by Ian Uys
“While entering the wood Henry Thomson was shot through the head by a machine-gun, and the fact of him ‘going under’ made me feel doubly fierce. Kuys was wounded at the same time, and I made up my mind to avenge these two. Poor old ‘Tommy’. Tell Mr Thomson and his sister that he and I stuck together through the whole thing, and that he proved a staunch pal. He feared nothing, did ‘Tommy.’ He took everything in a philosophical way, and didn’t care a rap for any German. Just before we scaled the parapet he said to me: ‘Well, thank God we’ve got a chance at last to get at the devils.’ However, he was killed before he reached them.
“D--n Fritz, his artillery, and his machine-guns, as man to man Fritz is the biggest funk out; he’ll never stand up to a bayonet charge; but their artillery kill our fellows off by the hundred, and his machine-guns are the curse of the war. The machine-gunners are handcuffed to the guns, or they would run when we advanced; however, they are there and we have got to smash them, and the sooner it’s done the better.
“Well, we have made our name, and that is all we care about. We had orders to hold the wood whatever happened — and we held it. It has been the most important battle in the advance, and I am glad to say that after having been in from the beginning to the end, I have come out safe and sound.
“My steel helmet has two holes in it caused by lumps of shell; my rifle has a bullet buried in its stock. I have two cuts in my hand made by shrapnel, and a scratch on my arm caused by a German bayonet, and still I live.”
*
Acting RSM Elger Prebble had displayed great courage under heavy fire in Egypt, for which he had been recommended for the DCM. In Bernafay Wood and Delville Wood he attended to wounded under fire. His example at all times was of great value. He was reported as wounded, then missing believed killed.
*
Private G Strachan had showed great bravery as a stretcher-bearer in Bernafay Wood and Trones Wood. When the shelling was intense in Delville Wood he was continually up and down the line, dressing wounded which necessitated his being constantly under fire.
He carried on stretcher work until he was wounded in the thigh at Longueval, then carried on until his regiment left the trenches when he reported at a dressing-station and was sent to hospital.
*
Private Gerard Charles Saunders, 19, was articled to a Durban accounting firm and lived on the Esplanade. He enlisted in October 1915 and after training joined the brigade in France on 30 June 1916. Eighteen days later the war ended for him when his position was overrun and he was taken prisoner.
*
Corporal Frances Hill Wiley, 31, was a clerk from Bloemfontein who had enlisted on the formation of the brigade. He was promoted to lance-corporal in January 1916 and corporal in May. At Delville Wood he was shot in the legs and left ear, which was to leave a large scar on the left side of his neck.
*
Sergeant Brook at the HQ dug-out recalled that Lieut Errol Tatham had given him instruction on leaving the shelter. “At about 3 pm on the 18th, things were getting very serious in the front line trench and he went out to see if he could do anything. He left his haversack with me saying that if anything happened to him I was to take care of it as it had papers connected with the orderly room duties. It also contained some personal effects of dead men, such as a Bible and pocketbook which he had taken from the body of a man who had been killed.
“He had shown great bravery during the three days in leaving the trench to succour wounded. He did it a great many times, especially on the first day. He freely exposed himself in doing this, and did it over and over again. After handing me the haversack, he left for the front trenches.”
Meanwhile, while leading a bombing party against a German attacking force, Lieut Walter Hill was killed. Shortly afterwards Private Henry Pauls was wounded.
Lieutenant Tatham made his way through the shattered wood to the front line where he sought out Major Burges. Private Pauls overheard him ask whether there was anything he could do. Burges requested that he try to get reinforcements. Tatham returned after a while with some men he had collected, but found that in the meantime Major Burges had been killed. Shortly afterwards Tatham was cut down by a welter of bullets.
*
Private William Poole, 2nd SAI, from Durban was in the frontline trenches that afternoon with Errol Tatham.
“I saw him lying in the trench wounded in the shoulder. He had the wound dressed. After lying there for a time, during which he looked very pale, I saw him get up and encourage the men and give orders.
