Читать книгу Canada in Flanders. Volume III - Roberts Charles G. D. - Страница 3

The Battle of Sanctuary Wood was fought and endured throughout the first two days of June, 1916. Canada's resistance to that terrific and overwhelming onslaught of metal and men will live as long and gloriously as any victory in the great story of our arms. During those two fateful days Canadian trenches were obliterated – blown out of the ground; dug-outs were buried and strong points crushed; woods in our positions were mown and torn to earth; Major-General Mercer was killed and one of our Brigade commanders wounded and taken prisoner. The Canadian front was crushed by that indescribable deluge of exploding metal – but it was not broken.

Between the heroic actions in the Ypres salient in June (1st to 15th) and the commencement of our strenuous thrusts on the Somme front in mid-September, no unit of the Canadian Corps was in any major offensive operation. But the routine work of holding and strengthening our positions continued with the full measure of that activity for which the Canadians have become famous. The vitality of our opposition to the confronting masses of men and machinery did not lessen for an instant. Relieved from the recent terrific efforts of defence and counter-attack, we were stationary yet aggressive. Hostile trenches and strongholds were raided and bombarded, wire was cut by hand and smashed by shell-fire, and mines were sprung. All arms continued to carry on enthusiastically, and the mental peace and physical security of the occupants of opposing positions were shattered constantly by bayonet and grenade, trench-bomb, bullet, and shell. The following instances will serve to illustrate the nature of our activities throughout this period of waiting, of preparation, and of so-called quiet.

Dominion Day (July 1st) was celebrated by the 26th (New Brunswick) Battalion in a manner little appreciated by the grey ranks across the way. Supported by the fire of our artillery and trench-mortars, two officers and twenty-five other ranks operated against a convenient point in the German front-line trench. The assaulting party were observed and subjected to a brisk but inaccurate fire of machine-guns and rifles before they had passed the enemy's inner wire. They pressed forward without a pause and rushed the parapet. The garrison of the trench immediately retired from this threatened point except for three men, who stuck to their loopholes and continued firing. Lieutenant Fleming accounted for one of these by thrusting his revolver into a loophole and returning the fire. The trench was then entered and its remaining defenders disposed of. After our party had investigated about forty yards of the trench they were driven out by a heavy bombardment of rifle-grenades and mortar-bombs. They then returned to our own lines with a few slight casualties, some useful information, and a quantity of German equipment.

An encounter in No Man's Land between a patrol of the 22nd (French Canadian) Battalion and a German patrol on the night of July 4th resulted in the dispersion of the enemy and our capture of two prisoners.

Ten nights later a reconnoitring patrol from the 25th (Nova Scotia) Battalion attacked an enemy listening-post at the moment of its being strongly reinforced. After a brisk exchange of grenades the Germans ran for their trench, leaving the field and one of their wounded to us.

On the night of the 25th a large German mine was blown in our lines on the Bluff. This was not the enemy's first attempt to possess himself of that advantageous position. It will be remembered that he attained his object in January of the same year and was not driven out until a month later, and then only at a heavy cost of killed and wounded. Fortunately the second attempt to secure a foothold on that ground failed utterly, thanks to the alertness and prompt action of our troops immediately concerned. Briefly, the story of the foiled effort is this: —

The 1st Canadian Division, which had taken over the Bluff sector on the 22nd of the month, received warning two days later from Major North, of the 1st Canadian Tunnelling Company, that the enemy might be depended upon to blow a mine very soon somewhere in the vicinity. The localities which were considered with the liveliest suspicion were a point known as the Bean and Trench 33. The Division immediately warned the 2nd Infantry Brigade of the menace; the G.O.C. the Brigade ordered reductions in the garrisons of the threatened positions, the covering of that section of front by machine-guns, and the detailing of parties for counter-attack and of other parties for the vital work of consolidation should a mine be blown.

The early hours of the night of the 25th were unusually quiet about the Bluff. Artillery was silent. Snipers and machine-gunners seemed half-hearted in their activities. The 7th (British Columbia) Battalion was engaged in preparing for a relief which was to be completed by midnight.

At ten o'clock the quiet was shattered by a tremendous convulsion. Earth, fire, rock, and smoke belched to heaven. Trenches vanished, engulfed. Instantly the S.O.S. rocket went up. Our machine-guns responded like crackling echoes of the explosion.

