Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) (1386 page)

From this time onwards this front was the scene of continuous aggressive action on the part of the Australians, which gradually nibbled away portions of the German line, until the day came for the grand advance of August 8. One of the most successful of these was on May 19, when the village of Ville-sur-Ancre was taken by a sudden assault with 20 machine-guns and 360 prisoners. A second very sharp fight, which may be mentioned here, though it is just beyond the scope of this volume, was on July 1 and following days in the Aveluy sector, near the Ancre, where the Twelfth and Eighteenth Divisions had three bouts of attack and counter-attack, in which the 37th and o4th Brigades were heavily engaged, the honours of the action being about equally divided between the British and the Germans.

IX. THE BATTLE OF THE LYS
April 9-12

The Flanders front — Great German onslaught — Disaster of the Portuguese — Splendid stand at Givenchy of the Fifty-fifth Division — Hard fight of the Fortieth Division — Loss of the Lys — Desperate resistance of the Fiftieth Division — Thirty-fourth Division is drawn into the Battle — Attack in the north upon the Ninth, Nineteenth, and Twenty-fifth Divisions — British retreat — General survey of the situation

NEARLY a hundred German divisions had been used against the British alone in the great Somme offensive which began on March 21 and ended in the first week of April. At this time the British forces in France, including Portuguese and Overseas divisions, numbered sixty in all. Of these no less than forty-four had been engaged in the great battle, and all of these were either still in the line, tied to the Amiens front, or else had been drawn out in a shattered and disorganised condition, having lost on an average not less than from 4000 to 5000 men each. It will be seen that there was only a very small margin over, and that if the Germans by a supreme effort had burst the line and reached the estuary of the Somme, it would have been possible to have caused a great military disaster. Especially would this have been the case if the northern flank of the British could have been driven in as well as the southern, for then the mutilated and shaken army would have been hurled in upon itself and would have found itself crowded down upon a sea-coast which would have given few facilities for embarkation. In the hopes of a debacle in the south the Germans had prepared out of their huge reserves a considerable force in the north which would have formed the second claw of their deadly embrace.

When the first claw missed its grip and could get no farther it was determined that the other should at least go forward and endeavour to reach the Channel ports. Although the Somme estuary had not been attained, none the less the Germans knew well that three-quarters of the whole British force had been engaged, and that most of it was not fit to take its place in a renewed battle. Therefore they had reason to hope for great results from their new offensive in Flanders, and they entered upon it with a good heart.

The omens were certainly propitious, but there were two factors which were in favour of the British — factors which could not yet have been adequately appreciated by the Germans. The first was the new unity of command under General Foch, a soldier famous for his writings in peace and for his deeds in war. This great leader, who had distinguished himself again and again since the first month of the war, when he had played a vital part in checking the German rush for Paris, was selected with the cordial consent of every one concerned, and especially of Sir Douglas Haig, as Generalissimo of the Allied forces. Therefore a common control and a common policy were ensured, so that the German chiefs could not turn their whole force upon half of the Allies with the assurance that the other half would find the operations outside their war map. Hence the British in Flanders, though they would have to fight their own battle for a week or two, could count confidently upon receiving help at the end of that time.

The second and more immediate factor, was that by a fine national effort a splendid stream of efficient drafts had been despatched from England during the great battle — young soldiers it is true, but full of spirit and most eager to meet the Germans and to emulate the great deeds of their elders. Their training had been short, but it had been intense and practical, with so excellent a result that one could but marvel at the old pre-war pundits who insisted that no soldier could be made under two years. These high-spirited lads flocked into the depleted battalions, which had often to be reformed from the beginning, with a skeleton framework of officers and N.C.O.’s upon which to build. It was of course impossible to assimilate these drafts in the few days at the disposal of the divisional generals, but at least they had adequate numbers once more, and they must be taught to be battle-worthy by being thrown into the battle, as Spartan fathers have taught their boys to swim.

One more sign of the times was the quick appreciation by the American authorities of the desperate nature of the crisis all along the Allied line. With magnanimous public spirit they at once gave directions that such American troops as were available and had not yet been formed into special American divisions should be placed under British or French command and fitted temporarily into their organisation. The few complete organised American divisions in France had been on the Alsace line, but some of these were now brought round to thicken the French army on the Oise. But most important of all was the effect upon the shipment of American troops, which had averaged about
50,000 a
month and now rose at a bound to 250,000, a number which was sustained or increased for several months in succession. This result was helped by the whole-hearted co-operation of the British mercantile marine, which was deflected from its other very pressing tasks, including the feeding of the country, in order to carry these troops, and actually handled about two-thirds of them whilst the British Navy helped to find the escorts. So efficiently were the transport arrangements carried out both by British and Americans, that when a million men had been conveyed they were still able to announce that the losses upon the voyage were practically nil. Even the lie-fed bemused German public began to realise in the face of this fact that their much boomed submarines were only one more of their colossal failures.

