II THE FIRST CHARGE

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July 2

It is possible now to get something like a clear idea of the fighting which began yesterday morning at 7.30, when the furious tempest of our guns passed farther over the German lines and our infantry left their trenches for the great adventure.

The battle goes on, with success to our arms. Fricourt, partly surrounded yesterday (by the 21st Division), was taken by assault to-day, and a German counter-attack upon Montauban was repulsed with losses that tore gaps into the enemy’s ranks. Prisoners come tramping down in batches, weary, worn men, who have the gallantry to praise our own infantry and remember with a shudder the violence of our gun-fire.

Wounded men who are coming out of the fighting-lines ask one question, “How are we doing?” Men suffering great pain have a smile in their eyes when the answer comes, “We are doing well.” The spirit of our men is so high that it is certain we shall gain further ground, however great the cost.

The ground we have already gained was won by men who fought to win, and who went “all out,” as they say, with a fierce enthusiasm to carry their objective, quickly and utterly and cleanly. This wonderful spirit of the men is praised by all their officers as a kind of new revelation, though they saw them in trench life and in hard times.

“They went across toppingly,” said a wounded boy of the West Yorkshires, who was in the first attack on Fricourt. “The fellows were glorious,” said another young officer who could hardly speak for the pain in his left shoulder, where a piece of shell struck him down in Mametz Wood. “Wonderful chaps!” said a lieutenant of the Manchesters. “They went cheering through machine-gun fire as though it were just the splashing of rain.... They beat everything for real pluck.”

They beat everything for pluck except their own officers, who, as usual, led their men forward without a thought of their own risks.

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The attack on Montauban was one of our best successes yesterday. The men were mainly Lancashire troops (of the Manchester Regiment) supported by men of the Home Counties, including those of Surrey, Kent, Essex, Bedford, and Norfolk. They advanced in splendid order straight for their objective, swept over the German trenches, and captured large numbers of prisoners, without great loss to themselves.

Their commanding officers were anxious about a German strong point called the Briqueterie, or brickfield, which had been full of machine-guns and minenwerfers, and the original intention was to pass this without a direct attempt to take it.

But the position was found to be utterly destroyed by our bombardment, and a party of men (the Liverpools) were detached to seize it, which they did with comparative ease. The remainder of the men in those battalions went on to the ruined village of Montauban and, in spite of spasmodic machine-gun fire from some of the broken houses, carried it in one great flood of invasion.

Large numbers of Germans were taking cover in dug-outs and cellars, but as soon as our men entered they came up into the open and surrendered. Many of them were so cowed by the great bombardment they had suffered and by the waves of men that swept into their stronghold that they fell upon their knees and begged most piteously for mercy, which was granted to them.

The loss of Montauban was serious to the enemy, and they prepared a counter-attack, which was launched this morning, at 3 o’clock, at a strength of two regiments. Our men were expecting this and had organised their defence. The Germans came on in close order, very bravely, rank after rank advancing over the dead and wounded bodies of their comrades, who were caught by our machine-gun fire and rifle-fire and mown down. Only a few men were able to enter our trenches, and these died. Montauban remains in our hands, and so far the enemy has not attempted another attack.

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Our line winds round the village in a sharp salient which drops south-eastwards to Mametz, which is full of German dead and wounded, who are being found in the cellars and taken back to our hospitals. It was in the taking of Mametz that some of the Gordons suffered heavily. With English troops they advanced across the open with sloped arms. There was very little shell-fire and not a rifle-shot came from the enemy’s broken trenches.

“Suddenly,” says one of their officers, “a machine-gun opened fire upon us point-blank, and caught us in the face. I shouted to my men to advance at the double, and we ran forward through a perfect stream of shattering bullets. Many of my poor boys dropped, and then I fell and knew nothing more for a while. But afterwards I heard that we had taken Mametz, and hold it still.... My Gordons were fine, but we had bad luck.”

It was the fire of German machine-guns which was most trying to our men. Again and again soldiers have told me to-day that the hard time came when these bullets began to play upon them. In spite of our enormous bombardment there remained here and there, even in a front-line trench, a machine-gun emplacement so strongly built with steel girders and concrete cover that it had defied our high explosives. And inside were men who were defiant also.

A young officer of the Northumberland Fusiliers paid a high tribute to them. “They are wonderful men,” he said, “and work their machines until they are bombed to death. In the trenches by Fricourt they stayed on when all the other men had either been killed or wounded, and would neither surrender nor escape. It was the same at Loos, and it would not be sporting of us if we did not say so, though they have knocked out so many of our best.”

The same opinion in almost the same words was given to me to-day by many men whose bodies bore witness to these German Maxims, and though their words were a tribute to the enemy, they also proved the fine generosity in the heart of our own men.

While the attacks were being made on Montauban and Mametz very hard fighting was in progress on the left, or western, side of our line from Gommecourt downwards. So far I have heard very little of the action at Gommecourt, where the German salient was most difficult to assault owing to formidable defences. In that direction our progress has not been great.

Farther south at Ovillers and La Boisselle our attacks were rather more fortunate, and some ground was gained with great loss in life to the enemy, though not without many casualties to ourselves. Fortunately, as in all this fighting, the proportion of lightly wounded men is wonderfully high.

The advance upon the ridge of La Boisselle was a splendid and memorable thing. The men who took part in it were hard, tough fellows who fear neither man nor devil, nor engines of war. They went forward cheering, and the Tyneside pipers played on their men. The German guns were flinging Jack Johnsons over, but they did not inflict much damage, and the men jeered at them.

