Chapter Four

1917

At the end of 1916 the Siegfried Stellung was only to be regarded as a ‘factor of safety’ and there was no intention of voluntarily retiring to it; however, by the middle of January, General von Kuhl summed up the situation at the principal General Staff officers’ conference: ‘We can no longer reckon on the old troops; there is no doubt but that in the past summer and autumn our troops have been fearfully harried and wasted’.

British Fifth Army winter operations made the situation even worse and, by the end of January, it was acknowledged that the positions presently held by the German Army on the Somme ‘were bad, the troops worn out’, and that they were probably not in a condition to stand such defensive battles as ‘The Hell of the Somme’ again (the 94 German divisions that had fought on the Somme were classed by the British Official History of the Great War as being in a ‘dire state’). After the war, the German Official History acknowledged the losses of killed and wounded during 1916 as 1,400,000; 800,000 of these were accounted for between July and October.

January on the Somme was relatively quiet but losses to minor British operations deprived the army of some useful observation points from which to observe future British assault preparations and, with the certainty of further British attacks, the army was to be ordered back to the Siegfried Stellung. Ludendorff later wrote that ‘the decision to retreat was not reached without a painful struggle. It implied a confession of weakness bound to raise the morale of the enemy and lower our own. But it was necessary for military reasons – we had no choice’.

For Home Front consumption: a daring patrol near Arras.

Mobile anti-aircraft guns mounted on a lorry.

This defensive line, with a depth of between six and eight thousand yards, ran east from Laffaux to Cerny-en-Laonnais on the Chemin des Dames ridge where it joined the front-line defences. Considerable effort had been put into these fortifications, using mass production techniques, which turned out identical components by the thousand. Three belts of barbed wire protected the trenches, each being ten to fifteen yards deep, separated by a five-yard gap from the next. Initial construction was by Russian POWs and later by Belgian civilian conscripts, skilled German craftsmen and troops. Eventually around 65,000 men were employed on this task on a daily basis.

‘The retirement to the new positions was code-named Alberich (a malicious dwarf from the Niebelung Saga) and the Army Group was directed to draw up detailed plans for its execution.’ Further plans were made to turn the evacuated zone into a desert. ‘Not only were all military buildings to be dismantled, depots to be withdrawn, railways to be torn up, craters to be blown in the roads; but so as far as possible, every town and village, every building in them, was to be destroyed by fire or explosive; every tree, even fruit trees, was to be cut down, or “ringed” to ensure that it died; civilians were to be removed; and wells filled up or polluted, though not poisoned.’ Leutnant Junger after the war described what had happened: ‘every village up to the Siegfried Line was a rubbish heap. Every tree felled, every road mined, every well fouled, every watercourse damned, every cellar blown up or made into a death trap with concealed bombs, all supplies of metal sent back, all rails ripped up, all telephone wires rolled up, everything burnable burned.’

As a hindrance to any advancing troops, and also to economise on food supplies, it was decided to leave between ten and fifteen thousand civilians – almost all were children, their mothers, and the aged. They were to be ‘left in Nesle, Ham, Noyon (in the French zone of operations) and a few smaller places in the intact houses for the advancing troops to look after; the remainder were taken away to work in the fields and factories.’ The pre-withdrawal programme was scheduled to start on 9 February and end on 15 March, giving the troops five days in which to retire; by 20 March all troops should be in their new positions. Although it was supposed to be a secret withdrawal, prisoners captured by the British indicated that there would be a withdrawal at some point.

The first withdrawal commenced on 14 March and ‘over the next two days, the troops withdrew from trench to trench, using sniper fire and machine guns to halt any pursuit. However, by 16 March, the first full marching day, the main body of the troops were retiring to the Siegfried Stellung and by 18 March four armies were withdrawing on a front of 110 miles followed by six enemy armies. By the end of March, the complete Alberich timetable was in British hands and they were now aware that the original withdrawals were not part of the plan. The whole defence line was not complete; indeed, this was the reason for the need to hold on to certain outpost villages.’ By 5 April, the retirement was complete, reducing the amount of line to be defended and increasing the number of men available to counter any future enemy attacks; supply was also easier. However, it was a purely defensive move.

A false gun position to trick aerial reconnaissance experts into firing onto useless targets.

In March, the population of the villages facing the French positions around Arras was moved out and sent, via Switzerland, to French controlled areas as the whole area was a potential battle zone; this action saved the lives of many civilians.

The withdrawal scarcely affected the troops on the Arras Front, except in the very south where troops pulled back towards Neuville Vitasse and Bullecourt. Although 6 Army was remaining on the defensive it was decided to strengthen the positions around Arras to prevent any potential British breakthrough. This entailed new lines of ‘deeply echeloned defences, protected with wire entanglements and blockhouses in reinforced concrete.’ Between Arras and Douai, besides the old defensive lines of 1914 and 1915, there were three new positions collectively forming the Siegfried Stellung. Coupled with new defensive positions there were also changes to defensive tactics, which provided for immediate counter-attacks using reserves organised at specific points; points at which it was expected that the attacking troops would lose their cohesion after they had taken their initial positions.

Future defence was to be in depth but at the same time elastic. ‘Out went deep dugouts and continuous trench lines, to be replaced by concrete bunkers, surrounded by obstacle belts and sited for mutual support. Gone was the rigid holding of the forward trenches packed with infantrymen. In came flexibility, defence in depth, a huge increase in infantry fire power, streamlined command and control and numerous tactical innovations.’

‘While the High Command advocated defence, the Entente was gearing up for the offence. Both sides were developing tactics designed to make each other’s lives more unpleasant. Fluid defence in depth, rapid deployment of local reserves and not every attack being countered, was countered by the British with the ‘box’ and ‘creeping’ barrage with little or no preparation and the night assault. The next battles were to be against the British at Arras and the French on the Chemin des Dames.’

Early in the year ‘G.H.Q. began to reckon on the great Entente offensive in France, Macedonia and on the Isonzo for the middle of April.’ As a result ‘the Army groups of the Crown Prince Rupprecht and the German Crown Prince were strengthened with divisions, artillery and ammunition, and were provided with everything necessary for successful defence.’

The second enemy in the trenches - lice.

Gas was an ever present danger in the trenches – troops pose for the family back home with a gas mask ready, just in case.

‘During February, identifications from raids had shown that the Canadian Corps was closing in and concentrating on the Vimy plateau, and the increased activity in the British positions was noted, particularly the work carried out on railways and roads, the increase in transport and the arrival of artillery units.’ A soldier from the same Bavarian division that had asked the Canadians to not use their artillery as much wrote home in February:‘My dug-out is four metres under the ground, but yet is not quite safe from the British who bombard us like the very devil. Men are constantly being killed or wounded.’

From 19 March, counter-measures were undertaken: reinforcements were brought up in the form of fresh divisions, more heavy artillery, aircraft and machine gun units with six divisions going to Sixth Army as a mobile reserve. Behind the lines at Douai ‘mountains of shells’ were stored and further work was carried out on the defences. However, much of the work was nullified by increase in enemy artillery fire and, even though the enemy artillery barrage had not properly started, many of the new and existing batteries were put out of action; the effects of this counter-battery fire were serious. By 6 April 11 Division did not possess a single battery able to develop its full fire-power. The harassing fire stopped movement behind the front, leaving the ammunition for the field guns and heavy artillery in Doaui. There was a severe shortage of shells which was particularly disastrous when the British assault took place.

During a trench raid on the morning of 28 March, a soldier from Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry was captured on the ridge. The information he provided under interrogation confirmed an impending attack: ‘Behind the entire British lines, from Souchez to Roclincourt, new batteries of field artillery were moving in. More disturbing, infantry companies were being brought up to full strength, a sure sign of impending attack, and each company had been issued with two Vickers machineguns in addition to their Lewis guns.’ An attack was coming but exactly where and when were the unknowns. It would fail of course, as had all the previous attempts, but not without considerable suffering.

There were problems with the existing defences from a defender’s point of view. ‘The new divisions which were put into the line complained that their predecessors had neglected the trenches and wire; now the bombardment, combined with the bad weather, made adequate repair almost impossible. The strain upon the troops was severe in the extreme’ and, even though the enemy artillery barrage had not properly started, many of the new and existing batteries were put out of action.

On the morning of 4 April, the British gas barrage temporarily silenced the greater portion of the artillery. The artillery barrage started just as the gunners of 405 Field Artillery Battalion were having breakfast of coffee, bread and sausage in their underground shelter. A shell landed directly above them causing the shelter to collapse, burying Kanonier Godry who, upon regaining his senses, scrambled out of the hole left by the shell in the roof. Their position was too dangerous to stay in as the British artillery had zeroed in on their battery with incredible accuracy. He recalled ‘although two of our guns had been destroyed and several of our men killed, we were ordered to immediately move the guns to a safer place. This had to be done in a hurry’. They limbered up their gun and moved to the main position on the reverse slope of a hill. Kanonier Godry was the last to leave and decided to use a shortcut to catch them up. This decision meant that he would soon become a victim of the British gas barrage – and, to his friends, a source of amusement. ‘Halfway across, a gas shell exploded with a ‘pop’ about three metres away and I clearly saw the shell break up into a few large fragments from which a large blue foggy cloud emitted and engulfed me. Although I held my breath and carried on running, some of the gas got down me. When I reached the new position I laid my head on the bridge of the gun, feeling awful. Then came the reaction. From out of my eyes, nose and mouth, water was discharging, as if my whole body was trying to get rid of all its liquid matter. But my comrades thought it funny and were rolling about laughing.’

Two of the defending divisions were the chief recipients of the gas: while 11 Division suffered few casualties, the casualty rate in 14 Bavarian Division was much greater. This had a demoralising effect on their future combat performance, so much so that they surrendered more readily when the enemy attacked on 9 April.

But it was not only the British who were attacking: the whole purpose of the British attacks had been to take the focus to the Arras front so that the main attack could occur on the Chemin des Dames. However, the start of both offensives was pre-empted by an assault on French positions. After a violent artillery bombardment on 4 April, an attack was launched on a front of three and a half miles, with the right flank on Sapigneul, just south of the Aisne. It was initially successful, attaining the Aisne–Marne Canal, 700 yards behind the French line, in the centre of the attack zone. French counterattacks gradually recovered the lost ground; by 12 April almost the whole of it was again in French hands. However, while no territory was gained, the attack plans for the French offensive were captured. Although General Nivelle knew about the loss by 7 April, two days before the launch of the British offensive, he decided that the operations already scheduled would continue.

In order to improve their defensive positions around Arras, 6 Army ‘wanted to make a rectification of its line by means of a local advance at Souchez…at the beginning of April.’ On 6 April Ludendorff came to the conclusion that a great British offensive was imminent at Arras. Now OHL knew that they faced a threat on two fronts. As a result the operation at Souchez was abandoned and Ludendorff requested Group Headquarters to bring up their reserves in anticipation of an attack – which materialised on 9 April. The divisions that constituted the second and third waves were moved up by 6 Army but by the start of the attack were not close enough to the front to be effective.

