By 4 am, the men lying in the wheat were getting cold as the fog thickened and closed about them. In the centre of the Australian line, the 17th Battalion made their last preparations. At 4.10 am, the company commanders’ order to ‘stand to’ was carried down the line in a low whisper, while a silent runner reported the men all present. Word also passed down the line that it was ten minutes to zero hour.
The seconds ticked by as thousands of eyes watched the slow sweep of the illuminated second hand on their carefully synchronised watches: 4.19 am, one minute to go. The final minute ticked away and then 3000 guns lit the sky, turning night into day and sending a line of bursting shells deep into German-held territory. Mixed in was a machine-gun barrage fired by lines of Vickers guns, sending a rain of bullets into German positions.
Private J. S. Finney from the 44th Battalion described the scene:
The Trench mortars started and almost immediately afterwards came a peculiar whirring, pulsating sound tearing the air into a turmoil and then down came that wall of steel, smoke and flames as if a curtain had been suddenly dropped from the heavens. It was a magnificent sight, as far as the eye could see. On the right and left it was raining that peculiar muddy red flame. Intermingled with this were Fritz Very lights in all colours, making a vain call for a counter barrage, but it was evident the call was unheard.1
At the southern end of the line, another Australian private noted in his diary the opening movements of the attack:
We hopped the twig at 4.20 am. Fritz heard us forming up before and dropped a barrage. They had to grin and bear it for an hour. The one big gun of ours went off a way back. Our barrage came down with a crash. There were thousands of 18lbs, 4’, 6’ 8’ even up to 15’ guns. Most of the heavies got onto his gun positions. All his gunners must have scuttled for their dugouts at once as the barrage stopped as quickly as ours opened. As soon as the barrage fell away we went in lines.2
Along the extended front, men cheered the barrage as it crashed ahead of them, bringing up dust and smoke to add to the dense fog. In the crashing tumult, shouts of command rang out, and the clamour was such that men had to yell to be heard. Lieutenant Binder of the 59th Battalion described the barrage like ‘being behind a curtain of rushing noise’.3
The men rose like dark phantoms from the earth and, with rifles slung and cigarettes lit, they moved towards the wall of descending shells 200 yards ahead of them. The nerves of battle quickly passed as a wave of excitement and adrenalin flushed through the advancing men. The Australians were confident: they were fit and well trained and, most importantly, they trusted their officers and mates.
The fog had become so thick that, in places, visibility was reduced to a few yards. Officers advanced using prismatic compasses, but the crashing line of shells and the flashes ahead in the distant fog gave the men some sense of direction. However, contact with units to either side was impossible and men soon became mixed, while the advancing tanks just ahead of the men became less effective due to the poor visibility.
The advancing line was soon among the first German advance posts and dugouts. Rifle fire and the explosion of grenades indicated the men were now in contact with the enemy. As Private R. Fryer-Smith wrote, ‘We come across a few enemy dugouts here and yelled at the Hun to come out and if he is not out in a few seconds, a Mills bomb is hurled into the opening and that is the end.’4
In the 27th Battalion, the men advanced ‘with the confidence as great as the moment’,5 mopping up as they went. Within a short time, large numbers of the enemy were captured and sent back to the Australian rear. After his advance was held up by a German machine gun, the 27th’s Sergeant Grant quickly out-flanked the enemy in the smoke and fog, capturing the post of two officers and forty-seven men along with two machine guns. He was recommended for a Victoria Cross but was killed later, on 3 October, just hours before the notification of his Distinguished Conduct Medal was to reach battalion headquarters.
After three minutes, the first ‘lift’ occurred, the barrage moving forward a further 200 yards. Fearful of the German retaliation, the men were surprised that no enemy shells had fallen yet. They realised that the Allied batteries allocated to counter-battery fire had done their job, smothering German artillery positions and depriving the enemy of the much-feared reprisal barrage. Also, the enemy gunners had no definite targets, and the assault had already overrun their front line and was advancing steadily behind the creeping barrage on their very positions. It was later discovered that in the days before the attack, the enemy had been short of ammunition and had restricted their firing.
Advancing along the towpath on the north of the river, the 39th Battalion traversed the swamp and struck only desultory enemy machine-gun fire and the occasional shell dropping short from their own guns. Thick belts of barbed wire half-hidden in the grass and reeds, however, retarded their advance. The first enemy seen while a platoon was negotiating these entanglements were German machine gunners, hurriedly retreating through the fog, carrying their gun. The shots that were fired at them missed.
