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  Unlike in the Second World War, Germany had very few tanks active in the First World War, with only 15 (A7V type) being produced in Germany during the war.

  By the end of the Battle of the Somme, in spite of their limitations, tanks had proven themselves as weapons with great potential for the future battles of the war.

  8

  A Day in the Life

  France, March 15/16

  Dear Father,

  At present we’re billeted in a barn and have very comfortable quarters and plenty of straw to lie on. They are fine billets and it is something to be able to stretch out and have a good sleep. The average dugout in the front line holds about two and you have to curl up in some peculiar shapes in some of them.

  “Stand-to” was a part of every soldier’s life. Leaders believed that raids were most likely during early dawn or in the evening, when visibility was low. Thus, soldiers in the front trenches were wakened an hour before dawn to take their position on the fire step of the trenches, ready for an attack. They repeated this procedure in the evening. After morning stand-to, soldiers cleaned their guns before breakfast in preparation for a later inspection by their commanding officers. In some battalions, the cleaning of guns was enhanced by a shot of rum.

  Life in the trenches involved a daily routine of filling sandbags, draining or repairing trenches, preparing latrines, and repairing duckboards. After the chores, daytime activity in the trenches was restricted because of snipers. This quiet time would be spent writing letters home, playing cards, catching up on lost sleep, and preparing meals.

  Mail Arriving at a Canadian Field Post Office.

  Courtesy Canadian War Museum 19920085-137.

  Normally, soldiers spent three to six days in the front trenches and then were moved back to the support lines. Occasionally they would be allowed a short leave in a nearby French village. In the following letters written in the early spring of 1916, Jim adds further details about the everyday life of a soldier at the front:

  March 2, 1916

  Dear Frank,

  At present we are only three or four miles from the firing line and can hear the big guns booming very plainly. We aren’t going up for a few days as the battalion that we are going in with are out resting at present. Two of our company went in last night and I guess Mac Woods was with them.

  It is very muddy here but the worst of it is over and the trenches are beginning to dry up. It is rather hard to write when you are sitting on the tent floor writing by candlelight.

  We are going into the trench with the Ross rifle. I thought before that we would have the Lee Enfield as we did our target shooting with it.

  When you get this letter you will be busy putting the crop in — pulling the lines over a four-horse team. Many’s the time I wish I was back again but we are soldiering now and have to put up with a few things. It is the long marches and hard cobblestone roads that are worst but we don’t have many long marches.

  Eatables are very dear in France and about all you can get are eggs and chops. We only draw a franc a day now; that is about 20 cents.

  Your loving brother Jim

  March 5, 1916

  My dear Mother and Father,

  It snowed here yesterday and it makes things rather wet. We are in tents now and we are in very comfortable quarters. I have met several fellows who have been out here for a year and safe yet and believe me I’m going to keep my head down.

  Well Mother and Father I have some news to tell you. You might not be pleased at first but I think you will consider it. I have started to smoke, not smoking steady but take a pipeful of tobacco occasionally. It gets so lonesome sometimes in the tent that it helps to pass the time away and one needs something to keep your nerves steady especially in a heavy bombardment. I don’t smoke very much but I considered it before I started and I thought that you wouldn’t mind it considering the circumstances.

  With love to all.

  Another chum from Winnipeg and I read our Bible chapter by candlelight every night possible.

  From you loving son

  Jim

  April 8, 1916

  My Dear Mother,

  Last letter you asked me if I needed any drawers or shirts. Well I’m wearing drawers at present and the weather is beginning to get warm so I don’t really need any in a short time. We have a bath and change of underwear about every two weeks and I really couldn’t carry any more in my pack as it is heavy enough now. I have plenty of sox but I guess those two pairs are on the road by now but there are some lads here who are short so I’ll give them a pair or so. I don’t need any kneecaps as we do not wear the kilt.

  Did you get that 3 pound I sent from Bramshott? You don’t want to bank it but keep it for yourself as spring is coming on and you’ll need it for flower seeds and etc.

  The order just came in that we’re going for a bath tomorrow. That certainly is joyful news as I need one and a change of underwear.

  With love to all

  From your loving son Jim

  On Good Friday (April 21, 1916), Jim wrote in his diary, “Left E camp for the trenches.” The next month he wrote:

  May 15, 1916

  Left B camp and went to the trenches. Trench 59 Bay 12. Spent four days in front line and moved to supports in Cumberland Dugouts. Got shelled every day for four days. Sgt. Maj. Morrison killed.

  Lice, which the soldiers called “grey-backs,” troubled the men in the trenches. Often the lice lived on in the seams even after uniforms were steamed and cleaned. After leaving the front line, soldiers would bathe in large tubs with many other soldiers to get rid of the smell of the trenches. Before their bath they left their clothes to be cleaned. After bathing, they collected their clean uniforms. The men were checked for lice, as they could carry dangerous diseases.

  May 3/16

  Dear Frank,

  Rec’d your letter yesterday and was glad to hear from you. I wish I had been home to help you break in those colts as I generally used to like that job. I suppose you will be breaking the sorrel pacer some of these days and then you won’t be able to see the buggy for dust.

