The viewing positions and maps are the same as recommended in the preceding chapter on the Royal Naval Divison.
See Map 11
‘At nightfall on the 13th, after the most bloody casualties, it was realised that the attack had again failed, but Lieutenant Colonel Freyberg, though wounded, collected every man who had got through the left of the German defences. This party of about 350 he led during the night up the spur to attack Beaucourt Redoubt. He took the redoubt and the remainder of the ridge, and next morning 5,000 Germael Freyberg won the battle of the Ancre. Probably this was the most distinguished act of the war.’
General Sir Beauvoir de Lisle, former GOC 29 Division, writing in ‘The Story of the 29th Division.’
After the withdrawal of the Royal Naval Divison from Gallipoli, Freyberg, with many others of the Hood Battalion, was able to go to England on leave. The fate of the Division was hanging in the balance, especially as the surplus of Royal Naval Reserve no longer existed. In fact he had determined to transfer to the Army, the commander of his Brigade recommending a man who had won the DSO, had been given command of his Battalion, and had been wounded. Amongst other things he wrote, ‘Commander Freyberg is gifted with the highest instincts of fearlessness, determination and leadership, and I cannot speak too highly of his admirable qualities. I am very pleased to record my high appreciation of him, with my strong recommendation for special employment in which these qualities are especially needed.’ In May 1916 he was gazetted a Captain in the Royal West Surrey (The Queen’s) Regiment, and made temporary Lieutenant Colonel commanding the Hood Battalion.
It was, perhaps, the arrival of Freyberg and fellow officers in London at this crucial time in the RND’s history that ensured its survival, more or less, in its post Gallipoli form, albeit with the addition of an army brigade. The greatest influence has been ascribed by some to AM (‘Oc’) Asquith, the Prime Minister’s son. There were many others who were influential in the Division, such as the Hon Vere Harmsworth, son of Lord Rothemere, proprietor of the Daily Mail. He was to be killed just beyond the redoubt that caused so much trouble early on in the November battle, and is now buried at the Ancre Cemetery. Rupert Brooke had been a member, others were prominent in literary and social circles — it had a high proportion of very intelligent and articulate men in its ranks.
The young Freyberg
Vere Harmsworth
It was to the hugely different warfare of the Western Front that Bernard Freyberg went in late May 1916. The RND spent the summer being inducted into these unaccustomed ways, a training period that was resented by many in the Division, but accepted by more level heads as a necessary part of adaptation to European war. The Battle of the Ancre was a long time coming, suffering frequent postponements; this inevitably produced considerable strain on all those concerned, as for a period of a month the Division was kept on two day’s standby for the attack.
When the great day came, the Hood Battalion was on the right of the Division and just to the left of the River Ancre. The minutes before the attack were tense, with the plan of attack requiring great numbers of troops to be packed in to a small area. Just before the start, Freyberg visited the forward units. “On the extreme right I stopped to talk to Kelly, who commanded B Company. I wanted to take both his hands and wish him ‘God speed’, but somehow it seemed too theatrical; instead we talked rather awkwardly, and synchronised our watches. I walked back along our sector, speaking to the men I recognised.” One of those who spoke to Freyberg on that cold, dank and misty morning was Joseph Murray, who wrote in Call to Arms: “I fancy I can see a figure approaching on my left; maybe it’s a ghost; I cannot hear any footsteps and there is no reason for anyone to be wandering about; we are all supposed to be sleeping. After what seems to be an eternity, I realise it is no ghost; it is the colonel, Colonel Freyberg, who is having a quiet chat with the chap in the next hole to me. I sit up with much difficulty. He apparently recognised an ‘old hand’…‘You, too, are still with us. So pleased to see you.
Beaucourt station.
The old church at Beaucourt, which was to the south and east of its present positon, in March 1916.
Make yourself as comfortable as you can and good luck. Do try to get some sleep.’ With these parting words he disappears in the darkness.”
The attack was launched at 5.45 am on November 13th, and the battalion set about its task. The first line was nothing more than an outpost, with resistance centred on the trenches immediately to the rear. This was honeycombed with deep dug-outs, connected to each other and to the second line, several hundred yards further back. They were lit with electricity and, in one case at least, were a hundred feet deep. The artillery had done its job, and the trenches were battered and smashed beyond a recognisable line — compasses, watches and the progress of the barrage were the only means of fixing position, as landmarks were non-existent. Lessons had been learnt — dug out entrances were lit up by the phospherous bombs that had been thrown down them, to minimise the risk of Germans coming up behind the advancing British troops.
The plan had by this stage broken down, with battalions being held up by the redoubt in the German front line to the left of the Hood attack. It was at times like these in the Great War that so much depended on the initiative of battalion commanders. Chief Petty Officer Tobin comments on the situation after the first rush: “…over the rise I saw Colonel Freyberg just prancing along all alone (his Adjutant and Signal Officer had been killed on the way up). He looked grand as he always did in battle, spick and span, in his best uniform. He said to me: ‘Hello, Tobin, I think we will get a VC today.”