“He was then the only officer left. He was evidently in great pain but continued encouraging the men for about half an hour. He then lay down for about five minutes, looking very pale. He then got up and left the trench, evidently very weak, and went in the direction of the dressing-station, as I thought.
“That was the last I saw of him. I wanted to go with him because I saw he was weak and wanted to take him to the dressing-station. He said I was not to do so, but was to stay behind and help to hold the trench as there were so few men left. If I had gone with him I should have got him to the dressing-station, but he would not let me.”
*
Sergeant Brook was at the HQ dug-out when Tatham returned. “He did not return for about 1½ hours and I became very anxious about him. After about 1½ hours I saw him coming back towards the HQ trench.
“He was wounded in the right shoulder, and he looked very pale. I could see he was wounded by the fact that his arm was in a sling and the blood on his shoulder.
When about 20 or 25 yards from the headquarters’ trench he collapsed near a shell-hole where two stretcher-bearers were sheltering.”
*
Private Bill Helfrich recalled what took place that hellish day.
“On 18 July 1916 I was acting as a stretcher-bearer at the headquarters in Delville Wood, France.
“On that day I and three other stretcher-bearers were bringing down a casualty from the front line trench to the dressing-station and, on reaching the centre of the wood, we could not proceed any further on account of the intensity of the shelling by the German artillery; so we decided to wait at the headquarters’ trenches until the bombardment slackened.
“As we deposited the casualty in a place of safety (a sandbagged shelter) the other stretcher-bearers took cover elsewhere, and I remained with the casualty. Some time early in the afternoon the Germans were advancing and there was heavy machine-gun and rifle fire going on.
“At this time an officer, whom I afterwards learnt was Lieut Tatham, appeared on the parapet above us. He had his left arm in a sling, and the shots were raining about him, and I told him to jump down quickly as they were firing at him. He seemed dazed, hesitated, and swayed forwards as if he were going to fall, and I said: ‘Don’t fall on this man as he has got a fractured leg,’ indicating the case on the stretcher. Just then he pitched forward, and I touched him so that he fell clear of the stretcher.
“He then sat up and said: ‘Look at this,’ waving his broken arm, ‘the bounders,’ or some such word to that effect, ‘are using explosive bullets.’ I went over to him and took off his tunic and started to put a tourniquet on his arm. (Tatham’s right arm had been almost shot away, both above and below the elbow.)
“I then enquired what regiment he belonged to and he told me the 2nd South African Infantry. I then asked him if he knew my brother Charlie Helfrich who was in the same regiment, and he said he did not. I enquired if he came from Bloemfontein, and he said: ‘No, Maritzburg’ and added that his name was Lieut Tatham.
“He then said: ‘Don’t trouble about me, I am finished.’ I said: ‘No, they will amputate your arm and you will be all right again.’ He then said: ‘No, there are other wounds’ and told me to look at his chest. I opened his shirt and found that his right breast had been shot away, and he had a bullet wound through the left side of his chest just above the heart. (In addition a finger of his left hand was missing.)
“He then asked: ‘What would happe
n if I took off the tourniquet?’ I told him he would bleed to death. He then implored me to loosen it. I replied: ‘No, sir, I could not.’ I then gave him a drink and he asked me if I had any morphia, and I told him I was sorry I had not.
“He then asked me to transfer his identification disc from his right arm to his left; and, in taking off his wristlet watch, he told me to keep it. This watch I have since handed to Lieut Tatham’s sister.
“Just then the casualty whom I had on the stretcher called me and, after attending to him, I returned to the lieutenant and found he had loosened the tourniquet with his teeth, and he was then practically unconscious and murmuring: ‘Oh, rain, beautiful rain, lovely rain!’ I raised his head and, within a few minutes, he passed away.”
Lieutenant Russell Tatham was also killed in action. A triple tragedy was to strike the family when it became known that Errol’s brother, acting Sub-Lieut William Tatham’s submarine hit a stray mine in the South Adriatic on 15 July and was lost with all hands.