The 39th soon found themselves on the outskirts of Sailly-Laurette, having had only one man wounded in the advance. Pushing into the village, they came across abandoned German machine guns and, soon after, the crews hiding in a cellar. The Germans were challenged and threatened with Mills grenades until they came out, hands above their heads. Forty prisoners and eight machine guns were captured and sent back under escort.
The advance of the 42nd Battalion at the very north of the Australian line was slowed due to the swampy ground along the river and the broken country in the dense fog. A tank supporting the battalion also found visibility limited, and at one stage was heading for the river before two officers from the battalion climbed on top and, with great difficulty, warned the crew.6
The advance through Accroche Wood south of Hamel by the 43rd Battalion was achieved nearly without firing a shot. They were quickly followed up by the 34th, who mopped up. On the northern edge of the wood, the 35th Battalion, however, encountered stiff resistance. The Australians charged and eventually cleared the trenches, allowing the advance to continue towards the heavily defended Gailly ridge to the east of the wood. By this time, the tanks were moving ahead of the advance and crossing the wheat field, clearing it of enemy resistance.
As the fog began to lift, the full extent of the fighting was revealed. Across the vast expanse of the battlefield could be seen long lines of artillery and limbers, general service wagons, ambulances, pack animals and lines of troops all relentlessly moving forward. As the enemy defences were not strong, there was little damage to the roads and the ground, except along defence lines and machine-gun posts, and the wooded areas and villages were totally destroyed. The pioneer units and engineers were quickly at work repairing roads, filling in shell craters and checking for booby traps and mines.
This was the 3rd Pioneer Battalion’s first experience of open warfare, free of trench lines and churned-up ground. As their history notes, ‘the sight reminded one of a great field day in pre-war days. Here one saw every arm of the service concentrating, coming and going: wounded tanks returned to be inspected and temporarily patched up, gun teams waited for orders for the move to new positions, engineers and tunnellers opened and inspected wells, advanced dressing stations sprang up.’7
While most of the German artillery had been knocked out, German batteries north of the Somme began firing across the river on the long lines of concentrated targets. As the fog cleared, German artillery in Mallard Wood in front of Chipilly began enfilading fire upon the 42nd and 44th Battalions, inflicting a number of casualties. This attack, along with long-range machine-gun fire, indicated the British III Corps had not reached their objective. Again, the flanking British units were not keeping pace with the Australian advance. Most of these German guns were quickly silenced, but the slow advance of the British was to become a major, recurring problem.
By now, as the AIF battalions had become mixed, men needed to be rounded up and reorganised. They did their best to keep moving forward, following the line of falling shells as they closed on the Green Line, but platoon commanders had little control of their men. As the 44th Battalion reported, the officers ‘simply became individuals, blind to everything except what he tumbled over and not knowing anything about the unit he was supposed to be in command of. The diggers, when they found themselves isolated or lost, simply pressed on always in the direction of the barrage. There was no sitting down waiting for orders.’8
Meanwhile, the tanks could be heard but not seen. Eventually the thinning mist allowed the tanks to move on points of resistance, but the tanks began hitting contact mines, causing their tracks to be stripped off. Other tanks had dropped out, having hit obstacles in the fog, or had been ditched, but few had been damaged by German fire.
Initially, the 13th Light Horse reported the advance due to the inability of the circling aircraft to see through the fog. As it cleared, low-flying aircraft with special markings flew along the line, sounding their klaxon and firing white flares, a signal for the men to light trench flares to indicate their position. The observer could then map the troops’ position. The map was then quickly flown back to headquarters, where it was dropped in special despatch bags.
At the southern end of the line, the Australians were operating with the Canadians, the boundary between the two defined by the railway line that ran from Villers-Bretonneux south-east. This was the first time two Dominion corps had formed the nucleus of an attack, although the Australians and New Zealanders had fought side by side on the slopes of Passchendaele the year before.
