical significance as required in a well-organised defence in depth. In consequence their defence was static and position-orientated, lacking flexibility or fluency of response. This was the legacy of Lloyd George’s policy of starving the Western Front of the men needed to restock the BEF. Yet the Germans also had increasing problems. Their available artillery support was greatly diminished by the necessity of moving forward their field guns. Furthermore, the fog gradually cleared away and British batteries that had been held well back from the Forward Zone could now take their toll on the advancing German troops. As the British had found so many times before, the second phase of an offensive was fiendishly difficult to navigate. Sometimes the Germans were caught in the open; sometimes they found themselves engaging in vicious localised skirmishes to eliminate pockets of frenzied resistance, but always their casualty toll seemed to be rising as they strove to break through. Although the British suffered around 38,500 casualties (21,000 prisoners-of-war), with the loss of 500 guns, the Germans also lost between 35,000 to 40,000 casualties, of which up to 11,000 were dead.

  By the end of the day the Germans had pushed their way deep into, or even through, the Battle Zone on both flanks of the Fifth Army. On the Third Army front the Germans were intent on pinching out the prominent Flesquières Salient left after the 1917 Cambrai fighting. They did not quite succeed in this, but the prospect of the entire garrison being cut off remained a distinct possibility.

  British divisions from the First and Second Armies had been despatched to the threatened front once it became absolutely clear that this was the main attack, not some cunning diversionary ploy by the Germans. However, the French Commander-in-Chief, General Philippe Pétain, was concerned by powerful diversionary bombardments carried out on his front and still feared that the Germans might be intending a major thrust there. In consequence, he was wary of sending reinforcements. For the moment the Fifth and Third Armies would have to fight on alone. Gough sensibly planned a staged withdrawal rather than risk committing everything to holding a nominal line more evident on his maps than on the ground. Obviously, the German tactical position offered a great deal more potential, but Ludendorff’s response to these opportunities illustrates his lack of clearly defined strategic priorities: the Eighteenth Army in the south had advanced furthest, so he decided to reinforce their success. The original intention of rolling up the British line to the north was gradually being forgotten.

  Next day, 22 March, there was another thick fog and the Germans made further progress against the Fifth Army, breaching the line being set up along the Crozat Canal and battering away at the British troops as they fell back. The sketched out Green Line proved worse than useless. Back they went, this time retreating to the Emergency Line delineated for the most part by the Somme River. To the north the Third Army was also falling back, deeply concerned at the prospect of the Germans pinching out the V Corps which was dangerously close to being trapped in the Flesquières Salient. All along the line the British were being forced back, unable to gain the time to dig in and consolidate their positions. Soon chaos descended.

  The stream of traffic moved so slowly – at times coming to a standstill for minutes on end, to allow other traffic to come in from other roads. There were several streams of traffic converging on the village. First one stream was held up to let another come on, and then that one was allowed to go on while the other was held up. There were traffic controls doing their best to regulate the traffic in this way. It was a hell of a crush. There was just a block of traffic, miles in length. It seemed absolutely hopeless to expect ever to get on. And now, on the face of the ridge just behind us, appeared some of our tanks, creeping across country and occasionally firing at something. What I dreaded and every moment expected was to see the Hun cavalry swooping down on us. But this did not happen. I don’t think the enemy could have had any cavalry, or he must have used it on an occasion such as this. What a haul he could have had! But he had got aeroplanes. Three of the beastly things appeared: swooping down low over the road and with machine guns rattling they flew up and down. They were also dropping bombs. I leapt lightly down a shell hole – a fairly deep one – and crouched against that side of the crater that afforded most protection. As the aeroplane passed over me, so I passed to the other side of the shell hole. I heard the bullets going ‘Zipp! Zipp! Zipp!’ into the ground. They were so low as to induce some officers to shoot at them with revolvers, but of course this was a futile thing to do.9

  Lieutenant Edward Alfree, 111th Heavy Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery

  The German aircraft dived down, ripping into any tempting targets they encountered. There was surely plenty of choice. Even the greatest ace of all was ground-straffing.