The enemy bombardment caused severe damage, reducing the forward trenches to lines of shell-holes, while ‘those in the rear suffered only a little less seriously…the wire, bad to begin with, disappeared altogether in many places, and fresh stocks to repair it could not be brought forward…section by section, the defences were systematically reduced’. However, other necessities besides wire could also not be brought up: ‘it took six hours to bring up rations from the regimental headquarters to the front line, a distance of about a mile in most cases, and towards the end of the bombardment none could be moved in certain sections’.

As well as high explosive, thousands of gas shells were fired by the British artillery, affecting their opponents severely. After four days of being shelled by gas, one soldier noted in his diary that one officer had been killed and several were ill because of it: ‘the sad point is that the English gas is almost odourless and can only be seen by the practised eye on escaping from the shell. The gas steals steadily over the ground in a bluish haze and kills everyone who does not draw his mask over his face as quick as lightning before taking a breath…Our people say that things weren’t as bad at Verdun as here.’

Landsturm Infantry Battalion Limburg at a field service behind the Arras front.

With such an intense barrage, whole units disappeared from view and control: ‘from the 6th to the 8th (of April) the 51st Regiment had no news at all from one of its companies in first line (sic). On the latter morning a patrol got through to it, to return with a report that the defences were destroyed, that the men had been without sleep and almost without food since the beginning of the bombardment, and that losses were heavy…the 10th Grenadier Regiment in the same division…had 181 casualties during the bombardment’. While troops using the deep dugouts were safe from the shellfire, the entrances were not and many were blown in.

‘Enemy counter battery fire was so effective that one division reported that it did not have a single battery able to perform at full capacity. And neither the… “mountains of ammunition” nor the extra heavy artillery arrived at the front, so that when the enemy attacked there was a general shortage of ammunition with which to delay the attacking forces.’

Facing the British were strong defences, especially south of the Neuville St.-Vaast to Bailleul road; after the first system of trenches there were three or four further lines from seventy-five to one hundred and fifty yards apart, linked by communication trenches at least every hundred yards; behind that was a support line and the formidable Siegfried Stellung. South of the River Scarpe there was a very strong, heavily wired reserve line, about three miles from the front, the Wancourt-Feuchy line, while on the northern side it curved back up to five miles. From the river at Athies to Farbus ran the intermediate Point du Jour line along the steep eastern slope of Vimy Ridge; behind that was a newly constructed reserve line, the Drocourt-Quéant switch. Holding these positions were troops of above average quality: 11, 17, 18, 23, 24, 79 Divisions and 220 Reserve Division together with 14 Bavarian and 1 Bavarian Reserve Divisions.

Ludendorff recorded his impression of the British attack in his memoirs: ‘on the 9th, after a short but extraordinarily intense artillery preparation, our army encountered a powerful attack, led by tanks, on both sides of the Scarpe. Some of our advanced divisions gave way. The neighbouring divisions which stood firm suffered heavy losses. The enemy succeeded before noon in reaching our battery positions and seizing heights which dominated the country far to the east. The counter-attacking divisions were not there to throw the enemy back, only portions of the troops could be brought up by motor transport. The situation was extremely critical, and might have had far-reaching and serious consequences if the enemy had pushed further forward. But the British contented themselves with their great success and did not continue the attack, at least not on April 9th.’

The British attack ruined Ludendorff ’s birthday and left him feeling deeply depressed, but, after talking to officers who had taken part in the fighting, he found that the new defensive ideas and principles were sound. However, he recorded that ‘the battle of Arras on April 9th was a bad beginning for the decisive struggle’ of the year, and that it threw all calculations to the wind.

The Battles of Arras 1917 are best known by the loss of Vimy Ridge, which happened in the first phase. There were several distinct phases: 9 to 14 April, the First Battle of the Scarpe and the Battle of Vimy Ridge; 23 and 24 April, the Second Battle of the Scarpe; 28 and 29 April, the Battle of Arleux; 3 and 4 May, the Third Battle of the Scarpe, with the loss of Fresnoy; 3 to 17 May, the very desperate Battle of Bullecourt, fought after a first unsuccessful (British) attack on 11 April, with the fighting lasting until after the end of May.

After the war, Ludendorff summarised the battle for Arras. The battle continued with the British attacking ‘again at the same spot from the 10th onwards in great strength, but not really on a grand scale. They extended their offensive on both sides, especially to the south, as far as Bullecourt. On the 11th they took Monchy, and during the following night we evacuated Vimy ridge. April 23rd and 28th and May 3rd were again days of severe fighting, and in the intervals sharp local engagements took place. The battles continued; we launched minor counter-attacks, which were successful, but also suffered slight losses of ground here and there.’ Then the French opened their offensives in Champagne and on the Aisne. Many years after the war when Ludendorff wrote his memoirs he could see little if any strategic point to the battle for Arras – a battle with a higher casualty rate than the Somme

In his autobiography, ‘Out of My Life’, Marshall Von Hindenburg, Ludendorff ’s commanding officer, described the British attack as being more serious. ‘On April 9th the English attack at Arras gave the signal for the enemy’s great spring offensive. The attack was prepared for days with the fury of masses of enemy artillery and trench mortars. There was nothing of the surprise tactics that Nivelle had used in the October of the previous year. ... The English swept over our first, second and third lines. Groups of strongpoints were overwhelmed or silenced after heroic resistance. Masses of artillery were lost. Our defensive system had apparently failed ! ... The evening report of the 9th April revealed a rather dark picture ... many shadows - little light. In such cases more light must be sought. A ray appeared, a tiny flickering ray. The English did not seem to have known how to exploit the success they had gained to the full. This was a piece of luck for us, as so often before! ... I knew that our reinforcements were hastening to the battlefield and that trains were hastening that way.’

9 April, when the British and Canadian forces attacked, was punctuated by squalls of rain, sleet and snow with a long and heavy snow-shower at night. At times the westerly wind blew the snow into the defenders’ eyes, making it difficult to see, but between the showers the weather was bright and clear. Although the bombardment had battered the trenches almost beyond recognition and cut the wire to shreds, the deep dugouts were full of men. The defence can be divided into two distinct types: troops who fought according to the new defence scheme and those who fought using the traditional methods of defence. The new defence rested on island positions which generally quickly surrendered or were abandoned while the traditional commanders ‘caught up the retiring troops and gave them a rallying position, which was reinforced by any available garrisons of strong points in rear’, often successfully delaying the attacking force. This new style of defence relied upon the swift arrival of reserves or the specialised counter-attack divisions, but, as these were too far away, the defence collapsed.

Within the defences of Vimy Ridge were numerous caves, connected by tunnels, some of them believed to have been used in the Wars of Religion during the 16th Century. From these caves, exits had been cut into the front-line trenches so their garrisons, sheltered up to fifty feet below the surface, could emerge fresh to meet the assault when the bombardment stopped or lifted. The defences were shallow by comparison to positions further south, but were still strong, being protected by deep belts of wire, and further back the plateau ‘was chequered with elaborate redoubts and concrete machine-gun emplacements and along the upper edge of the woods on the eastern face of the ridge’ were a number of batteries in concrete casemates.

The result of an Allied artillery barrage.

From observation posts on the dominating Hill 135 and Hill 145, fresh evidence of the British preparations could be seen every morning, but little effort was made to disrupt the build-up. This lack of activity led the British into thinking that the ridge was about to be evacuated. However, the opposite was true; 16 Bavarian Division was scheduled to attack the British at the northern end of the ridge and take their positions but, as the wind was unfavourable for the use of gas shells, on which the attack was based, it was cancelled.

Both the shelling and the weather impacted on conditions on the ridge. The ridge is chalk, but is covered in a layer of clay and decomposed chalk mixed with fine sand. After being pounded by nearly a million shells, the surface was ‘a wilderness of clammy mud. The sides of trenches collapsed on the burst of a shell, and as the water could not drain quickly, they became quagmires of slime, in places knee-deep.’ As a result ‘the forward defence system lost all continuity, and in places its trenches could no longer be distinguished. The garrisons of the deep dug-outs, situated about 120 yards apart in the first and second trenches, were isolated during daylight.’ Positions further back fared little better.

This isolation made the supply of food to the front-line garrisons extremely difficult. ‘Ration parties often took six hours to make a journey which had formerly taken a quarter of an hour, and the food on arrival was cold and filthy.’ Movement was so difficult at times that many front line ‘companies went without fresh food for two or three days at a time.’

There were only five regiments (equivalent to one and a half divisions) facing four full strength Canadian divisions, and, while the Canadian units were generally well rested and up to full strength, the opposite was true on the ridge. Four of the regiments had been in the line for at least five weeks and many of their companies were down to a rifle strength of between 70 and 80 men, which meant that the 15,000 men of the Canadian Corps faced only 5,000 defenders; in reserve, up to six miles in the rear, were a further 3,000 men against 12,000 Entente rifles. At Doaui, between twelve and fifteen miles away, were two divisions in 6 Army reserve. Getting any reserves to the front would take between two and four hours. If the Entente could keep the time and day of the attack secret, there would not be time to halt the initial rush of the attack.

During the night of 8/9 April there was little to alarm the sentries even though 30,000 men of the Canadian Corps had assembled on a front of nearly four miles, many within a hundred yards of the remains of the wire their artillery had carefully destroyed. Many men were waiting in tunnels that opened out into the front lines. At 0530 hours, the British artillery opened fire and two mines were exploded under the front-line. After three minutes’ rapid fire on the first trenches, the fire moved on 100 yards every three minutes. Simultaneously all battery positions and ammunition dumps were bombarded with gas shells and high explosives. Because of the gas, the horses could not move the guns or bring up ammunition; the batteries quickly ran out of shells. This, coupled with the damaged telephone cables and the destruction of most of the observation posts meant that the response to the rocket signals from the beleaguered front line positions was very feeble.

In some places, the advance was so rapid that garrisons could not leave their deep dugouts, although in others machine gunners did their jobs successfully before being over-run. The further the British advanced, the stiffer the resistance they faced, with increasing losses among the attackers. However, in some cases, although the machine gunners fought with courage, many of the troops were dazed by the barrage and attack and appeared happy to be taken prisoner. Two independent counter-attacks were launched without any success.

In most cases, the artillery preparation had been sufficient to allow the Canadian troops to leave their tunnels and successfully advance. One exception occurred at Tottenham Tunnel, in range of a strongpoint that had been rebuilt after having been destroyed earlier. At 400 yards the machine guns fired directly into the advancing Canadians accounting for around half of them, and attempts to rush the position were halted by the undamaged wire. Close by, persistent sniping and a counterattack drove back the most advanced troops with heavy loss.

However, by around 0700 hours, from the Labyrinth salient to Gunner crater, except for a short strip on Hill 145, the entire front defence system had been lost to the Canadians. The garrison on Hill 145 was able to hold out because the wire had not been destroyed, allowing the sheltered troops time to occupy their positions; the garrison would hold out for a further day and a half.

