17.

The Immediate Repercussions

‘Sanborn’s men won admiration of Australians. Made good with Haig’s hardest fighters in first battle.’

Chicago Tribune headline, 1918

AFTER DAWN ON 6 July, with all now quiet on their front, the Australian battalions that had fought and won the Battle of Hamel, together with their American colleagues, were progressively replaced in the front-line trenches by companies from other Australian battalions, and moved back west to the reserve positions in the old front line. In the centre, for example, the 15th Battalion was replaced by the 49th Battalion and pulled back to the support trenches in the old front line, with the 13th Battalion and two companies of the 14th immediately in front of it.

The 15th’s commander Lieutenant-Colonel McSharry was well pleased with his boys’ work. ‘The success of the operation,’ he remarked, ‘was due to the fine leadership of platoon commanders and the superb dash and daring of the men themselves, who dealt with any situation that presented itself on their own initiative. The gallantry displayed both individually and collectively was quite up to the Australian standard.’²¹⁵ McSharry would soon be submitting recommendations for gallantry awards for his men’s deeds in the Battle of Hamel. As Ned Searle hoped, one of the decorations destined for the 15th Battalion was the unit’s first Victoria Cross.

McSharry was also recommending British gallantry awards for a number of Americans who had fought as part of his battalion in the battle. ‘The Americans attached to us deserve special mention for their part in the operation,’ he declared. ‘They behaved magnificently, but were rather anxious to get too close to our barrage – a common fault with new troops. There is not the slightest doubt that they possess all the qualities required to make first rate fighting troops.’²¹⁶

Only now were the American companies that had participated in the battle able to obey General Pershing’s order to withdraw. It meant a fond and sometimes emotional farewell for Australians and Americans. Although they had only been comrades-in-arms for several days, they had forged a fraternal bond in blood. As the Americans of the 131st Infantry parted with the Australians of the 11th Brigade, an Aussie called out to them.

‘You’ll do us, Yanks,’ he said, ‘but you’re a bit rough!’²¹⁷

This put a smile on American faces that was still there when a proud Colonel Sanborn met his men of Companies C and E on the road as they marched the nine kilometres from the front to 66th Brigade and 33rd Division headquarters, the Chateau Molliens at Molliens-au-Bois. Captain Gale, the former police inspector now commanding the 131st’s Company C, enthusiastically reported to Sanborn, ‘More real good was done to this company by this small operation with the Australians than could have been accomplished in months of training behind the lines.’²¹⁸

Company E’s commander Captain Luke was equally enthusiastic, if a little more concise, with his report: ‘I can say that the show was a complete success.’²¹⁹

Sanborn marched with his men to Chateau Molliens. When the troops arrived there at 9.00 am, he reported to his brigade commander, Brigadier-General Wolf, and advised that the Battle of Hamel had been a stunning victory in which his troops had more than proved themselves.

Wolf had not been a party to the sleight-of-hand pulled by his own superiors General Read and General Bell in order to keep the four 131st and 132nd Infantry companies out of the withdrawal of all American troops from the operation, and keep them in the battle. As far as Wolf was concerned, Sanborn and his 132nd Regiment counterpart Davis had disobeyed the 3 July withdrawal order of their commander-in-chief, General Pershing.

‘You damned old fool, Joe,’ said Wolf to Sanborn after an exchange of salutes. ‘I don’t know whether to court-martial you or decorate you!’²²⁰

Sanborn was trying to explain to Wolf that the order had been an impossible one to obey, when Major-General Bell walked into the room. After Sanborn and Wolf both saluted their divisional commander, a smiling Bell congratulated Sanborn on a job well done, telling him that congratulations had been flooding in from the Australians and the British. He also told him that he’d heard the Australians were recommending a number of American officers and men from the 131st and 132nd Infantry for British gallantry medals.

Sanborn responded that he was similarly recommending a number of his men for American decorations, starting with Corporal Thomas Pope, whom he was proposing for the Medal of Honor, the highest decoration for gallantry that the US Government could bestow. Erroneously known as the Congressional Medal of Honor because it is presented by the President of the United States on behalf of US Congress, this is the only American decoration for gallantry to be awarded in that manner.