Within thirty seconds of the rocket-signal for help the guns of Dodd's Group commenced a crushing bombardment of the German positions which threatened the new crater. Our counter-attacking parties advanced, armed with rifles, grenades, and machine-guns. They occupied the forward lip of the crater, the flanking shell-holes overlooking its raw depths, certain points commanding the canal, and a ridge running between an historic old crater and the new.

The Germans, reinforced and ready for the dash from cover and the occupation of the Crater swarmed to their parapets, and swayed and seethed there for a little while like a headed wave about to break and flood forward. Then the wave broke and subsided – backward instead of forward.

The great attack was dead, dead in the first half-minute of its furious and painful life, killed by the smashing fire of our artillery and the whipping hail of our machine-guns.

Within one and a half hours of the blowing of the mine the O.C. the 7th Battalion reported to his Brigadier that the menace was past, and that the new crater was being swiftly absorbed by our defensive positions. Our artillery reduced its fire by one-half. Five minutes later the German artillery retaliation ceased, the fire of our machine-guns and artillery dropped to normal, and the relief of our infantry – which had been interrupted and delayed for nearly two hours – was calmly continued.

Owing to the precaution of thinning the garrisons in the threatened locality, our casualties were wonderfully light – less than fifty all told in killed, wounded, and missing. It is safe to say that the enemy casualties, caused by our artillery, machine-guns, Stokes and trench-mortar batteries, were much heavier; and, in addition to their loss of life and limb, the Germans lost their adventure. The months of toil devoted to the laying of the mine and the tons of explosive which comprised it failed to strengthen their position by a tittle or to weaken ours by a jot.

On the night of the 28th a patrol from the Nova Scotian Battalion (25th), consisting of a lieutenant, a sergeant, and four men, carried out a daring raid on a small scale. They bombed the German trench at the point where they intended to enter, and were about to negotiate the parapet when a party of eight enemy bombers attacked them on the flank. In the brief but desperate fight which followed this unexpected distraction three of the Canadians were wounded and the eight Germans were disposed of. Lieutenant Wise, with Sergeant Anderson and Private Johnson, then entered the hostile trench and discovered that their preliminary grenade-fire had killed five of the garrison. They drove the enemy down the trench, until Anderson was wounded. Lieutenant Wise ceased his offensive to help the sergeant over the parapet, and while thus engaged he received three wounds. Johnson continued to drive the enemy until all his grenades were thrown. He then escaped from the trench, returned to our lines, collected a rescue party, and led the way back to the scene of action. All our wounded were found and brought in with the exception of Sergeant Anderson.

At half-past eight on the morning of the 29th the 19th (Ontario) Battalion made a daylight raid into the enemy trenches on the St. Eloi front between Ruined Farm and the Canal. Two officers and the scouts of the Battalion had devoted every day and night of the preceding week to reconnoitring the ground over which the attack was to be made. During the night of the 28th the enemy's wire in front of the point selected for entry was hand-cut by two men of the Battalion. Machine-gun fire on the hostile parapet at the threatened point muffled the sound of the clipping of the wire. The raiding party, consisting of Captain C. L. Kilmer Lieutenant H. B. Pepler, and eighteen N.C.O.'s and men, covered three-quarters of their journey between the lines by way of an old ditch, doubled across the remaining forty-five yards, passed through the gaps in the wire, and went over the parapet before they were discovered by the enemy. They moved to the right and left along the trench, shooting and bombing. Upon the approach of strong German reinforcements along a communication trench, the signal to retire was given and successfully obeyed. During the evacuation of the trench the raiders suffered a few slight casualties from grenade-fire, and the two officers and a sergeant sustained shrapnel wounds. Captain Kilmer was the last to leave the trench. One of his ankles had been broken in the fight. As he was unable to reach our lines unassisted, and unwilling to delay the retirement, he crawled into a shell-hole situated about eight yards in front of the German wire. He was rescued from this insecure retreat by Lieutenant Burnham, Corporal Wilson, and Private Newton, who, covered by an accurate barrage from the guns of Stewart's Group, moved out to the shell-hole and back to our lines under a heavy fire of machine-guns and rifles.

