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The Western Front Association Stand To! No. 91 'Two Minor Demonstrations': The 1/1st Battalion's Raids on the Ancre, 16-17 by Michael Dorey

Trench raiding was an integral but controversial land close to the German wire listening for the Givenchy- region but in August tactic in wmfare on the Western Front during sounds of enemy movement and activity and 1916 the division moved south and went into the the Great Wm: This article examines the seeking weak points in the enemy's defences. line near Hamel, abutting the River Ancre and experiences of the 1/1st Battalion of the One Yorkshire infantryman of the 4/5 Black overlooked by the notorious Schwaben Redoubt Cambridgeshire in 1916, focusing Watch thought these operations were 'much like and the machine-gun garrison of Thiepval. The on two raids carried out simultaneously on one the playing at Indians of our boyhood'. <3l More Cambridgeshires, alternating with 4/5 Black night just to the north ofthe RiverAncre at a time dangerous were stronger patrols, sometimes Watch, held the right flank north of the Ancre, when most British resources were concentrated called 'demonstrations', which sought briefly to which included the marshy ground along the further south on the Somme. Occurring between enter the German front line in search of tactical northern bank of the river. two major actions on this section of the front, intelligence and the capture of a prisoner. These In June at Givenchy Lieutenant Colonel they were part of a wider policy that sought would comprise at least one officer and from Edward Pius Arthur Riddell had taken command British domination of no man's land. The raids, a dozen to 20 men. Casualties were frequent of the battalion, which at the tim~ was regarded howeve1; were calamitous and resulted in the from these incursions. Finally, there were large, with suspicion - it had been 'thor6ughly strafed' deaths offour officers, ensuring that, as far as -supported raids, with 2 or 3 officers at an inspection by a new brigadier in April officers of the battalion were concerned, small leading from 80 to 100 men into a mini-battle. and its use as a training battalion suggests that actions were as potentially fatal as full-scale With the soldiers blackening their faces and official confidence in its fighting capacity was battles on the Western Front during 1916. festooned with an assortment of diabolical low. <6l A Boer War veteran who had transfened weapons-nailed wooden clubs and medieval­ to the Rifle Brigade, Riddell was determined Trench warfare and trench raiding style metal maces as well as bombs and to improve his battalio!i.'s reputation. Acting The huge casualty figures resulting from such knives-these larger raids might be compared as 'a new broom' whilst the battalion was major battles as Loos (1915), the Somme with the 'cutting-out' operations favoured by still holding the line around Givenchy and (1916) and Passchendaele (1917) still attract crews of frigates during the era of Nelson. Festubert, he sought to forge self-respect in the attention today, but the persistent number of The higher military authorities justified battalion by remodelling the billets, latrines killed, wounded and missing duting the long trench raiding in a number of ways. Some, and cook-houses and establishing plunge­ intervening periods of static trench warfare such as the influence of raids on raising British baths for his men out of wagon tarpaulins. The on the Western front also have the capacity to and diminishing German morale, remain war diary shows that throughout the summer, surprise. The daily casualty lists of battalions controversial. Other rationales are more working parties permitting, he put the battalion in the line fluctuated. Although normally quite persuasive. Knowing which enemy units were through an intensive programme of training for small, there were occasions when a sustained in the opposite trench, how they had organised the coming offensive. As a result of his efforts, artillery bombardment or a lucky strike could their defensive positions and knowledge of Riddell later claimed, 'The whole spirit, military cause significant casualties in an instant. Thus by their strength and movements could be valuable knowledge, and bodily and mental condition of the end of a tour of duty the cumulative effect of intelligence, both at battalion, brigade and all ranks grew and prospered'. By the time the small but regular losses could place a strain on divisional levels. One of the most persuasive battalion marched to the Ancre he was 'watching morale and raise doubts about competence. For arguments in favour of patrols and raids, their improvement as a trainer watches a much 7 instance, the young subaltern Anthony Eden, however, was the need for subalterns to gain prized racehorse'. < l of 21st King's Royal Rifle Corps, wrote of the experience of no man's land under conditions Riddell was a thorough, meticulous planner, inevitable trickle of casualties in the trenches: that tested their leadership qualities and their anxious to obtain intelligence on every part 4 'I loathed each one of them. For more than six nerve. < l Others might have disagreed, but for of the terrain beyond the frontline, both at months now we had worked hard and trained Anthony Eden, 'our activities in no-man's-land Givenchy and on the Ancre. On the evening together in our small group, No. 9 Platoon. I became a war within a war and, for me at least, of 2 July he brought all his officers together had grown to know my riflemen and liked them the more meaningful part of it', whilst Charles to give a short address on the 'value of detail, immensely. I tried to put out of my mind the Carrington, moving beyond his company's wire and on the attack'.