The equivalent of the British Victoria Cross, the US Medal of Honor originated in 1862 and was first awarded the following year during the Civil War. Since late 1917, several US Navy sailors had been awarded the Medal of Honor, but no American soldier had yet received the decoration in this war. Pope would be the first.

As a matter of fact, Sanborn told General Bell, the Australians had presented the 131st with ‘a souvenir’ – the German machinegun ‘which was captured under exceptional circumstances of bravery’ by Tom Pope.²²¹ Proposing Pope for the highest award possible was not only warranted by the circumstances. It also meant that the commander of a Medal of Honor winner could not very well be sanctioned for the action in which the medal had been earned.

Thomas Pope would indeed be awarded the Medal of Honor. Based on the same citation from Colonel Sanborn, Pope would also be awarded Britain’s Distinguished Conduct Medal, France’s Medal Militaire and the French Croix de Guerre. General Pershing, who was so peeved that his troops fought and died under British command at Hamel, would quite deliberately, and petulantly, fail to mention Pope’s Medal of Honor, the inaugural US Army Medal of Honor of the war, when he wrote about this episode in his memoirs several years later. Robbing Pope and eighteen other officers and men of the 131st and 132nd who received British medals for their valorous parts in the Battle of Hamel of recognition, Pershing would merely say in his brief reference to the battle, ‘It seems needless to add that the behaviour of our troops in this operation was splendid.’²²²

That would be the extent of Pershing’s coverage of Hamel, a battle that proved to be the launching pad for the operations that would end the war within four months. And just as Pershing made no mention of the sacrifice, gallantry or success of American troops in the Hamel operation, never once did he mention General Monash in his plodding memoirs, or the value Pershing’s own officers placed in fighting alongside the Australians at Hamel and in later battles during this war.

As Colonel Sanborn met with Generals Bell and Wolf at the Molliens-au-Bois HQ, outside the chateau the weary men of the 131st’s C and E Companies were drawn up for the inspection of the divisional commander, minus their casualties in the operation. For the two companies, these casualties had been one officer and thirteen enlisted men killed, seven officers wounded or gassed, and ninety-four enlisted men wounded or gassed. Although this represented in the region of 25 per cent casualties, Generals Monash, Rawlinson and Bell all considered the figures low. Bell addressed the survivors, lavishing praise on them and reading aloud the telegrams from Field-Marshal Haig and Generals Monash and Rawlinson.

Monash, very much aware of the historic nature of the shared battle experience in the Hamel salient, had said to Bell in his 5 July cable:

My earnest thanks for the assistance and services of the four companies of infantry who participated in yesterday’s brilliant operations. The dash, gallantry and efficiency of these American troops left nothing to be desired, and my Australian soldiers speak in the very highest terms in praise of them. That soldiers of the United States and of Australia should have associated for the first time in such close cooperation on the battlefield is an historic event of such significance that it will live forever in the annals of our respective nations.²²³

Bell ordered Monash’s telegram published to all 15,000 men of the 33rd Division, and on 6 July cabled Monash in reply:

The bravery, efficiency and skill of Australian soldiers are fully appreciated by this division and they are known to the whole world. That your soldiers should have spoken in high terms of our men is the highest praise they could wish for. To have fought on the battlefield with Australia, in the brilliant operation of July the Fourth, will forever remain an historic event in the annals of our country.²²⁴

From General Rawlinson, Bell had received an even more exuberant telegram:

Am anxious to express to you, General Bell, and to all ranks of the 33rd (Illinois) Division, my warm thanks for the gallant part taken by portions of your division in the attack on Hamel and Vaire Wood on Independence Day. I hear nothing but praise of the manner in which your units fought the enemy, and my only regret is that I was not permitted to employ a larger portion of your fine division. Perhaps later on there may be another opportunity.²²⁵

At the Molliens-au-Bois parade, Colonel Sanborn turned to an aide, who was holding a German rifle. Taking the weapon, Sanborn presented it to Bell, as a gift. ‘The first German rifle taken by your troops on the Fourth of July,’ Sanborn proudly advised.

