Читать книгу The Australian Victories in France in 1918 - John Sir Monash - Страница 9

Table of Contents

The early days of the year 1918 found the Australian Corps consisting of the First, Second, Third and Fifth Australian Divisions, while the Fourth had been transferred far south to co-operate in the later developments of the Cambrai fighting. The Corps was then holding, defensively, a sector of the line in Flanders, which had in the previous years of the war become, at various times, familiar to all our Divisions, and which extended from the river Lys at Armentières, northwards, as far as to include the southern half of the Messines Ridge.

It was, indeed, that very stretch of country, which in June, 1917, had been captured by our Third Division, in co-operation with the New Zealanders. Opposite its centre lay the town of Warneton, still in the hands of the enemy. Excepting for a small area of undulating ground in the extreme north of the Corps sector, the country was a forbidding expanse of devastation, flat and woebegone, with long stretches of the front line submerged waist deep after every freshet in the river Lys, and with the greater part of our trench system like nothing but a series of canals of liquid mud.

This unsavoury region formed, however, the most obvious line of approach for an enemy who, debouching from the direction of Warneton, aimed at the high land between us and the Channel Ports; so that, tactically useless as were these mud flats, it was imperative that they should be strongly defended, in order to protect from capture the important heights of Messines, Kemmel, Hill 63, Mont des Cats and Cassel.

During the fighting of the preceding summer and early autumn, which gave the Australian troops possession of this territory, the locality was dry, practicable for movement, and reasonably comfortable for the front line troops. Now it was water-logged, often ice-bound, bleak and inhospitable. The precious months of dry weather, between August and October, 1917, had been allowed to pass without any comprehensive attempt on the part of those Divisions which had relieved the Second Anzac Corps after its capture of this ground to perfect the defences of the newly-conquered territory. At any rate, there was little to show for any work that may have been attempted.

Now, in the very depth of the worst season of the year, the demand came to prepare the region for defence and resistance to the last; for the threat of a great German offensive in the opening of the 1918 campaigning season was already beginning to take shape. It was the Australian Corps which was called upon to answer that demand. There followed week after week of heart-breaking labour, much of it necessarily by night, in draining the flat land, in erecting acre upon acre of wire entanglements, in constructing hundreds of strong points, and concrete machine gun emplacements. Trenches had to be dug, although the sides collapsed unless immediately revetted with fascines or sheet iron; roads had to be repaired, and vain attempts were made to provide the trench garrisons with dry and bearable underground living quarters.

The monotony of all this labour, which long after—when the Australians had disappeared from the scene and were again fighting on the Somme—proved to have been undertaken all in vain, was relieved only by an occasional raid, undertaken by one or other of our front line Divisions, for the purpose of molesting the enemy and gathering information. The Corps front was held by two Divisions in line, one in support, and one resting in a back area; the rotation of trench duty gave each Division about six weeks in the line.

My own command at that juncture still comprised the Third Australian Division, which I had organized and trained in England, eighteen months before. Although this Division had never been on the Somme, it had seen a great deal of fighting in Flanders during 1917. During this period, therefore, and until the outbreak of the storm in the last days of March, 1918, my interest centred chiefly in the doings of the Third Division, although for a very short period I had the honour of commanding the Corps during the temporary absence of Sir William Birdwood.

The information at our disposal led to the inevitable conclusion that, during January and February, the enemy was busy in transferring a great mass of military resources from the Russian to the Western Front. No one capable of reading the signs entertained the smallest doubt that he contemplated taking the offensive, in the spring, on a large scale. The only questions were, at what point would he strike? and what tactics would he employ?

Every responsible Australian Commander, accordingly, during those months, applied himself diligently to these problems, formulated his doctrines of obstinate defence, and of the defensive offensive; and saw to it that his troops received such precognition in these matters as was possible at such a time and in such an environment. The principles of defence in successive zones, of the rapid development of Infantry and Artillery fire power, of the correct distribution of machine guns, of rearguard tactics, and questions of the best equipment for long marches and rapid movement were debated and resolved upon, in both official and unofficial conferences of officers.

