The Somme Read online

  This obtuseness continued for another month. The ally whom the War Committee anticipated might soon be needing assistance was Russia, not France, and proposals for helping it out ran the familiar gamut: sending ammunition, or taking action in the Balkans, or launching a great Anglo-French offensive in the west (‘attacking [the Germans] with all the forces with which we are capable’).16

  Only in May did Britain's leaders seem to wake up to the fact that the Germans had for the last three months been making their strategic orientation clear, and that their action was beginning to imperil France's continued participation in the war. Robertson informed the War Committee that the French authorities estimated their casualties at Verdun at 115,000 but that actually they were ‘some-what heavier’, and that German casualties, although greater than those of their opponents, were not as large as the French were claiming.17 And a week later Kitchener warned his colleagues that the Germans were not only bent on wearing out the French forces at Verdun but were succeeding in doing so. After that, he suggested, they would ‘wear through and go on to Paris’.18 It was a great danger to France.

  It is evidence of the reluctance of Britain's political masters to take on board the significance of the Verdun operation that, even now, A. J. Balfour could not understand what all the fuss was about. He clung to his view that those conducting an offensive always paid more dearly than those resisting it, and he concluded that therefore the Germans at Verdun seemed to be doing just what the Allies wanted. ‘He did not understand why General Joffre did not rejoice.’19

  Kitchener, along with Sir Frederick Maurice (the Director of Military Operations), struggled to explain why Joffre was not rejoicing. As Maurice put it, thanks to German nibbling ‘in the end [Joffre] would have no troops left’. Prior to the attack on Verdun, Joffre had been intending to employ 40 divisions in the Somme offensive. He was now down to 25, and could not look as far ahead as 1 July (the projected date for starting the offensive). And Kitchener warned the committee that Joffre's divisions were getting so knocked about that he would soon have no reserves left.20

  So, late in the day, Britain's leaders were obliged to come to terms with the fact that the French, after all, would not be the major contributor to Allied strategy in the west in the summer of 1916. The offensive on the Somme would go ahead as planned. But it would be on a reduced length of front owing to the diminished contribution of which the French were now capable. The burden of undertaking the offensive would have to rest primarily on the British.

  Lloyd George, for one, firmly accepted the implications of all this. He was still prepared to promise large quantities of rifles to the Russians, but only on a time scale of six months to a year. And he was ready to offer surplus guns and ammunition to the Italians, who were at that moment being roughly handled by the Austro-Hungarians. But on the matter of the substantial employment of British resources he was definite on two matters.

  First, he was now firmly opposed to action at Salonika, which might be thought an exhausted alternative but remained one which the French – incomprehensibly, given their circumstances – persisted in taking seriously. (As the Foreign Minister, Sir Edward Grey explained to the War Committee, France's Premier Briand had made it clear to him that French public opinion was ‘set on this offensive’, and the British government's disdainful response had caused the French Ministry ‘great emotion’.)21 Lloyd George, unmoved, urged that the War Committee should ‘take the line of the [British] General Staff that this was an impossible operation’. The French, he said, were proposing to transfer 100 big guns to Salonika for an offensive there, and were ‘prepared to cripple the Western Front to do this’. The War Committee ought to refuse to embark on an operation which their military advisers told them would lead to disaster.22 (Following a remark by Lloyd George that this was ‘a mad proposition’, Balfour chimed in that not only were Joffre and Briand mad ‘but the whole French people were mad’.)23

  Second, and yet more significantly, Lloyd George was convinced of the necessity for powerful British action on the Western Front. Despite a section of French opinion which favoured action at Salonika, Lloyd George reported that there were stronger currents. On the strength of discussions with Albert Thomas, he told the War Committee that the French were becoming ‘rattled’.24 They had borne the brunt of the fighting for two years and were growing exhausted. The British must come to their aid, otherwise their army would be knocked out. Further, France was developing a jaundiced attitude towards its Entente partners. The idea was developing in France, Lloyd George reported, that the British were accumulating military resources for some future project entirely to their own benefit, and were disregarding France's immediate needs.25

  These statements decidedly alarmed Lloyd George's colleagues. Robertson was quick to insist that French misgivings about their ally's intentions were unwarranted. At Chantilly in December 1915 the British representatives had agreed to a joint offensive in 1916. Only now had Joffre raised the matter of the date on which it should commence, and Haig had been entirely agreeable to his proposal. Admittedly Petain, the commander in the Verdun region, was saying that his sector could not hold out beyond 20 June, but Joffre was saying it could last until early July. Robertson reiterated that the British had never refused the French assistance.26

  Grey chimed in, urging Lloyd George to assure Albert Thomas that the forces of Britain were at France's disposal. Lloyd George responded that he had indeed told Thomas that this was the case, but nevertheless the impression obtained in France that the British were doing nothing.27

  This discussion left Britain's leaders in no doubt that the situation of France in this war was now becoming precarious. Asquith commented that the whole position of that country had deteriorated. Lloyd George expressed the feeling that the French were ‘not quite holding their own’ at Verdun.28