Soon after the attack started, German machine-gun fire slowed both the Australians and the Canadians until, after a duel between Lewis gunners and the Germans, the advance could move forward. The Germans, however, kept up a constant defensive fire and on approaching Marcelcave, the first occupied village, Lieutenant Mason, MC, of the 21st Battalion, crossed the railway and assisted the Canadians in the fortified Jean Rouxin Mill, and after ‘a vigorous bomb fight, drove the Germans out’.9
As the 28th Battalion advanced with the Queenslanders of the 26th Battalion, they came under heavy fire and, upon reaching a strong belt of wire at Card Copse near the railway at the southern end of the advance, with no tank support the men were forced to ground. Needing to maintain the pressure of the advance, Lieutenant Alfred Gaby of the 28th Battalion found a break in the wire and charged the German trench line. Walking along the top of the parapet with his revolver, he fired down into the cowering Germans. Daunted by his audacious attack, fifty Germans with four machine guns surrendered, allowing the advance to progress. For his bravery, Gaby was awarded the Victoria Cross, but he never knew of his award, as he was killed by a sniper while encouraging his platoon in fighting near Framerville three days later.
In the middle of the line, the 17th Battalion was also lost in the fog. The ‘B’ Company commander, Captain Finlay, who had been originally commissioned in the field at Gallipoli, pushed his men forward and met little opposition. His first objective was the village of Warfusée which he passed to the south side, where, with the assistance of the tank ‘Buffoon’, was able to capture three 4.2-inch howitzers. The battalion history tells a typical story:
During the advance, a fine example of boldness and enterprise was given by one of ‘B’ Company’s young section leaders. Lance-corporal P. L. Anderson. The fog had begun to lift and revealed a party of about 50 Germans retiring hastily across the company’s front, obliquely from the right flank. They had with them three machine guns. Anderson, who was a footballer and in first class condition, straight away led his section, which was on the left flank, so as to head off the enemy. Outstripping his men, he succeeded in holding up the Germans who surrendered immediately when they observed Anderson’s section bearing down on them.10
Continuing the advance on Warfusée, four machine guns were captured by Captain Edward Harnett of the 17th Battalion. Soon after, a battery of four 4.2-inch howitzers were seen, their crews racing to hitch them up to escape. The Australians shot the German horses and quickly overran the guns, but the crews escaped. Then Harnett came upon a battery of 5.9-inch howitzers firing over open sights, point blank into the 7th Brigade. His men captured the guns along with one officer and forty-five gunners. German resistance evaporated, and Harnett and the 17th Battalion rushed on with the assistance of five tanks, which levelled buildings that lay in their path.
As the 17th and the 18th Battalions moved forward, Germans appeared, with their hands held high, out of the town’s cellars, one of which was a German headquarters. The Germans were disarmed and formed up on the road, before being marched to the rear to the overflowing POW cage at Villers-Bretonneux.
By this time prisoners were flooding back through the Australian line. As reported in the 25th Battalion history:
The Hun was on the run by then. Thousands of them coming through our lines with hands up. Our men pounced on them and lifted all their valuables. Watches, coins, postcards etc. galore. Then we saw a grand sight. The Cavalry. We had cleared his trenches. They had clear going and off they went.11
At the cage in Villers-Bretonneux, prisoners were lined up, awaiting their turn to be admitted. One group of sixty-six prisoners had been sent back under the charge of one Private Murray. When asked what happened with the prisoners he replied, ‘Well sir, we started off well, but I could not catch-up with the bastards.’12
On reaching the first objective, the Green Line, the advance stopped. The barrage, however, continued, falling 400 yards ahead of the rapidly consolidating line, while the heavy guns fired on German back areas and predetermined targets, often to the limit of their range. The 27th Battalion history notes:
It is doubtful whether less experienced troops could have reached the objective, so deep within the enemy lines, with practically only the controlling fire of our artillery to guide them and had the men sought cover from the point blank action of the enemy field guns, instead of rushing their positions, fearful casualties would have inevitably have resulted among the great mass of troops concentrated in the rear area.13
With the arrival of the advancing battalions at the Green Line around 7 am, the immediate priority was establishing a defensive line in anticipation of a swift German counterattack. Patrols started to move out into no-man’s-land to probe the enemy defences, which were quickly found to be in disarray. With patches of fog remaining and visibility still limited, aggressive patrols cut out German posts, surrounding them and capturing their garrisons to further advance the line.