Whilst the men of the 131st and 132nd Infantry were the focus of praise, the 108th Engineer Regiment didn’t escape commendation, either. Lieutenant-Colonel Roy McGregor, Assistant Director of Medical Services with the Australian Corps, sent a letter to Major-General Maclagan, operational commander for the Battle of Hamel, which Maclagan in turn passed along to General Bell, drawing his attention to the assistance provided on the Hamel battlefield to Australian medical staff by men of the 108th Engineers.

‘This assistance,’ said McGregor, ‘was proferred without being asked for and was of the greatest use on the 4th and on the night of the 4/5th when all our men were very busy or tired from previous heavy exertions.’²²⁶

Pointedly, there was no telegram or letter of commendation from the Americans’ own commander-in-chief, General Pershing, for American troops or units that had taken part in the Hamel operation. Pershing offered no praise, no thoughts or prayers, for the Americans who had bravely fought, bled and died in the service of their country on the Fourth of July. As far as he was concerned, this ‘local engagement’ had as good as never happened. Neither did Pershing officially congratulate Haig, Rawlinson or Monash on the operation’s success.

Pershing also strove to ensure that no report of the role of American troops in the battle would appear in the US press. He wouldn’t be entirely successful. Philip Gibbs, after writing an excited 4 July article about the ‘British’ victory at Hamel, would file another report for the British press the following day, enthusing about the American part in the battle, which would be picked up by American papers. In Australia, reports from Australian war correspondents also celebrated the unique Australian-American victory.

Accounts referring to Illinois’ part in the Hamel battle would begin appearing in the Chicago press later in the year. One quoted a letter from Private Frank A. Johnson, a member of the 131st Infantry’s Company B. Writing home on 8 August about the 131st’s exploits that particular day, Johnson also made reference to the regiment’s first battle, alongside the Australians, on Independence Day. The Chicago Tribune of 20 December would headline an article based on Johnson’s letter, ‘Sanborn’s Men Won Admiration of Australians.’

A subheading, relating back to General Bell’s 2 July exhortation to his men to make good with the Aussies, read, ‘“Made Good” With Haig’s Hardest Fighters in First Battle’. The article went on, quoting Johnson, ‘The 131st on that day won the admiration of the Australians. We had been treated kindly before by them, but we still had to make good. After the battle they took us to their hearts as comrades.’

The 131st’s commander Colonel Joe Sanborn was himself immensely proud of his men, and of the bond that had been forged between the Americans and Australians in the Hamel operation. ‘The Australians freely expressed themselves afterwards to the effect that the only complaint they could make was that our men were too savage and swift,’ he later remarked. ‘They displayed remarkable dash and endeavoured to be first and foremost in the fight, the Australians said.’

Sanborn happily repeated the comments of Lieutenant-Colonel John Farrell, commander of the Australian 43rd Battalion, to which the 131st’s Company E had been attached, who had told him his Illinois boys had done ‘excellent work’. Farrell had added, ‘Considering it was their first time in action, they fought splendidly.’ Sanborn would go on, ‘Even more valued than this official praise was the verdict of the Australian soldiers beside whom the Americans fought.’²²⁷

When Sanborn bumped into an old friend, Dwight S. Harding, in France several months after the battle, Harding would pump him for information about the Hamel operation, and the following 30 March the Chicago Tribune would publish an article quoting Harding about his meeting with Sanborn. ‘He told me his version of a fight about which I heard a good deal from other sources,’ Harding was to say. ‘He complied with an impossible order from British headquarters and went in and ate the Boche alive.’

Sanborn would have told Harding not to mention the Battle of Hamel specifically, for officially neither Sanborn nor any other subordinate of General Pershing was able to comment about the battle, nor even mention Hamel by name. Infuriated by his commander-in-chief’s determination to wipe American participation in the Battle of Hamel from the record, Colonel William K. Naylor, the 33rd Division’s Chief of Staff, lodged a memorandum with Pershing’s HQ. ‘This action is deserving of note by all Americans,’ he wrote after detailing the division’s role in the operation. ‘The people of Illinois have just reason to feel proud of their sons for what they did in this engagement. The engagement at Hamel and Vaire Woods can justly be called “Illinois Victory No. 1”.’

