FIVE

There’s been no sound from Peter, not a breath, ever since the

day he “marched out” from Roulles to join his battalion five months

back. His Army Record has been silent all that time. It’s as if his

personality had fused into that of the Battalion. As if, robbed by the

machine of all individuality, he’s been reduced to a non-person, a

cipher, a cog.

But he’s there, even if he doesn’t speak, (or isn’t spoken for) there in

the narrative, beneath the surface, slogging the roads of France,

trudging in and out of the damp water-logged line, all the time trying

not to remember the sights of death and destruction that everywhere

surround him.

What does he feel, what does he think, as he looks out from the

trenches to the, as yet, undamaged fields at Sailly-le-Sec ? Waiting for

the enemy to come ? We can only speculate. Perhaps he’s considered

the possibility that time’s running out, that his days are numbered. Has

he written letters ? Is he reminded of the fields of home ....

After their sweeping success begun on March 21st , the Germans,

now close to exhaustion, were forced to halt their advance in order to

reorganise, arrange new lines of supply, and bring up reinforcements.

They’d made huge gains in terms of ground captured and prisoners

taken, not to mention the casualties they’d inflicted, particularly on the

British 5th Army. In the first week of their offensive they’d advanced 25

miles. It’s probably true to say that had they not stopped when they

did they’d have made it all the way to Amiens, exhaustion

notwithstanding, without any real difficulty since there’d been insufficient

numbers in place to block their progress. As it stood they were now

no more than 11 miles from that city.

 So the 42nd was given a respite but it was short-lived. On Easter

Saturday, March 30th, , 9 days after they’d begun their phenomenal

advance, the Germans were on the move again. At noon that day they

began to bombard the Australian positions in the vicinity of Sailly-le-

Sec, reducing that village to flames and rubble in a short time. Then,

they turned their attention to the village of Hamel on the Australian

right flank, shelling it with gas and high explosives. Next, they opened

up on Bouzancourt nearby.

Around noon the line held by the 42 nd came under attack. Wave

after wave of the enemy surged forward, almost suicidally, in a line

from Sailly Laurette in the south to the Corbie-Bray road in the north.

The attack was met with strong resistance in the form of machine-gun

fire and then devastating shelling, the 3 rd Division artillery having

arrived in situ a short time before. At 2.15 pm a second attack was

launched and again the Germans were repulsed. Around 3 o’clock the

enemy realised that further engagement was fruitless and by sunset

he’d begun to withdraw from the 400 yards of ground he’d gained in

the course of the day. Both sides suffered heavy losses, particularly

the Germans, who left over 500 dead behind on the surrounding

hillsides.

In halting further German progress in this direction the 42 nd had won

a significant victory, blocked the road to Amiens, and earned itself

lavish praise at both Brigade and Divisional levels.

Two days later, April 1 st the 42nd went out of the line and were sent

to bivouac in a valley near the village of Vaux, a few miles to the

west of Sailly-le-Sec. This was no rest. Here they were set to work,
going out each day to strength defences along the line, stacking shells

for the big guns, digging, wiring, carrying, filling sandbags, burying the

dead, along with a 100 chores of a similar nature. All exhausting

work. Most men preferred duty at the front line to “fatigues” as they

called this sort of work. Lt. J.F.B. O’Sullivan of the 6 th Connaught

Rangers well summed up the average soldier’s distaste : “The term

“rest” became a standard joke. Everyone made it, each with an air of

great originality - and always got a laugh, or at least a sympathetic

snigger .... the periods when the battalion wasn’t holding the front

trenches were so filled with fatigues, raids, and back-breaking work

parties that many a tired man welcomed the return to the death-dealing

line.”

The German army continued to blitz the front line in this sector and

on April 4th it drove the British out of Hamel and Bouzancourt. They’d

made a gain of 3,000 yards and were now on the outskirts of the

town of Villiers-Bretonneaux, bringing them that bit closer to Amiens.

