Broodseinde and the Monash Emergence
1917
After leaving Bullecourt, Savige rested with his battalion at Warloy in France, and later Arques in Flanders. He enjoyed a surreal two months on the sidelines, playing sports such as Aussie Rules, tennis and cricket. He enjoyed concerts and the movies, and fraternised with the accommodating French and Belgian women, who wanted to see the diggers happy and revived for the coming battles.
By late September 1917 Savige’s 24th Battalion was back on the front line, preparing for a make-or-break conflict on a series of ridges outside the Flemish city of Ypres that was obsessing Haig.
At this time, General John Monash was emerging as a commander of uncommon brilliance. On 7 June his newly trained 3rd Division had won the first major victory by an Australian division in the war, at Messines Ridge on the high ground south of Ypres. Now he brought his victorious and confident division into the major push at the Broodseinde Ridge and Daisy Ridge sector of Passchendaele, the apex of Haig’s fanatical, even neurotic, drive. Haig wanted to hold the main ridge, which was of no particular tactical importance, before 1 million Germans returned from the Eastern Front, where the ongoing communist revolution meant it was only a matter of time before the Russians withdrew from the war.
By 27 September, the British were in a position to make a big attack, spearheaded by an Anzac force, on the main ridge, Broodseinde, which at this point had a gentle gradient. If taken, it would lead on to Passchendaele, which rose just 60 metres over several kilometres.
Savige and the rest of I Anzac Corps – consisting of 1st and 2nd Divisions – were moved to a launching place north of Polygon Wood (which was less than a kilometre from Broodseinde). Then II Anzac Corps – Monash’s 3rd Division and the New Zealand Division – were moved into line beside them.
‘This was a most thrilling moment, even more exciting than landing at Anzac [Cove],’ Savige wrote to Lilian. ‘You could sense the feeling right along the line with the four Divisions. It was first time the four Divisions had been lined up together. And Australian commanders, especially Monash, were going to have a big say in the [attack] plan.’1
The whole sense of the Anzac legend – and it was already that after only 30 months – bristled as men sent messages up and down the line. In one section it would be an exclusively antipodean enterprise. The energy generated by the common bond on Gallipoli was being reinvigorated. Savige later recalled that the soldiers, especially those like him who had recuperated from the horrors of Pozières and Bullecourt, were ready for action.
Late in the night of 3 October, he read his Bible, and for the umpteenth time absorbed Psalm 91, which told him that whatever he did, he would survive. It was now not a matter of whether he believed it or not, although he wanted to. It was more that the psalm message bolstered him. He prayed that he and everyone else would be spared, which was optimistic, given the casualty rates in every battle.
He had been given another dangerous mission: laying the jumping-off and direction tapes where the attacking Anzacs would form up. In heavy rain and squalls, he carried out this hazardous operation under strong artillery fire, and received several singe marks from hot shells. They stung, but he did not hesitate. He dressed his own minor wounds, snatched some sleep, and five hours later, he guided the diggers to their positions as the fire became heavier, heralding a German attack.
The arrowhead Anzac force was to go out at 6 a.m. on 4 October. At 5.20 a.m., white and yellow German flares, hazy in the drizzle, rose in sheaths along the Australian front. Then came the heavy Crump, Crump of another German barrage.
‘They sent out flares,’ Savige later recalled, ‘which was expected but in this case was a test of nerve as they exposed the waiting Anzacs.’
At 5.30 a.m., a heavy trench mortar barrage hammered the troops lying in shell holes along the white tapes that Savige had laid down so diligently on the start line. Savige stayed within view of the Anzacs, praying that no one would be struck. But one man in seven went down.
‘Those Anzacs remained steady and disciplined for that agonising half hour before the [British] barrage hit back.’2
The British shells fell in the slush and mud created by the night’s rain. They threw up smoke and steam, made eerie by flashes of artillery fire intermingled with the first shafts of dawn. But they also killed more enemy than expected.