Naylor was equally determined to point out that praise from Australian fighting men was praise worth shouting about from the rooftops. ‘We hear nothing but praise from all sides on the conduct of our men under fire. There are no finer troops on earth, nor have there ever been, than the Australian Corps, and when they are willing to admit the efficiency of the Americans, it is well worth attention.’²²⁸

Nonetheless, Pershing would persist in denying the 33rd Division due praise for its Independence Day success.

‘The psychological effect of the Battle of Hamel was electric and startling,’ General Monash would write to his wife. ‘This battle was the first definite offensive on a substantial scale which had been undertaken by any of the armies of the Allies on any front since the close of the autumn campaign of 1917.’²²⁹

Overnight, the Hamel operation changed attitudes. ‘Its success converted the whole thoughts of the Allies from an attitude of pure defensive to an attitude of offensive, and it began to dawn upon High Command that it was after all possible to do something else but sit down and take the cuffs and kicks of the enemy,’ said Monash. Now, everybody wanted to talk to him, and learn from him. ‘People came from far and near to hear all about it and find out “how it was done”, and GHQ published a special pamphlet describing the battle plan and the new tactical methods which I employed.’²³⁰

In preparation for the impending visit to his headquarters of French Prime Minister Clemenceau, Monash collected all the figures he could about his Hamel victory. Apart from taking all their objectives in record time, Monash’s Australians and Bell’s Americans had between them taken 1600 German prisoners. Monash estimated that the Germans suffered a similar number of killed or wounded, making overall enemy casualties around 3200. Australian casualties totalled 800, the majority of these being walking wounded who would return to duty. This amounted to a casualty rate of around 12.5 per cent of the Australian infantrymen who took part in the assault, which Monash and his superiors considered low. Monash would also record that the operation yielded 171 German machineguns, twenty-six mortars and two field guns.²³¹

Prime Minister Clemenceau paid his visit to General Monash and the Australian Corps on 7 July, just two days after the last shots had been fired in the Battle of Hamel. A short, stout seventy-eight-year-old with a walrus moustache, Clemenceau strode out enthusiastically when Monash took him to meet troops of the 4th, 6th and 11th Brigades that had taken part in the Hamel battle, just behind the front. ‘He made to them a very fine and fiery oration, in very good English,’ Monash wrote home to Vic.²³²

Clemenceau told the assembled Australians what the French people had thought of Australian soldiers when they first arrived in France. ‘They expected a great deal of you, because they have heard what you have accomplished in the development of your own country,’ he said. ‘We knew you would fight a real fight, but we did not know from the very beginning you would astonish the whole Continent with your valour.’²³³

Many other Frenchmen were equally keen to praise the Australians and celebrate the small but landmark Hamel victory. On 14 July, Bastille Day, the French national day, the Prefect of the Department of the Somme defiantly and patriotically held a lunch in the ruins of Amiens’ town hall, inviting twenty guests including General Monash and representatives of the evacuated metropolis of Amiens and the Australian, British and French armies. There, in the deserted city, the participants toasted the Hamel victory, and the victories to come.

As for American involvement with the Australians, that was to continue. In the short term, the band of the 132nd Infantry joined the band of the Australian 4th Brigade to play at the 4th Brigade’s sports day behind the lines at Querrieu on 20 July. At that same event General Monash presented medals to men of the 4th Brigade who had earned them for deeds during the Battle of Hamel. This medal ceremony, held in a field with men of the brigade sitting and standing casually as they watched and applauded proceedings, and with the medals laid out on a table draped with the Australian flag, didn’t include the 4th Brigade’s two VC winners. Their awards would only be announced in August, with the medals subsequently presented by King George V.

In August, too, men of the US 33rd Division would again fight alongside the Aussies, once more in an offensive devised by General John Monash. The Australian general had begun planning his very next battle almost the moment the Battle of Hamel ended so successfully.