In this, the first of our daylight raids, no prisoners were taken. The action was too swift and the encounters were too violent to permit of the removal of a single living Hun; but the operation was highly successful. The occupants of the trench were identified as the Royal Württembergers; valuable information of a technical nature was obtained; two machine-guns were put out of action and other machine-gun and trench-mortar emplacements located; many of the garrison of the trench were shot, and four large dug-outs, crowded with men, were effectively bombed; and it is reasonable to suppose that the casualties inflicted by our artillery were severe. Lieutenant H. R. Dillon, Canadian Field Artillery, who acted as Forward Observation Officer throughout the operation, did splendid service, especially during the rescue of Captain Kilmer, when he stood fully exposed in No Man's Land at a point within forty yards of the German trench, and from there directed the fire of his battery. Lieutenant Hooper, of the 19th Battalion, whose active command during the raid included a Lewis gun, snipers, and a telephonist, also did fine work.

On the night of August 5th-6th the 27th (City of Winnipeg) Battalion sent a raiding party into the enemy trenches opposite their front, with the usual objects of obtaining prisoners and information and inflicting casualties. This raid was daringly executed; but the fighting in the trench was so severe that no prisoners were taken. Lieutenant Harris was wounded while carrying a wounded German toward the point of entry. Two unwounded Germans were caught, but owing to their struggles and the depth of the trench the efforts of their captors to expel them over the parapet were ineffectual.

Eight nights later Lieutenant Clarkson of this same Battalion led another party into the enemy's lines and succeeded in bringing out a prisoner. The garrison of the invaded trench suffered heavily. Of Clarkson's party only one man was wounded.

A party from the 28th (North-West) Battalion, supported by the artillery of Stuart's Group, our trench-mortars, and Stokes guns, entered the enemy's trenches in the neighbourhood of Ruined Farm on the night of August 10th-11th. Lieutenant T. L. O. Williams, who commanded the raiders, was wounded. The enemy and his trenches were severely knocked about and a prisoner was brought back.

A dummy raid on the hostile positions at the Hollandscheschuur Farm and Quarante Wood salients was successfully practised by Dodd's Group, C.F.A., and the 10th (Ontario) Battalion in the early hours of August 15th. The object of this long-headed enterprise was to draw the Germans in force into their front-line trenches and there drub them thoroughly with the combined fire of our field batteries, Stokes guns, and machine-guns.

At 3.45 a.m. three white flares were sent up from our lines, and at the same time the enemy's entanglements were violently shaken by means of strong wires which connected them with our forward positions. The Germans immediately took alarm and subjected their own entanglements to a heavy grenade bombardment along the whole front from the Quarante Wood to the Chemin de Poperinghe. Our artillery and Stokes guns then opened heavily and accurately on selected targets on the enemy front and support trenches. The Germans promptly attempted a retaliation with the fire of a five-point-nine battery; but as their first two shells fell in their own lines at the Farm, the third in No Man's Land, and the next thirty-seven on various points behind and in their own defences, they soon became discouraged.

In addition to the casualties and material damage inflicted by our fire, the enemy must have suffered heavily from the erratic performance of his own five-point nines.

On the 17th a new strong point in the system of enemy trenches known as "the Loop," in Sanctuary Wood, about two thousand yards east of Zillebeke, was subjected to a concentrated bombardment by our 6-inch howitzers and partially destroyed. To complete its destruction the bombardment was resumed during the night of the 17th and 18th, and under cover of this bombardment a raid was undertaken by a party from the Royal Canadian Regiment against an advanced trench sector and bombing post in the immediate neighbourhood of "the Loop." The idea was to take the enemy by surprise while their attention was occupied by the bombardment, and to capture prisoners. In both these respects, however, the operation was a failure, as the Germans were found fully prepared and "standing to," with the post heavily manned, and not only were no prisoners taken, but not one of our men succeeded in getting into the trench. The affair was memorable, however, for the amazing courage and audacity with which it was pushed, in the teeth of overwhelming and ready numbers, and for the resourcefulness and heroic devotion with which the three officers – Lieutenant Bole, leader of the raiding party, and Lieutenants Churchill and Munn, who had come to his assistance – succeeded in bringing all the wounded back to our lines. It was remarkable, too, for the slaughter inflicted in the crowded trench by this greatly daring handful of raiders. The raiding party consisted of sixteen N.C.O.'s and men under Lieutenant Bole. A gap was blown in the enemy wire by the explosion of an ammonal tube. Immediately Lieutenant Bole, who had gathered his men at the head of the sap running outward from our front line, led the way through the broken wire in the hope of gaining the position in one rush. They were met, however, by a storm of bombs and machine-gun fire, and fell rapidly. But even the wounded, if not utterly disabled, kept on hurling their bombs. Lance-Corporal Reynolds, though already hit, succeeded in reaching the enemy's parapet and delivering all his bombs with deadly effect among the packed ranks. Then, finding himself alone, he withdrew, and dropped, with two more wounds, a few yards back from the parapet. By this time every member of the party was down except Lieutenant Bole, who occupied himself calmly with the task of rescuing his wounded. Lieutenant Churchill came to his aid in this, while Lieutenant Munn, taking his Lewis gun out into No Man's Land, played it along the enemy's parapet to keep down their fire. Under cover of this gun, and of a trench-mortar barrage which was presently dropped along the trench, Lieutenant Bole got all his wounded, one by one, back through the sap and into our lines. And so the affair ended – not, indeed, with success, but with great distinction for all concerned, and with the consolation of having exacted a heavy toll in German lives.