Much of the ground had been previously fought over and revealed macabre sights to the advancing troops. Uncovered by shell-fire were the remains of dead French soldiers from 1915, complete with their rifles and bayonets.

As the first wave of Canadian troops consolidated their positions, the support troops moved forward through spasmodic artillery shelling that caused a number of casualties. By 0830 hours the shelling of the advancing troops had ceased completely because no infantry remained to send up rockets for assistance; the artillery could get no news because ‘all telephone cables leading forward, including one buried 6 ft. deep, had been broken, and patrols sent forward could bring no enlightenment.’

After the war the Reichsarchiv volume on the battle described the strength of the artillery barrage on 261 Reserve Regiment. Those who survived the initial barrage watched the positions they had just vacated ‘disappear in a veil of smoke and fumes, while the fiery flashes of grenades and mines illuminated the battlefield with bloodred streaks of fire.’ However, unlike their compatriots on other parts of the front 261 Reserve Regiment incredulously watched the British troops advance, as they had at the Somme, ‘attempting laboriously and step by step to traverse the slimy waste between their own positions and the German line of craters.’ They were also able to send up flares for artillery support and use the surviving machine guns on their attackers: ‘crackling into life…they found their targets. Forward of 5 Company the British corpses accumulate and form small hills of khaki.’

To their left, the British preparatory artillery had been effective in destroying the defenders’ machine guns, allowing the attacking troops to move forward against the two defending companies. The words of the Reichsarchiv historian report on the fate of the companies: ‘Defending themselves against attack from all sides and no longer hoping for help from outside, 9 and 11 Companies’ bled to death. Only five men managed to make their way back to the rear of the ridge.’

Canadian troops undergoing instruction about their targets during the coming offensive.

262 Reserve Regiment on the left flank of 261 Reserve Regiment suffered the same treatment; the British attack was both furious and fast. Fusilier Schroeder described what happened to him, and probably many of his countryman, during the attack. ‘In the morning, tired and back from night duty, we lay down with the words :“Now let us put the blankets over our heads and sleep.” Suddenly there was heavy drumfire. The day sentries shouted, “Outside, the British are coming!”

We jumped up, all tiredness gone, for our country and our lives were at stake. While I was handing out hand-grenades, the shooting had already started. The English – they are Canadian troops – had broken through on our left and were already rolling up our own position. My corporal told me to go down into the dugout and fetch the box with the egg-shaped hand-grenades but on the way back, when I had gone up half of the thirty-two rungs, the corporal suddenly shouted: “Come up on the left, the British have already passed the trench!” So I dropped the egg-grenades and went up. I noticed I was alone, only a dead comrade was lying on the edge of the trench in a grotesque way. Then I ventured beyond the edge of the trench, and everywhere, left and right and forward, I saw only Britishers.’

Fusilier Schroeder now had to make a choice; fight, surrender, try and get back to his own lines or stay put. The area was swarming with enemy troops and, realising the danger of his position, he chose to stay put. With discretion being the better part of valour he ‘lay down beside his dead comrade and played dead too, while more assault waves came pouring over him’. Everything was fine until a soldier decided to investigate the two dead soldiers. When Schroeder saw his comrade being prodded with a bayonet he decided to move, at which point the Canadian told him to come on and he climbed out. Fortunately the soldier only asked if he was wounded. When he pretended that he did not understand English, the man ran off to join his unit, leaving him alone.

Once again Fusilier Schroeder had a decision to make; this time he decided to run for his own lines. ‘I ran in the direction of the Pimple, towards the positions of the 261st Regiment. But an Englishman jumped up and fired at me. I was hit in the right forearm. After that, while I was wandering around in a wounded state, my pal Cordes jumped out from some cover where he had managed to remain unhurt. We took each other by the hand and ran planlessly among the dead’. Schroeder’s luck continued to hold when they found a Canadian-occupied dugout where they found six soldiers playing cards, who paid no attention to them whatever. When the game was over, however, a medical orderly came over to them. ‘“Hullo, Fritz,” he said. “Are you wounded?” I nodded, and he examined me and said, “Not good.” Then he bandaged me and gave me something to eat and drink.’ Schroeder and his friend were not the only survivors of their company. While he waited to be taken to a rear area, gradually more and more of his regiment showed up. After a rest, the medic decided it was time for him to move on. ‘After I had regained some strength, the Englishman took me by the hand and took me to the main dressing station, where I was examined by a doctor’. He was then released and sent on his way to a big camp behind the front, where he found several comrades. Fusilier Schroeder was now a prisoner of war, like many thousands of his countrymen.

Such was the speed of the advance that many units were surrounded, leaving the officers with a difficult decision to make – surrender or try and fight their way back. Leutnant Schlensog of 51 Prussian Infantry Regiment had to make this decision. Surrounded, out of ammunition and realising that a breakout using bayonets would only result in the deaths of the remainder of his men, he opted for surrender. He recounted that: ‘As soon as we stopped firing we were overrun by the enemy who were not interested in us as individuals, but for what possessions we had. Watches, rings, iron crosses and whatever else was worth taking they took from us as if it was their God-given right. As if robbery was their major line of work.’

‘Group Vimy was now a shattered force. It had all happened so quickly. Questing Canadians, searching the dug-outs…for lurking snipers, found food on the tables, bottles of soda water and wine in the cupboards.’ Casualties were heavy: 261Reserve Regiment had lost 900 officers and men killed, wounded and missing, and would not be fit for further action for many months. 3 Battalion of 263 Reserve Regiment, which had arrived in the line just before the attack to relieve 2 Battalion, was lost entirely except for a handful of men and one officer. The situation was dangerous for the stability of the front, as Crown Prince Rupprecht wrote in his diary: ‘I doubt that we can recapture the Vimy Ridge…This leads to the question: is there any sense in continuing the war?’

The story was similar along the whole front. If they had had time, and a clear view through the sleet, the defenders in front of Thélus would have seen Canadian troops advancing through fully cut wire, over almost completely destroyed forward trenches, with a barrage moving steadily ahead of them. However, only when the barrage had moved on were they able to emerge from their deep dugouts. But it was too late; the assault waves were already in their rear. ‘In the past, they had attacked these unsuspecting forward troops, forcing them to turn back, but this time ineffectual defensive fire, and the presence of the tunnels, permitted the next waves to advance safely and engage the inhabitants of the dug-outs.’

Musketier Kraft, a seventeen-year-old from Kiel, was one of the soldiers trapped in a dugout by the speed of the Canadian advance. His survival depended upon luck and his behaviour, as he found out when he and his comrades surrendered. As they rested on their bunks with the artillery shells pounding their positions, the electricity failed. After lighting candles, the sergeant, who led the way, ordered them up the stairs. Upon reaching the top he yelled ‘Tommies’ and fell back down the stairs dead. The situation was not good. If they waited, they would die when the Canadians threw grenades down into the dugout. He later recounted:‘We all panicked and ran back into the cave and threw ourselves down with arms over our heads, fearing a bomb at any second. Then one of our “old hands” (he was twenty-two) came down the steps and told us to abandon our weapons and come up the steps one at a time as the position was hopeless, the English were all over us.’ Kraft was one of the lucky ones, unlike the defiant corporal who walked up in front of him. As they reached the entrance, the corporal spat on the floor, only to be greeted by a baseball bat on the head. Expecting the same welcome, Kraft covered his head with his hands and closed his eyes but nothing happened; perhaps it was because he looked very young. Opening his eyes, he viewed his captors and realised that they were Canadians: ‘Looking at the soldiers, I noticed that they all had their faces blackened. I was prodded in the stomach by one with a bayonet and told to keep my hands on my head. One of the soldiers wore no helmet and had no hair, apart from a small tuft on the top of his head. He also had white and red paint on his face and was very fearsome looking. I then realised that he was a Red Indian, and our captors were Canadians.’

The Kaiser and Hindenburg on the Arras front in 1917.

In the late morning, to the south of the ridge where the attack had not been held up, a sudden change in the weather gave rise to a curious occurrence. After the war, Franz Behrmann recorded what he had seen: ‘the cessation of the snowstorm lifted the veil which had till now hidden the landscape, and we saw a remarkable sight. The air was suddenly clean and clear, filled with spring sunshine. The high ground about Thélus was covered with English storm troops standing about in large groups. The officers could easily be distinguished waving their short sticks in the air and hurrying from group to group to give instructions. For a few minutes the artillery fire almost ceased on both sides and complete silence fell upon the battlefield, as if all were lost in wonder. The battle itself seemed to hold its breath.’

As is common in war, uncertainty breeds rumour and exaggeration. The Canadian reconnaissance of Willerval was one such incident; initially successful, the two patrols soon ran into more opposition than they were able to deal with and beat a hasty retreat with some loss. Although the two patrols numbered less than twenty and had been beaten back, this was quickly amplified to ‘a strong force of English Cavalry (that) had broken through into Willerval.’ So seriously was the threat taken that 1 Battalion of 225 Reserve Regiment, newly arrived in nearby Arleux, was ordered to recapture the village at once, even though the cavalry had long gone.

In all areas of the attack the British and Canadian troops pushed forward, trying to keep to their allotted timetable. ‘On the right of the British attack on the 9th April stood the 18th Reserve Division. It faced the left brigade of the (British) 21st Division – the only brigade of that division which took part in the original attack – the 30th Division and the right brigade of the 56th Division.’ 18th Reserve ‘was the most fortunate of the German divisions. Its main defences were the two trenches of the strong Hindenburg or Siegfried system, though its third trench, the Artillerieschutsistellung, was shallow and without shelters. All three regiments were in line, each having two battalions in the three trenches mentioned, and the third in reserve. On the German left, the 84th Reserve Regiment lost a portion of the Hindenburg Line on the afternoon of the 9th April, but recovered it by a counterattack next evening. The 86th Reserve Regiment, in the centre, repulsed the attack of the 30th Division. It was only the 31st Reserve Regiment, on the right, which suffered seriously in the attack of the 9th. Its right turned by the fall of Neuville Vitasse, it formed a flank facing north in a communication trench south of and parallel to the Neuville-Wancourt road. On the 10th April it was ordered to withdraw to a new line running about a thousand yards north-west of Wancourt and Guémappe; but the troops in the salient immediately south of Neuville were nearly all mopped up by the bombers of the 56th Division. Early on the 10th, a battalion of the 121st Reserve Regiment was placed at the disposal of the 38th Reserve Division.’

‘This battalion belonged to the 26th Reserve Division, which had just been relieved at Bullecourt. All the remainder of the division had gone back to rest areas, but this unit happened to be still on the platform at Cagnicourt awaiting a train, and was marched north into the battle. Later in the day two battalions of the 26th Division, one of the so-called “counter-attack divisions”, were added as a reserve.’