5 The Western Front Association Stand To! No. 91 scouting officer Lieutenant R H Carrette was with the result that the 4/5 fell acting capacity since . OBJ wounded on 3 July, one other rank on the night back to its original line. At one point the threat Adam was to play a crucial role in one of of 15-16 July and another on the following of a gap appeared in the British line as a German the raids on 16-17 September, together with night. During the next night Temporary Captain counter-attack developed. On his own initiative, Lieutenant William Shaw, who had replaced R J Tebbutt, of 'A' Company, was shot in the Riddell ordered his battalion up to fill the gap Herman as 2/IC 'A' Company. The only son of back whilst on patrol (one of three brothers in and stopped the enemy attack successfully. a widow-he was just a baby when his father, the regiment, he was the only one to survive the No progress was thus made on the day, but a farmer, died in 1894-Shaw came from no war). c9l Riddell found the men 'elated at the success privileged background. His mother, an official of their efforts ... laughing, smoking, eating, University lodging-house keeper, Officer casualties and talking about the prospects of getting tea was a superior servant, but her position gave These patrols were preliminary to major raids sent up to them'. 0 3) Casualties were one officer Shaw an unusual perspective on students and along the whole X Corps front on 19 July. killed and four wounded with fourteen other their lives. Although he left school to become an Artillery barrages preceded these attacks ranks killed or died of wounds and forty-seven apprentice organ builder, he had ambitions and and smoke bombs were used on the 1/1 wounded. c14l talents. In 1914 he matriculated at Fitzwilliam Cambridgeshire front. The battalion's objective Hall, Cambridge, which enabled him to study was to enter the German front line just to the The raids on 16/17 September 1916 for a degree without being a member of a north of La Bassee Canal. The raiding party When the British bombardment began in the college. He joined the university OTC as a cadet comprised 120 men and 5 officers. The German early hours of 3 September Riddell had heard and on 14 was commissioned wire was found to be uncut and 'a very formidable one of his young officers shout excitedly: into the 1/1 Cambridgeshire. 0 9l He went to obstacle', but a few officers and men managed to 'Nothing on earth can withstand that. Will this France with the battalion in February 1915, get through and throw bombs into a trench full mean the end of the war?' osJ This optimist was fought at Second Y pres and was mentioned in 2 of 'demoralized Boches firing straight up into the 22-year-old Captain Arthur Innes Adam, despatches in January 1916. c o) By September the air'. Forced to withdraw (with some men late of Winchester and Balliol College, Oxford. 1916, therefore, he was an experienced trench returning safely only the following afternoon), officer. casualties amongst the officers were high. Second Lieutenant Arthur Looker managed to A shanty on the Ancre walk back to his lines, though suffering from On 12 September the battalion relieved 4/5 wounds in his hands, his stomach and his foot, Black Watch in the Hamel right section of the to receive a DSO for keeping the enemy at bay trenches. C21 l This area included a detached post whilst the wounded were withdrawn. A South - a mill on the edge of the Ancre. African like Vaughan, he survived his wounds, It was from here between 1.00 am and 3.15 but was subsequently posted to the 3rd King's am on the morning of the 13th that a patrol from African Rifles. He was to die, aged only 45, in 'A' Company moved up the northern bank of the 10 , in 1926. C l river, pacing out the route and making detailed Two other officers died in the raid. Lieutenant notes of the terrain and every object they George Herman, a product of Winchester passed: hedges, trees and barbed wire. They and Trinity College, Cambridge and 2 I!C 'A' eventually saw, across the river, what the war Company, was reported missing and his body diary described as a shanty, from within which never found, despite the efforts of a search patrol they heard a man coughing. Another patrol from 1/6 Cheshires. Yet another South African, the next night discovered that the shanty was Second Lieutenant Guy Rawlinson, who had in fact a brick emplacement (in Riddell's later been commissioned in the Cambridgeshire words, 'a strong-point'), close to the German Regiment