  Richthofen continued to dive until he was close above the Roman road. Tearing along at a height of about 30 feet above the ground, he peppered the marching troops with his two guns. We followed close behind him and copied his example. The troops below us seemed to have been lamed with horror and, apart from the few men who took cover in the ditch at the roadside, hardly anyone returned our fire. On reaching the end of the road, the Captain turned and again fired at the column. We could now observe the effect of our first assault: bolting horses and stranded guns blocked the road, bringing the column to a complete standstill. This time our fire was returned. Infantrymen stood, with rifles pressed against their cheeks, and fired as we passed over them. Machine guns posted in the roadside ditches fired viciously at us as we flew overhead. Yet, despite the fact that his wings were riddled with bullets, the Captain still continued to fly just as low as before. We followed in close formation behind him, firing burst after burst from our Spandaus. The whole flight was like a united body, obeying a single will. And that was how it should have been.10

  Lieutenant Ernst Udet, Jasta 11, Jagdgeschwader 1

  The fragile British line along the Somme was soon breached and the Germans began to flood across the river on 24 March. Gough had no reserves left and not enough reinforcements had yet arrived, although the French were beginning to stiffen the right of the British line. As the Fifth Army fell back the Third Army was forced to conform or allow a gap to open up for the Germans to exploit.

  While his army commanders struggled to stem the tide, Haig was trying to secure the whole-hearted support of the French. This proved difficult as Pétain was more intent on defending Paris than providing a co-ordinated response in support of the BEF. He seemed to be willing to accept that the two great armies might be forced apart: Haig falling back to the Channel ports and the French to Paris. To Haig this was nothing short of madness, condemning the Allies to defeat. Desperate – and with good reason – he convened an emergency conference at Doullens on 26 March to be attended for the British by the Minister without Portfolio Lord Milner, the CIGS General Sir Henry Wilson and Haig himself, with the French represented by Premier Georges Clemençeau, President Raymond Poincaré, the Chief of General Staff Field Marshal Ferdinand Foch and Pétain. What exactly happened will always be a subject of debate, but Clemençeau seems to have used his bull-like force of personality to secure the French reinforcements and total commitment that Haig sought – but at a price.

  It was decided that Amiens must be covered at all costs. French troops are being hurried up as rapidly as possible and Gough has been told to hold on with his left at Bray. It was proposed by Clemençeau that Foch should be appointed to co-ordinate the operations of an Allied force to cover Amiens and ensure that the French and British flanks remained united. This proposal seemed to me quite worthless, as Foch would be in a subordinate position to Pétain and myself. In my opinion it was essential to success that Foch should control Pétain, so I at once recommended that Foch should control the actions of all the Allied armies on the Western Front. F
och seemed sound and sensible, but Pétain had a terrible look. He had the appearance of a commander who was in a funk and had lost his nerve.11

  Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig, General Headquarters, BEF

  Haig thus accepted the situation with good grace. In any event for the past two years he had fallen in with the requirements of first Joffre, then Nivelle and now Pétain, so this was not such a big step. After a further meeting it was formally agreed that Foch would now be the Supreme Commander responsible for the strategic direction of the French, British and American Armies on the Western Front.

  Meanwhile on the ground the situation was deteriorating. Having crossed the Somme the Germans were pushing on vigorously to the west. Yet as they pressed forward they too were suffering reverses. Their losses were mounting. Their lines of communication were being increasingly stretched; their artillery was in a state of disorder, unable to cope with the sheer pace of the advance. Slowly the British reserves were beginning to arrive and the Royal Artillery were beginning to recover as new batteries were moved down from the north.

