Blood and Thunder (36 page)

All through 11 July the battle raged as the Germans were pushed right to the edge of Mametz Wood. The scene was one of total destruction. In the confusion German and British shells, no doubt some of them Marc's, crashed indiscriminately into the Welshmen. The following day the battered Welsh Division finally secured the wood at massive cost. Marc bombarded the German front line all day in conjunction with a battery of howitzers. The gain hardly justified the cost, for nearly half of the Welsh troops had vanished, been wounded or blasted out of existence. Meanwhile, Rawlinson was busy planning the continuation of the campaign on the Somme and, as he did so, yet more OEs were marching into the fray.

Fathers in the Great War did not generally share the battlefield with their sons, but one Etonian exception saw William La Touche Congreve fighting in the southernmost sector of the British front on the Somme under his father's command.

Although he sent his son to Eton, General Sir Walter Norris Congreve VC had been educated at Harrow. After going up to Oxford he left early to go to Sandhurst, joined the Rifle Brigade and was awarded a Victoria Cross in the same action as Lord Roberts' fallen son Freddy. After commanding a brigade on the Aisne in 1914, ‘Billy's' father was promoted to divisional commander before the influx of new units at the front gave him a corps: tens of thousands of men under his command by the end of 1915. Billy watched, full of pride and ‘almost reduced to tears' as his father left his division to take up this exalted post with hundreds and hundreds of men cheering him on his way. ‘I think he really wept – if Lieutenant-Generals can weep.'

As for Billy himself, all 6ft 5in of him, he had been born in Cheshire in 1891, Walter's eldest son. He spent his early childhood in India and in Surrey and then went to Summer Fields in Oxford, where he was when he heard of his father's Victoria Cross. An energetic little boy he was devoted to horse riding and could climb like a monkey. In 1904 Billy was sent to Eton and Hugh MacNaghten's house. Not slow, he was however quite lazy and prone to teenage mood swings, although he was a good oar. Perhaps inevitably given his father's occupation, he went to Sandhurst in 1909 and joined Walter's regiment at Tipperary in 1911.

Billy was not long with the Rifle Brigade on the Western Front, taking up his post as a divisional aide. It was a job that ground him down by making him feel that he was not contributing. He had picked up a Military Cross at Hooge and was then awarded the DSO for single handedly forcing the surrender of a substantial body of Germans, although he was modest about how it came about. ‘Imagine my surprise and horror when I saw a whole crowd of armed Boches … I stood there for a moment feeling a bit sort of shy, and then I levelled my revolver at the nearest Boche and shouted “hands up, all the lot of you!” A few went up at once, then a few more and then the lot; and I felt the proudest fellow in the world as I cursed them!'

By the time the Battle of the Somme began Billy had changed position. Tired of being an aide, in December 1915 he was appointed brigade major in 76th Brigade which would fall under his father's command that summer. Dick Durnford had summed the role up rather succinctly the year before. ‘Brigade Major is a plum job and they do not give it to fools. It is like being adjutant to a Brigadier, you do all his dirty work for him.' Billy worked long and strenuous hours but loved it. ‘Of all the jobs … this … is the most dear to my heart,' he said.' ‘I am more or less my own master … there is unending work to do [and] there is heaps that's definite to show for it.'

Helping Billy along in his duties was his faithful, if trying, Scottish servant Cameron. Theirs was a love borne out of aggravating each other and they bickered like a married couple. Billy was in the bath one evening and Cameron thought it an opportune moment to tell him that all women were ‘terrible … creatures'. Billy gleefully suggested that he must be referring to Scottish women, whom he thought were ‘a poor type'. He got his intended reaction when Cameron raged at him and told him that a good Scottish woman might fix him and ‘his extravagant careless ways'. ‘This was a counter-attack,' Billy recalled. ‘So I told him I was already married, but he didn't believe me.'

Sometimes Cameron found ways to get back at him. Once, he decorated Billy's hut so that it looked partially like a tart's boudoir, with looted carpet and furniture and prints of Sir John French and General Joffre on the walls. Given that looting was prohibited, Billy worried what would happen if the authorities caught sight of his net curtains or his chest of drawers. ‘However Cameron would probably rise to the occasion and produce receipts!'

