3
The Somme and the Germans
That part of France finally chosen by the Allies for their summer offensive of 1916 was known as the Somme Front and was named after both a river and a department of that name. The British sector lay in the extreme north-east corner of the department and part of their battle front actually lay in the next, the Pas de Calais. Although the British rear areas lay astride the River Somme, it was through the French sector that the river actually flowed from German-held territory on its way to the sea.
Most British people thought of the Somme mainly as a river, and the use of that name to describe the battle was a slight misnomer since no British troops were to fight on the River Somme all that summer. But, as the French were to take part in the battle and as it was mostly to be fought in the department of the Somme, the choice of that name was as good as any other. The whole region had formed part of the old French province of Picardy and between the front and the sea could be found the ancient battlefields of Crécy and Agincourt.
The capital of the Somme department was the cathedral city of Amiens but only two, much smaller, towns were to play any part in the coming battle. North-east of Amiens was Albert, a dull little town of 7,000 pre-war inhabitants, little different from many others in this part of France. Albert had one outstanding feature: a large basilica dedicated to the Virgin Mary had been built there and it had been hoped at one time that the town would become a pilgrimage centre to rival Lourdes; but this had not happened. The basilica had a tall tower on the top of which was a statue of the Virgin offering her infant Son to His Father in Heaven. This gilded statue, known as the ‘Golden Virgin’, stood high above the little town and could be seen for some distance from the surrounding countryside.
Further north-east still lay the smaller town of Bapaume, which had been the site of a battle during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–71. The importance of all these towns lay only in their position as road and rail centres. The most important of the roads was one built by the Romans which ran perfectly straight from Amiens through Albert and on to Bapaume.
If the towns were dull, the countryside was not. A pleasant, open, chalk downland was covered with rich soil which grew mainly wheat and sugar beet. The main feature of the countryside was the woods. Whether extensive, dense woods of mature trees covering many acres, or small copses, they were to be dominant factors in the coming battle. Between the woods and the numerous villages the countryside was particularly open. There were no hedges; the chalk soil meant that no ditches were needed and there were hardly any trees. In these places natural cover was non-existent.
The region was crossed by two rivers. The larger, the Somme, ran due west to the sea. The original river ran in lazy loops in a valley it had cut for itself in the chalk uplands; but parts had been deepened and straightened to make a canal, leaving the original course as a wide marshy area. The river was lined with willow trees and the riverside villages were in pleasant contrast to their plainer upland sisters. The second river, the much smaller Ancre, ran south-west through Albert, where it flowed through a tunnel underneath the basilica, and on into the Somme half-way between Albert and Amiens. The Ancre was really no more than a small stream but it had the same characteristics as the Somme, the wide marshy valley cut into the chalk and the tree-lined banks.
The region had seen the limit of the German advance in 1914 when it was a completely French sector. The town of Albert had been taken and briefly held by the Germans but the French managed to push them out. The front line settled down about two miles outside the town, with the Germans, as so often, holding the higher ground. Bapaume was nine miles behind the German line and Amiens sixteen miles behind the French. Amiens was safe from long-range artillery but Bapaume not quite. Albert became a front-line town and most of its people left.
On 15 January 1915, a German shell struck the tower of the basilica. The statue of the Golden Virgin nearly fell and was left leaning right out over the square below. French engineers secured the statue in this precarious position by a chain.
A legend arose among the French troops, and was later adopted by the British, that the war would not finish until the statue fell. From their positions around Albert, the Germans could see the damaged statue and, like the French and British, their soldiers too had their superstitions: ‘We said that, if we could shoot down the statue, we would win the war and our artillery tried hard to hit it.’ (Unteroffizier Karl Goll, 109th Reserve Regiment) But the Germans were not consistent in their legends, for an artillery observer in another division had a different version. ‘We could clearly see the tower of the cathedral in Albert, with the Virgin’s statue hanging over. Through our telescopes we could even see British observers at work there, their binoculars gleaming in the sun. But we refused to fire on the tower; we had a superstition that the nation which shot down the Virgin would be vanquished.’ (Feldwebel Felix Kircher, 26th Field Artillery Regiment)
As the B.E.F. expanded, it had taken over the Somme sectors from the French during late 1915 and early 1916.* They found many differences between the Somme and their old sectors in the north. Because of the chalk just under the surface soil, the positions of their new trenches could be seen quite easily from the white spoil thrown out on either side; from the air, the trenches could be seen stretching like white ribbons into the distance. The chalk made it an ideal sector for mining and the R.E. tunnellers took over many mines from the French. The galleries did not need pumping out or shoring up, and there was little danger of collapse.
