Monday, 19 March 2018
Friday, 16 March 2018
1918 - German Spring Offensive / Injured and Left Behind
18th March, 1918, and 8th Battalion, Royal West Surrey Regiment (“The Queen’s”), is holding a ‘strong point’ around the village of Le Verguier, about 30 miles south-east of Arras. Walter Hitchcock is on leave, unaware of the offensive which is about to hit the battalion hard. In his own words,
“The casualties included 486 [...] known to have been killed, in addition to twenty four thousand wounded, and six thousand missing - of whom I was one.”L1
The first phase of the German Spring Offensive, Operation Michael commences at 4.30am. on 21st March. The German attack is well-planned and overwhelming: 8,000 artillery pieces open up on British lines, dropping around one million shells on the BEF over eight hours. Covered by fog, German assault parties advance across no man’s land and break through sections of the old British front line. The 8th Queen’s, positioned at Le Verguier, a small French village surrounded by rolling farmland, are right at the heart of the German offensive. The 8th Queen’s and the 17th Infantry Brigade (24th Division) have manned trenches at strong points covering roads and the approaches to the village.W7 By 7am telephones communication with the forward companies are lost. At 10.30am, A-Company, on the frontline near Priel Farm is retreating under heavy machine-gun fire from the north.B1
Location of Priel Farm, start of the German Offensive
WH, although in France, is still returning from leave. A letter written on pages torn from a notebook and sent to Rachel back in England on Friday, 22nd March, describe his current situation,
If I don’t get interrupted this should be quite a long letter. I had quite a nice run to F. After I left you when we got there the boats were full so we had to wait till the afternoon and got across about 7.30. (I was not seasick.)
While we were waiting for the boat the W.O.s [Warrant Officers] were allowed into town so a chap of the Royal Artillery who I chummed up with went out with me and we had a good dinner and had a walk along the seafront and afterwards cakked back and had some tea.
The journey across was quite nice and as soon as we got to France we had to alter our watches.
We should have come to rest camp but as usual some of us did not do the thing we ought to have done and slipped out the back way into the town and got a bed in a second-class hotel. We got there soon after 8 and had a nice supper, egg and chips and went to bed about 10. It was quite a good bed too, only it seemed a little strange getting into bed alone. You did have Florrie to console you for a little. We got up about 8 a.m. and had fish for breakfast and had to get on the train at 12 o’clock and since then the journey has been very rotten, we did not get off the train till 4 a.m. this morning and our present quarters can hardly be described as comfortable, however I think we are leaving here very shortly.
It is a lovely morning and there is a lot of activity. I expect the papers will have plenty of news tomorrow. That I think is about as far as I have got at present, darling. I hope my dear sweetheart that you got back safely and are not worrying at all about me. I am glad after all that you came to the station, you are such a good girl. When you are there it helps me to keep cheerful. I will try to get another note to you tomorrow but it may not be possible to do so as I have not yet found the Bn [Battalion]. Well, darling, I am writing this in a very uncomfortable place so shall have to close now. Trusting you are not unhappy. All my love darling wife, always your own ever-loving hubby
Walter
“I expect the papers will have plenty of news tomorrow”; With each word carefully chosen due to the risk of mail being intercepted, this is, perhaps, the closest WH can get to expressing concern that something very big is happening.
Although not yet at the front - which is around ten miles east on 22nd March, In WH’s own words, a lot of decisions had to be made, not least concerning food:
“Now, from the 22nd we were fighting a rearguard action the whole of the time, and we were placed just outside Chaulnes - I can't remember the name of the place now - but we only had one officer, I was the senior chap and we had a very, very small contingent of men. So, however, on this particular night we had no food, we had no rations, so, I had a chap named Quantor who was one of the sort of fellers who would always get something. He said,
"Look, Major" he said, "Can we go down the village and see if we can find anything?". I said,
"You may go down the village, certainly, but don't do anything in the way of looting. If you can find food, get it."
Well they came back with four chickens, some carrots, potatoes and they said,
“We could have got plenty of milk if we'd had anything to put it in, there were cows down there bellowing about and we couldn't milk 'em".