(In all since March 21st they gained over 60 kilometres of ground,

capturing several strategic locations such as St. Quentin, (see photo in

FOUR) Bapaume, Rosieres, and Avre.) At the time the 42nd was

digging reserve trenches along the Corbie-Bray road and taking

casualties from shell-fire. Over their heads “dog fights” for control of

the air were a continual occurrence, in one of which the redoubtable

“Red Baron”, Baron Von Richthoven was at last killed.

 On April 7th the 42nd were back in the trenches. It was cold and wet

and many were suffering from trench foot. This is an extremely painful

condition brought about by cold, wet, and unsanitary conditions.

Trenches were often water-logged and without duck-boards and men

were obliged to stand for hours on end in them without being able to

remove wet socks and boots. In such cases their feet would swell and

gradually grow numb and the skin would turn red or blue. If untreated

trench foot could grow gangrenous and result in amputation. Over

20,000 British troops were treated for trench foot in 1914-15. By the

end of 1915 each soldier had to have 3 pairs of socks and was

obliged to change twice a day. Keeping feet dry became a priority and

men were ordered to rub a grease made of whale oil into their feet

after drying.

On April 13th the Battalion was out of the trenches once more and

moved back “for rest” to the valley north of Vaux. While there they

heard that the Germans had captured Armenteries where they’d

soldiered for so long, and that the Australian 1st Division, which had

just arrived in the Amiens sector from there, were now being rushed

back to prevent further loss. No doubt the Battalion would have

regretted this set-back especially when they remembered the hours of

drudgery and hard work they put into strengthening the defences of the

city. On April 19th they returned to the trenches at Sailly-le-Sec where

they were involved in raiding and work parties.

 Baths had been opened in the village of Bonnay 5 miles behind the

front line and it can be imagined the luxury a warm scrub would have

been to men long living in close proximity to rats, lice, and decaying

corpses. On April 24th the Germans, rather unsportingly, struck Bonnay

with a vicious bombardment of high explosives mixed with gas while

the 42nd were in the village, and so forced into retreat not only the

happy bathers but the masses of troops held in reserve there. A Red

Cross hospital was hit during the shelling and its doctors and inmates

killed. Among the many casualties taken by the 42nd were 12 dead and

35 wounded.

This attack was part of the German strategy to take the town of

Villiers-Bretonneaux, the next step on their way to Amiens, and by

hitting Bonnay they hoped to make it unsafe to bring up

reinforcements from there. At the time Villiers-Bretonneaux was in the

hands of a badly weakened British regiment - the Australians who’d

gallantly defended it a few weeks before, having withdrawn to

reorganise. The British proved no match for the German attackers so

that the town was taken on April 24 th by an attack spear-headed by

tanks. This was the first battle of the War involving tank-against-tank.
 (The church at Villiers-Bretonneaux after the fighting.)

The town was not to remain in German hands for long. On the

night of April 24th a brilliant counter-attack by both Australians and

British won it back and there it remained till the Armistice in November

1918, despite several attempts by the Germans to regain it.

Some idea of the severity of the fighting as the Germans took

Villiers-Bretonneaux is to be found in the diary of Capt. Maberly Esler

of the Royal Army Medical Corps. He writes :

“When the battle of Villiers-Bretonneaux, near Amiens, started, first of

all we were gassed heavily. We were down the valley when it got so

full of gas that we had to clear out. We went to some support

trenches which were very primitive and we took up our position there.

The only place I could find as a first-aid post was a large quarry, and

we took up our position there. We found a cave at one end. In a

much bigger cave at the other end I put all the stretcher-bearers, the

stretchers and the drugs. Unfortunately, a shell fell short and hit the top

of the quarry and buried all those fellows and killed them. So we

finished the night without any stretcher-bearers at all.

