2nd Lieutenant William Alexander Stanhope Forbes
1ST DUKE OF CORNWALL’S LIGHT INFANTRY
OTHER OBJECTIVES ON 3RD SEPTEMBER were to include, naturally, Guillemont and Falfemont Farm, the much fortified German strong point to the south-east of the village. If the Fourth Army could reach as far east as the ground running between Ginchy and Leuze Wood then it would be almost upon Combles, beyond which lay the original German third-line system. Haig was convinced that such preliminaries were well within the power of the troops and artillery available if matters were planned with the proper diligence and care. Rawlinson decided to bring in a new division to take the area south of Guillemont and among them, coming into the line and relieving the Bantam division, was the 1st Battalion of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry.
2nd Lieutenant ‘Alec’ Forbes. (Private collection)
From Newlyn, Penzance, Alec Forbes was the son of a recently widowed artist, both parents having been founder members of the Newlyn School. An architectural student before the onset of war, Alec had failed to prove himself fit enough to stand the rigours of military life, but by a convoluted route found his way through the Railway Transport Commission and into his local regiment. Twenty-three years old on the Somme, by August Alec found himself joining his battalion and among the last Brits on the battlefield, before the French assumed the line holding the ground east of Maurepas thanks in part to the effort of Florian Morel on his right. The sector was quiet, the ferocity of battle having temporarily died down in the area except for shelling on certain positions.
On 2nd September the Cornwalls moved up into the line ready for the following day’s battle as the preliminary bombardment raged. Before dawn on the 3rd, Alec had led his men to their assembly trenches and the battalion sat ready to attack Falfemont Farm and Leuze Wood to the south-west of Guillemont. It was a poisonous area. A few days earlier the French had secured Angle Wood to the south and the German second position to the south-east of Falfemont Farm, but fire from the farm still halted further progress. The German occupants, armed with machine guns, could wreak untold havoc on any attackers from this stronghold. For that reason, at 9am on 3rd September, troops to the right of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry attacked the farm before the onset of the main advance to try to silence it. This ‘roused the Hun’ and the Germans responded by bombarding the British line, including Alec and his companions in their assembly trenches. The enemy managed to hold firm as Rawlinson’s troops were forced to try to conquer the farm without accurate artillery support. Within an hour, the attack on Falfemont Farm had petered out. The consequences would be harsh for those waiting to carry on the advance, who would now face these machine guns, and for the French, who could not hope to capture Combles with this position held up by hostile troops.
In the meantime, Alec Forbes was making final preparations for zero hour. Instructions were issued and the artillery ploughed on, subjecting the Germans to ‘a methodical and effective bombardment’. At noon, the 12th Gloucesters on the right and the Cornwall men on the left attacked the spur south of Guillemont. The artillery pounded their first objective in preparation for their arrival as they moved off in four waves behind a competent, disciplined creeping barrage. Alec and his men kept close behind it and the leading two waves poured into their initial objective.
With British troops dropping into their defensive lines, the enemy began laying a brutal barrage down on the advancing Cornwalls, ‘but quite undeterred our men pressed on steadily to their objective’. In the face of galling machine-gun fire, the men showed excellent marksmanship as they picked off the culprits. However, the battalion was losing many officers, many of whom had only been with the Cornwalls for a matter of weeks. At this juncture, as the young subalterns led their platoons on, they fell, killed instantaneously or collapsing to the ground mortally wounded. Twenty-three-year-old Alec Forbes was among their number.
Without him, the advance continued and the line from Wedge Wood up to the south-eastern corner of Guillemont was captured. The Germans were showing far less resistance than had been expected, again in large part due to the Cornwalls’ marksmanship. Next to them, the Gloucesters suffered the brunt of the untamed machine-gun fire that poured out of Falfemont Farm, but the third objective fell. Consolidation began, along with the sorting of troops who had become helplessly muddled in the frenzy of the advance.
It had been a day of mixed fortunes for Rawlinson and his army. Another attack on Falfemont Farm in the evening failed, the German machine gunners inside still fiercely determined to stand their ground. To the north, Guillemont was finally captured, or at least the pitiful remains of it. This was the only outstanding success of 3rd September. Any gains made around High Wood or Ginchy were cancelled out when the Germans counter-attacked in force and pushed the British back again. Lieutenant Alec Forbes was laid to rest at Guillemont Road Cemetery, plot I.A.1.