So they set to work and they plucked these chickens, the three or four chaps we had there and we cooked two of them - God knows how they were cooked, I don't know, shove a stick through them and hold them over the fire - at any rate, carrots, potatoes and chicken, so we had quite a good meal.” L1
From early morning on the 22nd March, the situation at the front near Montécourt is clearly worsening, with the Germans having moved round to the south of the Division, as well as in the north. Expecting the worst, key confidential papers are hastily destroyed. B1
The next day is no easier. From 3 a.m. there is a retreat from the front. The troops begin to dig in at Douvieux, anticipating holding the position and getting some rest, but a cavalry officer soon appears with order for the rear movement to continue as far as Pargny on the Somme. At this point, the 8th Bn move forward to meet the retreating front, intent on holding the river crossings. It is hoped that the troops retreating from the front can get some rest at nearby Licourt but, late at night, instructions come to move north to the village of Saint-Christ-Briost where the 1st Sherwood Foresters were attempting to hold the bridge. The bridge, only having been partially destroyed, had already allowed German troops to cross and, while these had been forced back, German guns had clear sight of the bridge, which did not allow its destruction by the Division. B1
Dawn, 24th March, and the 8th Queen’s reinforce the retreating troops en route to Chaulnes. A line of defence is formed between Omiécourt and Hyencourt-le-Grand. This is considered a good place to form a defence, utilising German ‘pillbox’ defences, built by the German army in 1917. B1
Omiécourt and Hyencourt-le-Grand Defensive Line, 24th March, 1918
25th March and moods lift as it appears the Germans are being pushed back - though this joy is short lived. With the 8th Queen’s ammunition running low, the enemy pushes forward again. Withdrawal to Omiécourt begins - but here Major Peirs, commander of the 8th Queen’s, is injured and further retreat to Lihons and Vrély is undertaken. B1 The retreat continues through to 27th March, with the German attack coming, “in mass” from Mérharicourt.
28th March, and WH’s war takes a new path.
The morning of 28th sees heavy fighting. In the words of the 8th Queen’s adjutant,
6.A.M. Early in the morning the enemy renewed the attack in the extended order. The Battn found itself exposed on both flanks and was obliged to fall back. It now comprised 200 men of various units. Officers stopped and rallied all available men incorporating then into the Battn. It was at this juncture that all troops became very much disorganised and started falling back coming under heavy machine gun fire. The main feature of the attack was the intensity of the machine gun fire, especially from VRELY village. Many casualties were sustained.
Walter Hitchcock is among those casualties. Shot in the leg, left behind and unable to leave the trench he is in, on the back of letter*, he records the following:
I lay in a trench and was kindly treated by German soldiers who passed, one gave me two wp [waterproof] sheets to cover over me, another gave me bread. Towards night it started raining, pain very bad. Our artillery nearly got me once. About 10 o’clock some English prisoners lifted me out of the trench on to the side so I should be seen. Got some snatches of sleep but could not move, rain very heavy at times, grateful for w/p sheets which kept one dry.
One can only imagine what WH thought his prospects may have been at this moment. Cold, in pain and unable to move, if he survived the night, his saviours would have to be those who, hours earlier, had been his enemy.
We close the events of 28th March, 1918, with the words of WH, recorded in the early 1970s.
WH: Well, on the day that I was wounded, the Germans - we were on a piece of sloping ground and the Germans were up there - they really opened up on us. Our instructions, my instructions, Major Peirs had just been wounded, we were standing on top of the trench when they put some shells over, and I was in the bottom of the trench, quick! He stood there, and he broke his arm, so I said to him "Would you like me to send somebody back to the dressing station?" he said, "No, no. I want you to take a machine gun over to that cross-roads" this was after he was wounded, "if the Germans come down there, they've all got to come down that road." I said, "We haven't got a machine gun, and we haven't got a machine gunner, Sir." so he said, "Well, do the best you can". Nothing was done, I didn't do anything at all, there was nothing I could do.
So then we were told we were to hold this position. I looked to the right and I saw the Battalion there, or the company or whatever it was, was falling back. I looked to the left and I saw they were falling back, I said, "Come on chaps, it's time we retired" or words to that effect, I don't know what I said! We started to retire, some were in the open, I was in a sunken road - there are lots of them in France as you probably know. I was going down there when Germans opened up and it felt just as though somebody had given me a smack across the legs. Of course that was when I was hit. So I struggled along and went down, well then some of the chaps said, "Well, we haven't got a stretcher" I said, that's all right, you just look after yourselves, and they put me in a trench on the side of the road. Well they hadn't been gone long when the Germans came.
Interviewer: They were that close?
WH: They were what was called ground Scouts. The first two that came along, I could see 'em coming - incidentally, I had dropped a bit of my... I had a revolver, I got rid of that, and they had a look, and they - it was raining now - got a couple of waterproof sheets and covered over me, they threw me a haversack which had got some bread in it, and as luck would have it I had a flask in my pocket and they had a third of a pint full of rum - and that was worth a hundred pounds to me. So, I lay in this trench, and night came. Oh, prior to that, there were some South African soldiers and they said could they do anything and I said, "If you could send a message to my wife to say that I'm alright, I'm just merely wounded and I'll be alright." and they did, and she got the letter.
To be continued …
Copy of first diary entry
Letter, on back of which first diary entry was written
References
B1 History of the Queen's Royal (West Surrey) Regiment In The Great War, Colonel H. C. Wylly, C.B., N&M Press, ISBN 9781843425397
W1 Website of The Queen's Royal Surrey Regiment - http://www.queensroyalsurreys.org.uk/war_diaries/local/8Bn_Queens.shtml
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