While the consolidation continued, some German shells still fell along the newly established front line. One shell hit a carrier tank of the 44th Battalion while it was being unloaded. Fortunately no one was inside, but the concussion of the blast started the tank engine: ‘It went at full speed down the hill, and coming to a very steep bank, rolled over and over to the road at the foot, where it lay on its back out of action.’14 Meanwhile, German matériel was salvaged, and valuable information and maps were discovered and quickly sent back to headquarters. Both German and Australian men and horses were buried, their graves carefully noted for later retrieval.
What quickly became clear was that casualties for the first four hours of fighting were exceptionally light. The 43rd Battalion reported three killed and five wounded, and the capture of 100 prisoners, twenty-five machine guns (including ten heavies), one section of field guns, one anti-tank rifle and a large amount of signals and other equipment. The 27th Battalion had five men killed, and one officer and forty-two other ranks wounded. In their advance, they captured 200 Germans, nine 77-millimetre guns, one wireless plant and twenty-five machine guns. Similarly, the 42nd Battalion on the river captured 300 prisoners, three 77-millimetre guns, twenty-five machine guns, seven trench mortars and a large quantity of ammunition and stores, all at a cost of a few casualties. This was in line with a 40th Battalion observation that as they followed up the first waves, ‘In advancing over this recently captured ground the fact that struck us most was the very small number of our dead.’15
Private Edward Lynch, the author of Somme Mud, was a member of the 45th Battalion attacking that day as part of the 4th Division’s advance on the northern end of the line, and refers to finding dead German soldiers:
We’re at the old enemy front line trench now. It is an open sepulchre, blown and smashed to pieces. Dozens of dead everywhere and not a whole man amongst them. Limbless and headless they lie coated in chalk, torn and slashed by the shelling. Slashed in life and slashed again in death. Killed by our remorseless shelling. Killed that we may advance.
He found Australian dead also:
Ahead of us we see the broken embankment of a machine-gun emplacement. We move nearer. In front of it are five 3rd division men lying dead just where they collapsed, bullet ridden, as they gamely rushed the enemy gun. In several shell holes are rifles and equipment that have been left by the wounded men, so we know that the Fritz gun had reaped a heavy toll before it was silenced.16
At 8.20 am, the second stage of the advance began. The plan was for the 4th Division to leapfrog the 3rd Division, and the 5th Division further south to leapfrog the 2nd Division. The objective was now the Red Line, three miles ahead, but unlike the first objective, there would be no creeping barrage to protect the line moving out towards the villages of Bayonvillers and Harbonnières, and along the valley running from Morcourt to Harbonnières.
The new attacking battalions started forward with bayonets fixed behind a slow-moving line of tanks. As the Victorian 15th Brigade began forward, they were cheered on by the 28th Battalion, who cheered again as British cavalry and artillery passed through their position. At the same time, the 4th Australian Division passed through the 3rd Division in artillery formation ‘as steady as if on a peace manoeuvre’17 and pushed on towards the Red Line. The 44th Battalion history notes:
The 4th Division can be well proud of themselves for that day’s work. They had marched for miles behind attacking infantry, through thick fog with direction and touch difficult to maintain yet they passed through the 3rd Division on time and free from the slightest trace of confusion, looking just as fit and confident as one would expect of any unit with the fighting record of the 4th Australian Division.18
As the Green Line had been about the limit of the protective barrage, the eighteen-pound guns that could be quickly hitched and moved needed to be brought forward as early as possible, even though their range and hitting power was limited. As the 44th Battalion settled in, ‘Field batteries galloped through the “Green Line” and deployed their guns and opened fire within minutes, to the delight and ribald encouragement of the irreverent infantry.’19 The horse-drawn eighteen-pounders then followed the infantry, providing mobile fire support where required.
The battalion cookers also arrived to serve the men a hot meal after the advance. Never before had cookers been so close to the front line in an attack, and the provision of hot food and tea was welcomed by the men. Once again, General Monash was keen to see the men were well fed, and their fighting morale and strength maintained.
Crossing the Green Line, the 15th Battalion at the northern end of the line near the village of Cerisy came under fire from a German machine gun hidden in a house on the outskirts of the village. A tank was called up, which fired into the house, bringing down the walls as the gunners fled out the back door. Fleeing with them were the crews of a battery of 77-millimetre guns, which were overrun and captured.