But the main difference for the British soldiers was their inheritance from the French of a sector with a well-established ‘live and let live’ routine. ‘It was a “quiet” sector, i.e. no large attack had taken place for some time. Shells outside the trench system were hardly known. Neither side shelled the transport and shelling never began before 8 A.M., so that we could all have breakfast comfortably before settling down to the day’s work.’†
Coming from the damp, dangerous north, the British found dry trenches, pleasant open countryside and accommodating Germans. They were well satisfied with the quiet Somme.
Let us look, now, at the men on the other side of No Man’s Land on the Somme Front.
On the outbreak of war Kitchener’s German counterpart may have had problems but these did not include that which troubled Kitchener most, the shortage of trained soldiers. The German system of conscription, which was a century old, had called up every fit young man at the age of twenty and given him two years’ military service (one year only for students), a service under iron-hard discipline and training under dedicated professional officers and N.C.O.’S. After release the man was recalled for up to eight weeks’ training at least twice every five years until he reached the age of forty. As this system had been in operation for over a century, nearly every adult male in Germany was a trained soldier when war broke out in 1914. A carefully prepared mobilization plan had called these men into their Reserve units which, together with the Regulars, provided Germany with an army of over 4,000,000 ready for immediate action.
While the basis of the British Army was the battalion, that of the German was the regiment. This, unlike the British regiment, was an operational unit composed of three battalions, with three regiments normally making a division. The regiments were raised on a local basis and, like some British units, often had two names, their official title and an older, traditional one, sometimes going back to before the creation of the modern German state; so that the 119th Reserve Regiment, for instance, was also known as Queen Olga’s 1st Württemberg Regiment.
The German units were lower in strength than the British; the German battalions when at full strength had 750–800 men and, with only nine battalions, the total fighting strength of the division was just over half that of a British division. The lower number of infantrymen in the German units was compensated for by their higher fire-power. They were particularly strong in machine-guns and even British machine-gun officers acknowledged that, in 1916, the German army was well ahead of their own in the development of machine-gun tactics. The German machine-gunners were specially chosen and trained and could be relied upon to man their weapons to the last.
The German divisions on the Somme were a mixture of Regular and Reserve regiments, and the German policy of leaving a division in the same area indefinitely meant that most had been there since 1914, although some had fought in Russia in 1915. The same policy had spared them from the bitter fighting at Verdun, so that before the Somme battle opened they contained a high proportion of their original pre-war soldiers and certainly all their officers and N.C.O.’S were experienced men. They had occupied the same sectors for months and knew every feature of the ground intimately.
The British troops soon came to differentiate between the various German troops who held the trenches opposite them. The Prussians were recognized as the most aggressive of their opponents, the Silesians were reputed to be lazy and the Bavarians fairly easy-going. ‘Once, in 1915, some Bavarians shouted across to us “Hold your fire. The Prussians will be here next week!” There was no love lost between the Bavarians and the Prussians.’ (Maj. C. J. Low, D.S.O., 1st London Scottish)
The best liked of all the Germans, however, were the Saxons, who were found to be gentle soldiers who liked a quiet life. ‘Whenever we held the line against Saxon troops we had an easy time. Sometimes they would advertise their presence by showing a placard from their trenches with the word “SAXON” painted on it. They would allow a quiet time and hoped for the same in return. The Prussians were a hard lot, they were always at it.’ (Pte F. W. A. Turner, 11th Sherwood Foresters)
For their part, the German soldiers do not seem to have differentiated much between the various British troops. They were, however, amazed that the Scots should go into the trenches wearing kilts and, like many others before and since, were very curious as to what the Scotsman wore under his kilt. The Germans did not like the fierce Scots, calling them the ‘Ladies from Hell’.
Knowing the political situation in Ireland, the Germans tried hard, but with little success, to subvert Southern Irish troops. ‘During the Easter Rising in Dublin (1916), the Germans were shouting out with loud-hailers, “The English are murdering your people in Dublin. Come over to us.” We gave them a heavy raid that night at platoon strength with bombs and coshes.’ (Pte W. Durham, 2nd Royal Dublin Fusiliers)
At this stage of the war it was the more experienced French for whom the Germans had the most respect. ‘The first days when the English arrived on the Somme, we had a good time. Their artillery wasn’t in position and we could get out of our trenches and walk around. We were amazed at the great calm. We feared the French more than the English. The French were far more experienced and their artillery was accurate. But the English were more phlegmatic’ (Feldwebel Felix Kircher, 26th Field Artillery Regiment) The Germans particularly feared the French colonial troops who were reputed to be particularly averse to taking prisoners.