“Capt. Toye, who was awarded the VC later on, came round to my

shelter in the quarry and said, “Where are all your stretcher-bearers ? I

said, “Under that lot,” pointing to the pile of rubble. He said, “You’ve

got to get out of this as quick as you can. You’re going to have a

hell of a walk because they’re putting down a tremendous barrage

between here and Villiers-Bretonneaux.

And we did do that. We started a 180 strong and we arrived 21.

People ask me if I was frightened. Of course I was frightened, but it

was so like a nightmare that I thought it must be a nightmare. That

sort of thing couldn’t be happening. I thought that I’d wake up

suddenly and find it was a dream.

I had a sergeant beside me. Suddenly, a shell went up, and as the

smoke cleared I saw him sitting with his two stumps waving in the air,

his legs completely shot off. I said, “Well, we’ll take you to the side of

the road.” He said, “You’re not going to leave me here ?” I said, “I’m

afraid we can’t do anything about it, we’ve got no stretcher-bearers,

we’ve got nothing to carry you with, we’ve got nothing to give you, but

we’ll put you out of the way of the tanks and hope you’ll be picked

up.

“It was an awfully painful decision to make. People who could walk

helped them along. I had about 5 people clinging to me, one with a

jaw blown away, bleeding all over me, and that’s how we ended our

march. Getting through that was a miracle really, a miracle.”

 On April 25th the 42nd Battalion marched out of the Sailly-le-Sec

sector and bivouacked at La Houssaye which was some miles behind

Bonnay. On that date its composition was 49 officers and 967 other

ranks, a drop of 2 officers and 41 other ranks on the early April

figure. On April 27th they were back to Sailly-le-Sec and into the front

line and on the 30th it was back to Bonnay and the following day they

were once again off foot-slogging to La Houssaye where they were

involved in “fatigues” around Heilly, the Brigade headquarters.

On May 9th they got orders to leave La Houssaye for Querrieu

travelling via Pont Noyalles. Querrieu was headquarters for the British

4th Army with a big training ground. Here at Quierrieu they encountered

not only great numbers of fellow Australians, but also some of the
newly-arrived Americans, or “Sammys” as they were called in those

days. They were inspected by Haig on May 17th and the following day

they were off and into the switch line at La Houssaye.

On May 20th they received orders to march to Villiers-Bretonneaux, via

Daours, to relieve the 15th Australian Battalion in the reserve trenches

in Bois l’Abbe to the west of the town. Those trenches can be seen

marked in red in the top left corner of the map above. Villiers-

Bretonneaux continued to be a hot spot and they well could expect a

bit of a roasting there. It was vital to the Germans that they

recaptured it as it was a key point in the defence of Amiens which in

turn was the key to both Paris and the Channel Ports. Since its loss

they had not weakened in their resolve to retake it, and although they

never did, they were to keep up the pressure on its defenders right to

the end of the War.

In his chronicle of the Battalion Vivian Brahms writes of the situation:

“On May 24th the sound of heavy gunfire was heard coming from the

direction of Albert. Then, at 5.30 pm the enemy began to shell us with

mustard gas. This lasted a half an hour. At 8.30 more gas came over

and that lasted for 3 hours. The roads around were also shelled

preventing the movement of almost all transport so that rations could

not get up till midnight.

“ Next day the gas bombardment recommenced and lasted for 3 hours.

The men had been wearing gas masks for over eight hours so that it
had been impossible to sleep overnight. As the day drew on, the heat

of the sun drew out the fumes that had lingered among the trees in

the wood. A wind then sprang up which drove the clouds of gas

towards the sleeping men who on awakening found their eyes badly

affected. As the day went on the ill-effects increased. Also their

uniforms had become saturated with gas so that while they slept

during the night they’d inhaled the fumes. Even the doctor’s orderly,

who’d been nowhere near the scene of the gassing, became a

casualty by merely bending over and attending to the men being

evacuated. Every officer and man in the wood was evacuated.”