All this discussion bore good fruit. Among the possible rôles which the Australian Divisions might be called upon to fill, when the great issue was joined, were those which involved these very matters. And so the event proved; and the Australians then approached their new and unfamiliar tasks, not wholly unprepared by training and study for the difficulties involved.

It was on March 8th that the Third Division bade a last but by no means a regretful farewell to the mud of Flanders and Belgium—regions which it had inhabited almost continuously for the preceding sixteen months. The Division moved back for a well-earned rest, to a pleasant countryside at Nielles-lez-Blequin, not far from Boulogne. It was lying there, enjoying the first signs of dawning spring when, on March 21st, the curtain was rung up for a great drama, in which the Australian troops were destined to play no subordinate part.

There followed many weeks of crowded and strenuous days, and the story of this time must, of necessity, assume the form of a personal narrative. Events followed one upon the other so rapidly, and the centre of interest changed so quickly from place to place and from hour to hour, that no recital except that of the future historian writing with a wealth of collected material at his disposal, could take upon itself any other guise than that of a record of individual experience.

The Germans attacked the front of the Fifth British Army on March 21st. The information which was at the disposal of our High Command was not of such a nature that the promulgation of it would have been calculated to elevate the spirits of the Army; consequently Divisions situated as we were, in Reserve, and, for the time being, entirely out of the picture, had to depend for our news partly upon rumour, which was always unreliable, and partly upon severely censored communiqués, framed so as to allay public anxiety. Nothing definite emerged from such sources, except that things were going ill and that fighting was taking place on ground far behind what had been our front line near St. Quentin. This hint was enough to justify the expectation that my Division would not be left for long unemployed; and on the same day, March 21st, instructions were issued for all units to prepare for a move, to dump unessential baggage, to fill up all mobile supplies, and to stand by in readiness to march at a few hours' notice.

Orders came to move on March 22nd. The Division was to move east, that is, back into Flanders, and not south to the Somme Valley, as all had hoped. The prescribed move duly started, but by March 24th had been arrested, for orders had come to cancel the move and await fresh orders. Advanced parties, for billeting duty, were to proceed next morning by motor lorry to Doullens, and there await orders. Later came detailed instructions that the Division was to be transferred from the Australian Corps to the Tenth Corps, which latter was to be G.H.Q. Reserve, and that the whole Division was to be moved the next night to the Doullens[3] area, the dismounted troops by rail, and the Artillery and other mounted units by route-march.

It was evident that the plans of the High Command were the subject of rapid changes, in sympathy, probably, with fluctuations in the situation, which were not ascertainable by me. There followed a night and day of strenuous activity, during which arrangements were completed to entrain the three Infantry Brigades and the Pioneers at three different railway stations, to start off the whole of the mounted units on their long march by road, and to ensure that all fighting troops were properly equipped with munitions, food and water, all ready for immediate employment. It was well that my Staff responded capably to the heavy demands made upon them, and that all this preparatory work was efficiently done.

The entrainments commenced at midnight on the 25th and continued all night. At break of day on the 26th, after assuring myself that everyone was correctly on the move, I proceeded south by motor-car, in the endeavour to find the Tenth Corps Headquarters, and to report to them for orders. My fruitless search of that forenoon revealed to me the first glimpse of the true reason for that far-reaching disorganization and confusion which confronted me during the next twenty-four hours.

Over three years of trench warfare had accustomed the whole Army to fixed locations for all Headquarters, and to settled routes and lines of inter-communication. The powerful German onslaught and the recoil of a broad section of our fighting front had suddenly disturbed the whole of this complex organization. The Headquarters of Brigades, Divisions, and even Corps, ceased to have fixed locations where they could be found, or assured lines of telegraph or telephone communications, by which they could be reached. Everything was in a state of flux, and the process of getting into personal contact with each other suddenly took responsible leaders hours where it had previously taken minutes.

In its broad result, this disorganization affected most seriously the retiring troops, by depriving them of the advantages of rapidly disseminated orders for properly co-ordinated action by a large number of Corps and Divisions withdrawing side by side. The consequence was, I am convinced, that the recoil—which may have been inevitable at first by reason of the intensity of the German attack, and because the defensive organization of the Fifth Army had been unduly attenuated—was allowed to extend over a much greater distance, and to continue for longer, in point of time, than ought to have been the case.