So, by 8 am, the attack had been ground down, with the single notable success of the Hood Battalion, having moved to the Green Line. But the troops that were due to pass through them on to the Yellow Line had been largely destroyed in their advance. Freyberg decided that he would have to attack with what troops were available to him, making full use of the barrage that was timetabled to fall shortly before 9 am. They succeeded in capturing Engine and Beaucourt Trenches, but Beaucourt, tucked in behind a small ridge, remained in German hands. The Divisional commander (Shute) had decided to keep up the barrage because he was afraid, with some justification, that Freyberg’s men might be cut off, due to the failure of the attack on the left. The rest of the day and night was spent in the region of the Yellow Line. Perhaps the worst aspect of this position was the constant number of British shells that ‘dropped short’ — nothing could be done about it, because there was little prospect of a runner getting back alive with a message. Freyberg gives us this description of being under shellfire. “We could hear the report of the 9.2-inch guns being fired, and we strained to hear the sound of the approaching shells; first we heard a whistle which quickly swelled into a roar, culminating with a tremendous concussion; the impact of the earth of the quarter-ton projectile driven at that rate through the air was frightening — quite the most vicious sound imaginable.” That going on for many hours is a ready explanation for shell shock.
There were, even then, lighter moments. A large German ration and postal dump had been captured, and the joys of cigars, cigarettes and some liquor helped to calm nerves during these tense hours. “My orderly room clerk discovered a jar of liquor, rather like rum in appearance and strength. After having drunk a good deal, he climbed out of the shell hole, and lay in full view of the enemy position, his commander thought, killed. He lay there all the afternoon until dusk, when they pulled him in by the legs, to find him untouched!”
During the night reinforcements had arrived, and Freyberg extended his left. Confusion was rampant, as several different battalion were now in the line, with several different, and frequently contrary, orders. Despite all this, the attack went ahead; Freyberg was hit, “I had not gone ten yards when a bullet hit my tin helmet, breaking my chin strap and knocking me on my back.” He was not hopeful of great success, when suddenly hundreds of Germans emerged from dug-outs to surrender. Freyberg had already been wounded twice, and was wounded a third time when an egg grenade found him caught up in barbed wire; although he hit the ground (so far as that was possible) he was hit by several splinters. Although the village was captured, it was essential to move the hundreds of troops that were bearing down on it out of the village before the Germans launched a fierce artillery barrage, once the fact of its loss had been confirmed. It was soon after this that Freyberg’s career with the RND was to be brought to an end: “…then there was a bang, a curious ringing note in my ear and I lost consciousness. When I came to my head gave me a good deal of pain, and as I lay downwards hot blood was dropping from my nose and chin. I thought at first my head had been smashed, but I located the wound in my neck with two dirty fingers.” He had suffered a huge gash, which had stripped the muscle to the vertebrae. Freyberg’s main concern was to warn the other battalion commanders that he was out of action, that they would have to shift for themselves and work through General Shute.
He was able to walk back (with assistance) to the RAP, situated by Railway Road at the foot of a steep bank. It was at this point that the pressure and physical injury had their impact on the man: “With the loss of blood, and the immobility, all resistance broke down, and it was a much frightened man who was carried back along the shelled road. At the field dressing station he was at first put in a tent reserved for those who should be made comfortable before death overtook them; a Captain Greaves had him removed and treated him. In 1941, in Cairo, Freyberg asked Greaves if he had been on the Ancre in November 1916 — he had recognised him simply by his voice.
The wounded await further evacuation. Note the dockets on some of the men, indicating the nature of the wounds and treatment given.
In mid-December 1916 his award of the Victoria Cross was announced in the Gazette, the citation ending: ‘The personality, valour and utter contempt of danger on the part of this single officer enabled the lodgement in the most advanced objective of the Corps to be permanently held, and on this point d’appui the line was eventually formed.”
Bernard Freyberg, the small boy from Richmond, Surrey who had emigrated with his parents to New Zealand and then returned to England when grown up, had achieved one of his great ambitions. He was to go on to even greater things. He returned to the Hoods in March 1917, but just two days before an attack near Arras in late April, he was appointed a Brigade commander (173 Brigade) of the 58th (London) Division. He had just turned twenty eight years old, and was the second youngest Brigade commander in the war — only ‘Boy’ Bradford held such a command at a younger age. In January 1918 he was moved to command the 88th Brigade, in the 29th Division — another connection with the Ancre sector of the Somme — and including within the Brigade the Royal Newfoundland Regiment. He also earned the unusual distinction for a brigade commander of winning not one but two DSOs — the last one for an action that ended at 10.59 am on the 11th November 1918. He was to add another one to his collection in 1945, during the Italian campaign.
After the war Freyberg stayed in the army — but as a Captain in the Grenadier Guards. Promotion followed steadily, until he retired as a Major-General in 1937. Soon after the outbreak of the Second World War he was chosen by the New Zealand Government to command their forces; he was C-in C in the ill-fated Crete adventure, and after the war was Governor-General of New Zealand, from 1946 to 1952. He returned to England and was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Windsor Castle, where he lived until his death. In 1922 he was married, in the remote and ancient church of St Martha’s, near Chilworth on the hills above Guildford, sited on the old pilgrim’s route to Canterbury. He died in 1963, and he lies now in that Churchyard surrounded by the beauties of the Surrey countryside. His gravestone says simply: Freyberg VC.
Bernard Freyberg VC