 (Australians waiting to be attended to after being gassed in Bois

d’Abbe, Villiers-Bretonneaux, May 26th, 1918. Peter may very well be

in this group.)
 Bean’s Official War History, “The A.I.F. in France” describes the

scene : “Such was the general situation when, on May 24 th and 25th,

the German shelling upon “touchy” sections of the British front suddenly

increased in severity. Several prisoners had given warning that the date

of the offensive was very close. The diary of an Australian at

headquarters of the 4th Australian Division states on May 25th that

attack had been expected on the 21st :

“.... then between May 21st and 25th : then May 25th. But all is very

quiet today until 7 o’clock when there suddenly burst out a heavy

bombardment. Gen. Burgess of the 4 th Division artillery, who is down at

Villiers-Bretonneaux, rang up from there and said that the Boche was

pouring gas shell into Bois d’Aquenne and Villiers-Bretonneaux. Col.

Lavarack said, “Well, Michael 3 has begun”.

For some time the general opinion among the Top Brass was that an

attack on Villiers-Bretonneaux would take place but it would be no

more than a feint. The same diarist went on to say :

“The Germans were gassing Buire, Ribemont, Heilly and Sailly-le-Sec

yesterday ; and tonight Villiers-Bretonneaux far more heavily. Burgess

says that the French in the Bois d’Aquenne are getting it badly ; the

flashes of 15 German batteries can be seen firing, he says. The

French have asked for counter-battery upon these guns and it is now

going on, with a large proportion of gas. A heavy bombardment ; and

our planes going over hour after hour.

 “Sunday, May 26. No attack followed the German gassing of Villiers-

Bretonneaux. But Wilkins (the official photographer) who went up there

to get photos of gassed men says that there seemed to be a very big

proportion of casualties -- 700, he thinks, in the 11 th Bde. ...Most

people expect first a feint at Villiers-Bretonneaux and Montdidier ; then

Michael 3 from Albert to perhaps Bethune. The tongue between the

Ancre and Albert should be quiet.”

After the gassing it was not thought that the enemy would attack

Villiers-Bretonneaux simply because you do not attack a sector that

you’ve just gassed. The stuff lies in the soil for ages and leaves the

area temporarily uninhabitable. Nonetheless, terrible damage had been

done. Gas shells began to drench the reserve trenches in the woods

at Villiers-Bretonneaux at 8 p.m. on the 25th. This shelling continued,

with a short break, right into the following morning raining down on the

Australian 3rd Division and in particular on its 11 th Brigade of which

Peter was part. Something in the region of 18,000 gas shells were

fired within that time span. Various casualty figures are given but it’s

thought that no fewer than 600 were sufficiently burnt or blistered to

be sent to the local aid centres for treatment.

For many of these men that was it, the War was over, so excessive

were their injuries, and they with Peter were removed from the field

never to return. It’s interesting to hear Capt. Wilkins, the official

photographer, describe what he saw when he arrived at Villiers-

Bretonneaux. Perhaps the above photo is his work. He writes :

“found the support or reserve trenches with the rifles still standing by

the little scooped-out shelter in the trench side, and the waterproof

sheet still hanging there. But no man in them -- or sometimes a very

few sitting down with their heads on their hands, and swollen,

streaming eyes, still hanging on. The road was filled with a trickle of

men coming down with eyes half-blinded, swaying across the road, just

able to open their eyes painfully and dodge between trees when the

shells burst. The defences of Villiers-Bretonneaux had been enormously

strengthened by the 4th Divn. ; but one does not know what defences

can stand this sort of thing ; 400-700 casualties in a night, though they

may be only casualties for a month, would soon run through the

Australian defence.”

An entry in Peter’s Army Record, dated 26 th May 1918, the first

entry for four months, is rubber-stamped, “WOUNDED in ACTION.”

Someone has written beside it in a bold hand, “Gas.”

END OF FIVE