‘The 18th Reserve Division was driven back but never really broken, as were those further north. It was left in action until the 14th April, and its casualties were not very high: according to its own account, 62 officers and 1,702 other ranks.’ But not all divisions were as lucky as 18 Reserve Division. With its left flank resting on the Neuville to Wancourt road, 17 Division held the line from Neuville Vitasse to Tilloy les Mofflaines, a sector about to be attacked by the British 3, 14 and 56 Divisions. Casualties would be high.

‘The 163rd Regiment, on the left, had three companies annihilated at Neuville Vitasse. On the evening of the 9th April it repulsed the British attack against the Wancourt–Feuchy line, between the Arras–Cambrai and Neuville–Wancourt roads. On the morning of the 10th, however, news came that the 11th Division had retired from this line further north. The divisional commander, General von Reuter, therefore ordered a withdrawal to the half-prepared Monchy village position. Screened by a snowstorm, the 350 survivors of the 163rd Regiment fell back. They joined two companies of the centre regiment, the 162nd, in the sunken Monchy– Guémappe road, north of the point where it crossed the Cambrai road. The reserve battalion of the 162nd was placed on the Monchy–Roeux road, facing west and northwest, and commanding the Scarpe valley. It was the remnants of these two regiments that held up the advance of the British (37th Division) on the 10th April.’

Without reinforcements to contain the enemy attack, the situation would inevitably deteriorate, but not until the afternoon did the first arrive, advancing in artillery formation from Boiry Notre Dame, in the shape of a battalion of 3 Bavarian Division that had been rushed from the Lille district. With divisional artillery having almost ceased to exist, the sight of a new divisional artillery crossing open ground at a gallop and unlimbering behind Monchy le Preux raised the defenders’ spirits. As one participant recorded: ‘There was a great arc of our batteries on a wide front behind our endangered positions. It was a most memorable and magnificent battle picture, lit by the evening sun.’ Its timely arrival would mean a hot reception for the British attack the next day.

Reinforcements were on the way. Behind the lines, near Doaui, Leutnant Junger, who had arrived back from leave on 9 April to find out about the losses, and his men prepared to join the battle the next day. Their job was to set up an observation post in Fresnoy. After the war he wrote about what happened: ‘I took a few men and explored the western outskirts of the village and found a cottage, in whose roof I had a look-out post made that commanded the front. We took the cellar as our dwelling-place, and in the course of making room there we came upon a sack of potatoes, a very welcome addition to our scanty provisions.’ His friend who was holding Willerval with just one platoon sent him some wine from supplies found in the village. Not wanting to miss an opportunity, Junger ‘equipped an expedition furnished with perambulators and similar means of transport to secure this treasure.’ But their luck was out – the British had got there first. The presence of the wine had caused some problems, as his friend later told him: ‘after the discovery of a large cellar of red wine a drinking bout had started, which, in spite of the attack then being made on the village, it had been extremely difficult to bring to a close.’

Casualties had been heavy after lengthy actions such as the defence of Tilloy and the holding of 3 (British) Division at the Wancourt–Feuchy line, so heavy that, although units were pulled back to hold other parts of the line, it was necessary for them to be relieved by fresher units such as 1 Battalion of 17 Bavarian Regiment from 3 Bavarian Division. The casualties of one division, 17 Reserve Division, stand as an example of the level of loss experienced: 79 officers and 2,700 other ranks between 9 and 11 April.

Further proof of the intensity of the fighting is given by 11 Division: on 9 April, it was attacked by 12 and 15 (British) Divisions and the right wing of 9 (British) Division. Fighting was severe and two battalions of 38 Regiment were destroyed.

In the centre, the front line trenches of 51 Regiment were overrun, and the Wancourt–Feuchy line was evacuated on the morning of 10 April on the order of a staff officer, given without the approval of the divisional commander. It fell back to the new Monchy–Roeux line, and was relieved in front of Pelves by 3Bn. 125 Regiment of 26 Division. On the right were 10 Grenadier Regiment, that, contrary to the general practice, had two battalions in line. ‘The support companies of these battalions made a prolonged and gallant defence of the railway embankment on the 10th, but had very few survivors’. The reserve battalion, with that of 38 Regiment, held the front from Roeux station to the Scarpe, and repulsed 4 (British) Division’s attempted advance from Fampoux. Losses for 11 Division were 105 officers and 3,154 other ranks in the two days’ fighting and, of this total, British Intelligence estimates suggest 2,200 were captured.

The casualties were heavy, but the divisions had done their best – except one that had met the attack of 9 and 34 (British) Divisions, and later of 4 (British) Division; Ludendorff suggested that 14 Bavarian Division had failed. This is a harsh judgment – as even the British Official History implies: ‘It should in fairness be said that it had received the worst of the gas bombardment, which seems to have affected its morale, in addition to the actual casualties caused. Its losses are not given, but it is known that the British took 2,800 prisoners from it. If, therefore, its ratio of prisoners to total casualties was similar to that of its neighbour, the 11th, its losses in two days would be over 4,000.’ In the same period 1 Bavarian Reserve Division reported a loss of 112 officers and 3,021 other ranks. 2nd Bavarian Reserve Regiment, part of this latter division, held up the advance of 51 British Division on the Point du Jour line before being pushed back to the outskirts of Bailleul the next morning. Another unit of the division, 1 Bavarian Reserve Regiment, suffered very heavily, being reduced to 150 of all ranks.

The conditions made it difficult to form and man a new front. Reinforcements were a varied group – some from resting, some from distant places like Lille, and some from the general reserve; they were ‘flung hurriedly into the battle-line, to be attached to divisions holding the front when the latter were still in a state to continue the struggle, and to relieve them as quickly as possible when they were not. The least mauled troops of the original front-line division were left in for a longer period than those which had suffered severely and fought on, intermingled with the fresh troops. It was fortunate …that the attack became almost as disorganized as the defence’, giving the defending battle-line ‘time to steady itself, to consolidate new or half-prepared positions, and to put its system of ammunition supply into order.’

Continuing British pressure caused further problems. The bridgehead over the Cojeul river was held by 84 and 86 Reserve Regiments of 18 Reserve Division; these regiments were in danger of being cut off and the decision was made, in the evening of 11 April, by Gruppe Arras, to evacuate them. They withdrew in the early hours of 12 April, but the British advance guard managed to get in among them and make their withdrawal to the Guémappe-Riegel line more difficult. This new line had been hastily dug; it ran across the commanding Wancourt ridge.

The fighting for Monchy was also hard. ‘The 23rd Bavarian Regiment, in the centre, was broken by a “mass of British troops” from Monchy (i.e. the leading waves of two battalions). The extreme left of the 18th Bavarian Regiment swung back and took the advance in enfilade. Thereupon it came to a halt, but supports “pouring out of Monchy” (which could only be the rear waves of the same two battalions) carried it forward to some 500 yards behind the original Bavarian line. The 23rd Bavarian Regiment, however, claims to have given way “elastically”, so that the 1/R. Newfoundland and 1/Essex were caught in a trap.’

Unteroffizier Bernardini of 23 Bavarian Regiment, a twenty-one year old veteran who held the Iron Cross, first and second class, was holding out in a house on the main street with a few of his men. Arriving in Monchy during the night to find the village very badly damaged, they were ordered to occupy the western part and immediately set about fortifying the houses before the British arrived. He described what happened: ‘Early in the morning we came under heavy artillery fire and the English attacked the village. As dawn broke a tank came rattling across the cobbles of the main street, closely followed by the English infantry who obviously felt quite safe. Hidden in this house, I ordered my men to hold their fire until I gave the word. I waited until the tank had got past and then we opened up with everything we had. The English were totally caught by surprise and many were shot down by our hail of fire. The rest scattered. Then we found out that the English had broken through at both ends of the village. Afraid that we would be cut off, we fought our way back to the east side and made good our escape.’

‘The reserve battalion of the 23rd Bavarian Regiment pushed straight forward from the rear position on which it was working. The left of the 18th, assisted by survivors of the right battalion of the 23rd, formed a barrier between Monchy and the unfortunate British troops east of it. A battalion of the 17th Bavarian Regiment from Boiry moved up on the British right and joined hands with further surviving companies of the “elastic” 23rd. Counter-attacked from three sides, 150 British surrendered, but the majority tried to get back to Monchy.’ This was not possible and the retreating British were shot down at leisure.

Many troops were facing tanks for the first time that day. Musketier Keyser noted how effective they were because of their firepower: ‘when it was directly opposite our trench the thing (a tank) started shooting at us with eight machine guns. Our rifle fire was useless against it and we had to withdraw.’ Not only its firepower, but also its cross country abilities impressed Feldwebel Speck. His regiment had been ordered to fill the gap left by the retreating 17 Bavarian Regiment and finding good cover behind the hedges on the main road, watched the British advance over half a kilometre away; a tank then appeared. Everyone was affected – as he noted: ‘We stared aghast as slowly a tank crept towards us. At fifty metres we opened fire with rifles and machine guns but, as it got within thirty metres of us, it suddenly turned off to the right towards the Bavarians. We clapped and cheered! And standing up we shot from the hip at the tank.’ It was then that they were given a demonstration of its capabilities – the tank turned back towards them and advanced. They hoped that the large ditch would provide them with safety, but they were dismayed to see it tip into the ditch, then straighten itself out, and head towards them. The tank got within five metres and then stopped without firing.

Unteroffizier and Offizieraspirant Josef Mayr, a theological student from Happing, winner of the Iron Cross 2nd class, died from severe wounds received during the shelling of his positions on 9 April 1917 while serving with 2 Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment.

Seeing their chance, some men left their positions and attacked the tank with grenades, while those who held their position joined in firing at the tank. Then the tank returned to life: ‘the tank tracks began to move and the tank crew opened up with murderous machine-gun fire which was slowly directed along 1st Company trench. Those that were not killed instantly, screamed as they lay there wounded.’ When the tank fired upon another trench, panic set in: ‘everyone from 1st and 3rd Companies jumped out of the trench and ran the fastest race of his life, pursued by the merciless tank machine-gun fire which cut down many men as if it were a rabbitshoot’. Such was the effect on experienced soldiers.

General von Wenninger, the divisional commander, decided to attack Monchy that afternoon. The bad news arrived about 3pm when the infantry was moving up. The artillery commander reported ‘that the ammunition railhead at Vitry was under heavy fire, that the destination of the trains had been altered to Corbehem, that the ammunition available was sufficient only to hold off one more big British attack, and that owing to the state of the roads the supplies could not be replenished during the night if they were expended now.’ The history of 18 Bavarian Regiment admits that the British placed an impenetrable barrage east of Monchy so no attack could get through. Close by, 26 Division continued to hold its narrow front astride the Scarpe and 18 Division its wider one between Roeux Station and the railway north of Gavrelle.