  About all the animals we see around here is “grey backs” (which resembled grains of uncooked rice) and we have a picnic every time we come out of the trenches picking them off our shirt but if we hadn’t anything worse than these to bother us we would be Jake. If you would ask Mother to send a little bagful of sulphur to put around my neck as they say that will kill them although I’m not bothered very much with them.

  We all heard about that big riot in Winnipeg between the soldiers and police and most of the fellows said to send them out here and they would get all the fighting they want and they can send our battalion back and will keep peace alright.

  From your loving brother

  Jim

  May 8/16

  My Dear Mother,

  At present we are back at a rest camp for a few days and we certainly enjoy getting where we can buy things and where we can stretch our limbs. It is a treat to get in a Y.M.C.A where we can write letters and there is a singsong every Sunday night and a band concert thro the week. Yesterday they held church parade and it was a treat for the whole battalion to meet once again and hold service. You were mentioning in your letter about the paper mentioning about the Canadians being in the thick of the fight but our battalion and a number of others were not in the thick of it at all. The newspapers often hear funny rumours.

  There has only been one communion since we have been in France and unfortunately I was on duty all that day. Dr. Gordon was away for a while when we came over first but he came the second time we went into the trenches with us and has been with us ever since. We will have service tomorrow in the Y.M.C.A and that will be our last Sunday out before we go back to the trenches.

  There certainly will be plenty of water in the ground and in the sloughs there this spring. I guess Cecil will have quite a time with his raft on the slough. I am glad to hear that the hens are laying well. Eggs are quite a price here �
�� two for 9 cents in your money but we can afford them now and again as we save money for a few days while in the trenches.

  Today was supposed to be our big sports day but I guess it is called off on account of the rain. We have been playing football and baseball and are having a fine time since we came out. It relieves the monotony of things and there is a band concert every night in the Y.M.C.A.

  With lots of love to all

  From your loving son

  Jim

  May 27/16

  Dear Brother,

  The 43rd baseball team played the P.P.C.L.I. and beat them about 8–2. We have certainly some baseball team. Most of them are Regina fellows. We have had a draft from the 44th battalion to reinforce us. Quite a few fellows have got Lee Enfield rifles. They watch around and pick up old ones and clean them up. I have still got the “Old Sam Hugh’s” yet, that is what the lads call them.

  Your brother,

  Jim

  “A Tidy Job.” Sketch by Captain Bruce Bairnsfather. Humour helped to keep the soldiers’ morale up during their time in the dangerous and uncomfortable trenches.

  Sometimes a mere 640 metres from the front, soldiers printed a newspaper called The Wipers Times (“Wipers” being a play on the British pronunciation of Ypres). Richard Westwood-Brookes from Dominic Winter Book Auctions, who recently sold what was thought to be the very first Wipers Times published, said: “The Wipers Times was intended to be a … good laugh before they were all blown to bits. It is an incredible monument to them. The fighting was at its fiercest when they were producing it.” The editor was Lieutenant Richardson, and its sub-editor and publisher was Captain F.J. Roberts. The paper reportedly was printed on an old press found in a hedge.

  WORDS OF WAR

  Extra! Extra!

  The Wipers Times was a trench magazine produced by some English soldiers who were stationed on the front lines at Ypres, Belgium. In early 1916 they had come across an abandoned printing press and decided to start printing material for and by the soldiers. Though originally called The Wipers Times (for the slang name the English had for the town of Ypres), the name of the publication changed as the troops advanced, at one point being called The Somme Times. There were even two editions published after the war ended entitled The Better Times.

  These magazines encouraged participation by the troops, who would submit their poems, advertise fake plays they were producing, and write advice columns. These were light-hearted in order to relieve the stress of the soldiers’ lives in the trenches. One advice column suggested: “Now, when on patrol work and you hear the words ‘Ach Gott! Ich bin gauz fed-up gerworden’ issue from an unknown trench, this does not necessarily signify that you have worked too far over to your left and stumbled into the French lines!”

  In spite of the light-heartedness, the reality and sound of war was never far off. In his diary, June 2, 1916, Jim writes, “Stand to all day and moved up to Tillebeck dugouts in the evening. Big battle in the loop of the salient. CMRs [Canadian Mounted Rifles] and PPCLI [Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry] cut up. Fritz explodes a mine and takes trenches, also Sanctuary Wood. Heavy casualties.”

  The Battle of Mount Sorrel was underway, with the Germans eventually capturing key Allied positions — Mount Sorrel, and Hills 61 and 62 — north of the Ypres-Menin Road.

  On June 3, 1916, Jim writes, “Moved into the Communication trench between Maple Copse and Sanctuary Wood as a front line.”

  On June 4 the 43rd Cameron Highlanders cleared Maple Copse, occupied Border Lane, and successfully repulsed a counterattack. Jim chronicled his movements over the next week in his diary:

  June 5, 1916

  Moved into trench in Maple Copse in strong point. Bombardment very heavy. Several killed.

  June 7th

  Got relieved by the 52nd Batt and went to the Belgian Chateau.