The German attack upon the British lines by the army of General von Quast in Flanders broke on the morning of April 9. There had been considerable shelling on the day before along the whole line, but as the hour approached this concentrated with most extreme violence on the nine-mile stretch from the village of Givenchy in the south to Fleurbaix, which is just south of Armentières in the north. This proved to be the area of the actual attack, and against this front some eight German divisions advanced about 6 o’clock of a misty morning. So shattering had been their bombardment and so active their wire-cutters, who were covered by the fog, that the advanced positions could hardly be said to exist, and they were able to storm their way at once into the main defences.

The point upon which this attack fell was held the by four divisions, all of which formed part of Horne’s First Army. The general distribution of the troops at that time was that the Second Army stretched from the junction with the Belgians near Houthulst Forest down to the Messines district where it joined the First Army. The First Army had weakened itself by an extension to the south, and Plumer’s force was about to extend also, and take over the Laventie district, when the storm suddenly burst upon the very point which was to be changed.

Two corps were involved in the attack, the Fifteenth (De Lisle) in the Armentières region, and the Eleventh (Haking) in the region of Givenchy. The latter had two divisions in the line, Jeudwine’s Fifty-fifth West Lancashire Territorials defending the village and adjacent lines, while the Portuguese Second Division (Da Costa) covered the sector upon their left. The depleted Fiftieth Division (Jackson) was in immediate reserve. On the left of the Portuguese was Ponsonby’s Fortieth Division which had lost five thousand men in the Somme battle only a fortnight before, and now found itself plunged once more into one of the fiercest engagements of the war, where it was exposed again to very heavy losses.

The main force of the German attack fell upon the Portuguese fine, and it was of such strength that no blame can be attached to inexperienced troops who gave way before so terrific a blow, which would have been formidable to any soldiers in the world. The division held the line from
2000 yards
south of Richebourg l’Avoué to the east of Picantin, a frontage of
9350 yards
, or more than half of the total front of the assault. The division had all three brigades in the line, and even so was very extended to meet a serious assault. The 3rd Brigade from the First Portuguese Division was in immediate support. The 5th Brigade was on the right, covering Le Touret, the 6th in the middle, and the 4th on the left, covering Laventie. Behind the whole position lay the curve of the River Lys, a sluggish stream which moves slowly through this desolate plain, the Golgotha where so many men have died, Indians, French, British, and German, since the first months of the war. In all that huge flat canalised space it was only at Givenchy that some small ridge showed above the dreary expanse.

The Portuguese had been in the line for some months, but had never experienced anything to approach the severity of the shattering bombardment which poured upon them from four in the morning. When an hour or two later the storming columns of the German infantry loomed through the thick curtain of mist, the survivors were in no condition to stand such an attack. All telephone and telegraph wires had been cut within the first half-hour, and it was impossible to direct any protective barrage. The artillery in the rear, both British and Portuguese, had been much weakened by a concentration of gas-shells extending as far as Merville, so that the infantry were left with insufficient support. The gunners stood to their work like men, and groups of them continued to fire their guns after the infantry had left them exposed. These brave men were killed or captured by the enemy, and their batteries were taken. In the rear the roads had been so shattered by the German fire that it was impossible to get a tractor or lorry up to the heavy guns, and there was no way of removing them. All observers agree that the crews or the heavy guns did excellently the Lys. well. The whole front had fallen in, however, and in spite of scattered groups of infantry who showed the traditional Portuguese courage — that courage which had caused the great Duke to place them amongst his best soldiers — the position was in the hands of the enemy. By mid-day they were at Le Touret upon the right, and the guns there were blown up and abandoned. About the same time they had reached Estaires upon the left and Bout Deville in the centre. Before evening the German line was four miles from its starting-point, and had reached the River Lawe, a small affluent of the Lys. From this time onwards the Fiftieth Division, coming up from the rear, had taken over the front, and the Portuguese were out of the battle. The Germans in their day’s work had taken 6000 prisoners and 100 guns, many of them in ruins. It should be mentioned that the Portuguese ordeal was the more severe, as breast-works had taken the place of trenches in this sector. All were agreed that General da Costa did what was possible. “He is a fine man, who does not know what fear is,” said a British officer who was with him on the day of the battle.

