World War I - 9 Book Collection: Nelson's History of the War, The Battle of Jutland & The Battle of the Somme - Buchan John

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sea," and ended only when the entrenched lines on either side reached the Belgian coast. The enemy then attempted to break through the left of the Allied front, and to seize the Channel ports, so as to threaten the British lines of communication. He transferred large numbers of his best troops to the north; between Armentiéres and the sea he had a total of 402 battalions of infantry and an immense superiority of guns. Two hundred and sixty-seven battalions were all that the Allies could fling into the gap, and their cavalry were outnumbered by two to one.

      Germany struck at various points; but being checked at Arras and on the sea-coast, she made her main effort in the last week of October against the British Army, which held the salient east of the city of Ypres. The battle, which is known as the First Battle of Ypres, began on the 21st of the month, and the crisis came on the 29th, when General von Fabeck attacked with a "storm group" of specially selected regiments.

      On Saturday, the 31st October, after a furious bombardment, it seemed that the end had come. For eleven days our little army had been holding its own against impossible odds. At the point of the Salient, north of the Menin road, lay the 2nd and 1st British Divisions, and south of them the 7th Division and Byng's cavalry. The men were very weary and their ranks terribly thinned. The 7th Division had fought for nearly two days on a front of 8 miles against forces of four times their number. The desperate character of the fighting was only fully known when the losses came to be reckoned up. That division had 44 officers left out of 400, and 2,336 men out of 12,000. The 1st Brigade of the 1st Division had 8 officers left out of 153, and 500 men out of 5,000. The 2nd Royal Scots Fusiliers, to take one battalion, was reduced to 70 men commanded by a junior subaltern. That is the price which must be paid for fighting one against four. Major Bellenden in Old Mortality considered one to three the utmost possible odds, and "never knew any one who cared to take that except old Corporal Raddlebanes." At the First Battle of Ypres the British Army would have welcomed the Major's odds as a relief.

      On that Saturday morning things had grown very desperate. The 1st and 3rd Brigades of the 1st Division were driven out of Gheluvelt, our line gave way, and soon after midday we were back among the woods towards Veldhoek. This retirement uncovered the left of the 7th Division, which was then slowly bent back towards the Klein Zillebeke ridge. The enemy was beginning to pour through the Gheluvelt gap, and at the same time pressed hard on the whole arc of the Salient. We had no reserves except an odd battalion or two and some regiments of cavalry, all of which had already been sorely tried during the past days. Sir John French sent an urgent message to General Foch for reinforcements and was refused. At the end of the battle he learned the reason. Foch had none to send, and his own losses had been greater than ours.

      The Critical Day in the First Battle of Ypres.

      Between 2 and 2.30 p.m. Sir Douglas Haig, commanding the 1st Corps, was on the Menin road watching the situation. It seemed impossible to stop the gap, though on its northern side some South Wales Borderers were gallantly holding a sunken road and galling the flank of the German advance. He gave orders to retire to a line a little west of Hooge and stand there, though he well knew that no stand, however heroic, could save the town. He considered that a further retirement west of Ypres might be necessary, and with this Sir John French agreed.

      The news grew worse. The headquarters of the 1st and 2nd Divisions at Hooge Chateau had been shelled. The two commanders had been badly wounded and six of the Staff killed. Brigadiers took charge of divisions, and during that terrible afternoon officers were commanding any troops that happened to be near. It looked as if fate had designed to lay every conceivable burden on our breaking defences.

      And then suddenly out of the mad confusion came a strange story. A breathless Staff officer reported that something odd was happening north of the Menin road. The enemy advance had halted. Then came word that our 1st Division was re-forming. The anxious generals could scarcely believe their ears, for it sounded a sheer miracle; but presently came the proof, though it was not for months that the full tale was known.

      This is what had happened. Brigadier-General the Hon. Charles FitzClarence, V.C., commanding the 1st (Guards) Brigade in the 1st Division, had sent in his last reserves, and had failed to fill the gap in our line. He then rode off to the headquarters of the 1st Division to explain how desperate was the position. But on the way, at the south-west corner of the Polygon Wood, he stumbled upon a battalion waiting in support. It was the 2nd Worcesters, who were part of the right brigade of the 2nd Division. FitzClarence saw in them his last chance. They belonged to another division, but it was no time to stand on ceremony. Major Hankey, who commanded them, at once put them under FitzClarence's orders.

      The rain had begun and the dull wet haze of a Flanders autumn lay over the sour fields and broken spinneys between Hooge and Gheluvelt. The Worcesters, under very heavy artillery fire, advanced in a series of short rushes for about 1,000 yards between the right of the South Wales Borderers and the northern edge of Gheluvelt. There they dug themselves in, broke up the German advance into bunches, opened a heavy flank fire, and brought it to a standstill. This allowed the 7th Division to get back to its old line, and the 6th Cavalry Brigade to fill the gap between the 7th and 1st Divisions. Before night fell the German advance west of Gheluvelt was stayed, and the British front was out of immediate danger.

      That great performance of an historic English county regiment is one of the few instances in any campaign where the prompt decision of a subordinate commander and the prowess of one battalion have turned the tide of a great battle. It was the crucial moment of the First Battle of Ypres. Gheluvelt was lost, but the gap was closed, and the crisis was past. Eleven days later FitzClarence fell in the last spasm of the action—the fight with the Prussian Guard. He had done his work. Ypres was soon a heap of rubble, and for four years the Salient was a cockpit of war, but up to the last hour of the campaign no German entered the ruins of the little city except as a prisoner.

      CHAPTER V.

       THE CANADIANS AT THE SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES.

       Table of Contents

      The Salient of Ypres was to be a second time the scene of a heroic stand against hopeless odds. In April 1915 the front of the Salient was held by the French on the left, the Canadian Division and the British 28th Division in the centre, and the 27th Division on the right. On the 20th the Germans suddenly began the bombardment of the town with heavy shells. It was a warning to the British Command, for all their roads of supply for the lines of the Salient ran through Ypres, and such a bombardment must herald an attack on some part of their front.

      The evening of Thursday, the 22nd, was calm and pleasant, with a light, steady wind blowing from the north-east. About 6.30 our artillery observers reported that a strange green vapour was moving over the French trenches. Then, as the April night closed in and the great shells still rained upon Ypres, there were strange and ghastly scenes on the left between the canal and the Pilkem road. Back through the dusk came a stream of French soldiers, blinded and coughing, and wild with terror. Some black horror had come upon them, and they had broken before a more than human fear. Behind them they had left hundreds of their comrades stricken or dead, with horrible blue faces and froth on their lips.

      The rout surged over the canal, and the roads to the west were choked with broken infantry and galloping gun teams lacking their guns. Most of the French were coloured troops from Africa, and in the early darkness they stumbled upon the Canadian reserve battalions. With amazement the Canadians saw the wild dark faces, the heaving chests, and the lips speechless with agony. Then they too sniffed something in the breeze—something which caught at their throats and affected them with a deadly sickness.

      The Second Battle of Ypres.

      The immediate result of the stampede was a 5-mile breach in the Allied line. The remnants of the French troops were thrown back on the canal, where they were being pushed across by the German attack, and between them and the left of the Canadians were five miles of undefended country.

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