Not all counter-attacks were unsuccessful. A company of Seaforth Highlanders had successfully pushed back the untried youngsters of 11 Company, 31 Regiment, opposite Hyberdad Redoubt, when the Battalion Commander formed the survivors for a counter-attack. At 3pm a bugle sounded and the men advanced into a hail of fire but no artillery. The enemy fell back towards Fampoux which further galvanized the counter-attack troops. Quickly they reached their previous positions and then had to decide whether to continue or dig-in. But some British troops were not prepared to pull back. Otto Noack, on reaching the front line, turned round to see his friends trying to draw his attention to the right. ‘I turned round and found myself staring with fascination straight down the barrel of a revolver which was emitting small puffs of smoke. There were at least two puffs before I reacted to the danger and dodged out of the way. It dawned on me that the man behind the revolver was wearing an English helmet and there were two others with him.’ They were only a few metres away. One of his comrades landed at his feet and they both threw grenades in the direction of their enemy. As the smoke cleared, he jumped into their position to find them dead. The counter-attack had been successful and the position was held throughout the day and night.

Crown Prince Rupprecht, aware that there could be further attacks, ordered a further withdrawal that was to be completed by dawn on 13 April. During the night of 11/12 April ‘the remaining civilians in the villages near the third line were hurried away from their homes, and every available vehicle was used to carry back stores. The artillery withdrew, leaving only a small proportion in position. After dusk on the 12th the front-line battalions and the last guns in action slipped away, leaving only patrols to offer a semblance of opposition to the pursuit’. As the troops were leaving, the counter-attack troops were arriving with their own field artillery and the missing heavy artillery. On 18 April, these troops were to face the British 1 Corps and Canadian Corps when they attacked from the Vimy and Lorette Ridges.

As well as underground tunnels, mining operations and infantry attacks the battle was also fought above the trenches. The air over the battlefield was patrolled by Baron von Richthofen and his ‘flying circus’, who were responsible for shooting down seventy-five British aircraft between 4 and 8 April, including twenty-eight on the first day of the battle. To the British air force this period was known as ‘Bloody April’. However, sometimes the British fliers got the upper hand. One serious loss was Leutnant W Frankl, credited with nineteen victories and awarded the Pour le Merite and Iron Cross 1st and 2nd Class, who was killed on 8 April. His loss was watched by Musketier Keyser while he was enjoying a walk with a comrade:‘The weather was clear and soon there were planes about. We saw the usual dog-fight which regularly happened in the afternoon and saw an English plane fall out of the sky, and then another one which somersaulted over and over before hitting the ground…Unfortunately it was one of ours…Leutnant Frankl…lying still in front of us. Solemnly we went back to the village.’

Further south, the British Fifth Army was tasked with providing assistance to the Arras attacks; the area chosen was Bullecourt. Although Fifth Army had been successful in its attacks against villages from Croiselles to Doignies on 2 April, the time left before the start of the offensive gave insufficient time to cut the wire and, when inspected, no gaps could be found, the troops reporting that the wire was thirty yards deep to the east of Bullecourt; as a result the attack was postponed; similarly the attack on the next day. Finally, in the early hours of 11 April, Australian troops again took up position in the snow to wait for the attack. They waited for the tanks that, due to mechanical problems or machine gun and shell fire, were able to offer little assistance, although the garrisons of both Riencourt and Hendecourt fell back under the attack of two tanks and the following infantry.

The advancing Australian infantry suffered heavy casualties, from troops who stood their ground and fought grimly, but did make progress, even when the wire was not cut. However, progress was slow and the further objectives for the attacking troops were not achieved because of stiff resistance. As the British artillery reduced, the Australian infantry fell back under the pressure of counter-attacks launched from all sides. As the survivors withdrew,‘through an inferno of machine-gun fire’, they left behind many men who became POWs. By early afternoon it was all over; 4 Australian Brigade had been almost destroyed against a loss of just 750 men.

Front line positions at Oppy during the British offensive in April.

Further east, the French were about to become involved but, fortunately for the defenders, new fortifications were under way in the shape of the Hunding Stellung and the Brunhild Stellung, with considerable further work being done to turn a slender fortified zone into an exceptionally strong one. ‘Fresh divisions were brought in, from the “pool” created by the withdrawal; the heavy artillery was reinforced; large reserves of munitions were amassed. The Crown Prince established at Sedan a Senior Officers’ School – similar to that of Prince Rupprecht’s Army Group at Valenciennes – for instruction in the new principles of the “Abwehrschlacht”, or defensive battle. Some training of the troops was also possible, and the pause afforded by the withdrawal’ notably improved morale. There were 21 divisions in the front line, with 17 in reserve against 53 French divisions.

Due to bad weather conditions, the French attack was postponed until 16 April for the G.A.R., and for the G.A.C. to the following day. ‘On many parts of the front, however, it appeared that the breaches made in the wire defences were not complete or had been repaired, and it was evident to the most optimistic that the infantry had a heavy task before it’.

The morning started misty with an overclouded sky and, almost from the start, it was evident that the preparation had been incomplete. Under an often light counter-barrage, the French troops advanced into heavy machine gun fire; there were many casualties and, where any success was gained, the French positions soon met with counter-attacks. Later in the day, French troops in the bigger penetrations faced full-scale counter-attacks which French tanks pushed forward and helped beat off. But in most cases the infantry were too exhausted to keep up. Tank losses were high, particularly to the west of the Miette river, where the French tanks were observed leaving the Bois de Beau Marais bombarded by artillery, with twenty-three being destroyed before they reached the front line.

On the Chemin des Dames ridge, even less progress was made by the French, and all that remained in French control by evening was the support line, two or three hundred yards behind the front. The French ‘losses had been very heavy and hardly a division was capable of another serious effort. Where the attack had been most successful, it was still short of the line which it was to have reached by 9.30 a.m. On the other hand, a very large haul of prisoners, over 7,000, had been captured’. The story was the same all along the attack front and the breakthrough promised to the French troops had not been achieved, although there was success the next day when the French Sixth Army continued its attacks and, by keeping up steady pressure, forced the voluntary abandonment of the defence triangle Braye–Conde–Laffaux, where many guns (some undamaged) and large amounts of munitions were left behind. Although the maximum advance by 20 April was only four miles, the French had taken 20,000 prisoners and 147 guns, freed the railway from Soissons to Reims, taken the Aisne valley west of the Oise–Aisne Canal and the second position south of Juvincourt, along with some of the most important peaks in Champagne. However, resolute defence had made the French losses very heavy – over 96,000 by 25 April, and, although the loss of defending troops was less, it was still very high at over 83,000. The German High Command claimed it as a victory because the French had not broken through, but the fighting men on both sides knew it was a victory for no one. In French political circles, any success there had been was nullified by a disappointment that turned it into a failure, looked upon with anger, disillusionment and horror; heads had to roll and a number of Generals were replaced, including Nivelle.

Even so, the French offensive was continued for a considerable time with some large scale attacks producing only a very limited amount of success, including the capture of the Californie plateau, and the capture of the Hindenburg Line on a two and a half mile front on the Chemin des Dames ridge, advances that bit deeply into the salient opposite Laffaux. The total losses to the French up to 10 May were approximately 28,500 prisoners and 187 guns.

The failure of the Nivelle offensive had a further effect towards the end of May: mutiny. Unfortunately the High Command did not believe the reports of a French troop mutiny until it was too late to use the information. And while the French offensive continued, the British had to continue to support its ally by continuing the Arras battle, knowing that there was no real chance of repeating the success of 9 April.

The battle was not all one-sided. In an attempt to aid the Arras Front, General von Moser was given approval for a four-division attack at Lagnicourt in the Amiens– Cambrai sector. The attack, which was hurriedly planned, ‘had as its objectives the destruction of the greatest possible number of guns and the mauling of the defence to such an extent that it would be unable to mount an operation against the Siegfried Line for some time to come.’

Luck was not with the troops; at 0405 hours the attacking troops were met by rapid rifle and Lewis gun fire from Australian troops that successfully checked any advance. When rockets were used to illuminate the Australian positions they also lit up the advancing troops who were mown down and forced back in disorder. Although initially successful in other areas of the attack, increasing Australian resistance slowed down the advance and eventually held it, except directly in front of Lagnicourt. Here the Australian positions were attacked in overwhelming strength, without a preliminary bombardment, and successfully broken, allowing the troops to enter the village. The retreating Australians left behind four artillery batteries in Lagnicourt and a further three batteries to the west – in total twentytwo guns were captured and wired for destruction, but only five were actually destroyed before they were recaptured by the Australians. However, this success had created a small salient with Australians on three sides and, when they counterattacked, any hope of a further advance was quelled. The troops’ resistance collapsed as they made for their original starting lines, many being killed by artillery as they tried to retreat through their own wire.

The attack was carried out by 2 Guard Reserve, 3 Guard, 38 Division, and 4 Ersatz Division, with 21 battalions in the first line. Each division was followed by two or three batteries for close support, and by parties of engineers to effect demolitions. There were hitches due to lack of preparation and knowledge of the ground, the chief result of which was that several units were very late. Little of any real significance was achieved by the attack, except by 2 Guard Reserve Division and the Lehr Regiment of 3 Guard Division on its left, who took Lagnicourt at the cost of 800 men. The total casualty list for the attack was 2,313, including four officers and 358 other ranks taken prisoner.

The divisions facing the British attack on 23 April had not changed since being relieved on 14 April. The only division that had been there at the opening of the battle was 220 Division, and it was not engaged until the British approached the Sensée brook. There had been slight adjustments to the troop positions, with 26 Division now being south of the Scarpe instead of astride it.

‘220 Division lay astride the Sensée and from about the Héninel-Croisilles road, was 35 Division, with its right flank on the Cojeul river. From the Cojeul to the northern edge of the Bois du Sart was 3 Bavarian and down to the Scarpe was 26 Division. From the Scarpe – the boundary between the two Corps, Gruppe Arras and Gruppe Vimy – to the southern outskirts of Gavrelle, was 18 Division, and from Gavrelle to Oppy was 17 Division. In immediate reserve from south to north were the l99, 221, l85, and 208 Divisions. 9 Grenadier Regiment, part of 3 Guard Divisionthat was in line near Bullecourt, had been detached and was held in reserve to Group Arras.’

‘On the extreme British right 220 Division ejected the 1/Queen’s from its lodgement in the Hindenburg Line, but met with tough resistance.’ The three regiments of 35 Division (each approximately a British brigade) were each, more or less, facing a British division. 176 Regiment was driven out of the Seigfried line, but retook it by a dramatic counter-attack. 61 Regiment repulsed the frontal attack of 30 British Division. However, the front battalion of 141 Regiment was not as fortunate and it was overrun by the British 50 Division, but its support battalion restored the situation. The regiment was finally over-whelmed by the evening attack of the British 50 Division. 35 Division was not reinforced, and was withdrawn at night through 199 Division, which was placed in the Chérisy-Riegel. 35 Division had suffered heavily, with 141 Regiment alone losing 1,089 officers and men, upwards of two-thirds of its fighting strength, and 19 machine guns.