in 1915 after service with the Natal second line, in which three men were working. Carbineers, was capturM but died of his wounds The alarm was raised, whistles were blown and on 23 July. Riddell informed his parents, who the Germans emerged from their workplace had thirteen other children, that Rawlinson 'was Captain Arthur Innes Adam wearing their equipment. The patrol managed last seen alive in the German trenches, fighting to retire without casualties. But Adam and like the brave man we all knew him to be'. Clll Adam, brother of the subsequently celebrated Shaw were now hatching a plan. Officer casualties in this operation - which sociologist Baroness Wootton, had joined the In the meantime, under divisional orders to appear to have, been disproportionate (only one battalion in and had had a swift . maintain pressure on the front, Riddell was other rank was killed and six wounded) - were baptism of fire. On his first day in the trenches reluctantly planning a large raid to be carried compounded by the sniping of two subalterns two officers were mortally wounded, one, out by 'C' Company under the command of the on 20 July, one of whom died. Lieutenant Hugh Crookham, having arrived 23-year-old Captain Francis Marr. Like Adam, Imme!diately on arrival at the Ancre front on with him, and on 2 July he was himself slightly Marr was the son of a Cambridge Don. He had 26 August, Riddell ordered three night patrols wounded in the hand by a sniper. Like Rudyard joined the battalion in France in April1915 and to begin the process of gaining familiarity Kipling's son John, Adam was extremely was to survive the war as a brigade major with with the new conditions. Every night for the short-sighted and had only passed the army a DSO and MC. He died in 1942 when aU-boat next week patrols were out, often in very bad medical after finding a sympathetic doctor who torpedoed the SS City of Cairo. weather, as it was known that a major attack allowed him to take the eye test whilst wearing Among the officers who were to take part in was planned for 3 September. They reported his spectacles. He had been a child prodigy, this raid was Second Lieutenant Henry Blythe on shell damage to the German wire and also reading the Biblical Job and Jeremiah at the King Allpass, known as Rex to his friends and made gaps in the British wire preparatory to the tender age of three. Like so many of his fellow regrettably called 'Allpress' in the regimental battle. This was for the benefit of the 4/5 Black subalterns, with his love of music and the history. The son of a clergyman who had revived Watch, which had been ordered to carry out the Classics, his high-pitched voice and very fair the ancient but moribund Sir George Monad attack on 3 September on this part of the front. hair-at Balliol he was nicknamed 'The Mouse' School in Chigwell, Allpass had obtained The Cambridgeshires were to be in support. and among the soldiers of his Company he was a First Class Honours degree in Modern The objectives of the 39th Division on 3 'Parson Snowy'-he was an unlikely warrior in Languages at Exeter College, Oxford, where September were to take three lines of German an age of industrialised carnage. 0 6l He often one of his friends was J R R Tolkien and where trenches on a spur south of Beaumont Hamel confessed to his mother, a widow and academic, he had had the misfortune to fail to prevent a and then advance up the valley of the Ancre, that he had little prowess as an officer and that depressed student friend from shooting himself. 22 protecting the left flank of 49th Division the cause of his enlistment had been 'a desire c l In he took up the position of 2 advancing on the other side of the river. 0 l 118 · to become a little less irresolute'. (l?l Riddell, Head of Modern Languages at St Bees School Brigade's attack began well, but failure south however, had seen beyond this diffidence in in Whitehaven, where he also commanded the of the river led to the attackers being enfiladed Adam to confirm his position as commander of Junior OTC. Now acknowledged as one of the from the Schwaben Redoubt and its environs, 'A' Company, which he had been holding in an 'War Poets' and a Fabian in politics, he was also

6 The Western Front Association Stand To! No. 91 reserve battalion of the , so he organised an attachment to the Cambtidgeshires, joining the 1/1st in the trenches in mid-. He was appointed Bombing Officer, was present at the 3 September defence of the line and was recommended for the Military Cross.