Between Albert and St. Quentin there were in existence several lines of defence, which by reason of their topographical features, or the existence of trenches and entanglements, were eminently suitable for making a stand. Yet no stand was made, at any rate on a broad front, because there was no co-ordination in the spasmodic attempts to do so. I subsequently learned of more than one instance where Brigades of Infantry or of Artillery found themselves perfectly well able to hold on, but were compelled to a continued retirement by the melting away of the units on their flanks.

I sought the Tenth Corps at Hautcloque, where they were to be. They were not there. I proceeded to Frevent, where they were said to have been the night before. They had already left. In despair, I proceeded to Doullens, resolved at least to ensure the orderly detrainment of my Division and their quartering for the following night, and there to await further orders. A despatch rider was sent off to G.H.Q. to report my whereabouts, and the fact that I was without orders.

Arriving at Doullens, I tumbled into a scene of indescribable confusion. The population were preparing to evacuate the town en masse, and an exhausted and hungry soldiery was pouring into the town from the east and south-east, with excited tales that the German cavalry was on their heels. Influenced by the persistency of these reports, I determined to make, immediately, dispositions to cover the detrainment of my troops, so that some show of resistance could be made.

In the midst of all this stress and anxiety, I was favoured by a run of good luck. Within half an hour of my reaching Doullens, the first of my railway trains arrived, bringing Brigadier-General Rosenthal and a battalion of the 9th Brigade, sufficient troops, at any rate, to furnish a strong outpost line for covering the eastern approaches of Doullens, while the remainder of the Brigade should arrive. These arrangements made, I motored to Mondicourt, where almost immediately afterwards a train arrived, bringing Brigadier-General McNicoll and the first battalion of the 10th Brigade.

There also arrived, almost simultaneously, that rumour with the ridiculous dénouement, that German armoured motor-cars were approaching along the road from Albert and were within three miles of that point. Those Armoured Cars proved ultimately to be a train of French agricultural implements which a wheezy and rumbling traction engine was doing its best to salve. McNicoll likewise received orders to put out a line of outposts to cover Mondicourt railway station.

At this point, too, endless streams of dust-begrimed soldiers were straggling westwards. McNicoll collected many hundreds of them, and did not omit, by very direct methods, to prevail upon all of them who had not yet lost their rifles and essential equipment, to call a halt and join his own troops in the defensive dispositions which he was making.

My next business was to select a suitable central point at which to establish my Headquarters, preferably where I could find a still intact telephone service. Again by good luck I found a most suitable location in a small château at Couturelle, whose owner hospitably provided a much needed meal.

It was there, soon after my arrival, that I learned of the presence in the neighbourhood of Major-General Maclagan; this news, implying as it did the presence also of some at least of the Fourth Australian Division, was a gleam of sunshine in an otherwise gloomy prospect. Report said that he was at Basseux, and thither I proceeded, in order to arrange, by personal conference with him, some plan for co-ordinated action.

Basseux rests on the main road from Doullens to Arras, which lies roughly parallel to the line along which, as subsequently transpired, the vanguard of the enemy was endeavouring to advance at that part of the front. That main road I found packed, for the whole of the length which I had to traverse, with a steadily retreating collection of heterogeneous units, service vehicles and guns of all imaginable types and sizes, intermingled with hundreds of civilian refugees, and farm waggons, carts, trollies and barrows packed high with pathetic loads of household effects. The retrograde movement was orderly and methodical enough, and there was nothing in the nature of a rout, but it was nevertheless a determined movement to the rear which evidenced nothing but a desire to keep moving.

I found Maclagan at about four o'clock. His Division had already been on the move, by bus and route march, for three days without rest. The position to the east and south-east of him was obscure, and he also had posted a line of outposts in the supposed direction of the enemy, and was arranging to despatch his 4th Brigade to Hebuterne (which the enemy was reported to have entered), with orders to recapture that town. That the enemy was not very far away became evident from the fact that the vicinity of the hut in which we were conferring presently came under desultory long-range shell-fire.

There was nothing to be done except to arrange jointly to keep up an effective and as far as possible continuous line of outposts towards the south-east, and to await developments. Having made these arrangements I returned along the same crowded road, which was now also being leisurely shelled by the enemy, to Couturelle. There I found that the principal officers of my Staff had arrived.