One of their plum arguments was about earwigs. Cameron was adamant that they were dangerous, ‘crawling into one's brain and dying'. He claimed he knew of several cases. Billy informed him that he was a fool and a liar ‘but he waxed indignant and is as obstinate as a mule. Silly old ass … I say one thing and he contradicts me
flat
and I say, “Damn you Cameron, you don't know what you're talking about.” and he says, “Ah well, I know I am right.” He very seldom is. The Scotch are a wicked race … they and their earwigs!'

Walter Congreve's XIII Corps had been transferred to his old friend ‘Rawly's' Fourth Army in spring 1916 and it was to prove an added challenge as his sector comprised the point where the British lines joined with the French to the south. Added to this, asthma sometimes confined him to his sickbed and he was obliged to conduct proceedings whilst flat on his back. As a commander, Billy's father was hands on and consequently popular. ‘Never content to command from the map,' he was keen to get forward and see the men in the line for himself. He cared how they were living as well as fighting. Neither was he guilty of being a yes man or of ‘blind obedience'.

Billy and his brigade were not present when his father enjoyed his comparative success on 1 July. In fact, as summer began Billy's thoughts could not have been further from the war. He had gone home on leave and married the daughter of two actors, Pamela Maude, on 1 June. The Bishop of London, whose youngest son had been killed at Hooge with Billy Grenfell and Dick Durnford, presided over the service and they seized the opportunity for a brief honeymoon at Beaulieu. Within days Billy was on his way back to the front. By 1 July he had returned and was at St Omer with the rest of the brigade when they were ordered to entrain for the Somme to join his father.

From Doullens, Billy and his men continued their march south in blistering weather. Three days later he was about to be placed under his father's command and he accompanied his brigadier to a conference at Walter's headquarters. Then, having travelled ahead of the men, they left his father and went to reconnoitre the area around Montauban where they were to take up residence.

The men arrived and began to settle in Walter Congreve's sector where Billy's priority remained getting to know the lay of the land. As Marc Noble arrived and began bombarding Mametz Wood further north, Billy took twenty of the brigade's officers and men up towards Caterpillar Valley in a lorry in the pouring rain where they remained until the early hours. On 8 July the 76th Brigade, which comprised one battalion each of the Suffolk, Royal Welsh Fusiliers, King's Own Lancaster and Gordon Highlanders regiments, began occupying the trenches in front of Montauban, whilst Billy and the rest of the brigade staff took up residence at Bronfray Farm nearby. The Germans continually shelled the 2nd Suffolks in the trenches with gas shells, but as for actual fighting there was more going on to either side of them in Mametz Wood and at Trônes Wood than in the brigade sector.

This appeared to be about to change when 76th Brigade received orders to the effect that they were to be part of an attack on the important ridge behind Longueval on an as yet unspecified date. They began preparing in earnest. As it turned out, all the work they put in creating ammunition dumps, reconnoitring wire defences, practising and carrying stores under increasingly heavy shell fire was to pave the way for different troops when the brigade was pulled from the line and put in reserve. On 14 July the replacements attacked the German second line at Bazentin-le-Grand and Bazentin-le-Petit whilst the battalions under Billy's jurisdiction remained digging to the rear. Their replacements sent a thank you for all the hard work undertaken by 76th Brigade when they enjoyed relatively smooth progress.

Rawlinson's army had in fact scored broader success on 14 July but a decisive breakthrough was very much still out of reach and any hope of one was diminishing. German reserves began to arrive on the scene. Rawlinson put a veto on any more random, localised attacks that would decimate manpower before a proper, large-scale assault could be launched over which he could exercise proper control, but the slaughter carried on regardless of his instructions.