  The next day the War Committee, who were also showing signs of being ‘rattled’, reassembled. Haig was now present and confirmed their worst fears. He told them that the French President was evidently alarmed at the situation, even saying ‘Verdun sera pris.’ The French were aware, Haig argued, that having started the war as the strongest of the Allies, ‘they were now going down and down’. Consequently he had told Joffre that he was prepared to launch his attack on 20 June, as against his preferred option of 15 August when all the artillery he required would be at hand. Joffre had assured him that 1 July would be soon enough.29

  III

  Two matters here require emphasis. Both diverge from generally held views. First, it is not the case, as often claimed, that the British offensive on the Somme was launched only on account of the French army's parlous circumstances at Verdun. On the contrary, the offensive had been proposed by the military, and at least partially endorsed by Britain's War Committee, weeks before the Germans had even launched the Verdun operation. And such qualifications as the War Committee had placed on its commitment to this offensive were with-drawn before its members woke up to the fact that the French were in serious trouble on account of Verdun. Indeed, some were still imagining that Germany's offensive at Verdun was serving the purpose of the French and British.

  In short, the only effect that France's travails at Verdun had on Britain's strategy in 1916 concerned the timing of the offensive on the Somme and the relative contributions of the main participants. The offensive might have commenced in August had the French not been pleading for it to start by 1 July. (As against this, as long as it was recognised that this must be a lengthy operation, it could not be delayed too late into the campaigning season.) Again, French losses at Verdun reduced the size of force that they could contribute to the joint venture. This did not cause the British to increase the extent of their participation. It simply meant that the size of the operation overall was reduced and the British involvement became, relatively, greater than that of the French.

  The second aspect requiring emphasis is the way in which the course of events thrust Lloyd George to the forefront of those causing this
offensive to happen. It is a widespread view, which in time Lloyd George would seek to propagate, that his role in the inception of this operation was largely that of querulous onlooker. An examination of the course of events tells a different story.

  Simply by his occupancy of the key post of Minister of Munitions, Lloyd George – far more than Kitchener or Robertson or Haig – became the man capable of providing the wherewithal and assurances necessary to this offensive. The grisly experiences of Russians and French and British in 1914 and 1915 had placed the nature of the war beyond doubt. Formidable accumulations of men – even men of sound national character – would not accomplish victory. As the Germans were proclaiming by their modus operandi at Verdun, the recognition was now general that only a terrifying accumulation of killing devices could bestow success upon any offensive operation. Only Lloyd George, in his capacity as Minister of Munitions, could provide the necessary assurance that such a volume of weaponry would be available to Haig's army by the due date.

  So, at a series of meetings between 21 and 30 June, Lloyd George presented the War Committee with an apparently satisfying array of facts and figures. On 21 June he produced statistics revealing an ‘enormous improvement’ in the British army's firepower, particularly in heavy gun ammunition. (The Prime Minister deemed it ‘a remarkable contrast’ with what had gone before.) Further, Lloyd George told his colleagues that Britain was now doing ‘extraordinarily well’ in the production of heavy guns, turning out 140–150 every month in contrast with France's 20–30. And Haig's army was now in a position to expend shells at a rate of nearly 300,000 a week. Aerial photographs were presented of the bombardment of the German lines at Ypres and St-Eloi. These revealed, according to Grey, that ‘the trenches were obliterated’. Grey inquired whether the same could be done to all German trenches. Lloyd George replied ‘Certainly’.30

  There was, the Minister of Munitions admitted, a problem with fuses. Earlier, shells had sometimes exploded prematurely, so damaging the guns supposed to dispatch them. The introduction of delayed-action fuses had solved this problem but produced another: the shells did not explode until they had buried themselves in the ground. The Ministry had therefore reverted to a modified version of the earlier fuse, and the artillerists were delighted. Lloyd George asked if the War Committee was prepared to accept this compromise, still with some risk of prematures but improving the prospect of shells bursting on impact. A committee of experts was appointed.31

  To complete this generally hopeful picture, Lloyd George provided information on the output of machine-guns (which the Prime Minister deemed extraordinary), and told the War Committee that the output of small arms ammunition was also ‘very satisfactory’.32

  By way of summation, Robertson, responding to an inquiry from Balfour, said he regarded the situation ‘with serenity’, and Asquith characterised as ‘marvellous’ ‘the improvement in the output of munitions’. A formal conclusion was adopted, recording that ‘the War Committee were impressed with the great progress which has been made’ regarding the output of munitions ‘and the highly satisfactory position which had been reached’. Lloyd George pointed out that prominent men who had set aside their own business concerns to further the output of munitions had been subjected to grossly unfair attacks in the newspapers. So the War Committee agreed that the Prime Minister should make a statement in Parliament embodying its favourable judgement.33

  IV

  The War Committee engaged in this panegyric to Britain's preparedness for battle on 21 June, just ten days before the commencement of the campaign. In the following days it received less comforting information, not about its own forthcoming offensive but about its allies. Information was received that French casualties at Verdun had risen to a quarter of a million (although the speculation was offered that German losses might be double this), and that so far the Germans had not diminished their exertions at Verdun in response to British preparations for an offensive on the Somme.

