This is a brief note to give some indication as to what happened on July 1st 1916 between the north bank of the River Ancre and the Redan Ridge, which rises to the north above Beaumont Hamel.
See Map 4
The boundary between X Corps to the south and VIII Corps to the north went through Mary Redan eastwards towards Beaucourt Station, and then followed the route of the railway line. This same boundary marked the divide between the ‘Incomparable’ (the name they had given themselves at Gallipoli) 29th Division and the 36th (Ulster) Division. The task of the two battalions from the 36th Division attacking north of the Ancre was to secure the ground between Mary Redan and Beaucourt Station and to establish a number of defensive points on the western rise overlooking Station Road; they were also to occupy the station, the mill and a couple of houses beyond the station. The right hand battalion was the 9/Irish Fusiliers, which managed to get some of its men close to Beaucourt Station, having succeeded in breaking through the German front line trenches. To the left of the attack, 12/Irish Rifles found that the wire, at this point quite well concealed from direct view by the British as it lay over the crest of a hill, had not been well cut. What gaps that existed in it were covered by German machine gun fire, and no one could get through on the initial assault. A couple of subsequent attacks by hastily reorganised men from the battalion failed — not only did they have the machine guns still to contend with, but they had lost the supporting British barrage. The attack fizzled out rapidly, and by 8 am the Germans had retaken their original front line positions.
German front line trench at Beaumont Hamel manned by men of 119 Infantrie Regiment.Taylor Library
The 29th Division, to their left, was fated not even to have the support of an artillery barrage at zero, 7.30 am. The decision to fire the Hawthorn Redoubt mine early, at 7.20 am, is discussed in full later; for reasons that will forever remain unclear, all the field howitzers on the whole of the Corps front were ordered to lift from front line machine gun positions at that time. This was almost certainly an administrative error — the purpose of the instruction was to enable men to get close to the mine so that they could occupy the crater quickly when it blew. Matters were made even worse by orders to the divisional field artillery to redirect half their firepower to the Support Line three minutes before zero. The onslaught at the great moment, zero hour, on 29th Division front, at least, was going to be a very strange affair — as far as the artillery was concerned, zero was to all intents and purposes zero minus ten.
To compound the problems of 29th Division there also lay the strength of the German position at Beaumont Hamel. They had built a veritable fortress out of the topographical advantages that it enjoyed. From the far side of the River Ancre it came under protective fire and artillery observation from the Schwaben Redoubt — just stand by the Ulster Tower and look across today and see the view that these Germans had. Behind Beaumont Hamel the German defences ran like a grandstand on the forward slopes, up to the Second Line in the area of the Beaucourt Road — a view which may best be appreciated to-day from the neighbourhood of Frankfurt Trench Cemetery. Beaumont Hamel itself was protected by Redan and Hawthorn Ridge and the natural declivity that is Y Ravine (Leiling Schlucht to the Germans). The Germans had had months to make full use of the chalky ground to construct strong points, dug outs and complex tunnel systems. It would require massive firepower to overcome these defences.
This was something the British did not have, though it is no part of this account to describe the failures of munitions production. There was a shortage of the heavy howitzer whose shells had the best chance of busting these fortifications; what ones there were suffered from very poor quality shells — either because the fuse failed, or even fell off in flight! In short, the success of the attack of the 29th Division probably depended more on a prayer than any other point on the Somme front — and that is saying something, given the formidable task that faced the British Army on that day.
Men of the Middlesex Regiment retreating from before the crater on Hawthorne Ridge – 7.45 am on 1 July 1916.
The battle commenced, the various battalions moved to the attack, and the attack crumpled. The Germans were alerted by the blast of the mine, and were able to man their parapets with relative impunity as the shell fire largely lifted off their positions. Men from the 2/Royal Fusiliers were unable to capture the crater, and held only a tenuous grip on the westernmost edge, whilst survivors from the battalion used the heap of earth that it had created as a means of cover. 1/Royal Dublin Fusiliers found themselves under fire from German defenders on the ridge to the immediate north of Beaumont Hamel, whilst 1/Lancashire Fusiliers and their support, 16/Middlesex had come under withering German enfilade fire from Hawthorn Ridge as well as from their front. The attack on 86th Brigade front had come to nothing; nothing at all.
Further south the attack of 2/South Wales Borderers collapsed within five minutes of zero, succumbing to scything machine gun fire from Y Ravine. 1/Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers attacked in platoon file due to local tactical considerations (elsewhere, as is all too well known, waves of infantry in extended line was the norm). A reasonable number manged to cross the German fire trench, which seemed unoccupied; they were caught from the rear as up to a company of the enemy, who had been concealed in deep dugouts, manned their parados (that is the rear of the trench) and caught them from behind. The fighting continued for rather longer on this flank of the 87th Brigade attack
Good communications, quick and accurate, were a pipe dream for commanders in World War I. This, the desperate desire to hear good news and act on any scrap of information that might be optimistic, meant that the lull in shell fire in No Man’s Land, the report from RFC contact aircraft that men in khaki had been seen well beyond the German front trenches and the sight of white flares (a pre-arranged signal for British success; unfortunately also a German signal for artillery support) meant that the planned 8.05 am assault by 1/Border and 1/King’s Own Scottish Borderers went ahead. It had come to a grinding halt in a blockage of dead and wounded within ten minutes. Delays in communication between Brigade and Division meant that the higher formation commander, de Lisle, ordered the attack to be continued, based on the original optimistic reports, using the rear, 88th, Brigade. The Newfoundlanders set off unsupported soon after 9 am — 1/Essex, who should have gone with them on their right, found that the heavy German shell fire on the British trenches in their sector and the clogging of the crossings of trenches even behind the British front line with dead and wounded provided massive obstacles, could only attack later, and found themselves cut down. It was the artillery observers and staff on Brock’s Benefit, a position on Mesnil Ridge which enabled them to see what was going on on at least part of the battlefield, who convinced Major General de Lisle that the attack had been a complete failure and who stopped 4/Worcesters and 2/Hampshires being further sacrificial victims. The attack on 87th Brigade front had come to nothing, nothing at all. It had not been a good day for the Incomparable 29th.
Major General Beauvoir de Lisle. His other claim to fame is as the founder of the modern game of Polo.