Shortly afterwards the Germans reached the shelter and Helfrich held up his hands, being quite unarmed; but a German fired a rifle at him, grazing his temple. Then another tried to bayonet him, but the third was more humane, and pushed his comrade aside and began asking Helfrich questions as to how many there were, and where, etc.
Helfrich then pretended to faint, being wounded in several places by this time, and the Germans left him. After it was dark, he managed to move the wounded man a little way, but not far, and then tried to sleep. A bomb was then thrown so near to him that it tore his mackintosch to shreds and wounded his knee badly.
He had to leave the unfortunate man on the stretcher, and creeping away, managed to get out of the wood. Helfrich was making for a dressing-station when he came across an English regiment and was then taken up by their stretcher-bearers.
The man he had left on the stretcher was evacuated from the wood four days later, more dead than alive, having had neither food nor drink during this time.
*
As the company had lost its last officer, Sec-Lieut Garnet George Green, 26, of B Coy was sent to lead C Coy. Green had served as a trooper in the 1st Royal Natal Carbineers in SWA. He was commissioned on 12 May 1916.
By his gallantry and coolness under heavy fire Garnet Green put fresh energy and confidence into the remaining men. He kept up communications with Col Thackeray, then moved with his men to support him in Buchanan Street.
*
CSM Francis Wilkie, 39, of C Company, 2nd SAI, was court-martialled in Egypt for being AWOL from 26 to 28 December.
Wilkie was born at Glasgow, was 5 ft 10 ins tall and had blue eyes and reddish hair. He served in the Scottish Rifles for 15 years, fighting in India in 1895, the South African War and again in India in 1908. He joined the SA Engineers for service in SWA and was attached to the Armoured Train.
Before leaving England for Egypt Wilkie went on a spree, possibly visiting his relatives in Scotland. He was found guilty and reduced to the ranks.
Wilkie, was a corporal at Delville Wood and was wounded in his left wrist on the 18th.
*
After Major Gee was killed, his second-in-command, Capt W F Hoptroff took command. He had been wounded in action in Egypt in January. After a month in a Cairo hospital he had rejoined his company. Captain Hoptroff was killed during the bombardment.
Lieutenants Letchford and Davis then took command of the company. Davis was to recommend Sgt George Edmund Marshall, 30, for the DCM.
Marshall was born at Ficksburg, OFS. After serving for three and a half years in the Transkei Mounted Rifles he became a bank clerk. The six foot tall Marshall was promoted to corporal in January and lance-sergeant in June 1916.
In Delville Wood he showed conspicuous bravery in commanding a platoon under trying circumstances. On several occasions, at great personal risk, he dug out wounded who were buried by the shell fire. He held his sector of the line until shot in the chest and right hand.
Private Harold Taylor, who was shell-shocked at Bernafay Wood, had been sent to the rear and told to remain with the transport when his company entered Delville Wood. His zeal brought him into action in the wood where he was severely wounded by shell fire.
*
Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Thackeray recalled the day’s events in an interview 40 years later. “The enemy completely smothered the area with shells. Things got worse as the day advanced and we were driven back and I actually found myself holding only the south-west corner of the wood.
“The trenches were full of wounded. All the stretcher-bearers were casualties so the poor fellows just had to lie there. That evening we were told the welcome news that we would be relieved that night. But relief under such conditions was a slow and risky business. By midnight the relief had been partly carried out.”
*
Albert William Harvey MacDonald served as a staff-sergeant and lieutenant on the UDF staff in SWA and was mentioned in despatches. He then served as a lieutenant and quartermaster of Prince Alfred’s Guards.
After joining the brigade MacDonald’s wife and five children went to live in London. He assumed the duties of adjutant in December 1915 and was promoted to temporary captain in May 1916. He took leave from 14 to 20 June then returned to the front.