The mill by the banks of the Ancre at StPierre Divion. IWM Second Lieutenant Henry A/pass a comic writer of some talent. He wrote for suggested that his daily role of inspecting the The objectives of thli, raid under Marr, The Westminster Review and Isis and, having kit of five cooks and his sergeant was 'rather an according to the war diary, were 'to enter the received a commission in the Essex Regiment arid life for a Man with a Moustache'. (23 l enemy's trenches, kill Germans and obtain in , edited the magazine Stars for Like Adam and many other young men, identifications', but the chances of catching the Subaltems at Halton Camp. In this he published Allpass' view of the war was ambiguous. Germans by surprise were minimal, for their a series of whimsical letters to his mother, He wanted it to stop, but not before he had greatly reinforced barbed wire defences required portraying himself as a bumbling innocent: experienced it firsthand: 'A week in the trenches, daily artillery and trench mortar bombardments mistaking the adjutant for his colonel and one charge, the DSO (which is much more before action could be contemplated. Facing another colonel for a railway porter; forgetting dignified than a VC), and a wound in my left the 1/lst Battalion, moreover, was the 119th to wear his Sam Browne belt in public; and arm' was his preference, (one of his two brothers Reserve Regiment, comprising mainly calling his batman by the wrong name for had been killed with the Wiirttemburgers with a high reputation as a three long months. He gently parodied some in at .) There was little fighting unit. Riddell had little confidence in of the army's more arcane customs, as when he chance of his achieving his aim whilst in a the plan, but gave his approval once it had been

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The Western Front Association Stand To! No. 91

Trench map of the Ancre Sector- Robert's Trench picked out in green The Western Front Association Stand To! No. 91 reported that the wire had been cut. He was more Summer House. After an exchange of bombs and them, occurred for tactical and strategic reasons, sanguine about the other, smaller raid that Adam rifle fire which, according to the war diary, left not in order to give young subaltems experience and Shaw had proposed, which would involve a several of the defenders dead, the raiders were · of warfare. None was fighting out of a sense of small number of men, led by Shaw, who, using a forced to withdraw. As they crawled back to the nafve idealism. Misfortune turned into tragedy ladder to cross the trickle that was then the River stream, it was discovered that a wounded man because of the strong esprit de corps that Riddell Ancre, would either capture or kill the' garrison' had been left behind. Fatally, Adam and Shaw, had infused into the battalion. A wounded man in the shanty (now called 'the Summer House'). either separately or together, decided to return to could not be left alone without some attempt to The larger raid would begin first and would act find him. Close to the Summer House both were rescue him. From this unwritten rule, eve1ything as a diversion for the smaller one. hit by machine-gun fire. In the meantime the rest else followed. Riddell was right to be pessimistic. During of the party had returned safely to the mill. There Michael Durey was educated at the University the night of the 16th, no sooner had the British Butlin decided to take his orderly and Bradford of York (UK) and now lives in Perth, Westem banage begun and 'C' Company moved out of back to find the missing officers. They found Australia. He is Book Review Editor for the Roberts Trench than a strong German counter­ them lying in a very exposed position. Ordering Australian maritime joumal, The Great Circle. barrage struck no man's land. The troops Bradford back to get help, Butlin remained with managed to reach the wire, only to find it the wounded men. A stretcher was brought up References uncut. The enemy front line was also strongly and Butlin was in the process of placing the OJ Eden, A: Another World 1897-1917 (Allen ganisoned, although the war diary claimed they more badly wounded Shaw on it when he too Lane, 1976), pp.77-78. 'had the wind up'. Man's men were forced back was shot, together with one of the bearers, who (ZJ Adam, A. M: Arthur Innes Adam (Bowes to Roberts Trench. Unfortunately, Allpass had managed to crawl away. Butlin then ordered the and Bowes, 1920, reprinted BiblioLife, somehow managed to get through some of the other stretcher-bearer to get further assistance. 2009), p.164. wire. He was last seen lying badly wounded By now dawn was breaking and Riddell, <3l Andrews, W. L: Haunting Yeah: The beyond the reach of the stretcher-bearers. It was having moved to the mill, denied pennission to Commentaries of a War Territorial hoped that he might have been taken prisoner, Bradford to return to the wounded by the route (Hutchinson, 1930, reprinted 2001), p.107. 