Across the Somme, Germans could be seen scattering up the slope, running for a trench line and cover. Elsewhere the Allied tanks moved 100 yards ahead of the infantry, who were advancing in artillery formation, in columns of lines. The tanks gradually moved forward, engaging German machine guns and duelling with German artillery, often at point-blank range.
As the 15th Battalion advanced and cleared the ridgeline to the right of Cerisy, it came into full view of the German battery over the river on the Chipilly ridge, which quickly destroyed the battalion’s supporting tank. A young Tasmanian Gallipoli veteran, Lieutenant Bernard Shaw, was killed as he led his men past the tank the instant it was hit. Immediately, the battalion used the captured German machine guns to put harrowing fire on the enemy positions, quickly decimating the ranks of the German gunners and preventing them returning fire. By the time the battalion reached the Red Line they had one officer and seven men killed, plus three officers and thirty-three men wounded, including six gassed. They captured 350 Germans, two 77-millimetre guns, two minenwerfers, fifteen heavy machine guns and four light machine guns.
At the southern end of the line, the 15th Brigade found the advance difficult from the start, and were unlucky to receive the only real German resistance, apart from that at the northern 4th Brigade sector along the river. The 15th came under German artillery fire as they formed up, and the tanks supporting them pushed forward in an attempt to suppress the German artillery. One tank was knocked out but two others advanced, supported by the infantry, driving the Germans from the gun and capturing the crew. More opposition was encountered and overrun by the 59th Battalion on the extreme right as it went south of Bayonvillers, leaving the village to be cleared by the 58th Battalion with the aid of tanks.
In the centre of the line were the 8th Brigade, part of 5th Division, and to their left, the 12th Brigade of 4th Division.
The 8th Brigade was in the vast flat plains to the north of the Roman road where the country provided no cover and, fortunately, no defensive high ground. This gave them a straightforward advance to the east and, apart from a skirmish near Bayonvillers, it was only when they came to the outskirts of Harbonnières and the Red Line objective that they encountered serious resistance. Having all but one of their tanks knocked out, they succeeded in firing on and stopping a German battery of 77-millimetre guns escaping, with the crew fleeing and leaving the stricken guns by the roadside.
To their left flank, the Victorians of the 46th Battalion, 12th Brigade, encountered the head of the valleys running south from the Somme, first at Lena Wood, then Susan Wood and finally Jean Wood. Here they overcame scattered German resistance with the assistance of the tanks. To their north, the 45th Battalion found the steeper valley sides slowed their advance and diverted the tanks south to a point where they could cross the valley. They finally reached the southern end of the Morcourt valley and halted as British heavy artillery burst along the ridgeline.
All along the line, Germans were surrendering, filing back with hands high above their heads to be quickly ratted by the advancing Australians. A note in the 44th Battalion history makes an interesting reference to Germans being captured by Australians: ‘The enemy surrendered in droves and it was noted that several of them were well aware of the Australian habit of frisking prisoners for souvenirs as in their posts the capitulating Germans had actually taken off their watches, emptied their pockets and lined their personal effects and accoutrements along the parapet of their trenches before the Australians arrived to spare themselves the indignity off being “ratted”.’20
As the 48th Battalion approached the next village, Morcourt, accompanied by a unit of the Royal Horse Artillery, they found themselves looking down into a long valley filled with German billets, supply dumps and bivouac areas. The artillery quickly opened fire while the Australians entered the valley and cleared it of enemy opposition. Here they located equipment and discarded weapons, the Germans having fled to the east, abandoning everything. The 45th and 46th Battalions pushed ahead to the end of the valley and the Red Line, just east of Morcourt where it intersected the Somme.