Thereupon orders were issued for the concentration, after detrainment, of my three Brigades in the following areas, each with due outpost precautions, viz.: 9th Brigade at Pas, 10th Brigade at Authie, and 11th Brigade at Couin. My Artillery was still distant a full day's march by road.

About nine o'clock that evening I received, by telephone, my first order from the Tenth Corps. It ran as follows: "A Staff Officer has left some time ago on his way to you, carrying instructions for you to report personally at once to Corbie for orders. We have since heard that you are to go to Montigny instead."

It was nearly an hour before the Staff Officer arrived, having been delayed on the road by congestion of traffic. The instructions he carried transferred my Division from the Tenth to the Seventh Corps, to whom I was to report personally, without delay, at Corbie. It was evident from the later telephone message that the Seventh Corps had been compelled to withdraw from Corbie, and was proceeding to Montigny.

This was the second stroke of good luck that day; for if the telephone message above recited had not overtaken the Staff Officer, it is quite probable that I should have already started for a wrong destination, and have had to waste valuable time at a most critical juncture. Had I failed to find General Congreve, the Seventh Corps Commander, that same night, it is almost certain that my Division would have arrived on the Somme too late to prevent the capture of Amiens.

Setting out from Couturelle shortly after ten o'clock that night, accompanied by four of my Staff and two despatch-riders, with two motor-cars and two motor cycles, in black darkness, on unfamiliar roads congested with refugee traffic, I did not reach Montigny until after midnight. I found General Congreve in the corner of a bare salon of stately proportions, in a deserted château by the roadside, seated with his Chief of Staff at a small table, and examining a map by the flickering light of a candle. The rest of the château was in darkness, but heaps of hastily dumped Staff baggage impeded all the corridors.

General Congreve was brief and to the point. What he said amounted to this: "At four o'clock to-day my Corps was holding a line from Albert to Bray, when the line gave way. The enemy is now pushing westwards and if not stopped to-morrow will certainly secure all the heights overlooking Amiens. What you must try and do is to get your Division deployed across his path. The valleys of the Ancre and the Somme offer good points for your flanks to rest upon. You must, of course, get as far east as you can, but I know of a good line of old trenches, which I believe are still in good condition, running from Méricourt-l'Abbé towards Sailly-le-Sec. Occupy them, if you can't get further east."

At that juncture General Maclagan arrived and received similar crisp orders to bring his Division into a position of support on the high land in the bend of the Ancre to the west of Albert. I gleaned further that the Seventh Corps was now the south flank Corps of the Third Army, and that as the Fifth Army, south of the Somme, had practically melted away, while the French were retiring south-westerly and leaving an hourly increasing gap between their north flank and the Somme, General Byng had resolved to make every effort not only to maintain the flank of his Third Army on the Somme, but also to prevent it being turned from the south, while the Commander-in-Chief was taking other measures to attempt next day to fill the gap above alluded to.

It was already 1 a.m. of March 27th, and I had left my Division twenty miles away. Everything depended now on quick decision and faultless executive action. It was fortunate that a telephone line to G.H.Q. had been found in good working order, and that the services of three large motor bus convoys could be arranged for to proceed at once to the Doullens area, in order to transport my Infantry during the night to the place appointed. I worked with my Staff till nearly break of day, considering and settling all detailed arrangements, and we then separated in various directions to our appointed tasks.

I proceeded myself a little after dawn, with one Staff Officer, to Franvillers, which had been decided upon as the point for leaving the buses. There was yet no sign of any Australian troops, and the village was being hastily evacuated by the terror-stricken inhabitants. But there were ample and visible signs, far away on the high plateau beyond the Ancre Valley, that the German line of skirmishers was already on the move, slowly driving back the few troops of British Cavalry who were, most valiantly, trying to delay their advance.

The next hour was one of intense suspense and expectancy; but my anxiety was relieved when there rolled into the village from the north, a motor bus convoy of thirty vehicles, crowded with good staunch Australian Infantry of the 11th Brigade, and bringing also Brigadier-General Cannan and some of his Brigade Staff. It was not the first time in the war that the London motor-bus—after abandoning the population of the great metropolis to enforced pedestrianism—had helped to save a most critical situation.

