The Battle That Won the War: Bellenglise: Breaching the Hindenburg Line, 1918

By Peter Rostron

It is no exaggeration to claim that 46th North Midland Divisions action on 29 September 1918 was the hammer blow that shattered the will of the German High Command.Painting the strategic picture from early 1918 and the dark weeks following the Germans March offensive, the Author lays the ground for the Allied counter-strike. Ahead of them was the mighty Hindenburg Line, the Kaisers formidable defensive obstacle given added strength by the St Quentin Canal.Undaunted the Allies attacked using American, Australian and British formations. Led by Major General Boyd, 46 Division stormed the Canal and, thanks to a combination of sound planning and determined courageous fighting, seized their Hindenburg Line objective by the end of the day.The psychological damage to the German will, already weakened by the failure of the Spring offensive, is demonstrate by Ludendorffs collapse and opening of negotiations that led five weeks later to the Armistice.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Mar 30, 2018
• ISBN: 9781526711649

Book preview

Preface

It was the life jackets that first caught my imagination. The image of a complete brigade of some 3,000 soldiers going into the attack wearing life jackets in order to storm the massive defences of the Hindenburg Line was appealing; the fact that those life jackets had been borrowed from the cross-Channel steamers that supported the British Army in France and Belgium in the last year of the First World War made the story irresistible. The storming of the St Quentin Canal, and the breaking open of the apparently ‘impregnable’ Hindenburg Line by the 46th (North Midland) Division on 29 September 1918 was a stunning operation. The site was visited later by King George V, and the story of the battle was told and retold – for a time. By the mid-1920s it had largely slipped from public consciousness, and in the welter of controversies over the handling of the Great War it became one of those moments that were best forgotten. Indeed, the whole history of The Hundred Days, the period in which, under the direction of Field Marshal Haig, the British and Dominion Armies, supported by the Americans and French, swept the German Army back to the Belgian frontier and achieved a crushing victory is now largely untold and unknown.

The ‘narrative’ of the Great War emphasizes Mons, Gallipoli, the Somme and the series of battles known collectively as Passchendaele. A popular view is that Haig was a butcher, all generals were callous blimps, and soldiers were lucky to survive more than a few days before they were killed ‘going over the top’ in a series of futile offensives. The fact that it was the same generals who directed these earlier campaigns who now practised their art so surely and with such success to gain victory is counter-intuitive. It does not fit the ‘story’. An example of the more outrageous way in which history can be manipulated is C.S. Forester’s novel The General. Written in the 1930s, when the main characters in the drama were dead and pacifism threatened our ability to defend ourselves against the rising tide of fascism, it tells the story of a cavalry officer. He earns a DSO in the Boer War by pure luck and a certain amount of stupidity, does not bother to attend Staff College but rides beautifully, and in 1914 is a major, second-in-command of his regiment. Promoted to command, he performs valiantly at First Ypres, and is soon promoted to command a New Army infantry division. Forester gives him credit for his leadership and courage, but makes clear that he is unable to understand modern war. In a telling simile, he compares the generals who call for more and heavier artillery to savages who try to pull a screw; they apply more and more force, using more and stronger levers, unable to comprehend that a simple solution lies in the screwdriver. The reader can assume that he is referring to the tank. By early 1918 the main character is a lieutenant general commanding a corps which takes the full weight of the German March offensive. In despair he rides towards the front line, is wounded and evacuated to England. For him, the war and his career are over. Forester therefore conveniently ignored three crucial areas which would have given a more rounded picture; artillery – more and bigger guns – were the critical element that enabled armies to achieve breakthroughs; the tank at that stage of its development was not; and – the most unkindest cut of all – that, by having him wounded, the General of the title is prevented from taking part in the victories of The Hundred Days. It was a surgical disembowelment of a whole generation of British soldiers.