Delville Wood summed up the state of affairs after 14 July. Behind Longueval, which was also coveted, it was a death trap that troops had nicknamed ‘Devil's Wood'. Attempts to grab it commenced in force on 15 July. Wave after wave of men were sent into an inferno of shells. The South African Brigade was battered out of all recognition. They came out with less than 800 men of 3,200. On 17 July Billy Congreve's brigade received short-notice orders to follow their expensive example and assault the village of Longueval and the north-west corner of the wood the following morning. The 1st Gordon Highlanders were selected to undertake the task with the Lancasters in support. Officers were rushed up to look at the ground that they were to be attacking in just a few hours and brigade headquarters quickly shifted forward to a quarry just north of Montauban. Overnight any hopes of a calm before the storm were obliterated by constant gas shelling by the enemy and at 2 a.m. the Highlanders moved forwards to get ready for the attack.

They were to move around the north of Longueval, clear the orchards about the north end of the village, clear the houses in the village south of the road that connected Longueval with High Wood, and also to push patrols through the north-west corner of Delville Wood to gain touch with more British troops.

The artillery had tried to quieten the Germans in front of them as much as possible given the lack of notice. There had been a steady bombardment of the position for one hour previous to the assault, then one or two intense bursts lasting five mintutes. Before the Highlanders went off they threw a last fierce flurry of shells at their objectives.

The attack moved off at 3.45 a.m. The north of the village was behind too much uncut barbed wire and it was too well shielded by enemy rifles and machine guns to make a proper advance. The orchards too were ‘veritable quagmires' from the recent rain. Germans were found to be entrenched in the village itself, again shielded by uncut wire. The Highlanders were pushed back. They suffered very heavy casualties and some of the King's Own Lancasters were quickly pushed through the village to help consolidate their positions.

By 9.a.m. all movement to the north of the village was impossible because of machine-gun fire. The Germans then began shelling Delville Wood and the village. With no major advance on a broad front to keep them busy, the enemy was able to direct all of their artillery attentions on this one position and they flung shells at Billy's brigade with ‘unparalleled intensity' for nearly five hours. At 4.30 p.m. they launched a counter-attack. The northern half of the village was by now completely untenable and when the Germans came on in four waves the British troops withdrew to the south. The 2nd Suffolks began to arrive as reinforcements and together the combined elements of Billy's brigade managed to strengthen their positions and began digging in.

The following day things did not go well at all. General Haldane, commanding the division to which they belonged, travelled through the ruined village of Montauban into the very south of Longueval where he found brigade headquarters ensconced in the quarry. They were under a heavy artillery barrage and Billy had just returned from a dangerous visit about the village to assess the situation. He looked tired, but Haldane said nothing. ‘I knew that if I said he was overworking he would scorn the idea.' Billy had worked himself into a state of exhaustion. Cameron was snapping at his heels, urging him to calm down but Billy characteristically told him to shut up.

The brigade was shelled very heavily until dawn on 19 July. Brigade headquarters was hit repeatedly with gas shells and they all had to evacuate. Billy was pulling casualties out of harm's way with a medical officer despite having been exposed to the gas himself; not the only instance of him attempting to help treat wounded men under heavy shellfire. That evening orders arrived for them to attack again the following morning. At 10.30 p.m. Billy arrived at the 2nd Suffolks to inform the battalion of their task. He spoke to all officers and platoon commanders and explained that they were to push off east, clear Longueval and sweep north-east along a road running through the splintered remains of Delville Wood to gain touch with the 10th Royal Welsh Fusiliers. They were then to consolidate the entire area together.

Having explained the plan, Billy then went out to superintend arrangements for the attack. The Suffolks were in place by 3 a.m. but the Royal Welsh Fusiliers had a much harder time getting to their jumping off point thanks to lost guides and shoddy intelligence and had already had to repulse two German attacks whilst they were trying to get ready. It was mayhem and a testament to their resolve. The brigade had been told that ‘Princes Street', running east through the centre of the wood, was in British hands but this statement appeared to be rubbish and they could not get more than 150 yards further into the wood from the southern edge. To make matters worse, the leading company of Welshmen was being shot at by their own side because the commander of the nearby 11th Essex Battalion had not been told that friendly troops would be moving about on his front, or even that there was to be an attack.