It may be in place here to give an interesting instance of the work that was being done by our Tunnelling Companies – work calling for not only great courage and devotion, but also the highest technical skill and resource. The work of a tunnelling company at the Front is like a duel with knives in a dark room, where one may feel at any moment the stealthy adversary's knife in one's back. The tunnellers' ears, nerves, and intuition are ceaselessly on the strain. And just when he has successfully mined his opponents and is about to blow them up, he may be counter-mined himself and hurled into eternity. At the position known as "The Bluff," overlooking the Canal, a mine had been blown by the enemy on July 25th, forming a new crater of which we had at once taken possession. By the explosion a lip was formed on the east side of the crater, which was capable of being transformed into an extremely strong position. But it was impossible to work on this position with any degree of safety, as it was certain that the enemy's gallery, from which he had laid the mine, ran somewhere beneath the lip, and was occupied. Any work we should attempt on the position would inevitably be heard in the gallery and could be frustrated, disastrously for us, by the explosion of another mine. It was decided to try to tunnel into the gallery from another direction. Bore-holes, therefore, were driven in the supposed direction of the gallery, in the hope of being able to locate it exactly by listening. In this the borers were so successful that they came upon the gallery before they expected to. The enemy made them aware of their success by exploding a charge beneath the bore-holes, killing three of our men and injuring others. From this, however, it was obvious that the main charge was not yet laid in the gallery. Plans were therefore made at once for endeavouring to sap into the gallery from No Man's Land and blow it in, so as to cut it off at some distance from the crater, and thus, if possible, gain the crater end of it for our own use. In order to begin the work far out in No Man's Land it was absolutely necessary to obtain some cover there, and cover of such a nature that the enemy should not recognise its purpose. The problem might well have seemed an insurmountable one; but Major North, O.C. 1st Tunnelling Company, Canadian Engineers, solved it successfully, outwitting the Germans by an ingenious ruse. In the words of the Official Report: – "One hundred pounds of ammonal were taken over the parapet, and, after a rather difficult reconnaissance, were placed about fifty feet in front of the new crater… This charge was wired back to Thames Street. In co-operation with the 5th Battalion, two 60-pound trench-mortars were fired at the German line in front at a prearranged time, and at one minute interval. A minute later our charge was exploded, and after another minute another trench-mortar was fired, the object being to make the enemy believe that our charge was a trench-mortar fallen short. This charge made a crater about 4 ft. deep and about 8 ft. in diameter, breaking the tough surface layer of roots and gravel. We entered the crater immediately after it was blown, placed another charge of 200 pounds of ammonal, and blew it. The next night we entered the crater, finding it about 8 ft. deep and about 25 ft. in diameter." From this effective cover our boring went on unsuspected, and a number of charges were laid in different bore-holes close to where the gallery was judged to run. When these were simultaneously exploded our calculations were proved correct. A sector of the gallery was found completely wrecked, effectually cutting the communications, and we entered into possession of the undamaged portion, about 112 ft. in length, extending up into the new crater. We thus secured a valuable post of vantage from which to conduct other mining operations, and the crater was consolidated into a strong point of considerable importance to our line.

By these and many similar small operations the enemy were kept at a tension and subjected to continual harassing annoyance; and our own men were encouraged and stimulated while perfecting themselves in the art of modern war.