The tide has gradually turned to a more informed and impartial approach by historians, led with great courage and insight by John Terraine. But for the British public as a whole, the Great War is characterized by the phrase ‘Lions led by donkeys’. I hope that the telling of one fragment of the period that ended the war will help in some way to restore the balance, and in doing so pay due tribute to the soldiers, from general to private, who gave of their best – and of their lives. I can think of no better way to do this than to tell the story of the storming of the St Quentin Canal, sometimes referred to simply as Riqueval or Bellenglise. It is remarkable.

What I discovered, as I researched the story, was that this operation was remarkable in many ways. Remarkable because it was carried out by a Territorial formation, the 46th North Midland Division, which, until late September of 1918, had not had a particularly fortunate war. Remarkable because of the personalities involved; the extremely able divisional commander, commissioned from the ranks; the brigade commander and his brigade major who were both holders of the Victoria Cross; the Church of England parson who was to win the Victoria Cross at the head of his battalion. Remarkable because an operation that was considered by many as simply an ‘add on’, a diversion from the main thrust, became the successful point of attack, while the Americans on their flank, despite the best efforts of their Australian tutors, became bogged down. Remarkable because, within the space of a few hours, the defensive fortress which the German army had spent two years preparing was broken. Remarkable because the leadership, the organization, the armament and the tactics employed to such effect combined everything that the British Army had learned in four years of bloody fighting. It was the summation of the hard years in which the raw amateurs of the Territorials became part of the best-led, best-equipped and best-trained army in the world.

It was, indeed, a perfect battle. Of course, it was not the last battle; a number of actions followed, not least those made possible by the dramatic breaking of the last German stronghold. But, as the distinguished reporter Sir Philip Gibbs acknowledged, it was the last major battle, and it was undoubtedly the one action that finally delivered victory. Certainly it was the tipping point which induced the hysterical departure of the last elements of sensible judgment on the part of Ludendorff, convinced him finally that there was no further point in resistance, and led directly to the railway carriage at Compiégne and then to Versailles.

Chapter 1

‘I was not surprised … at the decision to remove me from the War Office’ Field Marshal Lord Robertson, on the events of February 1918

The last year of the Great War did not begin well for the Allies. The French Army, still suffering the effects of the mutinies of the previous year, was unable to play the major role that had been theirs. The Russians were out of the war, their country convulsed by revolution, their armies no longer fighting the Germans. Hundreds of thousands of German troops were being transferred from the Eastern to the Western Front, where they were soon expected to take the offensive.

For the British, the political direction of the war effort was reaching crisis point. Field Marshal Robertson, Chief of the Imperial General Staff (CIGS), professional head of the British Army, spelled it out in his modest, understated way:

I had been unable to agree with some of the strategical plans the Prime Minister wished to see adopted, and my opposition to the Palestine plan a few days before was the culminating point of previous refusals to lend my authority and name to acts which, I was convinced, were unsound and a danger to the Empire. This incident, coupled with my warnings as to the consequences likely to ensue from the armies on the West Front not being kept up to strength, doubtless decided the Prime Minister to try another CIGS whose strategical views might be more in conformity with his own, and who could devise a way of winning the war without the additional men for whom I had asked.

