“And so, on an unforgettable morning, cold grey dawn of the 31st July, in battle dress, with bayonets fixed, buttons dulled and the polished helmets coated with a thin skin of mud to be less visible, 2nd Battalion The Prince of Wales Own West Yorkshire Regiment, under Captain John Philip Palmes, M.C., with perfect discipline and undimmed courage, passed from me in a few minutes through the quaking shell holes into the hurricane of the battle.”  From General Jack’s diary, 1917 as his men take part in Pilckem Ridge.

The equipment the men carried A bayonet wound described Officer casualties

Perhaps the hardest thing to understand, for those of us who have never had to go to war, is how all those thousands of ordinary men, like my grandfather, could rise up at the sound of the whistle and go over the top, knowing what the machine-guns would do to them.

Maybe an understanding of how they could do this comes out in the last two lines of Edmund Blunden’s poem, ‘Flanders Now’.

They died in splendour, these who claimed no spark Of glory save the light in a friend’s eye.

Liddle saw ‘mateship’ as important to the men individually, and vitally important to the fighting efficiency of the units; “It was of importance to a man that his conduct was sufficient to hold him his place in their (his mates) eyes and it was important in the close-knit fellowship of a group of men that none risked being weighed and found wanting. The social stigma of exclusion from what has been called ‘mateship’ was a burden none would contemplate lightly”.

Going ‘over the top’ at Arras.

Going over the top must have been frightening enough, but then they were told that they had to advance slowly and in line abreast.  On the battlefield tour, we stood at Lochnagar Crater in the pouring rain at 07.30 on July 1st, 2002, and heard a description of how the soldiers moved out of the trenches, and then slowly advanced. Moving. They had all been told how the barrage by the British artillery had cut the wire, it would be a breeze.

An extract of a couple of lines from 2nd Lt Gray’s poem “Neuve Chapelle”.

Then we looked to our rifles to see they were right, Shook ‘ands with old pals, case we fell in the fight; Wished each other good luck, an’ old “Smithy” - my pal- Ses, “I’ll meet yer to-night, Jack, when we’ve took Neuve Chapelle.”

2nd Lt Gray was killed, 4th March, 1917.

The following is a brief extract from Max Arthur’s book “Forgotten Voices of the Great War”, it is Captain Charles Carrington 1/5th Warwickshire talking of going over the top on 1st July, 1916; “...... And then there was nothing left but noise.  And after this we saw nothing and we knew nothing. And we lived in a world of noise, simply noise.”

From Liddle’s book; “We must now deal with the infantry, men trained from the Fourth Army Tactical Notes to advance in extended order with intervals of two to three paces between each man.  A hundred or so paces behind such a line would come the rest of successive waves of men likewise in extended order.  Protected by the overwhelming effect of the bombardment which at timed intervals lifted for their progress, the men would carry into the advance an abundance of heavy, awkwardly-shaped equipment.  They were not meant to hurry and they could not hurry, but there was to be, after all, no need for them to hurry!

Liddle describes the equipment to be carried by the men; “In addition to his rifle and equipment less pack, every man was to carry two extra bandoliers of small-arms ammunition, three Mills grenades, one iron ration and rations for the day of the assault.  He would have his haversack and waterproof cape, four empty sandbags, two gas helmets and a pair of Spicer goggles against tear gas. Unless he were a bomber or a signaller he would carry a pick or a shovel and then a full water bottle and a mess tin in his haversack. Some men would carry bombs in a special bucket or in a waistcoat carrier or they would have wire cutters.

A soldier’s ‘fighting order’ equipment would include his steel helmet and entrenching tool, a rolled ground sheet and water bottle.  Apart from items to be kept in his haversack, like spare socks and a shaving kit, he would also have a field dressing. Allowing for variations, each infantryman was to carry about 66 lbs of equipment. The Official Historian recognised that such a weight made it ‘difficult to get out of a trench, impossible to move much quicker than a slow walk, or to rise and lie down quickly.’  In the event, many thousands of men offering so bulky and slow-moving a target would crumple to the ground quickly enough but would not rise at all, never mind quickly.” There is an account of what the men carried into the attack on Hooge, 9 August, 1915.

Lines taken from Siegfried Sassoon’s poem “Attack”   The barrage roars and lifts. Then, clumsily bowed With bombs and guns and shovels and battle-gear, Men jostle and climb to meet the bristling fire. Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear, They leave their trenches, going over the top,

Private Easton (21st Northumberland Fusiliers) from Liddle’s book describes going over the top after the mines were blown on the 1st July, 1916; “The earth under their feet had shaken with the explosion of the mine, then the whistles had blown and they clambered out. ‘Keeping in line and extended order men began to fall one by one.  Our officer said we were alright, all the machine guns were firing over our heads. This was so until we passed our own front line and started to cross No-Man’s-Land, then the machine guns began the slaughter.  Men fell on every side screaming with the severity of their wounds. Those who were unwounded dare not attend to them, we must press on regardless. Hundreds lay on the German barbed wire which was not all destroyed and their bodies formed a bridge for others to pass over and into the German front line.’ 