  Again, messages from the Russian front were, at best, decidedly mixed. On the southern sector, General Brusilov's subsidiary offensive against the Austro-Hungarians was making striking gains. But the main Russian contribution to the concentric Allied operations, on Russia's northern front against Germany, was hanging fire. Further, Hindenburg was reported to be mounting operations against the Russians on a front of 172 miles, and Russia's supply of weaponry was well below requirements.34 (Lloyd George subsequently commented that whereas British industry was producing 120,000 shells a week, the Russians were bringing forth only 40,000.)35

  These ominous matters, raised at the War Committee's meeting on 22 June, did not cancel out the hopeful prognosis already established. On 30 June, in a last survey of the Somme battlefield before the infantry went over the top, Robertson exhibited a photographic panorama of the British and German fronts, along with maps showing the lines of attack and the British objectives. The British front ran for 15 miles and the French for 7 miles. The immediate objectives were at a depth of 1.5 miles. The artillery preparation had been proceeding satisfactorily. The British were employing 26 divisions and the French14 (with more to follow). Robertson laid before the committee figures of the imposing number of guns being used and the miles of railway lines and water pipes constructed in support of the attack. He could not offer figures of the numbers of German guns, as the enemy artillery were not responding to the Allied bombardment, but estimated that the enemy had only six divisions facing the British (although probably with more at call). He took the view that ‘we could get on all right’.36

  One other point emerged during these last days before the battle. On 22 June Robertson surveyed for the War Committee the British situation on the Western Front as a whole. The British, he said, had 51 divisions, which would become 54 divisions by 1 July. The Germans had 36 or 37 divisions facing the British sector ‘but a German division was smaller than ours’.37

  Then, seemingly out of the blue, he remarked: ‘We had a superiority in men but he thought the Germans were superior in guns.’ A.J. Balfour, in a response of potentially great moment, remarked: ‘on the whole our superiority was great except in the one thing that really mattered’.38 This exchange seemed to cry out for further exploration. But nothing followed. With the British army poised for its greatest endeavour so far in this war, the apparent discrepancy between the rival forces in so crucial an area as munitions excited no further comment. Only by this potent act of omission were the political masters of Britain able, with whatever qualifications, to approach the start of the Somme battle with high hopes and full endorsement.

  5 ‘Grasping at the Shadow’: Planning for the Somme, February–June

  I

  In accordance with the decision taken at Chantilly and confirmed with qualifications by the War Committee the British command began planning for the offensive. The location chosen by Haig and Joffre was the area to the north and south of the River Somme in Picardy. Here the Somme is sluggish and meandering, with wide, marshy banks which preclude military operations in its near vicinity. For this reason the river itself plays little role in the battle which bears its name.

  In January 1916 the front to the north of the river (from Rancourt to Curlu) was occupied by the British Third Army commanded by General Allenby. Immediately to the south of the river stood the French Sixth Army commanded by General Foch. In the early phase of the planning the French command proposed that the British should carry out preliminary operations in order to attract and wear down the German reserves. But, as already mentioned, Haig refused to accept such a secondary role and in mid-February the plan was dropped.1 Allenby was accordingly informed that he was to prepare for an attack north of the Somme in conjunction with an offensive by the much larger French forces to the south. The front of attack laid down by Haig ran from Gommecourt in the north to Maricourt in the south. The French would thus take over some ground to the north of the river which would enable one national army to co-ordinate operations on both of its banks. Overall command of t
he British section of this battle would reside with Allenby, including the newly established Fourth Army headquarters under General Rawlinson.2

  This plan soon ran into trouble. The problem was that Rawlinson was senior to Allenby. Haig's solution was to promote Allenby temporarily but this was resisted by the War Office on the grounds that it would be difficult to reverse when the battle had concluded. Tortuous negotiations followed, and King's Regulations were quoted by both sides. Robertson eventually pointed out – with some exasperation – that Section 219, which was overlooked by ‘most people’, allowed junior generals to be placed temporarily in command of their seniors. The thoroughness with which these trivialities were canvassed puts to shame much of the later planning of the battle and in the end the issue was not even decided by Haig or the War Office. As noted earlier, it was decided by the Germans. On 21 February they launched their offensive against Verdun. This brought about an immediate request from Joffre that the French X Army, which was sandwiched between the British First and Third Armies to the north of the proposed area of battle, be relieved. Haig promptly ordered Allenby to take over the French-held section and Rawlinson to take command of the Somme operation.3 So it was that on 25 February Rawlinson moved into his headquarters at Querrieu. Inauspiciously, the move took place in a blizzard.4

  The Topography of the Battlefield

  Rawlinson's first action as Army Commander was to undertake a series of reconnaissances of the front. His purpose was to select an area of attack and to familiarise himself with the German defences. He found himself in a region of gently undulating hills with green fields and woods still in evidence behind the British and German trench lines. There were no precipitate rises, the highest point being just 300 feet above sea level. However, the British lines were to some extent dominated by the Thiepval–Ginchy Ridge, which from some points provided the Germans with extensive vistas to the west and south. South-west from this high ground lay a gentle slope to the valley of the River Ancre. The reedy marshes of the Ancre bisected the British battlefield between Thiepval and Beaumont Hamel.