The final words sum up his contempt for those politicians whose amateur approach to strategy led them to ignore his advice – for if anyone was qualified in the art of war it was Robertson. Born into humble circumstances, ‘Wully’, as he was to become known, enlisted as a trooper in the 16th Lancers, and over the next ten years worked his way up, by sheer ability and application, through all the intermediate ranks to troop sergeant major. Under the urging of his officers he took the requisite exams and applied for a commission. Gazetted second lieutenant into the 3rd Dragoon Guards, he joined that regiment in India, where he applied himself to a study of his profession and to Indian languages, eventually passing exams in Hindustani, Persian, Pushtu, Punjabi and Gurkhali. He took part in the Black Mountain and Miranzai expeditions, and joined the Intelligence Branch, undertaking a long reconnaissance of the route leading to the Pamirs in preparation for any move that the Russians might make against India. He was on the staff of the Chitral Relief Force, was present at the capture of the Malakand Pass, was severely wounded, mentioned in dispatches and awarded the DSO. Graduating from the two-year course at Staff College, where he added French to his languages, he was posted to the Intelligence branch in the run up to the Boer War. He joined Lord Roberts’s staff in South Africa, was promoted major and brevet lieutenant colonel, and made head of the Intelligence Division of the War Office. From there he was successively Brigadier General General Staff at Aldershot, Commandant of the Staff College, Director of Military Training, and Quartermaster-General and then Chief of the General Staff of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in France. In 1916 he became CIGS. Like Haig, he did not waste words; his pithy comment to General Smith-Dorrien when the latter was sacked, ‘’Orace, you’re for ’Ome’, entered army folklore. His career was extraordinary. The complete antithesis of the popular notion of a First World War general, here was a man uniquely qualified to guide the fortunes of Britain’s armies and provide advice to governments during that titanic struggle. It says much for Lloyd George’s arrogant and blinkered approach that he so often scorned the counsel of this exceptional man, whom history has proved to have been right.

Robertson had summed up the main points of contention between himself – in alliance with the Commander-in-Chief of the British Army in France, Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig – and the Prime Minister. The strategy to be adopted the Allies was the main issue. The generals, guided by the master of war, Clausewitz, looked for the enemy’s ‘centre of gravity’, that entity without which he could not continue the war. They concluded that it was the German army, and that maximum effort must be concentrated on its defeat. They were the ‘Westerners’. The politicians, appalled by the losses of the Somme offensive in 1916 and the series of battles in 1917 known collectively as Passchendaele, looked for ways to ‘knock away his props’ and were keen to achieve resolution in any other theatre – such as Palestine – where casualties might not be so enormous. They were the ‘Easterners’.

It was not only Robertson whose judgment Lloyd George distrusted. Haig, also, was to him a stupid soldier who lacked the ability to articulate his ideas – a major contrast to the unrestrained oratorical ability of the Prime Minister. The ‘Welsh Wizard’ was totally unlike the taciturn Scot. Born in Edinburgh, Haig was unusual among his contemporaries in that after Clifton College he spent three years at Oxford before a year at Sandhurst, from where he passed out top of his intake. He joined the 7th Hussars and served with them in India before attending Staff College. He saw active service in the Sudan campaign as chief of staff to the commander of the cavalry. Returning to England he served under Major General – later Field Marshal – Sir John French, first as Brigade Major of 1 Cavalry Brigade, then as Deputy Assistant Adjutant General in South Africa. He was promoted to brevet lieutenant colonel and command of the 17th Lancers. On the conclusion of the Boer War, in which he had enhanced his reputation, he gained accelerated promotion and by 1903 he was a major general in the post of Inspector General of Cavalry in India. Although some of his tactical ideas, notably on the employment of cavalry, were decidedly old-fashioned, he was regarded as a rising star, and Lord Haldane, one of the most able War Ministers the country has ever known, appointed him Military Secretary. After three years he was appointed Director of Military Training, a very influential post, and then Director of Army Staff Duties. Lord Haldane wrote of this period;

The men one came across, the new school of young officers – entitled to the appellation of men of science just as much as engineers or chemists – were to me a revelation. A new school of officers has arisen since the South African War, a thinking school of officers who desire to see the full efficiency which comes from new organizations and no surplus energy going to waste.

He was undoubtedly referring to Haig, and in 1911 he offered him command at Aldershot, a post which carried with it the appointment of Commander I Corps of the BEF in the event of mobilization. One of the great sadnesses of the ensuing period was that Haldane was forced out of office because of his well-known Germanophile sentiments. He, Robertson and Haig could have done great things together.

The history of the BEF over the next four years is too well known to be reproduced in detail. Sufficient to note that Haig replaced French as Commander-in-Chief of the BEF after the Battle of Loos at the end of 1915, and was therefore in command throughout the period of its greatest trial. His strengths – his total self-confidence, his imperturbability, his iron determination – inspired his military subordinates, who were hugely loyal to him. His difficulty in expounding his views with fluency caused politicians to doubt him.