Further south, the 48th Battalion joined with the 30th and 31st Battalions to continue the advance to the old Amiens line between the Roman road, south to the village of Harbonnières. Here German resistance was weak, consisting of in most cases machine gunners firing a few bursts then either making a hasty retreat or surrendering. In some places German machine gunners fought until overrun then surrendered, expecting mercy from men with scores to settle and revenge on their mind. The diggers rarely took prisoners in those situations. Private R. E. Barrie, DCM, wrote:
Machine gun fire began to take its toll as we left the copse, but following Captain Caldwell, we forged ahead. My cobber on the right, a chap named Mason, got his issue about a couple of feet from me and my blood boiled when I saw him fall. Every man who went down in the fire automatically spurred the survivors on to fresh efforts to reach the objective. Much to our surprise, the Germans suddenly stood up with their hands raised higher over their heads and going hard, we were on them in quick time. But for the levelheadedness of Captain Caldwell, things would have been unpleasant for them, as feeling against them was running high during the advance. One Fritz officer had in his holster a revolver which I souvenired, despite his protests.21
The Australians’ training and trust in each other now provided an advantage. When a machine gun was seen, men would rush forward over short distances, covered by Lewis-gun fire which would engage the enemy machine guns. Yet again, individuals advanced with Lewis guns, firing from the hip in individual acts of bravery. Such was the case of Private E. S. Brown, who, after noticing a German gun firing on his advancing platoon, raced forward, firing as he went and shooting down three Germans as they attempted to flee. For this action he was awarded a Military Medal.
During the advance to the Red Line, there were many notable acts of individual bravery. Apart from the work of the tanks, it was the discipline and outstanding quality of the infantry battalions which carried the line.
At 9 am, the 4th Brigade advanced along the Somme, with the 13th Battalion tasked with capturing the right of the brigade’s Red Line objective, the 14th in the centre and the 15th on the northern end by the river. As they advanced, and with the fog now dissipated, the 15th immediately started to take enfilading fire from across the river, particularly from the Chipilly ridge.
A German record by the 13th Field Artillery Regiment states, ‘Now targets offered in confusing plenty,’22 and ‘other German accounts say that the [German] artillerymen on the northern heights felt keenly their inability to fire at all the targets offering.’23 Bean also notes, ‘During most of this phase, and of the next, the German artillery north of the Somme was the chief instrument of the enemy’s resistance on the Australian front.’24
As the 13th Battalion history notes:
They would have had no more opposition than we, had the commanding Chipilly Spur been in the hands of the Third Corps of the Imperial troops as we had been assured it would be by 8.20am. That Corps had, on the 6th, been driven back 1000 yards on a frontage of 1000 yards losing an area just won by the 3rd AIF Division. After repelling the Tommies today (8th August), the German gunners and machine gunners slewed their guns around and dealt with the 4th Brigade and our tanks, knocking the later out, one after the other, by direct hits, easily obtained over open sights.25
Soon after, the 13th Battalion came under fire and fifty-seven men fell within a few minutes, such was the intensity of the German fire. By 10 am, after taking fire and heavy casualties from the Chipilly Spur, the 4th Brigade descended the last of three ridge-lines and crossed the Red Line.
In spite of these hardships, the men remained in good humour. The 13th Battalion history notes, ‘Captains McKillop and Swinburne had treated the battle with such joy and coolness that they had infected their men, one and all, with their spirit. Never have men joked so and laughed so heartily throughout a long battle as did the 13th that great day.’26 They were also rewarded for their good work, coming as they did on a mass of German stores, and ‘an officers mess (with fresh grapes and eggs), two canteens with good pre-war cigars, a store of photographs and boxes of maps and a pay office where one man blew open a case with 25,000 marks in notes’.27
Nearby, the 48th Battalion had reached Susan Wood south-west of Morcourt, and halted for fifteen minutes to allow the 45th Battalion to move ahead and prevent bunching as an attractive artillery target. At 9.15 am, as they approached the Red Line, they sent the following message: ‘48th Bn HQ in vicinity of Susan Wood. No further casualties. Everything going well. Very little hostile shelling here.’28 They then moved forward, bayonets fixed, crossed the Red Line at 10.55 am and continued leapfrogging and advancing towards the Blue Line, 1500 yards ahead, the third and final objective of the day.
The Blue Line was taken easily, and consolidation began soon after midday. Quickly runners were sent back, making the dangerous journey across land that was in German hands barely an hour before. One man, Private O’Loughlin, was shot in the leg while returning to battalion headquarters. Determined to get his message back, he began crawling over bullet-swept fields until, exhausted and suffering loss of blood, he delivered his report. He was awarded a Military Medal. Similarly, a party of signallers under Sergeant Davies established a telephone line across open country at great risk after the previous line was cut. The new line allowed every company to be connected to battalion headquarters, assisting also with the artillery fire support. For his bravery, Sergeant Davies was awarded a Distinguished Conduct Medal.
