History of the 1/8th Battalion
HISTORY OF 1/8th BATTALION
AUCHEL TO PONTRUET
Sept. 7th, 1918.— Sept. 26th, 1918.
We left Beuvry on the morning of Sept. 7th and were taken back on the light
railway to Ferfay. On this occasion, much to our surprise, the trains moved off
at the scheduled time. From Ferfay it was but a short march to Auchel, another
mining village, where we found very good billets, and were welcomed in their
usual hospitable way by the French miners and their families. Thanks to a most
generous Town Major we got all sorts of little billet comforts, of which he
seemed to have an unlimited supply, whilst opposite the Headquarters Mess was a
very comfortable little restaurant, bearing the sign, "Cosy Corner," where we
found helping to run the show, an old friend known to us in earlier days at
Béthune as "Lily."
On the day after our arrival Lieut.-Col. J. F. Dempster, D.S.O., 2nd Manchesters,
took over command of the Battalion, Major Andrews resuming the duties of
Second-in-Command, and Lieut. C. H. Powell temporarily acting as Adjutant.
Changes had also taken place in the Higher Commands in the Division.
Brigadier-General John Harington, D.S.O., from the 46th Machine Gun Battalion,
had succeeded General Wood in command of the 139th Brigade, and Major-General
Thwaites, who had laboured so assiduously to keep the Division up to the highest
pitch of perfection in every respect, had gone to England to take up the duties
of Director of Military Intelligence at the War Office, and we now had the
pleasure of meeting his successor, Major-General G. F. Boyd, C.B., C.M.G.,
D.S.O., D.C.M., who was to command the Division for the rest of the war. He came
to see us at Auchel, and we soon realised that under his leadership, given
ordinary luck, we could not help doing well. Fresh from the battles of the
South, he had much to tell us about the latest forms of attack, particularly
those carried out in conjunction with Tanks, and we were not long in finding out
that what he could not tell us about the kind of fighting that was going on was
not worth knowing. He introduced to us the system of advancing in the early
stages of the attack in the "Blob" formation, that is, with Companies on wide
frontages, echelonned in depth, with each Platoon in a line of sections in
"blobs," or small and somewhat open groups. With this formation there was less
likelihood of severe casualties from shelling or machine guns, whilst it was a
most simple formation from which extensions could be carried out, and at the
same time it allowed the Section Commander to retain control of his men up to
the last possible moment. This system we at once set about practising, and later
on used it in all the battles in which we took part. Very little training was
possible during the few days spent at Auchel owing to the bad weather.
It was, of course, general knowledge that we were shortly to take an active part
in the fighting in the South, and therefore no surprise when we received orders
to entrain. This was carried out in the early hours of Sept. 12th, at
Calonne-Ricouart Station, and was rendered extremely uncomfortable by a
torrential downpour, which made it specially difficult to get the transport
vehicles up the steep ramps on to the trucks. C Company had to do the loading
for the whole Brigade, and were at the station for nearly twenty-four hours,
working in shifts. They left by the last train at 12.40 p.m., the main body
having left at 3.16 a.m. This was our farewell to a district of which we had got
to know practically every inch, and of which we shall always retain most happy
recollections. We had been there for seventeen months without a break.
Slowly but surely we wended our way Southwards, until we reached Amiens. At one
period the town had been emptied of all civilians, but they were just beginning
to come back and the streets were now showing slight signs of life again. A
certain amount of damage had been done by shell-fire, and as we moved Eastward
from Amiens, signs of the one-time proximity of the front line became more
marked. Eventually we came to a stop at Corbie Station, where we detrained
during the afternoon, after a journey of about twelve hours. After most welcome
and refreshing tea, which we owed to the forethought of Capt. Salter, the Acting
Staff-Captain, we marched to billets at La Houssoye, some five miles away, where
C Company joined us early the following morning. We were now in the IX Corps,
which formed part of General Rawlinson's Fourth Army. We were soon able to make
ourselves comfortable, though the village was somewhat battered and contained
very few inhabitants. When we moved further forward, it was, from a purely
military point of view, a decided advantage to find no civilians at all. All
around was a delightfully free rolling country, and we could wander anywhere
according to our own sweet will, those lucky enough to have horses getting some
lovely gallops across the chalk downs. This area had been too near the front
line for the past few months for any work to be carried out on the land, and
such crops as there were were now being harvested by soldier labour, mostly
Canadian.