The failure of the British attacks north and south of the Souchez river was due primarily to the fact that they came up against the new system of defence, for which no provision had been made. Four regiments were involved in the defence: 35 Regiment on Hill 65, and 118 Regiment of 56 Division, and 34 and 266 Reserve Regiments, with its left on the Lens-Vimy railway, both from 80 Reserve Division. They repulsed the attacks without reinforcements, so that the counter-attack division, 1 Guard Reserve, behind this sector of Gruppe Souchez, could be sent that same evening southwards to assist Gruppe Vimy in its effort to recapture the lost ground at Gavrelle.

On the British VI Corps front, three divisions, 15, 17, and 29, were opposed by two divisions, 3 Bavarian and 26 Infantry. ‘The former had a bad day on its right flank, where 18 Bavarian Regiment lost Guémappe and suffered 808 casualties.’ 9 Grenadier Regiment, put in to counter-attack north of the Cambrai road, recovered some ground, and on its right beat off the renewed attacks of 29 British Division. The whole division and the Grenadiers who had supported it were relieved on the night of 24 April by 221 Division.

British Intelligence kept detailed records of all the divisions that they fought against; in their view 26 Division was not only one of the hardest fighting in the Army but also alert and well led. Realising that Lone Copse valley afforded the British a good assembly position, 125 Regiment established a concealed outpost at a point where it could look down into the depression. It reported the assembly of the British 17 Division’s troops half an hour before the assault, with disastrous consequences for them. As well as losing hardly any ground, 26 Division was able to hold its own front and assist the counter-attack on Roeux.

North of the Scarpe, 86 Regiment on the left of 18 Division had just been relieved by 161 Regiment of 185 Division, the local counter-attack division. Driven out of Roeux by 51 British Division, 161 Regiment had recently retaken the place by a counter-attack. 86 Regiment was then thrown in, but failed to recapture Roeux Station and the Chemical Works. However, by 0900 hours this important position had been taken by a battalion of 65 Regiment (208 Division). The other two regiments of 18 Division (31 and 85) were so severely mauled that another regiment, 89 Grenadier, belonging to 17 Division but held in corps reserve was brought up north of the railway, but failed to recover the line of the Roeux–Gavrelle road. 18 Division and all troops which had been attached to it were relieved on 24 April by 208 Division.

Only 90 Regiment, on the left of 17 Division, was involved in the morning assault. The battalion in the Oppy line was destroyed by the British 63 (Royal Naval) Division, ‘and the defence of Gavrelle then depended on a company in a quarry on the eastern side, which never readied its battle station. Fusilier Lutmer was in Gavrelle when the ‘Sea Soldiers’ attacked. ‘Due to the large bombardment we had hidden in the cellar of a large house. Sergeant Kloke shouted, “Tommies are here!” so we took up position by the shattered windows on the ground floor. Before we got a chance to open fire, a Tommy threw a grenade into the room which bounced along the floorboards.’ Luck was with them when the sergeant managed to pick up and return it to its owner before it exploded. They then started to fire again but, being on the ground floor, were easy targets; Lutmer saw two of his school chums shot through the head. Quickly they were surrounded and realized that further resistance was pointless. Then his luck ran out: ‘another grenade was thrown into the room and Kloke picked it up to throw back but this time he was too late; it exploded in his hand. There was a terrific bang and then whistling in the ears and the next thing I know, I woke up in the street outside the house where I had been dragged. I had many shrapnel wounds from the British bomb…everyone else had been killed by the bomb.’ He was then taken to hospital.

‘The Reserve Battalion was ordered to rally the troops which had been driven back and retake Gavrelle, but its counter-attack broke down completely.’ The next to attack was 185 Division, the local counter-attack division. Two battalions of 28 Reserve Regiment advanced across the open from the direction of Izel under heavy artillery fire, but they were stopped by the infantry of 37 and 63 British Divisions on the outskirts of Gavrelle. Further attempts next morning were also decisively defeated.

Captured troops being used to take Canadian wounded back to a field dressing station.

Gruppe Vimy, however, knew that the Gavrelle positions were too important not to recover. It now had at its disposal 1 Guard Division, formerly the counter-attack division to Gruppe Souchez, further north. This division was sent down when it was discovered that the attack on La Coulotte was not serious. In the afternoon, 64 Reserve Regiment of 1 Guard Division was put in to make a counter-attack from Mauville Farm. ‘The regimental commander was given control of all troops already in front of Gavrelle, with orders to carry them forward with his fresh battalions. The result was another costly failure. It is clear from regimental accounts, that though the British barrages caused heavy loss, it was in the last resort the machine guns of the defence that defeated the counter-attacks.’ 64 Reserve Regiment then relieved the shattered remnants of 28 and 90 Reserve Regiments in front of Gavrelle. More successfully, to the north a number of British POWs were taken when a machine gun company fired into their attack.

As the battle was beginning to die down, unknown to the defenders, the British were getting ready to attack again. On 28 April there was to be a further attempt to capture Oppy and Arleux, to the north Fresnes-les-Montauban, Neuvireuil, Fresnoy and Acheville were to be attacked, while, in the southern sector of the Arras front, fresh assaults were planned against Greenland Hill, Roeux, Fontaine lez Croisilles, Chérisy, Vis en Artois, Boiry Notre Dame, Plouvain and Bullecourt. If these assaults succeeded, troops garrisoning the Siegfried Line between Banteux and Havrincourt would be the next to be attacked.

To the north of Arras, British shells cut the wire, while to the south the British artillery preparation included counter battery fire for destruction, harassing fire by night, and bombardment with gas shell. The important sidings at Brebières were shelled by 9.2 and 12 inch railway guns to put them out of action. On 27 April, British trenches to the south of Arras were persistently shelled, with particular attention being paid to the Monchy-Pelves road at 2100 hours the same evening; the target was the junction of two British divisions. The bombardment was followed by a strong attack aimed at recovering the front line lost on 24 April. The assault was carried out by three battalions, two from 26 Division and one from 221 Division, but was repulsed although some ground was reoccupied, no British positions were taken.

28 April was a bright, mild day but the visibility was poor. ‘From the Scarpe to about 1,000 yards south of Gavrelle the 208th Division had four regiments in line, from left to right 65th (detached from 185th Division and the only regiment of that division not used up in the Second Battle of the Scarpe), 65th Reserve, 185th, and 25th, the two first approximately opposed to the British 34th Division and the other two to the 37th.’

The 34 Division attack passed right through Roeux, but left a few men holding out in the village. The British then pressed on to the high ground above Plouvain, where 400 “English and Scottish troops” established themselves. These survivors beat off the first counter-attack, but the reserve battalion of the 65th Regiment was then brought up to attack them from the south. Almost surrounded, the greater part of the British were captured. Roeux was then counter-attacked and regained, with the troops getting a footing in the old British line. From this, however, they were speedily ejected.

The history of 25 Regiment (on the right of the attack) states ‘that a British battalion with machine guns was seen advancing along the Gavrelle–Fresnes road, north of the regimental sector. The machine-gun company of the right battalion took this column and its line of retreat under such effective fire that it surrendered in a body to the division on the right.’ However, while British records agree that the 2/R. Marines did lose a very large number of prisoners, they show that the whole battalion did not surrender. ‘Meanwhile part of the British 37th Division had broken clean through, driven the three battalion staffs out of Hollow Copse, only narrowly been stopped from entering the rear line of defence west of Fresnes and beaten off a counter-attack by the reserve battalion. At midday a battalion of the 1st Guard Reserve Division, from the sector on the right, attacked this detachment from north and north-west; the battalion of the 25th renewed its attack simultaneously ; and the British were overwhelmed, losing 125 prisoners.’

64 Reserve Regiment was the only regiment of 1 Guard Reserve Division in the line; on its right was 75 Regiment of 17 Division, that had not been engaged on 23 April. The right battalion of 64 Reserve, north of the Gavrelle–Fresnes road, was almost destroyed by the British 63 Division’s attack. However, a counter-attack by a battalion of 2 Guard Reserve Regiment restored the situation; the battalion retook the windmill; but this was in British hands at the end of the day. On the right, only one battalion of 75 Regiment held a front of a thousand yards, from just north of the railway to north of Oppy. To stabilize the front, the support and reserve battalions were thrown in to counter-attack, and by about noon had regained their regimental sector, though only after fierce fighting with parties of the British 2 Division.

North of Oppy up to Acheville was 111 Division, which had two battalions – on the right one from 76 Regiment and on the left one from 73 Regiment – in the forward trench of the Arleux Loop (as it was known to the British), or ‘Nose’, to the defending troops). The Canadians broke through the ‘Nose’ in the sector of 73 Regiment,‘attacked from the rear and captured the companies still holding out, rolled up the battalion of the 76th from the flank thus opened, and captured the western side’ of the ‘Nose’ and the village of Arleux. Although this was an important position to hold, it was not vital as long as the Fresnoy Line in the rear was held, so the divisional commander forbade a counter-attack. The front line battalion of 73 Regiment had 400 men missing.

By the end of the April battles, the Oppy Line was in British hands to within two hundred yards of the wood. The fighting in this area had been fierce and stubborn, with both sides fighting with bravery and determination. From both sides the volume of artillery fire had been tremendous, with the German fire being particularly accurate and effective, especially on the attack front of 99 British Brigade prior to their attack on 29 April, when most of the stored small arms ammunition, grenades and water were destroyed.

On 29 April, Admiral Müller recorded ‘good news from the Arras front. The English attacks have been beaten off with bloody losses.’ And two days later he wrote:‘In bitter fighting our troops at Arras have withstood the attacks of the English, who are believed to have suffered very heavy losses’. However,‘our losses were also stressed, particularly our loss of commissioned ranks.’

The casualty figures for April show just how heavy the fighting was – over 78,000 officers and men. ‘The sick wastage for the month numbered 1,896 officers and 49,260 other ranks. These latter figures comprise little over two and a half per cent of a force numbering, with labour units, 1,910,400.’ The loss during April to the three British Armies ‘engaged in the offensive, including perhaps 800 prisoners taken in the final operations against the outpost villages, were 17,959 prisoners and 254 guns; 11,295 prisoners and 185 guns by the British Third Army, 5,784 prisoners and 69 guns by the British First, and 880 prisoners by the British Fifth Army. This total of just on 18,000 prisoners in a month may be compared with the 39,000 prisoners taken by the British in the twenty weeks of the Battles of the Somme’.

And so the battle continued with the 3rd Battle of the Scarpe. Attack was met with counter-attack and loss of life on both sides. Although the British attacks pushed their line forward, nowhere was it conclusive, and the main structures of the Siegfried Stellung were still in place – or, if they had been dented, were replaced by new lines behind them; importantly a lynchpin – the Oppy sector – was secure, however hard the fighting to take it.

28cm railway gun on the Arras front.

According to the British Official History ‘the British failure was in general so complete that the defence was able to repulse the attack or drive out troops which had broken into its positions without calling upon divisions in reserve. The impression left by the accounts in regimental histories emphasizes the British infantry’s lack of power of resistance when counter-attacked by quite small bodies of troops’.