General Ludendorff, who now had complete control over the German armed forces, had changed tactics in response to Haig’s step-by-step encroachment. Ludendorff had set up so-called ‘counter-attack’ divisions, which were now brought forward from the rear, where they had waited since dawn to support and thicken the front line.
At 6 a.m., the Anzacs scrambled from their foxholes, and straight into Germans of 212th Regiment coming out of their trenches just 25 metres away. The attack times of both sides, by pure chance, was identical. Had the Germans been given intelligence on the Anzac move, they would never have sent the regiment out into a head-on collision.
Savige, still at the front, saw Australian Lewis machine gunners opening fire and cutting down the enemy.
‘Our boys revelled in the direct contact in the open,’ he later noted, ‘and they were more than handy with their bayonets, causing the enemy to scatter.’3
The Anzacs pressed forward, heading for their targets. Monash’s 3rd Division had trouble with the German pillboxes, small fortresses that looked like oversized Ned Kelly helmets. But the diggers destroyed them and moved on to their target in the valley bounded by the Gravenstafel Ridge. At 9.15 a.m., after three hours of slogging and close fighting, 6000 of the division were digging in, their objective reached.
Monash, in his bunker and armed with his maps and aerial photos, was giving his commands with coolness and clarity. This was just the sort of warfare he thrived on. His engineering skills and his ‘big picture’ mentality were coming into play.
Unlike cavalrymen Haig and Gough, Monash had no time for the limited, dated ‘mobile’ policy. He saw horses as superfluous in this mechanised war. His planning was more than meticulous; it bordered on the obsessive-compulsive. His British superiors were surprised, even appalled, at the way he set directives right down to sections and even individuals.
But Monash was doing things his way. He ignored the views of others who were not concerned with such detail. Whether building bridges as an engineer, on his feet as a lawyer in the courtroom, or on the battlefield, he excelled, mainly because he had done far more homework than anyone else.
Monash hated the concept of making front-line diggers expendable, using them to ‘mop up’ after the weaponry had done the damage. He wanted to combine all the new technology – aerial reconnaissance and bombing, artillery and machine guns – to defeat the enemy. Again, this was a complete break from the recent past.
He followed the developments of weaponry on both the Allied and German sides. He kept in contact with the British tank regiments, frequently asking for information on how tank development was progressing after the failures of the early models. He was going to use them if they improved.
Monash was also winning support by standing up to the British commanders who had once directed him. Savige heard that at Broodseinde he had told British Lieutenant General Alexander Godley, commander of the New Zealand military since 1910, to move his staff up quickly to relieve Monash, who had been controlling events for 12 hours without a break. Savige and other officers who could see Monash’s strength and ability were encouraged by the knowledge that at least one Australian commander had the confidence, or temerity, to do this.
Godley had been in command of Australia’s 2nd Division – the true Anzac force – on Gallipoli. Godley had misled Monash about Turkish armed strength on Gallipoli, which had led to the slaughter of diggers pushed into unwinnable battles. But Godley and Monash were now almost on a par in terms of their command of divisions, and the Australian’s military genius was coming to the fore at every meeting and conference.
What the two commanders did not know was that not only was Monash the King’s favourite, but Haig felt the same way too. Monash did not push himself on them, but once they realised he was a special talent, even a military genius, they came to him. Instead of complaining to them, he handled them with finesse, knowing that if he did so his abilities would likely have a greater chance of being expressed. And Broodseinde was a classic expression of his capacities.
‘He ordered pinpoint use of artillery,’ Savige later noted, ‘and it crushed the enemy for two and a half hours. The [German] counter-attacks were limited.’
Some of his officers wanted to advance further into enemy territory but he ordered them to stay put. ‘He had plenty of experience of this folly from British commanders about leaving men stranded and sitting ducks for artillery,’ Savige would write. ‘He would have read all the reports on Pozières and Bullecourt.’4
Savige and all the front-line soldiers appreciated this caution.