While the Australians advanced relentlessly along the line, another surprising and gallant action was undertaken by British cavalry and armoured cars. After the taking of the Green Line, Whippet tanks ranged far and wide, well behind the German lines, shooting up transport lines, German troop concentrations and battalion headquarters, and even disturbing Germans eating their breakfast. The British 1st Cavalry Brigade divided into three units and charged into the villages of Rainecourt, Framerville and Vauvillers, a charge that was chivalrous and heroic like those of days past. The cavalry and the Whippet tanks did enormous damage during the first day of the offensive, a fact that has been unrecognised for too long.
It was at this time that a squadron of British cavalry made for three railway trains that were shunting north-east of Harbonnières. Two of the trains began to retreat east but the third one, a broad gauge train with a strange hump, was seen to belch smoke. The cavalry realised it was a large railway gun. As it too tried to retreat, it was strafed by a British aircraft and its boiler pierced, causing the train to lose power.
At this time, the 31st Battalion was advancing south of the Roman road on the right flank of the 8th Brigade, and soon came upon the railway gun with the back carriages alight. Lieutenant George Burrows and two sappers rushed forward and, as machine-gun bullets whipped around them, put out the fire and then shunted the smouldering carriages into another siding before repairing the line and moving the gun back to safety.29
The enfilading fire from the north of the river continued to hamper the advance of the 4th Brigade. Two guns firing from the wood above Chipilly and four more guns below the village knocked out a number of tanks and stalled the advance. Other tanks pressed into Cerisy, opposite Chipilly on the southern riverbank, flattening houses and driving Germans from the village. They were closely followed by men of the 15th Battalion, who went through the houses capturing several hundred Germans. But destructive fire came from across the river, again stalling the advance. The 4th were now on the Red Line but had, as Charles Bean wrote, ‘By far the most difficult task on the Australian front’.30
At the southern end of the Australian line, Pompey Elliott’s 15th Brigade was also having a difficult time securing Harbonnières, two miles east of Bayonvillers. The Canadians on the brigade’s right had been held up at Guillaucourt and were unable to secure the Australian right flank. Instead, the brigade’s 57th Battalion was required to lag behind to protect this flank. The Canadians had been held up due to the late arrival of the tanks and the destruction of many of them as the fog lifted. As a result, the northern end of the Canadian advance, across the railway line, did not take the Red Line until 4.30 pm. However, by the end of the day, the Canadians had advanced through to the Blue Line and had taken all their objectives.
By 12.30 pm, most of the area along the Blue Line had been consolidated and most battalions were dug in and secure by 3 pm. By the end of the day, all objectives had been taken. Along the front, the men rested, secure behind a defensive line that, given the disorganised state of the German army, need hardly have been constructed.
Like the Australians, the Germans were quickly digging in, with their line 800 yards from the Australian front. After sunset, Australian patrols pushed out into no-man’s-land, some sneaking right up to the German front line, where peaceful penetration and harassment continued. Others pushed towards the town of Proyart to gauge the enemy’s strength there.
While the Australians dug in, other services came to their support. Quartermasters were ready with cookers serving hot meals. Some men were so hungry they tried to bribe the cooks with souvenirs collected during the day. The engineers were also hard at work in the villages, testing wells, fixing the buckets and repairing the windlasses and watering points that were established close to the line. They were also busy with the bridges along the Somme, repairing access roads, erecting signs and bringing up materials like barbed wire, screw pickets, picks and shovels. As an indication of this frenetic work, the 8th Field Company ‘had sent in accurate reports on over 19 miles of roads and railways in the newly won ground by 4pm’.31 Overhead, both the Royal Flying Corps and the Australian Flying Corps continued their aggressive patrolling and photo reconnaissance while also delivering ammunition by parachute.
In taking and consolidating the Blue Line, the Australians, and the Canadians to their right, had not only achieved their objectives for the day, but had also enhanced and confirmed their reputation as crack colonial troops. Similarly, the leadership of Monash and Currie, along with their divisional and brigade staff, engendered a new respect for their detailed planning and operational brilliance.
Much of the credit for all of this must go to Monash, for his precise, detailed and intricate organisation and contingency planning. As one digger said, ‘it was a tres bon stunt’,32 a sentiment Monash would have no doubt appreciated, coming as it did from an impressed digger.