Lloyd George did not trust Haig, but knew that an attempt to unseat him would face the opposition of the senior commanders in France. He therefore put in hand a series of measures to limit his authority and reduce his ability to carry out any offensive. The first was to demand the removal of key members of Haig’s staff. General Kiggell, the clever and highly-qualified Chief of Staff, was the first to go, along with Brigadier General Charteris, the head of Intelligence. There were apparently reasonable grounds for the demise of the latter; the charge was that he had let his concern for Haig’s confidence outrun his professional judgement and had given his commander an over-optimistic assessment of the state of the German forces opposing him. This view will be examined later. The replacement of Kiggell could also be justified on the grounds that he had been in post for many months, and a change of personality, with new ideas, would not be amiss in the face of new circumstances. Other key personalities to move were the Deputy Chief of Staff, the Quartermaster-General and the Commander of the Royal Flying Corps. Such changes in the top echelon of supporting staff at this critical moment were unsettling, and did not augur well for the smooth functioning of Haig’s headquarters as the Allies faced a reinforced enemy.

Robertson also touched on the manpower problem. By the end of 1917 the army in France was running dangerously short of soldiers. Over one million men were tied up in campaigns, small and large, away from the Western Front. Robertson argued that by reducing the forces in these less-important theatres to a defensive minimum, not only would more shipping be available for the Americans, who were beginning to arrive in France, but also much-needed reinforcements could be given to the critical front. The Army requested 615,000 men, a figure that, considering their losses in 1917, was if anything too few. The Cabinet Committee decided to allocate 100,000, with the same number of lower medical grades. The consequence was that, over the protests of the Army Council and the Commander-in-Chief, the army in France and Belgium had to be reconfigured. Each brigade was to be reduced from four battalions of infantry to three, and the divisions overall to reduce from twelve battalions to nine. The resulting reorganization, tiring and demoralizing for those involved, took time.

The final dagger thrust was an attempt by Lloyd George to reduce Haig’s authority by backing the idea of a Supreme War Council – war by committee – with the power to overrule his plans. These unsettling and, in the case of the manpower problem, potentially disastrous moves, now took effect just as the operational scene changed to Germany’s advantage.

The build-up of German strength, released from the Russian Front, was formidable. In late 1917 there were some 150 German divisions on the Western Front. By the end of the year the total had risen to 171, by the middle of March 1918 it had risen to 187, and finally reached a peak of 208. Against the expected onslaught the position of the British Army in France was fraught with danger. Five divisions had been lost to the Italian front, and, crucially, Gough’s Fifth Army had to double the length of its frontage, taking over 20 miles from the French to its south, to give it a total frontage of 42 miles, to cover with his weakened divisions. The sector was in no fit state for defence; the positions he was supposed to take over were either inadequate or non-existent, or in some areas, actually being dismantled by the local population. The task was too much, and it did not take a genius to forecast where the expected German offensive, when it came, would fall. The Germans could aim for the weakest point, and divide the Allies.

The hammer blow, when it came on 21 March 1918, was not unexpected, but crushing. Two aspects are worthy of note. The first concerns the use of artillery. Both sides had realized early in the conflict the importance of a huge weight of shells, of all calibres and types, delivered at and for the correct time, to best effect. The fire from the 6,473 guns of the German artillery, coordinated by Colonel Bruchmüller, was of such stunning intensity that whole battalions disappeared. It is worth examining the man and his methods, in light of the development of artillery by the British. Born in 1863, Bruchmüller had an undistinguished career in the Foot Artillery, dealing with the fortress and siege guns of the German Army, until 1916, when he set up a system of centralized command of the thirty batteries of his division. This enabled the batteries to co-ordinate their fire with movements on the battlefield. By 1917 he was artillery adviser to General von Hutier’s Eighth Army, and for one operation co-ordinated the fire of 152 batteries of field guns firing 500,000 shells in five hours, followed by a creeping barrage behind which the infantry could advance. A major feature of the programme was that there was no prior registration of the guns, thus achieving both operational and tactical surprise. In comparison, the Royal Artillery before the Somme battle fired 1.7 million shells in one week; before the Kaiserschlacht of March 1918, the German artillery under Bruchmüller fired 3.2 million shells in five hours.