Almost immediately after, there arrived McNicoll, with a battalion of his 10th Brigade. Hour after hour a steady stream of omnibus convoys came in. No time was lost in assembling the troops, and in directing the Infantry—company after company—down the steep, winding road to the little village of Heilly, and thence across the Ancre, to deploy on the selected line of defence indicated in the orders above recited.

The spectacle of that Infantry will be ever memorable to me, as one of the most inspiring sights of the whole war. Here was the Third Division—the "new chum" Division, which, in spite of its great successes in Belgium and Flanders, had never been able to boast, like its sister Divisions, that it had been "down on the Somme"—come into its own at last, and called upon to prove its mettle. And then there was the thought that they were going to measure themselves, man to man, against an enemy who, skulking behind his field works, had for so long pounded them to pieces in their trenches, poisoned them with gas, and bombed them as they slept in their billets.

That, at any rate, was the point of view of the private soldier, and no one who saw those battalions, in spite of the fatigue of two sleepless nights, marching on that crisp, clear spring morning, with head erect and the swing and precision of a Royal review parade, could doubt that not a man of them would flinch from any assault that was likely to fall upon them. Nor was there a man who did not fully grasp that upon him and his comrades was about to fall the whole responsibility of frustrating the German attempt to capture Amiens and separate the Allied Armies.

By midday, the situation was already well in hand, and by four o'clock I was able to report to the Seventh Corps that no less than six Battalions were already deployed, astride of the triangle formed by the Ancre and the Somme, on the line Méricourt—Sailly-le-Sec, distributed in a series of "localities" defended by rifles and Lewis guns. As yet no Artillery was available.

The 11th Brigade occupied this line to the south of the main road from Corbie to Bray, the 10th Brigade continued it to the north of the road, while the 9th Brigade was leaving the buses and assembling in the neighbourhood of Heilly.

So far, the pressure of the enemy upon my front had not been serious. It was obvious that he had, as yet, very little Artillery at his disposal. We had not, however, found our front totally devoid of defenders. During the forenoon, a few troops of our cavalry, and a force under Brigadier-General Cummings, comprising about 1,500 mixed infantry, the remnants of a large number of different units of the Third Army, were slowly withdrawing under pressure from the advancing German patrols. These valiant "die-hards," deserving of the greatest praise in comparison with the many thousands of their comrades who had withdrawn from any further attempt to stem the onflowing tide, were now ordered to retire through my outpost line, thus leaving the Australian Infantry at last face to face with the enemy.

These dispositions were completed only in the nick of time. All that afternoon the enemy appeared over the sky-line in front of us, both in lines of skirmishers and in numerous small patrols, endeavouring to work forward in the folds of the ground, and to sneak towards us in the gullies. But all of them were received with well directed rifle fire and the enemy suffered many losses. Towards nightfall the attempts to continue his advance died away.

That was, literally, the end of the great German advance in this part of the field, and although, as will be told later, the enemy renewed the attempt on several subsequent occasions to reach Amiens, he gained not a single inch of ground, but, on the contrary, was compelled in front of us to undertake a slow but steady retrograde movement.

Our reconnoitring patrols discovered, however, that the enemy already had possession of the village of Sailly-Laurette, and of Marett and Treux Woods, but that he was not yet in great strength on the crest of the plateau. Orders were issued to perfect the organization of our defensive line, put out wire entanglements, dig-in machine guns, and rest the troops in relays during the coming night, but not to attempt any forward movement until the next night.

My Artillery and other mounted units were still half a day's march away; but Brigadier-General Grimwade, their Commander, had been instructed to push on in advance, with the whole of the Commanders of his Brigades and Batteries. They arrived on the scene in sufficient time to enable the whole situation to be examined in the daylight, and for detailed action to be decided upon. The Artillery kept coming in during the whole of the following night, and although men and horses were almost exhausted after two days of forced marching, their spirits were never higher. Next morning found the guns already in action, and engaging all bodies of the enemy who dared to expose themselves to view.