The German soldier may have disliked his enemies in general but this did not extend to the individual soldiers he occasionally saw or met. ‘Before the bombardment started and while everything was peaceful, I could see through my periscope a young Englishman playing his trumpet every evening. We used to wait for this hour but suddenly there was nothing to be heard and we all hoped that nothing had happened to him.’ (Feldwebel Karl Stumpf, 169th Regiment)
The ordinary British soldier was little different. ‘Another man and myself went down to the River Ancre to get water and found two Germans there doing the same thing. One of them spoke good English, he had been a miner in Durham. He said, “This war’s no bloody good.” We had our rifles; they didn’t. We could have taken them prisoner but we let them go.’ (Pte A. V. Wilson, West Belfast Volunteers)
The German soldiers may have been bored with duty on the Somme but they realized they were lucky not to be fighting at Verdun. As with all front-line troops they longed for the war to be over and to be back at home. Their thoughts were almost identical to those of the British soldiers; extracts from letters found on German dead reflect all the familiar sentiments. From a girl friend to her soldier: ‘Oh, sweetheart, we are still so young, life has so much to offer us yet. Let us hope that life will be better in the future than now. The two days we were together were real “rosy days”, weren’t they?’
From a grumbling wife: ‘You write that things are not too good for you. We are no better off. The people here have nothing to laugh about, for everything is so expensive.’
From Ernst, a soldier, to his girl: ‘The days are long here and lonely, I am hoping there will be an end soon. Dear, I shall marry you when I get my leave again, for sure; you must not mistrust me.’ Whatever troubles his girl had, Ernst could not help – he was killed while out on patrol near Thiepval in June, 1916, before he could post the letter.
Many of the Germans, having been in the trenches since 1914, had reached the conclusion that neither side could achieve complete victory unless it was prepared to sacrifice limitless numbers of men. One colonel talked to a captured German officer earlier in the war and asked him when the war would end. The German replied, ‘I do not know that, but I know where, and that is here. You cannot drive us back, nor can we drive you back.’ (Lieut-Col. G. R. V. Steward, D.S.O., 4th Tyneside Irish)
After the British had completed their takeover of the line on the Somme, the nature of the war there changed. The front-line men of both sides would have been happy to let this remain a quiet sector but the attitude of the British generals soon made itself felt; raids, sniping, artillery fire and all the other means whereby the offensive spirit could be imposed upon trench warfare became more commonplace Naturally the Germans knew that the British had arrived. They expected that the British would attack some time that summer and they suspected that it might be on the Somme. This suspicion, added to the increased British activity, set the Germans to improving their defences even further. Their positions in this area were already strong and they were to have another six months, uninterrupted, to complete the work before the battle started. The German was a very thorough and industrious soldier; supplied by his leaders with the necessary tools and materials, he proceeded to make his fortifications on the Somme as strong as any on the Western Front.
The Germans assiduously sought out the higher ground and, if their front line crossed a valley, they would pull back their foremost trench to follow the contours around the valley. Their lines were anything but straight; out they went to take advantage of spurs in No Man’s Land and then back again along the slopes overlooking the valleys.
The Germans put great faith in their machine-guns and protected them in very carefully sited and constructed posts, some made of concrete or steel plating. A well-trained machine-gunner could hit targets up to a mile away. There were approximately 1,000 of these machine-gun posts in the German positions that the British were to attack on 1 July.
Because they held higher ground and the region was naturally well drained, there was no limit to the depth to which defences could be dug. The Germans took advantage of this; their trenches were up to ten feet deep, but where they really profited was in their dug-out construction. These could be forty feet below ground, with several alternative entrances and even tunnels running right back to the next trench. Many were large enough to hold a platoon of men. The officers’ dug-outs were panelled in wood or had cloth hangings to cover the rough chalk walls, and were furnished with tables, chairs and even pianos taken from nearby villages. Their men lived in miniature underground barrack rooms with rows of bunk beds and special alcoves or cupboards for each man’s equipment. The whole system was lit by electricity, had forced air ventilation and was often supplied with piped water.
In 1915 the French had captured, intact, a perfect example of a typical German dug-out on the Touvent Farm sector, opposite Serre. When the sector was handed over to the British, this dug-out was used as a company H.Q. An officer of the South Antrim Volunteers, sent to this sector for his instruction in trench warfare, found the dug-out so unlike any other that he had seen, that he recorded careful notes of it in his diary. It was twenty feet underground, twenty yards long, seven feet wide and divided into separate sections for signallers, the officers’ mess and servants’ quarters. Cut into the wall of the officers’ mess were recesses for beds to accommodate six officers. There were five entrances. It would seem that the existence of this model of a German-type dug-out was not noted by anyone concerned in the planning of the coming attack.
The Germans believed in defence in depth and had built the usual support and reserve trenches. They had gone further than this, however, and built three, and in some cases four, complete trench systems making a total of anything up to twelve trenches to be crossed before an attacker could reach open country. Not all of these systems, or ‘Lines’ as they were known to the British, were as strong as the front line, but many were replicas of it, complete with dug-outs, machine-gun posts and thick belts of barbed wire.