In his book, ‘Great Push’, Patrick Macgill writes as a stretcher bearer, and they went over the top following the waves in front of them; “It was now grey day, hazy and moist, and the thick clouds of yellow pale smoke curled high in space and curtained the dawn off from the scene of war.  The word was passed along.  “London Irish lead on to assembly trench.”  The assembly trench was in front, and there the scaling ladders were placed against the parapet, ready steps to death, as someone remarked. I had a view of the men swarming up the ladders when I got there, their bayonets held in steady hands, and at a little distance off a football swinging by its whang from a bayonet standard.

The company were soon out in the open marching forward.  The enemy’s guns were busy, and the rifle and maxim bullets ripped the sandbags. The infantry fire was wild but of light intensity. The enemy could not see the attacking party. But, judging by the row, it was hard to think that men could weather the leaden storm in the open.

The big guns were not so vehement now, our artillery had no doubt played havoc with the hostile batteries......I went to the foot of a ladder and got hold of a rung.  A soldier in front was clambering across. Suddenly he dropped backwards and bore me to the ground; the bullet caught him in the forehead..................I flung my stretcher over the parapet, and , followed by my comrade stretcher-bearer, I clambered up the ladder and went over the top.”

In Max Arthur’s book there is a description by Lt. Burke of what it is like to take a bayonet wound; “When we got to the enemy trench we jumped in.  This German put his bayonet up and I caught it in the right shoulder, right across my back.  It just missed my spine but I was impaled on it.  My great fear was that he would press the trigger, which would have made a hell of a mess.  But my sergeant, who was nearby, saw this, came in close, shot the fellow and then hoisted me off the bayonet with the help of another man. I was on top of this dead German and it wasn’t pleasant. A bayonet wound hurts directly it goes in and the withdrawal is even more anguished than the putting in, because at least the putting in is instantaneous.  If you get hit by a bullet or bomb splinter it’s so hot that it cauterises the wound and you don’t feel anything for a minute or so.” I guess most of us will just have to believe him.  The idea of the bayonet is scary to most of us.

All along the line men must have been going forward into the machine-gun fire, while the men in front were being mown down. Sitting here, it seems incredible that ordinary men could do this, but each time there are conflicts, whether Goose Green on the Falklands or Iwo Jima in the Pacific, ordinary men do get up and do extraordinary things

From Edmund Blunden’s ‘Undertones of War’, Third Ypres; “Flaring lights, small ones, great ones, flew up and went spinning sideways in the cloud of night; one’s eyes seemed not quick enough; one heard nothing from one’s shouting neighbour, and only by the quality of the noise and flame did I know that the German shells crashing among the tree-stumps were big ones and practically on top of us.  We rose, scrambled ahead, found No Man’s Land a comparatively good surface, were amazed at the puny tags and rags of once multiplicative German wire, and blundered over the once feared trench behind them without seeing that it was a trench.”

One verse of a poem used in ‘Great Push’ by Patrick Macgill   Was it only yesterday Lusty comrades marched away? Now they’re covered up with clay. Hearty comrades these have been, But no more will they be seen Drinking wine at Nouex-les-Mines.

Officer casualties were very high.  Officers were easy targets for the enemy gunners because they were at the head of their men, often carrying a stick and armed only with their revolver, Liddle; “The responsibility and the price of regimental officer leadership in battle could hardly be better illustrated than in Private Easton’s own brigade, the 102nd. The four Commanding Officers were killed, two of the four second-in-command officers were killed, the others wounded; two of the four adjutants killed, the others wounded.”  As Liddle states, ‘We may remind ourselves that the doomed youth of the Somme were led not driven to their fate, leader and led sharing death and the poor compensation of a part in an immortal tragedy.”  General Jack, reflecting on officer casualties at Neuve Chapelle wrote in his diary; “I consider that in this and similar assaults our casualties in officers of irreplaceable value were far too high. Too many of them were sent charging across open, bullet-swept ground when experience and training were largely at a discount and little more was required than bulldog courage.  At the same time one must weigh the effect on the morale of the men if their officers do not share their dangers.  The mistake was in having so many valuable officers present with battalions at all....”

Another stanza from Patrick Macgill’s book. Seven supple lads and clean Sat down to drink one night, Sat down to drink at Nouex-les-Mines, Then went away to fight.   Seven supple lads and clean Are finished with the fight; But only three at Nouex-les-Mines Sit down to drink to-night.

Because of the high casualty rate for troops going ‘over the top’ it was necessary to keep back some from the attack who could then form the core of the new unit when it received new drafts of men.  General Jack records in his diary; “In accordance with Army Orders, the second-in-command, 2 captains, 5 subalterns, Regimental-Sergeant-Major, 2 Company-Sergeants-Major, and 10 others per company are to be left at the transport lines as a reserve in case of too serious casualties.  This practice has resulted from the crippling losses generally sustained in trench attacks on the Somme; losses which have left battalions with insufficient personnel to reorganise them on coming out of action....”

Reading the War Diary of the 9th Royal Rifle Corps and the preparation for the tank attacks at Flers, there was an interesting comment in the 42nd Inf. Brigade Op. Order No. 68 written on 24/8/16, which shows the expectation that some soldiers will not want to be in the vanguard of the attack; “Straggler posts will be established. Stragglers are to be collected and sent back to their battalions in a formed body.  The names and units of all stragglers will be noted, and a special mark made against those without rifles or equipment. Battalions will place guards at the end of communication trenches in the area to turn back any stragglers.”