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Title: The Seventh Manchesters

July 1916 to March 1919

 

Author: S. J. Wilson

 

Release Date: June 23, 2006 [eBook #18659]

 

Language: English

 

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THE SEVENTH MANCHESTERS

 

July 1916 to March 1919

 

By

 

CAPTAIN S. J. WILSON, M.C.

 

With a Preface by the Hon. Anthony M. Henley, C.M.G., D.S.O.

(Brigadier-General (retired), late Commanding 127th Infantry Brigade)

 

And an Introduction by Gerald B. Hurst, T.D., K.C., M.P.

(Lieut.-Col. Commanding the 7th Bn. Manchester Regiment)

 

Published by the University of Manchester at

The University Press (H. M. Mckechnie, Secretary)

12, Lime Grove, Oxford Road, Manchester

 

Longmans, Green & Co.

London: 39, Paternoster Row

New York: 443-449, Fourth Avenue and Thirtieth Street

Chicago: Prairie Avenue and Twenty-fifth Street

Bombay: 8, Hornby Road

Calcutta: 6, Old Court House Street

Madras: 167, Mount Road

 

[Illustration: The Hon. A. M. HENLEY, C.M.G., D.S.O. Brig.-Gen.

(retired), late Commanding 127th Infantry Brigade]

 

The Seventh Manchesters

 

Manchester

at the University Press

Longmans, Green & Co.

London, New York, Bombay, Etc.

1920

 

Contents.

 

PAGE

 

Preface by Brigadier-General A. M. Henley, C.M.G., D.S.O. vii

 

Introduction by Lieut.-Col. G. B. Hurst, K.C., M.P. xi

 

List of Illustrations xv

 

List of Sketch Maps xvi

 

Chapter I.—Holding up the Turk 1

 

” II.—Desert Life 16

 

” III.—For France 30

 

” IV.—Holding the Line 34

 

” V.—Belgium 47

 

” VI.—An Interlude 65

 

” VII.—Stopping the Hun 75

 

” VIII.—Worrying the Hun 94

 

” IX.—Hammering the Hun 113

 

” X.—Pursuing the Hun 134

 

” XI.—Aftermath and Home 142

 

Appendix I.—Honours and Awards to Members of the Battalion 144

 

” II.—Members of the Battalion Killed in Action,

Died of Wounds, Missing, etc. 148

 

Index 156

 

Preface.

 

I first met the 7th Manchesters early in May, 1917, when they were

gaining new experiences of warfare on the Western front, not far from

Epehy in the north of France. They, with the rest of the 127th Infantry

Brigade, and in fact the whole of the 42nd Division had already had a

long war experience in Gallipoli and Egypt, but they had only recently

been transferred to France. I was taking up the command of an Infantry

Brigade for the first time. I did not know then what a lucky man I was,

but it did not take me long to find out, and we worked together without

a break from that time until the armistice.

 

The writer of this book passes over with considerable sang froid a

certain operation which took place on a June night in 1917. If the 7th

Manchesters, and not only the 7th, but the 5th, 6th and 8th as well will

allow me to say so, I did not enjoy the same complete confidence as to

the result before and during the night in question. The operation

consisted of digging a complete new front line trench, a mile long, on

the whole Brigade Sector, five hundred yards in advance of the existing

front line, and half way across No Man’s Land. June nights are short and

it needed practically the whole brigade to get the job done in time. We

had to find not only the diggers, but the covering troops and strong

parties for carrying and wiring. Now four battalions digging on a bare

hillside within point blank range of the enemy’s rifles and machine guns

are not well placed to meet attack or even to avoid fire if they are

caught. So everything possible had to be done to avoid raising any

suspicion of what was on foot in the minds of the watchful Germans. The

troops had to work at high pressure and in absolute silence. The R.E.

who were to lay the tapes were the first to go forward after the

covering troops; then came the wire carriers, and, as soon as the R.E.

had had time to get the tapes into position, out went the diggers, who,

after reaching the line, had to be spaced out at working distances along

the whole front. We who stayed behind spent some anxious hours. However

complete the arrangements and however perfectly executed there was yet a

chance that some enterprising and inquisitive German patrol might find

out what was happening in time to give one of their local commanders an

opportunity of hindering our work. We had to make such arrangements as

would give the appearance that we were doing nothing unusual, that we

were in fact excruciatingly normal. There must be neither more noise nor

less than on an ordinary night, and so the artillery and machine guns

must fire their accustomed bursts into the likely places in the German

lines.