The enemy had been driven back from the neighbourhood during August by the
Australians, who had had particularly hard fighting about Villers-Bretonneux,
not many miles distant from where we were billeted, and the work of clearing the
battlefield was already in hand. Gangs of Chinese were employed in the task, but
we were not impressed by their industry. Everything had to be carried to dumps
by the roadside, and no matter what the burden the only authorised way of
carrying it was by putting it on the end of a pole, which the "Chink" carried
over his shoulder. It seemed decidedly comical, to say the least, to see a man
walk several hundred yards to retrieve a coat, for example, hang it on the pole,
and walk several more hundred yards with it to a dump! Nevertheless, this seemed
to be the recognised way of working.
Such training as we carried out was mostly in the attack and other operations,
such as advanced guards, likely to be required in open warfare. Little was done
in the way of bombing, which had had its day. There was a good deal of Lewis gun
work, and "field-firing" practice in the shape of Platoon attacks on strong
points. Flags to represent Tanks were introduced into the scheme with a view to
giving some idea of how to follow up a Tank and take possession of the ground it
gained. A good deal of practice in Map Reading and Compass work was carried out
by Officers and N.C.O.'s, which proved most useful in the days to come. Several
Officers and N.C.O.'s here enjoyed their first aeroplane flight through the
kindness of the Officer commanding a Bombing Squadron in the vicinity.
Orders for a move came after little delay, but with unexpected suddenness. We
had to break off in the middle of a practice attack on September 18th, to
prepare for our departure, and at 9 p.m. on the same day we left La Houssoye and
marched to Bonnay, where we embussed for the forward area once more. Transport
marched brigaded and was now under Lieut. Toyne, who took charge when Lieut.
Tomlinson broke his collar-bone in a jumping competition a little while before
at Vaudricourt. Somewhere about midnight the long procession of lorries moved
off. The other two Brigades of the Division were being moved by the same means,
and there is no doubt that the Auxiliary 'Bus Companies were having a pretty
busy time! In the darkness the journey seemed endless. It was too bumpy to allow
even a doze, sleepy as most of us felt. The whole area was a desolate ruin, but
in the darkness we were, of course, able to see little or nothing of it. For
something like 40 miles, the Somme area, through which we were passing, was
nothing but an immense wilderness—every village practically in ruins, and hardly
sufficient remains in many cases to identify their position. In one case a
signboard had been put up to mark the site of the village, and on maps they were
usually described as "—— ruins of." Old trenches and barbed wire entanglements
existed at various points. Not a scrap of ground was cultivated—all was wild and
uncared for. Not a living soul was there except a few odd troops of our own,
working mostly on roads or guarding dumps, and French, Italians, Portuguese and
"Chinks" working on the railways. A few odd woods and shattered trees were
practically the only things standing in this enormous tract of country. Later on
we saw all this for ourselves when we used to cross this devastated area going
on leave or for trips to Amiens, which a generous staff permitted us to indulge
in occasionally. Much of the area had been fought over four times—firstly, when
captured by the enemy in the original advance; secondly, when he withdrew to the
Hindenburg Line early in 1917 and laid the whole place waste; thirdly, during
his offensive of 1918; and, lastly, when he was driven out once and for all by
British and other troops just before our arrival.
Eventually, about dawn on September 19th, the long train of lorries came to a
halt, and we were dumped on the road about a mile West of a one-time village
known as Poeuilly, to which we marched, and where we were told we had to
bivouac.
It was a cheerless prospect to be turned loose into a bare field at 4.0 a.m. on
a late September morning. Poeuilly, however, was found to contain a certain
amount of useful material which very soon found its way to our field, and with
the aid of a few "trench shelters," and taking advantage of some trenches which
were there, it was not long before we had put up some quite useful protection.
Though chilly in the early morning the weather was quite seasonable, and on the
whole we did not fare badly. Our Transport arrived late the same day.