  As the sky began to lighten in the dawn of 26th March we were as ready for them as if we had been preparing for a day’s practice shooting on Salisbury Plain. What a day that was! I could watch the German columns approaching one of my registered targets, and time the salvos of my own, and other batteries too to arrive there with them. The smother of shell fire would disperse them: watching them reorganise, I could do the same to another column elsewhere, and then switch back to the first to break it up a second time. All day long they came on, and all day long we shifted our fire from one point to another across those valleys. They had plenty of other well-aimed opposition, too: in fact Bucquoy became a new bastion of the British line which was never lost.12

  Major Richard Foot, ‘D’ Battery, 310th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery

  On the Third Army front the situation was at last stabilising.

  The Fifth Army was still in dire straits but was helped by the arrival of some French Army divisions, which were beginning to plug the gaps, allowing the line to solidify. The Germans had the vital rail junction of Amiens in their sights but, under the determined leadership of Foch, the French no longer entertained any idea of falling back and leaving the British to their fate. Soon the remnants of the Fifth Army were amalgamated with the French First and Third Armies to form the Group of Armies of Reserve under the unified command of General Émile Fayolle. Somewhat controversially, Gough was relieved of his command of the Fifth Army. This was widely perceived – especially by Gough – as unfair as there was little more he could have done in the circumstances. He was replaced by Sir Henry Rawlinson.

  Between 21 March and 26 March the BEF suffered something like 75,000 casualties. Suddenly Lloyd George’s objections to reinforcing the Western Front in accordance with the requirements of his generals were forgotten. Troops were released that had been held in Britain and divisions hitherto occupied by the plethora of minor campaigns in Italy, Palestine and elsewhere were suddenly made available. Hundreds of thousands of extra troops began to pour into France. The shallowness of the claims of the ‘Easterners’ was finally revealed by exposure to the reality of the Western Front.

  Yet the Germans now unveiled a second string to their bow. On 28 March they launched another furious attack under Operation Mars by the Seventeenth Army on either side of the Scarpe River in front of Arras, with the intention of driving into the junction of the First and Third Armies. Here, however, they were not blessed by fog and the British defences were in far better shape. The stupefying bombardment opened at 03.00 and the German troops went over the top from 06.00. This time things did not go their way; the German batteries had failed to suppress the British artillery. Lieutenant John Capron was at the guns when the crucial moment came.

  But now a jabber of machine guns swept up and a thousand star shells, red–green–red, the British SOS. Rush up and hang in the upper darkness. The Germans are over the top. Now it is our turn to join in with the response barrage. Until now we have only been under a desultory counter-battery fire but we are having to face a fiercer concentration – a determined blotting out. Faster and thicker whine down the shells, some well over, some short and some fearfully among us. The hideous energy, the dust and acrid reek, the blast and fury of each down rush makes us catch our breath – this is big stuff now! The ground heaves and seems to sway. It’s a case of surviving – or not! How could the infantry have lived through a barrage such as now spouts around us? Yet, through the nearer tumult, fitfully comes and swells and fades, the sound of rifle fire. Heartened, we slip and stumble perilously to and fro between gunpits and ammunition recesses. ‘Come on, 109s, the Londons are still there – give the bloody old Huns their rations!’13

  Lieutenant John Capron, 109th Battery, 251st Brigade, Royal Field Artillery

  The Londons were surviving sure enough and managed to deliver a severe rebuff to the advancing German infantry. Funnelled by barbed wire into machine gun traps, the Germans suffered heavy casualties.

  Heavy machine gun fire unexpectedly appeared at the left flank from Fampoux, causing severe casualties especially among the officers. The attack slowed down a bit, causing the accompanying barrage of fire to lose connection with the attack and its purpose, covering the attacking infantry, was lost. In front of the Scots line, the English main position, the attack would be stopped, because the enemy infantry, protected by the cover of machine gun fire from their Fampoux positions, resisted fiercely, driving our infantry into the trenches for cover, halting further development. The repeated attack in the afternoon also didn’t succeed. The strong English infantry defensive actions were backed by their regrouped artillery batteries that were firing at their own well known positions, now occupied and overfilled by us.14

  Lieutenant Gerhard Dose, Headquarters, 187th Infantry Regiment

  Although some small gains were made overall, Operation Mars was a failure and Ludendorff decided to close it down immediately.