“Silly old five-point-nine crumps!” said a young officer to-day who had been among them. “They only made a beastly stink and the devil of a noise. It was the machine-guns which did all the work.”

The machine-guns were enfilading our men from La Boisselle, and from the high ground above their bullets came pattering down in showers, so that when they hit men in the shoulder they came out at the wrist. They swept No Man’s Land like a scythe.

But our troops passed on steadily with fixed bayonets at parade step, not turning their heads when comrades dropped to right and left of them. They took the first line of German trenches, which were blown to dust-heaps with the bodies of the men who had held them. In the second line there were men still living, and still resolute enough to defend themselves. They were bombed out of this position, and our men went on to the third line still under machine-gun fire.

“It seemed to me,” said a Lincolnshire lad, “as if there was a machine-gun to every five men.” Without exaggeration there were many of these machines and they were served skilfully and terribly by their gunners. Beyond La Boisselle, which was pressed on one side, the fire became very intense. High explosives, shrapnel, and trench-mortars ploughed up the ground.

“They threw everything at us except half-croons,” said a man of the Royal Scots.

It was the Royal Scots who charged with the bayonet into a body of German troops, and the other battalions advanced at the double and captured batches of men who had no more stomach for the fight.

Some of the hardest fighting at La Boisselle was done by men of Dorset and Manchester with Highland Light Infantry and Borderers. They had an easy time over the front line, but when the second was reached had to engage in a battle of bombs with a large body of Germans. This resistance was broken down and when there was a show of bayonets the enemy surrendered. They were haggard men, who had suffered, like most of our prisoners, from long hunger and thirst as our bombardment had cut off their supplies and broken the water-pipes.

Farther north there was a severe struggle for the possession of Thiépval, which was once in our hands but is now again in the enemy’s grip. It is clear from all the evidence I can get that our men passed beyond to a further objective without staying to clear out the dug-outs where Germans were in hiding or to search for all the machine-gun emplacements. The enemy came out of their hiding-places and served their machine-guns upon the British troops who had gone forward.

A sergeant-major of the Manchesters, who took part in one of the attacks which followed each other in waves upon the Thiépval positions, says that he and his comrades forced their way across the front trenches and had to walk over the bodies of large numbers of German dead, who had fallen in the bombardment. With his regiment he went forward into a wood known to the men as “Blighty,” and then fell wounded.

Machine-gun bullets and shrapnel were slashing through it with a storm of lead, lopping off branches and ricochetting from the tree-trunks. The men stood this ordeal superbly, and those who were not wounded fought their way through towards the village. Some battalions working on the left of Thiépval had a very severe ordeal. One of them, wounded, told me that they seized the first system of trenches in the face of machine-gun fire and captured the men who remained alive in the dug-outs.

They were deep dug-outs, going 30 feet below ground, and in some cases, even at that depth, had trap-doors leading to still lower chambers, so that our bombardment had not touched them. Many of them were elaborately fitted and furnished, and were well stocked with wine and beer. A great deal of correspondence was found and sent back to our lines in sandbags.

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It was when our men advanced upon the Thiépval woods that they had their hardest hours, for the enemy’s fire was heavy, and they had to pass through an intense barrage. Meanwhile big fighting was in progress at Fricourt, and some of the North-countrymen had a great ordeal of fire. They have done magnificently, and Fricourt is ours.

Other troops were engaged, for masses of men of many British regiments advanced on both sides of the village endeavouring to get possession of Shelter Wood, Lozenge Wood, and the high ground to the north of the village from the position known as the Crucifix. Large numbers of Germans were killed and wounded, but the garrison of Fricourt maintained a very stout resistance, and until this morning our attacks did not succeed in taking this stronghold, although it was nearly surrounded.

Heroic acts were done by our men, as I know from the comrades who were with them. One boy of eighteen, to give only one instance, was so good a captain, although a private soldier, that when the officers of his platoon had fallen he rallied the men and led them forward. “Come on, my lads,” he cried. “We’ll get them out!” A pipe-major of the Royal Scots led this battalion forward to an old Scottish tune, and during the attack stood out alone in No Man’s Land playing still until he fell wounded.

Early this morning a very fine flanking attack was made on Fricourt by the men who had held on to the ground during the night, and Crucifix Trench was taken after the explosion of two big mines. The attack then closed in, one body of troops working round to the north and another fighting their way round the south side in order to get the village within a pair of tongs.

The operation succeeded and the village was taken, but fighting still went on to gain possession of the high ridge above. A whole company of German soldiers were seen to come suddenly across the open with their hands up. Other men straggled singly over the shell-beaten ground to surrender to our men.

But the enemy’s guns put up a heavy barrage of shrapnel and high explosives when our men tried to advance along the ridge, and from the upper end of the Fricourt Wood there came the incessant clatter of machine-gun fire. Our attack did not falter, and as far as I can learn the position to-night is good.

Here, then, are some scraps of fact about a great battle still in progress and covering a wide stretch of ground, in which many separate actions are taking place. It is impossible for an eye-witness to see more than a corner of these battlefields, and at this hour for one man to write a clear, straight chronicle of so great an adventure. I have been travelling to-day about the lines, trying to gather the threads together, talking to many of our fighting men, going among the wounded and the prisoners, and in the intense and immediate interest of this great drama of war which is all about me, trying to get at the latest facts of our progress from hour to hour.

But what I have written is only the odds and ends of a long heroic story which must be written later with fuller knowledge of men and deeds. Only one thing is really very clear and shining in all this turmoil of two days of battle—it is the unconquerable spirit of our men.