The Hindenburg Line lay a few miles in front of us, and some of its outer
defences were already in our hands. On the afternoon of September 20th, we left
Poeuilly and relieved the 2nd Royal Sussex in Brigade Reserve in trenches and
dug-outs about Pontru, with Battalion Headquarters at "Cooker" Quarry, the 5th
and 6th Battalions taking over the front line. At this point we were some seven
miles North-West of St. Quentin, and two to three miles West of Bellenglise, on
the St. Quentin Canal. There was no great excitement during the three days we
spent there except that we had rather bad luck with the Transport. As the idea
was rather pressed on us that we were now taking part in "moving warfare," some
of the horses and Company limbers of bombs and small arm ammunition were taken
forward to the edge of a small wood just behind Battalion Headquarters.
Unfortunately this wood got shelled and several mules were knocked out, with the
result that the ammunition was dumped, and the limbers and rest of the animals
were sent back to Poeuilly.
On September 23rd we received orders for certain action to be carried out by us
in connection with an attack which was to be launched the next day, when the
46th Division were to carry out a "minor operation" in conjunction with the 1st
Division on their right. The Australians had pushed forward considerably on the
left, and the line now bent back sharply, where the troops we had relieved had
been held up by the village of Pontruet. The attack was planned both to
straighten out the line and to get possession of the high ground on the right.
The 138th Brigade, who had taken over from the Australians on the left, were
ordered to capture the village of Pontruet, and for this purpose detailed the
5th Leicesters. The attack was to be carried out by an enveloping movement from
the North, and the village was to be rushed from the East. Our 5th and 6th
Battalions were to co-operate by occupying some trenches about Pontruet, and, on
the night following, the 8th Battalion was to relieve the 5th Leicesters as far
North as the inter-Brigade boundary.
The attack was launched at 5 a.m. on September 24th, and though the 5th
Leicesters made most strenuous efforts to attain their objectives, they just
failed to achieve the full purpose for which they set out, and at the end of the
day Pontruet was not ours. Our 5th Battalion on the right also had some stiff
fighting, and suffered several casualties, taking their objective on the high
ground South of Pontruet, and capturing about 100 prisoners. Late in the day our
orders to relieve the 5th Leicesters were cancelled, and we had to take over
from our own 5th Battalion, who were holding the Western edge of Pontruet. This
operation was completed just before dawn on the 25th, Battalion Headquarters
being in a dug-out in the high ground South of Pontru. Fortunately we were there
only two days, for the discomfort was very great, the dug-outs and cellars
swarming with flies and vermin, and there was little other protection from the
enemy shelling, which was fairly frequent. On September 26th we were relieved on
an intensely dark night by the 1st Black Watch and went back to bivouacs just
off the Vendelles-Bihécourt Road, put up for us by the Battle Details, who had
moved up from Poeuilly. They, together with the Transport and Quar.-Master's
stores, had had none too peaceful a time during the last few days. Having moved
to Vendelles they were shelled out of it almost at the moment they arrived, but
eventually found a quiet resting-place for a brief space at Bernes, where, in
addition to ordinary stores, there were piled all the men's packs and spare kit,
and numbers of Lewis gun boxes. All moves now were done in light "fighting
order" and the Quar.-Master and Quar.-Master-Sergts. had their time fully
occupied in thinking how all the spare kit was to be got forward when it was
wanted.
During our recent moves we had received a regular influx of new Officers, no
fewer than nine having joined between September 3rd and September 26th. They
were 2nd Lieuts. G. Newton, John Henry Smith, A. N. Davis, R. N. Barker, T. F.
Mitchell, W. J. Winter, R. S. Plant, P. A. Turner, and W. G. Jacques. We had
lost 2nd Lieut. Morris, who had gone to the 139th Trench Mortar Battery; and
Comp. Sergt.-Major Slater and five N.C.O.'s who were sent to England as
Instructors. Slater was succeeded as Comp.-Sergt.-Major of A Company, by Sergt.
Attenborough. Our battle casualties at Pontruet amounted to five killed and 24
wounded.
The men were now very fit and the Battalion was on the top of its form. Our
chief anxiety was whether after all we were to be in a real good push. We
suspected that we might have been brought here to be whittled away in minor
trench attacks, and that the opportunity of really showing what stuff the
Battalion was made of would never present itself. Our fears were not lessened
when we saw how the 5th Leicesters and 5th Sherwood Foresters suffered at
Pontruet, and we saw looming ahead what we imagined to be the never-ending luck
of the 46th Division. Our fears were ill-founded. Better things were before us
and arrived sooner than we expected.