I must now turn to the Fourth Australian Division. They had been less fortunate in several respects. Maclagan was directed to leave behind his 4th Brigade, which had on the 26th speedily become committed to important operations under the 62nd Division in front of Hebuterne, from which village this Brigade had driven the enemy. This left him with only two Brigades, the 12th and 13th. He was faced with the obligation of bringing his already over-tired infantry, by route march, down from the Basseux area, to the high ground west and south-west of Albert. That town had fallen and the situation there had, by the 26th, also become very critical.

This march was, however, accomplished in strict accordance with orders, and was a remarkable feat of endurance by the troops of the 12th and 13th Brigades. There can be no doubt, however, that the effort was more than justified, for the mere presence, in a position of readiness, of these two Australian Brigades, did much to steady the situation opposite Albert, by heartening the line troops and stimulating their Commanders to hang on for a little longer. It was this last effort which brought to a standstill the German advance north of the Ancre, as the entry of the Third Division had stopped that to the south of that river.

After his two Brigades had had only four hours' rest, Maclagan took over, with them, the control of the fighting front, opposite Dernancourt and Albert, which the Seventh Corps had allotted to him.

Thus, by the night of the 27th, as the result of the rapid movements which I have described and the ready response of the troops, there was already in position the nucleus of a stout defence by five Australian Brigades, stretching almost continuously from Hebuterne to the Somme, while another Australian Brigade, the 9th, remained still uncommitted.

But the situation south of the Somme gave cause for the gravest anxiety. The north flank of the French was hourly retiring in a south-westerly direction, and the ever widening gap was filled only by a scratch force of odd units supported and assisted by a few elements of the First Cavalry Division. The right flank of our Third Army, therefore, lay exposed to the danger of being turned, if the enemy should succeed in pressing his advantage as far west as Corbie, and in crossing the river at or west of that town.

It was for this reason that, after a conference with General Congreve, late in the day, I decided to deploy my 9th Brigade along the Somme from Sailly-le-Sec westward as far as Aubigny,[4]—far too extended a front for one Brigade, but at least an effort to dispute the passage by the enemy of the existing bridges and lock-gates over the Somme.

The two following days were full of toil and hard travelling in establishing touch with Divisional Headquarters to the north and south of me, in arranging for co-ordinated action with them, and in gleaning all possible information as to the situation, and as to the number and condition of other troops available in an emergency.

It was an especial pleasure for the Australian troops to find themselves fighting in these days in close association with famous British Cavalry Regiments, and that these feelings were reciprocated may be gathered from the following letter from Major-General Mullens, who commanded the First Cavalry Division, which was devoting its energies to covering the gap between the Somme and the French flank:

"My dear Monash,

"I was hoping to have come to see you, when the battle allowed, to thank you, your Artillery Commander, and your Brigadiers who were alongside of my Division, for your most valuable and encouraging support and assistance, especially on the 30th March, when we had a hard fight to keep the Bosche out of our position. I was very much struck by the courtesy of yourself and your officers in coming to see me personally, and for your own and their keen desire to do everything in their power to help. As you know, we had a curious collection of units to deal with, and it was a very real relief to know that I had your stout-hearted fellows on my left flank and that all worry was therefore eliminated as to the safety of my flanks. Your order for the placing of your heavy guns and batteries so as to cover my front was of very real assistance, and incidentally they killed a lot of Huns, and what they did was much appreciated by us all. Will you convey to all concerned my own appreciation, and that of all ranks of the 1st Cavalry Division. It was a pleasure and an honour to be fighting alongside troops who displayed such magnificent moral. I only hope we may have the chance of co-operating with you again, and under more favourable circumstances.

"Yours sincerely,

(Sgnd.) "R. L. Mullens."

On the night of March 29th I advanced my line, pivotting on my right, until my left rested on the Ancre east of Buire, an extreme advance of over 2,000 yards, meeting some opposition and taking a few prisoners. This deprived the enemy of over a mile of valuable vantage ground on the crest of the plateau along which ran the main road from Corbie to Bray.

Map A.

By that time it was apparent that the enemy's Artillery resources were hourly accumulating, and on the next afternoon he delivered a determined attack along my whole front, employing two Divisions. The attack was completely repelled, with an estimated loss to the enemy of at least 3,000 killed. My Artillery were firing over open sights and had never in their previous experience had such tempting targets.