The attacking infantry were organized into specialist attack troops, Sturmtruppen, who took advantage of the barrage and the early morning mist to infiltrate the British positions. The tactic, ascribed, rightly or wrongly, to General Oscar von Hutier, was highly successful in tearing a huge hole in the British defences. But their very advantages brought in their wake problems which undermined their success. The pick of their infantry suffered crippling losses to the detriment of lesser-regarded units, and the speed of their advance was such that they outstripped their supply arrangements. After some anxious moments, the German advance was halted before Amiens by the dogged resistance of the British, assisted eventually by the French.

The Germans tried again, first in the north close to the Belgian border, then in the south. Each blow was feebler than the first, and eventually they were forced to call a halt. They were still numerically stronger than the Allies, but their morale had taken a bad knock, and they would now turn to the defensive. Over the next three months both sides skirmished warily, until on 12 August, ‘the black day of the German Army’, Haig’s carefully-prepared offensive fell on the Germans at Amiens. As the Allies began the long fight back, the Germans looked over their shoulders to the line of fortifications – the Hindenburg Line – which they considered impregnable. First prepared in 1916, it was based on the St Quentin Canal with five lines of trenches, concrete strongpoints, barbed wire and covering positions to impede any attacker forming up. It was here that they would stand on the defensive, and break any attempt to advance further.

By late September, the new line of the Allied armies ran from near Soissons, passing west of St Quentin and Cambrai, to Lens. Marshal Foch, appointed supreme commander to coordinate the French, British and American plans, had already urged the British, supported by the left of the French armies, to continue the attack in the direction of Cambrai–St Quentin. At this stage the British Fourth, Third, First and Fifth Armies, with twelve corps, comprising fifty-two divisions, two of them American, and three cavalry divisions, were holding the front from St Quentin to near Armentières. It was faced by about sixty-three German divisions. After several conversations with Haig, whose troops had the heaviest task to perform, that of forcing the Hindenburg Line, Foch allocated the sequence of events as follows;

•26 September, Americans and French attack between the Meuse and Reims.

•27 September, attack by the British Third and First Armies.

•28 September, attack by the Group of Armies in Flanders.

•29 September, attack by the British Fourth and French First Armies.

The bombardment by the last two armies was to begin on the 27th. By delaying the assault of the Fourth Army until two days after that of the Third and First Armies Haig hoped to deceive the enemy as to the main point of attack, and to allow a prolonged bombardment of the enemy’s position, thereby making Fourth Army’s task easier.

To appreciate the importance of the Hindenburg Line it is necessary to step back two years. The Line, known to the Germans as the Siegfriedstellung, was a defensive position built during the winter of 1916/17 in response to the British and French success of the Somme offensive. Haig’s three aims of that offensive were; to ease the strain on other theatres of war; to wear down the strength of the German Army; and – a demand added later – to relieve the pressure on the French at Verdun. All three were achieved, and the Germans anticipated that they would face renewed attack in 1917. By the beginning of that year, the strategic situation made a retirement inevitable. The German High Command was prepared to give up ground for a better and more easily defended defensive line. A shorter Western Front could be held with fewer troops, and by incorporating methods such as reverse slope positions, defence in depth and camouflage, German casualties could be minimized. An added factor was that by planning ahead, it would be possible to destroy the infrastructure of the ground given up, impeding the Allied advance. Military buildings and depots, railways and roads, houses and trees, all were to be destroyed, wells were to be polluted and the French civilian population forced to leave the area. The intention was that the Allies would advance ‘into a desert’.

To prepare the massive fortifications, 12,000 German, 3,000 Belgian and 50,000 Russian workers dug the trenches, while ferroconcrete installations were prepared under the supervision of staff