The British plan of attack was flawed and allowed the defenders to reap a rich harvest. To their advantage, the sun did not rise until 0522 hours, and the moon was not only nearly full, but did not set until sixteen minutes before the British attack began. This provided a clear view of the impending attack. ‘On large stretches of the front the troops assembling…were silhouetted against its light as it sank behind them, their appearance giving warning of the attack and drawing heavy fire.’ The British Official History summarized the major problems of the attack as: ‘the confusion caused by the darkness; the speed with which the German artillery opened fire; the manner in which it concentrated upon the British infantry, almost neglecting the artillery; the intensity of its fire, the heaviest that many an experienced (British) soldier had ever witnessed, seemingly unchecked by British counter-battery fire and lasting almost without slackening for fifteen hours; the readiness with which the German infantry yielded to the first assault and the energy of its counter-attack;’ and agreeing with German Regimental histories that the British troops were unable to withstand any resolute counter-attack.

Although bombarded by British artillery, not all positions had been affected;Tool Trench, in the front line, lay just behind a crest and had suffered little. Its garrison stood shoulder to shoulder to meet the British attack, and such was the strength of its fire power that the attack was smashed. Any troops that fought their way into the position were taken prisoner. In other sectors, the British troops were fired upon from defenders who had pushed forward into the shell holes of no-man’s-land and had thus not been affected by the barrage that had fallen behind them. Some attacking battalions moved forward but, when the flank battalions were checked and pushed back, their positions became untenable and they were also forced to move back by counter-attacks.

Artillery fire also caused considerable casualties when the British front line was deluged, just before the attack, with chemical and high explosive shell. At zero, the British field batteries were enveloped in thick clouds of gas. As well as causing casualties and confusion among the attacking troops, it also caused casualties amongst the reserve troops; the severity of the barrage is clearly shown by two battalions suffering 350 casualties just going up to the British front line.

Again the attacks against Roeux, Greenland Hill and the Chemical Works faltered but even the use of heavy howitzers could not dislodge the defenders, and as in other sectors the darkness caused hopeless confusion amongst the British attackers. Being familiar with their environment gave the defenders a considerable advantage in the darkness, allowing them to hide until the last minute. Hiding behind a wall facing the British Household Battalion was a machine gun that opened up as the line of soldiers came level with it, to terrible effect. The darkness did not allow quick identification of the troops in the immediate area. One battalion walked into a defended position, thinking they were following their sister battalion, to heavy loss while men of one battalion, having wheeled too far right, attacked their own trenches in confusion, firing at the position from the hip.

The front was held, during this phase of the battle by seven divisions, some of whom were fresh, whereas only two of the eleven British divisions were new to the battle. 49 Reserve Division on the left, from the Sensée to southeast of Chérisy, had just arrived from Flanders; 199 Division newly arrived from the south garrisoned positions between Chérisy and Cojeul river; 221 Division, from the Cojeul river to the Bois des Aubépines, had previously been in action on 23 April; the next division north to the Scarpe, 9 Reserve Division, arrived on the night of 29 April. 208 Division, in position from the Scarpe to the southeast of Gavrelle, had previously been heavily involved in the fighting; to such an extent that its exhausted 25 Regiment had been replaced by a fresh regiment, 17 Bavarian Reserve from 6 Bavarian Reserve Division. Holding the important sector, southeast of Gavrelle to the Oppy-Bailleul road, was 1 Guard Reserve (a counter-attack unit), a division that had had all its regiments heavily involved in the fighting. Attached to this division and holding the centre sector, was 185 Division, another unit that had suffered heavily; holding the final sector between the Oppy-Bailleul road and halfway between Fresnoy and Acheville, was 15 Reserve Division, a completely fresh division.

The defending troops were able to repulse the attack and drive the British troops, who had broken into their positions without using any divisions in reserve. Between the Sensée and the Cojeul, on the front held by 49 Reserve and 199 Divisions,‘where the British had great initial success, it took only three platoons to retake Chérisy’, emphasising the British lack of resistance to even weak counter-attacks during this phase of operations.

‘Some of the hardest fighting was immediately north of the Cojeul, where the 169th Brigade of the 56th Division broke through the 41st Regiment, 221st Division. Part of this attack swung northwards across the Cambrai road, and took the front line further north, but was, in its turn, mopped up by the…reserve battalion.’ In the zone of attack for the British 167 Brigade, the artillery fire completely missed the frontline held by 60 Reserve Regiment (221 Division) allowing the defenders to stand up and fire into the attacking masses, annihilating the leading waves. Many prisoners were taken and little ground was lost, with only 9 Reserve Division losing any ground permanently.

The British 4 Division broke through north of the Scarpe on the front held by 65 and 185 Regiments of 208 Division. ‘The regimental reserves, aided by the 25th Regiment, in divisional reserve, restored the situation.’ The British Official History records what it achieved as ‘a wonderful feat. Counter-attacking up the Scarpe valley, with its left on the river, its right company came unexpectedly upon a body of British troops, from which it captured 150 prisoners and three machine guns. A second party of British troops was then encountered, from which, with the aid of a detachment of the 185th Regiment, it took fifty more prisoners. Yet another party was then overrun, so that, by the time it had re-entered Roeux and rescued a pioneer company still holding out there, it had in its hands 358 prisoners. Its own losses are given as 117. It must be added, however, that this regiment had a casualty list of just under one thousand between the 23rd April and the 3rd May.’ Several other regiments suffered similar losses. The heaviest losses were at Fresnoy; here many defenders were taken prisoner and the counter-attacks were unsuccessful. 17 Reserve Regiment (15 Reserve Division) alone reported 650 casualties. British casualties were also high and some of the fighting was reminiscent of 1 July 1916.

‘The 5th Bavarian Division, assembling about Douai between the 1st and 3rd May, received orders on the 5th to recapture Fresnoy. The operation was to be a deliberate counter-attack (Gegenangriff, as opposed to the Gegenstoss or immediate counter-attack, frequently carried out in the course of the battle). All three regiments were put in, the 21st with its right on the Lille road, along which ran the northern edge of Fresnoy Park ; the 19th thence to the southern edge of the wood south of Fresnoy; and the 7th against the remainder of the British position in the salient. The attack was supported by 27 field and 17 heavy batteries, not taking into account the artillery of neighbouring divisions.’

21 Regiment reported only one temporary hold-up. ‘After that the battlefield was empty except for dead and abandoned arms and equipment. The strongest resistance came from the edge of Fresnoy Park, on the regiment’s left flank, but it was speedily stifled. The 19th in the centre lost the barrage owing to heavy rain having turned the ground to the consistency of glue. It also met with stronger resistance from the British and might not have reached its objective had not the 21st disengaged its right. The 7th also had trouble, but bombed up the trench south of the wood, rolling up the British front —that is, the line of the 1/East Surrey.’

‘This highly successful attack was carried out in depth, each regiment having two battalions in line and one in reserve, and each battalion two companies in line, one in support, and one in reserve. The company passing through Fresnoy village was provided with a Flammenwerfer. The leading waves were ordered to push straight through to the final objective; the supports to clear the captured ground and provide flank protection; and the reserves to fill gaps or cooperate in neighbouring sectors. The losses were comparatively heavy, 1,585 for the infantry alone, which probably means 1,750 in all.’

The successful defence of Bullecourt against an Australian attack on 11 April resulted in the British Fifth Army preparing a renewed attack. From 12 April, an increasing amount of artillery bombarded the approaches to the village, reducing troop movements, cutting the wire and smashing artillery positions. The last remaining houses were demolished, but the rubble fell as cover for the deep cellars, providing extra protection as did the remains of the walls. The second attempt to take Bullecourt started at 0345 hours on 3 May and after twenty-four hours fighting, the defences had held, except opposite the Australian 6 Brigade; even here it did not look like a permanent loss.

Mark II training tank captured on 11 April near Arras.

At the end of four days’ fighting, the strong defence had used up two attacking British divisions and caused serious casualties to two more. This had only been achieved by slightly adjusting the front, using large numbers of troops in defence as well as in the half dozen counter-attacks, and by bringing reserves. The British attack was developing into a slow and ferocious struggle in which success was measured by the yard, and, as Bullecourt was still untaken, it left the attackers with two options: abandon any territory taken, or continue sending brigade after brigade into the fight.

On 11 May, the defensive positions at Roeux were overrun by British troops. Five days later, a counter-attack was carried out by fresh troops – 38 Division that had come from the Quéant area and had been in reserve to the Sixth Army for a week. ‘The operation was entitled “Erfurt”, the use of such a code-name always implying that the German command meant business; again it was a Gegenangriff in the fullest sense. The 94th Regiment attacked the station and the Chemical Works, the 95th the village of Roeux.’

‘Some companies came under hot fire on their way up and were delayed, but they just managed to assault in time, behind the barrage. The attack of the 95th was, generally speaking, a failure. That of the 94th was almost completely successful, but the battalions had suffered so heavily that they could not resist the British counterattacks especially as the British artillery and machine guns prevented their reinforcement. Finally, except for one company which held on north of the railway, the survivors withdrew to their starting-line.’ 94 Regiment suffered 547 casualties - those of 95 Regiment are unknown. ‘It was as complete a failure as the counter-attack on Fresnoy had been a success. On 20 May 49 Reserve Division was attacked by the British 33 Division with the main thrust falling on the centre regiment – 225 Reserve. The regiment held an awkward sector that formed a salient; ‘on the right the Cherisy-Riegel from the Fontaine—Heninel road to the Hindenburg Line, and on the left the Hindenburg Line to a distance of 1,000 yards south-east of the Sensée. On both sides of the angle the defence collapsed with heavy casualties, and the regiment was severely shaken. On the 21st May the division was relieved by the 220th which had previously held this front and which faced the later attack of the 33rd Division.’

By 13 May, apart from an area known as the ‘Red Patch’, the whole of Bullecourt was now in British hands. Attacks that day were held by the defenders, as were those the next day. During the night an intense bombardment caused heavy casualties among the British, destroying much of their positions in the Hindenburg line. In the morning the artillery was joined by trench mortar fire that levelled the trenches with their big projectiles. British field artillery units were enveloped in gas, as were the counter batteries, but they managed to put down a protective barrage. ‘The flashes of explosions, the fantastic firework display as rockets of all colours were flung up, calling, it might be, for aid, for fire to lengthen, or fire to shorten – no observer could in the confusion recognize signals or even tell whose were the rockets – made a truly awful and infernal battle picture, to which the din was fitting accompaniment.’

A little before 0400 hours on 15 May, the Australian and British troops faced the last and biggest counter-attack at Bullecourt. It extended over the whole front and was designed to recapture it in its entirety. Only in Bullecourt did the counter-attack meet with any success; in other places the frontal assault was smashed or, where successful, was quickly routed. After a prolonged and fluctuating struggle in the village, a British counter-attack pushed the attackers back. By the end of the day, Bullecourt had been lost, but the official communiqué stated that it had evacuated in accordance with orders.