On the previous day, however, the situation between the Somme and Villers-Bretonneux, and still further to the south, had become desperate; and much to my discomfiture I was ordered to hand over my 9th Brigade (Rosenthal) for duty with the 61st Division, in order to reinforce that dissolving sector. My importunity as to the necessity for maintaining the defence of my river flank, however, led the Seventh Corps Commander to let me have, in exchange, the 15th Brigade (Elliott), which was the first Brigade of the Fifth Australian Division to arrive from Flanders on the present scene of operations. This interchange of Brigades was completed by the 30th.

That day was further marked by a concentrated bombardment of the village of Franvillers, in which I had established my Headquarters. Although no serious loss was suffered, the responsible work of my Staff was disturbed. On reporting the occurrence to General Congreve, he insisted upon my moving my Headquarters back to St. Gratien, which move was completed the next day.

On April 4th the enemy attacked, in force, south of the Somme, and the village of Hamel was lost to us by the rout of the remnants of a very exhausted British Division which had been sent in the night before to defend it. This success gave the enemy a footing upon a portion of Hill 104, and brought him to the eastern outskirts of Villers-Bretonneux. Three months later it cost the Australian Corps a concentrated effort to compel him to surrender these advantages.

One last and final attempt to break through the Australian phalanx north of the Somme was made by the enemy on April 5th. The full weight of this blow fell chiefly upon the gallant Fourth Australian Division. The battle of Dernancourt will live long in the annals of military history as an example of dogged and successful defence. The whole day long the enemy expended Division after Division in the vain endeavour to compel two weak Australian Brigades to loosen their hold on the important high ground lying west of Albert. He well knew that the capture by him of these heights involved the inevitable withdrawal of the Third Australian Division also, and that thereby the path to Amiens would again lie open.

The great German blow against the important railway centre of Amiens had been parried, and from this time onwards interest in this sphere of operations rapidly waned. It blazed up again for a few hours only when, three weeks later, the enemy made his final attempt to reach his goal, on this occasion by way of Villers-Bretonneux. North of the Somme, his activity quickly died down, and the attitude of both combatants gradually assumed the old familiar aspect of trench warfare, with its endless digging of trenches, line behind line, its weary trench routine, and its elaborate installation of permanent lines of communication and of administrative establishments of all descriptions.

South of the Somme, the Fifth Australian Division came into the line on April 5th, relieving a Cavalry Division on a frontage of about 5,000 yards, and thereby obviating any further necessity for the maintenance of my flank river defence. This duty had been performed for me in succession by the 15th Australian, the 104th Imperial and the 13th Australian Brigades (the latter then under Glasgow). My 9th Brigade still remained detached from me, operating under both the 18th and 61st British Divisions, and performed prodigies of valorous fighting in a series of desperate local attacks and counter-attacks, which took place between Villers-Bretonneux and Hangard, where the French northern flank then lay. In this service the 9th Brigade received gallant co-operation from the 5th Australian Brigade (of the 2nd Australian Division), which was now also arriving in this area, after having been relieved from trench garrison duty in the Messines—Warneton sector in Flanders.

The Fifth Division and these two detached Brigades were, during this period, serving under the Third Corps (Butler), which had been reconstituted to fill the gap between the Somme and the flank of the French Army. The First Australian Division was already well on the way to follow the Second Division, when, on April 11th, it was hurriedly re-transferred to Flanders to assist in stemming the new German flood which was inundating the whole of that region, and which was not arrested until it had almost reached Hazebrouck. This task the First Australian Division performed most valiantly, thereby upholding the reputation already earned by its younger sister Divisions for a capacity for rapid, ordered movement and decisive intervention at a critical juncture.

For some days there had been rumours that the Australian Corps Headquarters would shortly be transferred to the Amiens area, and would once again gather under its control the numerous elements of the four Australian Divisions which were by now widely scattered, and had been fighting under the orders of three different Army Corps. There was the still more interesting and pregnant rumour that General Lord Rawlinson—relinquishing his post of British representative on the Supreme War Council at Versailles—was soon to arrive and to form and command a reconstituted Fourth British Army,[5] which was to be composed of the Australian and the Third (British) Army Corps.