  June 9th

  Left Belgian Chateau and went up to the trenches. No. 2 platoon went to S.P.

  June 11th

  Left S.P. and marched to the Belgian Chateau.

  June 13th

  Left Belgian Chateau on a forced march to Tillebeke dugouts and stayed there till the next evening. Rained for the last couple of days and trenches in bad mess.13th and 16th Batt. took back trenches lost on June 2nd and took quite a few prisoners. Quite a few casualities.

  Writing home on June 17, Jim reassures his mother and father, “I guess you’ve been anxious about me. We have been having quite a time these last two weeks but I came through it safe. Don’t worry. I am in fine health and a good rest will fix us all up fine.”

  While Jim was writing this letter home to his family, 20,000 sappers were tunnelling under the Messines Ridge. A year later, on June 7, 1917, as the Third Battle of Ypres (Passchendaele) began, the 19 mines planted by these sappers were detonated, blowing the Germans off the Messines Ridge to the south of Ypres. The blast was heard from as far away as London. In the three years since the war began, this would be the first significant movement in this section of the line.

  Throughout the summer of 1916, Jim’s letters home described manning the trenches in this area. By August 27, 1916, his diary records that they were marching and travelling by train toward the Somme. They arrived in Aberle, where they were billeted until September 6. During that time, Jim records that drill is the order of one day, a gas course another.

  9

  Battle of the Somme

  Why the Somme?

  For nearly a century, military historians have debated why the Somme was chosen as the launching site for a joint French-British attack and for the first major British offensive of the war.

  The Somme, a quiet river weaving its way across the undulating countryside of northeast France to the English Channel, was not a major front in the ongoing war. The Germans were entrenched already with deep bunkers, using the slopes of the surrounding hills for protection.

  General Haig would have preferred more time to prepare. However, the French were experiencing heavy fighting near Verdun and General Joffre felt a unified offensive would divert some of the German strength northward. General Haig finally agreed that when the grounds dried in the spring they would launch a unified offensive along the 70-kilometre front. This would involve well over one million troops and was meant to overwhelm the enemy.

  The Somme battlefield itself was small (stretching approximately 24 kilometres with a depth of up to nine kilometres) but it claimed 300,000 British, Commonwealth, French, and German soldiers’ lives between July 1 and November 19, 1916; twice as many soldiers were wounded.

  Generals Haig and Joffre finally agreed on July 1, 1916, as the date and the Somme as the location for the initial attack.

  Horses and men hauling in supplies through ankle-deep water and mud, April 1917.

  Courtesy Library and Archives Canada, PA-001229.

  Preparations began in earnest. Imagine the commands being given, the scurrying to carry out orders. Imagine the secrecy and need for stealth. Imagine the chaos, the anticipation. Imagine the apprehension, night and day.

  Trenches that the British had taken over from the French at the end of 1915 needed reinforcement of their parapets, parados, and fire-bays, and barbed wire needed to be installed in no man’s land. The sound of marching boots on cobblestones and the staccato of horses’ hooves drifted over the surrounding countryside as 400,000 men and 100,000 horses were moved to the Somme.

  “Moles” quietly implanted dynamite under no man’s land. Carpenters, blacksmiths, mechanics, aircraft units, doctors, nurses, ambulances, catering wagons, signal corps, and map detachments prepared for the fight under a closer deadline than earlier anticipated. Three hundred trucks of drinking water were hauled in. One very important aspect of planning was to establish a clearing station where the seriously wounded could be brought for treatment before being transported by train to a hospital near the coast.

  ON THE BATTLEFIELD

  Trench Runners

  A runner was a soldier who was responsi
ble for passing on messages between fronts during the war. This was arguably one of the most dangerous jobs, since these soldiers had to leave the safety of the trenches or bunkers in order to move from one front to the other. While on the open ground, the soldier was completely exposed to enemy lookouts, and it was common for runners to be killed, often by snipers, before they had reached their destination. This is why most runners worked under cover of darkness. Many were highly specialized — efficient at reading maps and at reconnaissance — and they generally worked in pairs. Adolf Hitler was a runner for the German army during the First World War, and he was wounded twice. Runners were often decorated for bravery, and Hitler was no exception, receiving both a second-class and first-class Iron Cross during the war.

  By the time the Second World War broke out, radio and telephone communication had replaced runners completely.

  Communications were one key to success. The Allies installed 11,000 kilometres of buried telephone wires plus 70,000 kilometres of above-ground cables. The military would need phones, telegraphs, runners, dogs and pigeons, flares, flags, and horns to alert all those along the front and in the air what was happening. A long blast would ask “Where are you?” The answer would come through a pre-arranged variety of coloured flares. The life expectancy of a “runner” during battle was measured in hours.

  — — —

  Although the Australians’ method of attack at Pozieres during the Battle of the Somme was for the men to fan out and circle behind the German lines, the British still favoured the frontal attack, where soldiers advanced shoulder to shoulder. This foolhardy plan used by the British at the Somme had been tried previously by the French — it had failed.

  The British generals were confident even though the great losses suffered by the French fighting desperately near Verdun meant they would not be able to support the British at the Somme.