‘For fourteen days some of the most savage fighting of the war had taken place around the ruins of a small village and over a stretch of ground slightly under a mile of width’. Casualties were heavy: ‘by the end the dead of both sides lay in clumps all over the battlefield, and in the bottom or under the parapets of trenches many hundreds had been hastily covered with a little earth.’ The British losses were extremely heavy at over 14,000 or 1000 a day; losses among the defenders were also heavy but not at the level of their attackers’, with 3 Guard Division recording losses of over 2,000 and 27 Division reporting over 2,300 in the infantry alone; the losses of the other six regiments involved are unknown.

Although this was officially the end of the battle for the British, local encounters continued for many days in order to show that the battle of Arras had not finished. ‘It was not the sole operation fought for this purpose; for before it had ended another attack had been launched against the Chemical Works at Roeux, and, after it was over, further attempts were made against the Hindenburg Line near Bullecourt.’

While the Bullecourt attacks were taking place, a further assault was launched against the Chemical Works and the nearby château and cemetery. As with previous attempts, any success was limited and was mainly attributable to the quality of the defending troops opposing 4 British Division. Their attack had fallen mainly on 4 Ersatz Division, a ‘luckless formation, from the Havrincourt area (that) had failed in the Lagnicourt counter-offensive, had been harassed and harried by the left wing of the Fourth Army when closing up to the Hindenburg Line, and had now been transferred to the wasps’ nest of Roeux.’ Its losses were large with over 450 taken as prisoners. 6 Bavarian Reserve Division to the north, a division of stouter troops, resisted the attack.

Throughout 15 May, British positions were bombarded prior to an attempt to recover the lost ground. At 0345 hours the next day, the troops advanced behind a heavy barrage. After heavy fighting some positions were retaken and held, but not the important Chemical Works. However, British attempts to take Infantry Hill on 19 May were stopped and some prisoners taken. A further British attack on 30 May at 2330 hours was spotted as troops left their trenches fifteen minutes before zero hour and, within five minutes, the requested artillery barrage was sufficiently powerful to break the attack. Any groups that penetrated the front line were surrounded the next day and forced to surrender.

The battles around Arras from now on would be small operations that did not require large numbers of troops or artillery. British reinforcements would henceforth go to those divisions scheduled for the next big attacks to the north in Flanders, and artillery units would be slowly withdrawn to assist future offensives.

Although the battle of Arras was over for the British by the end of the month, there were other operations in June, and a successful attack against Hill 70 in mid-August by Canadian troops. In this assault, the defenders were driven back and the hill occupied by Canadian troops who were able to advance no further. Local counter-attacks in the early morning to retake the hill were broken up by artillery fire, while, later in the morning, the massed infantry in extended order were caught in artillery barrage of field and heavy artillery that was vividly described, after the war in the regimental histories: ‘they marched across the open through fountains of earth sent up by the heavy shells, and later through a hail of shrapnel and machine gun bullets.’ In all, the Canadians repulsed eighteen counter-attacks and, the next day, when they continued their attacks, came across troops massing for a counter-attack. After fierce close fighting, the counter-attack troops withdrew, leaving behind one hundred dead, an equal number of wounded, and thirty prisoners. Counter-attacks later in the day, lasting around ninety minutes, similarly failed to dislodge the Canadians. Hill 70 was a vital observation area and the attacks and counter-attacks lasted for six days, with the Canadians eventually holding the hill and moving down towards Cité St. Emile. Fighting continued until the end of the month with no change in the situation. A further British assault was planned for 15 October to take Lens and the high ground around Sallaumines, but a lack of troops, due to the Flanders offensive, meant it could not take place.

The lucky ones from the Allied offensives found themselves as prisoners in France well away from the war.

The major French offensive, at the same time as the British Arras offensive, had been a failure with numerous mutinies; the French Army was no longer fit for offensive fighting. Although the French troops were prepared to defend their lines, they would not attack. As a result of the unreliability of the French Army during this period, the British offensive at Arras had to continue in order to conceal this problem, and, when Arras finally did finish, the focus would move to the Flanders plain and a further British offensive – Third Ypres. The British Official History recorded that ‘the campaign was fought by Sir Douglas Haig, on a front favourable on account of its strategic advantages, in order to prevent the Germans falling upon the French Armies, shaken and dispirited after three years of unceasing warfare and finally mutinous in consequence of the losses in and failure of the Nivelle offensive, upon which such great hopes had been set’. However, OHL received information from a spy that there would be an attack in the Ypres area so that there would be no surprise when it came. This was further corroborated by information from prisoners taken on the Arras front; ‘statements of prisoners proved conclusively that no further big attacks were to be expected in the Arras sector, and that a big attack was to take place from the Armentieres-Ypres front about the 7th June, after an eight-day bombardment’.

After two months of intensive fighting, the Arras Front would now become a comparatively quiet front as both belligerents focused their attentions on the Ypres Salient. It would be nearly a year before Arras became an important area again, and then only for a very short while.

Lessons had been learned from the Arras offensive that were applied to the French offensive and later: very importantly the need to supply reserves with speed when and where they were needed, and the principle of a fluid defence that kept the men away from the immediate front line whenever possible. This Abwehrschlacht gave a new sense of confidence. ‘The infantry, observing the rhythmic flow of the reserves in each engagement, gained an impression of leadership as something vital, active, and ever watchful of their fortunes. No unit henceforth felt that it was to be left to its own resources; each one knew that the machinery for supporting it existed and would be put in motion if that were humanly possible. It realized, too, that the better it fulfilled its allocated role the more efficiently would that machinery function.’ It is probably this that prevented the army from crumbling under the Entente attacks of 1917, as many of their leaders feared it would.

Counter-attacks were handled well and the junior leadership was good, with the under-officer frequently showing initiative by daring and resourceful local assaults to recapture positions of importance without the aid of an officer. On the other hand, British troops who lost their officer were apt to fall back. The army had learned a great deal. Casualties had been high but not as high as among the British troops and, while some important positions had been taken, the actual ground lost was relatively small.

At dinner on 31 May, to general surprise, the Kaiser suddenly rose to his feet and said: ‘General Ludendorff has just reported to me that the spring offensive at Arras, on the Aisne, and in Champagne has been defeated. We have gained a famous victory.’

Fighting around Arras, at least for the next few months, would be localised attacks and trench raids of specific tactical necessity. Troop numbers would be deliberately kept at a minimum to allow a maximum input into the defence of Flanders and, at the end of the year, at Cambrai. There would be little change until well into 1918.

After the battle around Ypres and then at Cambrai, the army had started to change and manpower became a serious issue. ‘In millions of letters from the Western Front from April to November came the ever-rising bitter complaints of the almost unbearable hardships and bloody losses in the scarcely interrupted chain of battles: Arras, Aisne-Champagne (Nivelle), Flanders, Verdun and the Chemin des Dames (Malmaison). A hundred thousand leave men told the Home Front by word of mouth the details of the ever-growing superiority of the enemy, particularly in weapons of destruction.’ So, by the end of 1917, after the Flanders battle – ‘the greatest martyrdom of the World War’ – had consumed the German strength to such a degree that the harm done could no longer be repaired, ‘the sharp edge of the German sword had become jagged.’ However, the German Army was still a most formidable force and was being reinforced by first class troops from the Eastern Front.

What was not realised at the time was how much the army’s will to carry on the struggle was being eroded. Troops from Russia did not all welcome the transfer. Many who had witnessed a successful end to the campaign had hoped that their fighting days were now over and had no wish to join their comrades in the bloodbath in the west. There were many troops who disappeared during the transfer from one front to another. The railway trucks transporting the men were often painted with appropriate slogans that expressed their feelings: Schlachtvieh für Flandern – fattened beasts for Flanders or beasts to be slaughtered for Flanders. As the trains moved across Germany, societies established to help men who were prepared to desert did just that, and many men simply vanished from the army. This movement was particularly active in the major cities across the country. It is estimated that up to ten per cent of the troops moving west were provided with forged papers, money and ration cards, and helped to cross into Holland and Switzerland.

Further numbers of troops were to come from the released prisoners of war. However, many of them had become socialists during their time in captivity and were not reliable. For re-education they were sent to special camps but even then many were more likely to be troublemakers rather than reliable soldiers; so much so that, even during the desperate manpower shortage from summer of 1918 to the end of the war, some unit commanders would not take them, believing that they could not be trusted.

Gefreiter Josef Linner, a farmer’s son, who had won the Bavarian Military Service Cross 3rd class, was killed on 9 April 1917 while serving with 1 Machine Gun Company of 2 Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment.

After the fighting at Ypres came the December battle of Cambrai and although little real gain had been achieved by either side, both had learned valuable lessons for the coming year: ‘our action has given us valuable hints for an offensive battle in the west if we wished to undertake one in 1918’ wrote Hindenburg in his memoirs and, as Rupprecht recorded, ‘it was our biggest success over the British since 1915, at Ypres’ and ‘captures from the British, since the opening of the counter-offensive had amounted to 75 officers, 2,556 other ranks and 85 guns’. However, the enemy had taken 189 officers, 10,916 other ranks and ninety-eight guns.

Although the offensive had finished, there was continued fighting on various parts of the front; part of 16 Bavarian Division had a limited success in a local attack on 12 December near Bullecourt and there were further successes at Messines and Polderhoek.

Apart from the fact that not all troops could be trusted to perform to their best, the advantage was now passing from Allied hands. Something needed to be done to win the war before the Americans arrived in strength. On 11 November, at Mons, the first ideas for an offensive in 1918 were discussed. General von Kuhl argued for an attack against the British at Ypres, Colonel von Schulenberg favoured an attack against the French at Verdun, but Ludendorff wanted an attack south of Ypres, with an offensive near St. Quentin offering the greatest possibilities for rolling up the British front. At a further planning conference on 27 December, Ludendorff ordered that planning and preparation should be made for attacks in a number of areas: ‘George’ – an offensive towards Hazebrouck with a subsidiary,‘George Two’ towards Ypres, ‘Michael’ against St. Quentin with a subsidiary against Arras – ‘Mars’. Other schemes were prepared against French positions around Verdun and in the Vosges.

Destroyed British tank near Bullecourt.

Twenty-nine year old Gefreiter Kaspar Schiechtele of Sachsenried, serving with 17 Bavarian Reserve Infantry Regiment, was killed on 8 May 1917.

Daily news sheet produced by Luddendorf ’s headquarters on 16 April 1917 detailing how successfully the defences were holding up against British attacks, taking 475 Australian soldiers prisoner and fifteen machine guns.

Troops in bivouac, using their waterproof cloaks to make tents, wait their turn to be called to the front at Arras.

Another casualty of the British attacks on 8 May 1917 was twenty year old Anton Helsberger from Grünwald, who was killed by an artillery barrage at Chérisy, near Arras.

Johann Seidl, a twenty year old soldier in 4 Battery of 3 Bavarian Reserve Foot Artillery Regiment, from Linden, died of wounds, caused by a shell, on 11 May 1917

Five decorated NCOs pose near Arras on Whit Sunday 1917.