4 but he was never seen again. One other rank was used by the raiding party, but he did allow him < l Holmes, R: Tommy: The British Soldier also reported missing and eight were wounded. and his own orderly, Lance Corporal William on the Western Front 1914-1918 (Harper Just to the south a larger tragedy was unfolding. Nightingale, to seek a passage to the wounded Perennial, 2005), pp.311-14; Griffith, P: In addition to Adam and Shaw, two other officers through the dense rushes near the bank of the Battle Tactics of the Western Front (Yale were involved in the raid on the Summer House. river. Sometimes up to their necks in water, they University Press, 1994), pp.61-62. In defensive support was Lieutenant Alfred managed to find the right place, but no bodies <5l Eden, op.cit., p. 77; Carrington, C: Soldiers 24 Bradford, the Lewis Gun Officer. Bom in 1894, were visible. < l Both returned safely, although from the War Returning (Hutchinson, 1965, he had attended Bedford Grammar School; his Riddell had to creep out to re-direct Nightingale, reprinted Pen & SWord Books, 2006), father, a widower, was owner of the imposing who had lost direction and was heading towards p.95. 6 University Arms Hotel in Camblidge. Bradford a German trench. It was surmised that the < l Riddell, Brigadier-General E. and Clayton, initially enlisted in the , Germans had taken the wounded into their Colonel M. C: The Cambridgeshires 1914 was commissioned in May 1915 and joined the trenches as prisoners. All three, however, died, to 1919 (Bowes and Bowes, 1934), p. 32; 1/lst in France not long after Adam. Finally, Shaw as late as 27 September. The Germans Adam, op.cit., p.213. 7 overseeing the operation from the mill was the buried them, but Butlin's body, like Allpass', was < l Riddell & Clayton, op.cit., pp.36, 39. Adjutant, Captain Sir Guy Butlin. A 23-year-old never recovered. These two are commemorated <8l War Diary, 1/lst Cambridgeshire Battalion, Old Harrovian whose father had been President on the Thiepval Memorial. Adam's remains TNA, WO 95/2590, 2 July 1916. of the Royal College of Surgeons, Butlin had were later exhumed from a small graveyard <9l Officers Died in the Great War 1914-19 graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge in and reburied in the Achiet-le-Grand Communal ( 1919), p.244. 10 1914 and was training to become a ban·ister Cemetery Extension. Shaw's body now lies in < l [Melbourne] The Argus, 8 April1926. when war broke out. He inmlediately joined the the Porte-de-Paris Cemetery, Cambrai. Oil De Ruvigny's Roll of Honour 1914-18 Cambridgeshire Regiment and went to France (Naval and Military Press, n.d.), Vol. IV, with the 1/lst in February 1915. Thus, like all Aftermath p.165. the other officers involved in the operation, he The 1/1 Cambridgeshire played only a small <12l Miles, Captain W: History ofthe Great War: was very experienced in trench warfare. role in the major offensives of 1916 on the Military Operations France and Somme battlefront. This explains why the (1938, reprinted linperial War Museum, significant impact of trench warfare on the n.d.), Vol. 2, p.279. 13 battalion's officer casualties was atypical. < l Riddell and Clayton, op.cit., p.47. 14 Fifteen battalion officers were killed in 1916, < l War Diary and Commonwealth War Graves six, including Bradford, during the battalion's Commission data. one major attack in October during the Battle <15l Riddell and Clayton, op.cit., p.44. of the Ancre Heights. Altogether, seven were <16l Balliol College War Memorial Book, killed in offensives, one in the trenches and no Vol. 1. 1 fewer than seven in trench raids. Raiding tactics < 7l Adam, op.cit., p.l61. 18 were still being developed, by trial and error, in < l Obituary, British Medical Journal, 1916 and were to improve as the war ground 15 . 19 on, but they were always capable of producing < l London Gazette, 13 October 1914. significant casualties. In more ways than one, <20l National Archives, Medal Index Card. therefore, they might be seen as offensives 'in <21l 1/lst Cambridgeshire War Diary, 12 miniature' as well as useful training for larger September 1916. 25 22 operations. < l < l Garth, J. 'Tolkien, Exeter College and the In the regimental history Riddell called the Great War', in http://www.johngarth.co.uk/ Summer House raid 'a deplorable adventure' php/tolkien_exeter_great_war.php. 23 Captain Sir Guy Butlin and regretted Adam's decision to accompany < l Allpass, H. B. K: Oxford, St Bees and the the raiding party. 'As a soldier he was wrong', Front (T. Werner Laurie, 1920), pp.l-8. 24 Fiasco he wrote, but 'as they were all mere lads', none < l Harrow Memorials of the Great War 26 For reasons that remain unknown, Adam went could be blamed for the consequences. < l It is (1918), in http://www.archive.org/details/ part of the way with Shaw and the eight other true that all involved were young, either aged harrowmemorials04warn. 25 ranks on the bombing mission, remaining on 22 or 23, but they were not inexperienced. All < l Griffith, op.cit., p.l93; Spagnoly, T. and the northern bank where the ladder had been but Allpass had been in France for more than Smith, T: The Anatomy of a Raid: Australia placed. The attack was a fiasco. The previous a year; Adam was a company commander and at Celtic Wood 9th (Leo nightly patrols had put the Germans on alert and Butlin was the battalion's adjutant. These 'two Cooper, 1998). they had set up a machine-gun post to cover the minor demonstrations', as the war diary called <26l Riddell and Clayton, op.cit., pp.54-55.

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