 

It was a great success. By dawn there was a trench, continuous at least

in appearance along the whole front, at intervals there were rifle and

Lewis gun posts in it; and if there were places where it was preferable

to pass along in the attitude of the serpent after his expulsion from

the Garden of Eden and ever since, there was nothing to show the Germans

which they were. There was wire in front, and the troops got back

without more casualties than averaged as a result of the ordinary

nightly strafes.

 

Though we took on many tougher jobs later I was never again anxious as

to the result.

 

Our great days were:—

 

Stopping the Germans East of BUCQUOY—

March 23rd to 29th, 1918.

 

The advance West of MIRAUMONT—

21st August, 1918.

 

The Capture of MIRAUMONT and PYS—

24th August, 1918.

 

The Capture of VILLERS AU FLOS—

2nd September, 1918.

 

The Battle of the HINDENBURG LINE—

27th September, 1918.

 

The Battle of the SELLE RIVER—

20th October, 1918.

 

In every one of these the 7th Manchesters were called upon to play a

part. Whether their original role in the plan of battle had been to lead

the attack or to act in support they were always in the picture before

the end of the fight. I am not going to pick out this or that as their

finest performances. The reader can choose for himself when he has

finished the book. It is enough for me to say that, whatever task was

given them, they took on cheerfully and carried through magnificently.

Not only that, but they were anxious to go beyond what was demanded of

them, as is well shown by the fighting at La Signy Farm which they

attacked and captured on their own initiative.

 

I can only wish them individually the same success in peace as they won

as a battalion in war. I think they will have it. For it takes

first-class men to make a first-class fighting unit. Perhaps many of

them will join again under the old colours. I hope so, and I

congratulate in advance any commander whose good luck it may be to lead

them.

 

A. M. HENLEY, Brig. Gen. (retired)

late Commanding 127th Infantry Brigade.

 

21st February; 1920.

 

Introduction.

 

Captain Wilson’s book continues the story of the 7th (1st 7th)

Manchesters, which is recorded in my own book “With Manchesters in the

East,” from July, 1916 until November, 1918. It is written with intimate

knowledge and much understanding, and will be enjoyed by all his

comrades. It was the good fortune of the Manchester Territorials (127th

Brigade) to belong to the first Territorial Division (the 42nd), that

ever left these islands for active service, and this active service

eventually took place on three fronts. The 7th Battalion garrisoned the

Sudan and fought through the Gallipoli campaign. It recruited its

strength at Suez, and then helped to clear the Sinai Peninsula of the

Turks. Finally it served for two and a half years in Flanders. It

translated its motto, “We never sleep” into its daily life.

 

This volume will be a useful supplement to any general history of the

War. It is based on the diary of a Regimental Officer, who won

considerable distinction in the field, and whose eyes missed little of

consequence. It is of even more value as evidence of what men of

essentially civilian habits and traditions can achieve as soldiers. The

numbers of the 7th Manchesters were never fully up to strength after

April, 1915, and for many months at a time while in the East they fell

to vanishing point. Yet from the day in September, 1914, when the

original first-line Battalion sailed from Southampton for Port Sudan in

the “Grantully Castle,” each successive draft was of the same mould. The

men came from the same neighbourhood, were of the same capacity, and had

been bred with the same ideas. Their devotion was founded on a sense of

duty. They were personally utterly remote from what is called

militarism, and saw little fascination in its pomp. The survivors are

now absorbed once more in the undramatic industry of Lancashire. There

is nothing to indicate to an observer that they have ever left it. The

last time you saw your tramway conductor may have been as a bomber in

“the western birdcage” on Cape Helles; your fellow passenger may have

last talked to you as your “runner,” when you tramped along the

duckboards from Windy Corner to Givenchy. What such men did for England

will therefore illustrate for all time the potentialities of a

Territorial Force.

 

Captain Wilson’s style of expression and cast of thought are, in my

view, true to type. He is the Lancashire man of action, who affects no

literary arts. These pages are bare of heroics. There is a soldierly

brevity in his account of even of the bravest exploit. There is also

plenty of quiet humour. The reader will search vainly for any “villain

of the piece.” The “Hun” is to Captain Wilson, as to the normal British

officer, just a “Boche” and no more; to the rank and file he was simply

“Jerry.” If you want adjectives, you will have to look for them in _John

Bull_ or listen to speeches in the House of Commons.

 

For all who were in authority over him, whether Corps Commanders or

Divisional Generals, Brigadiers or temporary Commanding Officers,

Captain Wilson has a good word. A reader unfamiliar with soldiers’

psychology might deduce that all his superior officers had been

invariably models of judgment and efficiency. He would possibly be quite

wrong; but it is most fitting that this book should be framed on such

lines, for they are the lines which our soldiers have