Captain MacDonald was among those ordered to leave the wood. Despite being wounded in the left arm he had remained at the Buchanan Street HQ. He proceeded to Longueval for reinforcements and ammunition and only retired when ordered to do so by the medical officer.
*
Solomon recalled that whereas they had wondered what the 15th, 16th and 17th would bring forth, the 18th was ushered into being with a shock so fierce, so unexpected, that nature groaned under the strain.
“For at an early hour on that morning the German gunners, seeming to open the very floodgates of their resources, launched upon us an attack that reached a pitch of violence and intensity the like of which we had never before experienced. The air was filled with the shrieks of shells that rained upon us unceasingly; the atmosphere seemed to be rent asunder by the endless succession of terrific explosions; sand and stones hurled up by the force showered over us clattering onto our steel helmets; the earth shook; trees crashed over; and men waiting for the storm to abate, helpless under its fury, saw or experienced death dealt out lavishly.
“But the storm did not abate; was not to abate for many hours. Instead it increased in vigour. It was unsafe to move, impossible to remove wounded, impossible to bring up rations and water; so we had to subsist on what we had, take as much cover as possible, and trust to providence to intervene where it could in that raging inferno.
“The shriek of shells, the hiss of their approach and descent, brief moments of speculation as to whose turn was coming next, and then more and more, and yet more, crowding into the seconds as the minutes and hours dragged on.
“The scene beggars description. What impressions of the grim reality can cold print convey? The three previous days, eventful and trying as they had been, were to the 18th as is the calm to the storm that it precedes.
“And yet men lived through it, some even unwounded.
“One man’s shelter was completely covered in. With feverish haste he was dug out, nose, ears, mouth and eyes full of sand, and he trembling like a leaf, for he had been unable to move a muscle beneath the weight of earth that covered him and thought, as he said, that his last moments had come.
“That an infantry attack would follow on the cessation of the bombardment was sure, but when that would be we did not know.
“Major Jackson was killed, and our only remaining company officer wounded.
“And then, at 4 pm every gun ceased fire with a startling abruptness.
“A brief, blessed interval of silence, and then the sentries’ ‘here they come’ brought every man to his feet to meet the coming attack. The rapid fire that followed caused the rifles to become hot in our hands, but we could not stem the tide of the advancing infantry. Avoiding a frontal
attack, they came at our flanks while others advanced on to and occupied Longueval, or a portion of it, thus cutting us off in the rear.
“Some men from C Company ran up. ‘The Germans are in the wood behind; millions of them’, they said.
“And there they were sure enough, absolutely barring our way to the rear had we received orders to retire. We did not, however, receive such orders, and at that stage it would have been too late to carry them out had they been issued, so we devoted our attention to the enemy in the wood, keeping an eye on the other direction as well.
“A party of our own men passed through the wood a short distance away, and we could not understand the move until we saw the German soldiers over them. Then another small party passed. That was too much.
“Leaving their positions a few charged towards the party and released the captured men, their German guards not waiting to see the matter out. Two of our number were mortally wounded in that little affair, one being the man who had been dug out earlier in the day.
“It was not to last however. There was no chance of relief, and we were hopelessly outnumbered and surrounded. No useful purpose could have been served, nothing gained, by further opposition. Only a few more German lives, and the extermination of our diminished force. Based on those considerations, towards evening the order to cease fire was issued.
“And that was the end.
“When the day was over we were able to take some stock of the havoc wrought in our ranks, but the fate of many of our comrades was unknown. Of the platoon I belonged to, four unwounded men represented the fifty who had entered the wood, while A Company’s muster of approximately two hundred, less than thirty remained. The rest had been killed or wounded, some of the latter being captured with us. The other companies suffered as badly as ours.”
*
The incessant shelling blasted the shallow trenches, killing and maiming the remnants of the company. Eventually, only Tom Heunis and a friend, Jack Russell, were left manning their platoon’s length of trench. Heunis knew that the Germans could watch them with binoculars from the two villages ahead (Ginchy and Guillemont). The next attack would overrun them.