  In spite of employing extraordinary masses of artillery and ammunition, the attack of the Seventeenth Army on both banks of the Scarpe was a failure; it was fought under an unlucky star.15

  Quartermaster General Erich Ludendorff, General Headquarters

  The truth was it was nothing to do with luck: the Germans had been beaten by well-manned, well-prepared British defences, without the random factor of fog to cloud the issue or the British sights.

  Back on the Somme, the Germans were also encountering stiff resistance. The French divisions were even beginning to launch counter-attacks to stabilise the front and secure tactically significant features. Many of the British troops were utterly exhausted, but now at last fresh troops were arriving.

  Our men are gaunt and weary, unwashed and with eight days’ growth of beard, their lips raw and deeply chapped by the salted bully beef they have gnawed, and the coldness of the March winds. Most are limping painfully, for few have a change of socks with them or have had their boots off for eight days and nights. Over and over again we have been promised a relief which never comes, until a numbness of sensation has come over us all. They obey orders mechanically but sink fast asleep when opportunity offers.16

  Second Lieutenant Frank Warren, 17th King’s Royal Rifle Corps

  Yet their replacements managed to construct a solid front line, causing the German attacks to flounder, costing ever more men. Finally, on 30 March, Ludendorff called a pause to consider his options and allow his own exhausted troops to rest and reorganise. When the offensive burst back into life on 4 April with a concerted drive on the town of Villers-Bretonneux, in front of Amiens, the assault was checked with the assistance of the Australian Corps brought down from the north. The great German St Michael Spring Offensive was over.

  The results had been a disappointment for the Germans, who needed outright victory here to give them any hope of winning the war before the Americans could deploy in strength on the Western Front. Their original intention to break through and r
oll up the British lines had been abandoned in an attempt to separate the British and French Armies by a powerful drive on the rail junction at Amiens. But this too had failed. However, some ground had been gained – about 1,200 square miles of French soil was once again under German control. But this was surely the whole point: much of that ground had been abandoned voluntarily during the retreat of March 1917 to secure a better tactical position. Now they were the proud possessors of an ugly 40-mile salient deep into the Allied lines that was far less secure than their previous Hindenburg Line fortress. They had achieved tactical successes, smashing the Fifth Army and inflicting some 178,000 British and 92,000 French casualties. Yet the Germans themselves suffered 239,000 casualties. And while the Allies lost a total of over 1,300 guns, 200 tanks, 2,000 machine guns and 400 aircraft, these losses were soon made good by their munitions industries. Almost as Helmuth Moltke the Elder had predicted so many years before, the Germans could not win in this kind of exchange. They had to win outright. But they had failed and, whatever the drama, whatever the trauma they were suffering, the Allies were still on course to win the war.

  The Germans could not rest. How could they when the whole war was at stake? Ludendorff decided to attack the British again, but this time in Flanders, where they had little space to manoeuvre. The weather was by this time dry enough to permit the attack south of Ypres that had been at the centre of Operation George which was now reborn as Operation Georgette. The plan was to knock the British out of the war by crashing through the lines, surging forward to take the Hazebrouck rail centre some twenty miles east of Armentières, threatening the security of the Ypres Salient, and ultimately seeking to take Dunkirk and Calais. On the first day, the German Sixth Army would attack the Second and First Armies in the Lys Valley sector around Armentières and La Bassée Canal, while on the second day the German Fourth Army would assault all along the Messines Ridge, aiming for Mont Kemmel and threatening to encircle Ypres. This was the attack Haig had feared, and the reason why Gough had been forced to stand alone for so long while the safety of Flanders was ensured. But even so, of the fifty-six British divisions, forty-six had already been sucked into the fighting in repelling the German assaults on the Somme and at Arras.