The Germans had tied the villages that lay within their positions into this strong trench system. They liked to place their front line just forward of these villages and then to fortify the ruins. The cellars, covered by the rubble from collapsed houses, made perfect machine-gun posts and, as in the trench system, they were linked to each other and to nearby dug-outs by tunnels. These villages became miniature forts with defences proof against most shell fire and, as they did not have the distinctive chalk diggings to give away their positions, they were more than usually difficult to detect.
The sector about to be attacked by the British contained nine of these fortified villages on an eighteen-mile front, all either in or just behind the front line. Their names were to become part of the history of the British Army. Reading from south to north, they were: Montauban, Mametz, Fricourt, La Boisselle, Ovillers, Thiepval, Beaumont Hamel, Serre and Gommecourt.
Where there was a part of their defences not covered by a village, the Germans constructed even more miniature forts. These were in open country, on sites chosen for their dominance of surrounding ground, and became known as redoubts. They were well fortified positions built especially for all-round defence and containing more than the usual number of underground dug-outs and passages. These passages were so intricate that an attacking force gaining a foothold could be counter-attacked from an unexpected direction. A typical German redoubt has been described as covering the same area as Piccadilly Circus.
Where possible, each side made use of the woods as places of concealment or even as part of their front line if available. None of the woods lay in disputed territory – No Man’s Land was open ground along the whole of the sector.
That part of the front that was due to be the scene of the opening attack was shaped like a huge letter L. There was an oversize vertical arm running north and south for eleven miles and a horizontal one of five miles completing the L. Due to the irregularities of the trenches the actual length of the attack front was more like eighteen miles.
The junction with the French was at the extreme eastern end of the lower arm; the British troops manning these trenches, opposite the fortified village of Montauban, occupied the traditional place of honour on the right of the whole British Army in France. The line ran westwards passing two more German-held villages, Mametz and Fri-court, to the corner of the L, the ground always rising slightly to the German lines. There were no marked physical features on this part of the front that the Germans could make use of when building their defences, but behind their lines there were no less than eight woods, with the ground between them quite bare.
Turning the corner of the L the line ran northwards, culminating at the point where the River Ancre flowed from the German lines into the British. This five-mile sector, which was to be the centre of the British attack, is of great interest and contained three elements that were to be very important to the battle. First of these was the old Roman road running north-eastwards from British-held Albert, through the German lines at La Boisselle and on through Pozières to the town of Bapaume. Second was a ridge of German-held high ground dominating the whole area, with Pozières again demanding attention as the highest point of all.
Here were two reasons making this an important sector for the British. In a war where artillery observation was the key to all success, the capture of the high ground was essential. Again, if the British were to make any breakthrough into the open country behind the German trenches, the possession of the only good road in the area provided an attractive axis for the advance. So there was Pozières, a little village just five miles behind the front, the vital point the British must have and, knowing this, the Germans had covered this five miles with four complete trench systems.
Nor was this all, for a third factor here was a series of valleys and spurs running at right angles to the front. In every valley the German trenches ran right back keeping to the high ground and on every spur there was either a fortified village or a redoubt. An attacker faced a dreadful dilemma: he could make a short, but dangerous and uphill, direct assault on the spurs or a longer approach along the naked floors of the valleys, being overlooked on two sides and with an enemy trench waiting at the far end of the valley. Typical of these valleys were Sausage and Mash on either side of the main road, with La Boisselle village on the spur between them. No Man’s Land was 700 yards wide in Mash Valley and nearly as much in Sausage. Between them, where the spur pushed right up to the British trenches, the adversaries were only fifty yards apart.*
On the other side of the marshy Ancre valley the line continued mainly northwards past two more German village fortresses, Beaumont Hamel and Serre, then over a broad plateau before coming to a large bulge into the British line known as the Gommecourt Salient. The village itself formed the core of the salient but Gommecourt Park, part of the grounds of a château, covered the point of it. The German front-line trench actually lined the edge of the park. The German soldiers who manned the trench at the point of the salient had the distinction of being the most westerly members of a German Army that stretched all the way back to Russia in the east and Italy in the south. Before the battle there stood at this point a distinctive oak tree, undamaged by shell fire; it was known to the Germans as the Kaisereiche –the Kaiser’s Oak.
This, then, is a quick tour of the area where the battle was to be fought and where the Germans had gouged for themselves, in the pleasant land of the Somme, defences which John Masefield, writing in 1917, was to describe in the following terms:
They [the Germans] took up their lines when they were strong and our side weak and in no place in all the old Somme position is our line better sited than theirs, though in one or two places the sites are nearly equal. Almost in every part of this old front our men had to go uphill to attack.
... the enemy had the lookout posts, with the fine views over France and the sense of domination. Our men were down below with no view of anything but of stronghold after stronghold, just up above, being made stronger daily.*