The caving in of the front of the line had a most serious effect upon the two British divisions, the Fifty-fifth and the Fortieth, who were respectively upon the right and the left of the Portuguese. Each was attacked in front, and each was turned upon the flank and rear. We shall first consider the case of the Fifty-fifth Division which defended the lines of Givenchy with an energy and success which makes this feat one of the outstanding incidents of the campaign. This fine division of West Lancashire Territorials, containing several battalions from Liverpool, had some scores to settle with the Germans, by whom they had been overrun in the surprise at Cambrai at the end of the last November. At Givenchy they had their glorious revenge.

The position of the Fifty-fifth Division was a strong one, extending for some thousands of yards from the hamlet of Le Plantin in the south to Cailloux in the north, with a section of the old British line a thousand yards in front, a deserted trench half full of water and festooned with rusty wire. There were outpost companies along the scattered line of ruined houses, and a few posts were thrown far out near the old trench. The village line consisted of a series of well-concealed breast-works and loopholed walls without any continuous trench, the whole so cunningly arranged that it was difficult to get the plan of it from in front. Each post or small fort had its own independent scheme of defence, with good enfilade fire, concrete emplacements, belts of wire, and deep ditches. Very early in the day the left flank of the position had been entirely exposed by the retirement of the Portuguese, so that during the whole long and desperate struggle the general formation of the division was in the shape of an L, the shorter arm being their proper front, and the longer one facing north and holding up the German attack from inside the old lines. The northern defensive flank does not seem to have been entirely improvised, as some precautions of this nature had already been taken. The new front extended from the hamlet of Loisne upon the stream of that name, through a second hamlet called Le Plant in, and so down to the canal. The first strain of the fighting fell chiefly upon the 165th Brigade (Boyd-Moss), consisting of three battalions of the famous King’s Liverpool Regiment. The 6th and 7th Battalions were in the line with the 5th in support at Gorre, but as the day wore on and the pressure increased, units from both the other brigades were drawn into the fight, so that all participated in the glory of the victory. By 8:30 the flank was entirely naked, and the Germans in small but audacious bodies, with a constant rattle of rifle and machine-gun fire, were pushing in between the outer posts of the British division, overwhelming and obliterating some of them by a concentrated fire of trench mortars. Some of these isolated garrisons held out in the most desperate fashion, and helped to take the pressure off the main village line. One particularly brilliant example was that of Captain Armstrong of the l/4th South Lancashires, who with A Company of that battalion defended a moated farm, literally to the death, having been warned that it was a key position. About mid-day the German attack was still creeping in, and had gained one important outpost called Princes’ Island. The 10th Liverpool Scots from the 166th Brigade, a battalion which has a great record for the war, had come up to thicken the line of defenders. Amid the crash and roar of constant shells, and a storm of bullets which beat like hail upon every wall and buzzed through every crevice, the stubborn infantry endured their losses with stoic patience, firing steadily through their shattered loopholes at any mark they could see. At 1 o’clock some audacious stormers had got so far forward on the left that they were in the rear of the Brigade Headquarters, and were only held there by spare men from the transport lines who chanced to be available. The attack was drifting down more and more from the new ground, so about this hour the 5th South Lancashires, also of the 166th Brigade, were sent across to the north of Loisne to hold the stream. Each flank was attempted in turn by the wily assailants, so that when the left proved impervious they charged in upon the right, and captured Windy Corner, which is near the canal upon that side, continuing their advance by attacking Le Plantin South from the rear and the flank, so that the defenders were in an impossible position. Having taken this point it seemed as if the Germans would roll up the whole long thin line from the end, and they actually did so, as far as Le Plantin North. Here the British rallied, and the survivors of the 6th and 7th King’s made a furious advance, pushed the Germans back, retook Le Plantin South, and captured a number of prisoners. The position was still serious, however, as the Germans held Windy Corner, and had penetrated between the British right and the canal, so as to get into the rear of the position. A great effort was called for, and the men responded like heroes. The 2/5th Lancashire Fusiliers from the 164th Brigade (Stockwell) had come up, and these fine soldiers, with the weary remains of the two King’s Liverpool battalions, rushed the whole German position, dragging them out from the pockets and ruins amid which they lurked. In this splendid counter-attack more than 700 prisoners were taken in all, with a number of machine-guns. At the end of it the British right was absolutely intact.