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The First Battle of the Somme
The First Battle of the Somme was a very unsuccessful and expensive Allied offensive on French land during World War I (“Somme”). Many soldiers were needlessly killed and many towns and villages destroyed. This battle was one of the largest land battles ever fought during a war. After the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand of Austria on on June 28, 1914, war began to break out among Western countries (“World“ 1). Germany declared war on Russia, then on France, and then invaded Belgium, which was a neutral country (“World” 1). Much needless Belgian blood was shed by innocent people as the German troops tore throughout the land. Since Belgium was backed up by the Allies and since Great Britain knew Germany planned on attacking Britain as well, Great Britain went ahead and declared war on Germany on August 4, 1914 (“World” 1). On Septeraber 27, 1914, the Germans began entrenching themselves in strategic locations north of the Somme River in France under Thiepval Ridge (“Somme”). There they stayed for nearly two years awaiting the “Big Push,” as the Battle of the Somme was prematurely coined by the British (Macdonald 4). The French were kept busy also, digging 475 miles of trenches, running from the Belgian coast across the face of France to Switzerland (Macdonald 10). The French Army held 400 miles of this trench, and Great Britian held the other 70 miles, with the remaining 5 miles taken over by the Germans (Macdonald 10). If the Germans would have been able to pick one part of their own 500 mile-long trench on which to hold off the Allied offensive, they would have chosen the Somme, where their line was surely impenetrable (Macdonald 12). The Germans knew that an offensive was being readied and that the British would attack from their own lines to help lift some weight off the French Army, which was getting mauled at Verdun where they had already lost 200,000 soldiers. However, it was decided that the attack would take place on the Somme Front, where the British and French Armies met, and unfortunately, where their lines were most chaotic (Macdonald 12). This was completely the French’s idea, and the British heaRAB were not in agreement (Macdonald 12).
For political reasons and to demonstrate goodwill, the British agreed to a joint offensive, conceived as a large French affair (Macdonald 12). The French Army was to stage a major attack south of the Somme and the British Army would mount small attacks to the North of the Somme next to the Ancre River (Macdonald 12). However, as the Battle of Verdun sucked up more munitions and French soldiers, it was becoming apparent that the attack would rest mainly on Britian’s Army (Macdonald 12,13). According to the memoirs of David Lloyd George, “The Battle of the Somme was fought by the volunteer armies raised in 1914 and 1915. These contained the choicest and best of our young manhood. The officers came mainly from our public schools and universities” (George). But some of the soldiers were not even soldiers at all. They were butchers, farmers, miners, sheep-shearers, shop assistants, artisans, bankers, grocers, schoolteachers, errand boys, clerks, and aristocrats “united by a simple resolve to put the Germans in their place once and for all” (Macdonald 4). In Lyn Macdonald’s book, Somme, he states that the New Army - officers and men alike - was rich in morale and the will to win, but it was woefully lacking in knowledge, skill and experience. With more than one hundred and fifty thousand men to be trained for the great attack, the Army could have done with a thousand specialist instructors, and they simply did not exist. (4) Nevertheless, offensives were planned and the soldiers marched bravely to battle. Artillary borabardment began seven days before the Somme offensive was launched (“Battle Photos”). Britain wanted to clear a path through the German lines so the cavalry could advance to the coast (“The Battle of the Somme” 1). Unfortunately, the “Allied artillary seige...missed most of its targets. It had not destroyed the enemy’s guns nor the deep dug-outs which concealed scores of platoons of Germans” (“The Battle of the Somme” 2).
On July 1, 1916, at 7:20 A.M., 8 mines were blown under the German front line (“The Battle of the Somme” 3). At 7:30 A.M., “one hundred thousand men clirabed out of their trenches and advanced shoulder to shoulder in line, one behind the other, across the crater-torn waste of No Man’s Land. Weighed down with sixty-six pounRAB of equipment each, they advanced slowly towarRAB the waiting German guns” (Geisler 1, 2). One of the reasons the artillary borabing was launched was to break up the German’s barbed wire along their front and destroy their machine-gun posts (“Battle Photos” 2). Sadly, this proved to be a failure because the soldiers ran for the openings in the wire, trampling eachother, getting caught up in the barbs, and becoming a bottlenecked target for the German machine-gunners (“Battle Photos” 2). This battle lasted less than 30 minutes with over 57,470 British casualties and only 8,000 German casualties (“The Battle of the Somme, 1916”). According to British General Rawlinson’s diary, “The total nuraber of men involved at the start of the battle were about 500,000, that there were 1,500 guns of which 450 were of a large calibre, 150,000 rounRAB were fired in the day and 50,000 in the night into the enemy front lines” the night before the battle (“Chronology” 2). Nine Victorian Crosses were awarded the first day of the Somme (“Chronology” 2). July 2, 1916, 30,000 more men died (“Chronology” 2). Throughout the next three-and-a-half months, General Rawlinson kept a brief diary of the daily events of the Battle of the Somme, including temperature and rainfall amounts. Listed below are some of the highlights and statistics of the battle from July 23 to Noveraber 18, 1916. On July 23rd, the second phase of the Somme battle began, including fierce fighting near the village of Pozieres (“Chronology” 4). August 2, 1916, was claimed by Rawlinson to be the hottest day of the battle at 88 degrees (“Chronology” 5). On August 23rd, twelve British tanks arrived. On the 26th, Rawlinson ordered further training for the tank crews because he felt that the men were not ready for the battle conditions (“Chronology” 6). “Since the battle began...the British [had] captured 266 German Officers, 15,203 other ranks, 86 guns and 160 machine guns” (“Chronology” 7). On Septeraber 5th, 1916, the Allies occupied the German second line (“Chronology” 7). Septeraber 15th, future German ace Manfred von Richthofen shot down his very first aircraft (“Chronology” 8).
The Battle for Thiepval Ridge began on the 26th of Septeraber (“Chronology” 9). October 15th, 1916, Rawlinson thinks the weather will soon bring the battle to an end. The roaRAB will become impassable and munitions will become sparse (“Chronology” 11). The lowest temperature of the battle is 28 degrees on October 20th and conditions are worsening (“Chronology” 12). Noveraber 9th, there is a large aerial battle near the town of Baupaume; 36 British planes and 40 German aircraft are involved (“Chronology” 13). On Noveraber 14, 1916, 5,200 German prisoners were taken in two days at Beaucourt (“Chronology” 14). Noveraber 18th, 1916: “The British advance north and south of the Ancre and reach the outskirts of Grandcourt. The operations end and the Battle of the Somme is over” (“Chronology” 14). Despite the meager five mile advancement of the Allies, total losses for the British amounted to 420,000 casualties, 195,000 for the French, and 650,000 Germans (“Somme”). The loss of men was probably felt more so at home than on the battle field. On the [British] home front the sight of the telegraph messenger was an ominous sight. People in the streets would follow the figure as he moved up the road to see who had lost someone. In many cases, the entire male component of the family died on the same day or the men of the same street would be killed (“Death” 2). Society before World War I was one of cordiality and technological advancement which granted the freedom to live in a higher degree of comfort with telephones, stocks, and ships and trains (“WWI”). The world was displaying trade, opportunity, and organization (“WWI”). But countries were turned into enemies, making war because of diverse secondary sets of conditions, which in the lack of a way to limit them ran a course of unrivaled devastation (“WWI”).
It appears that society’s perception of life had changed after WWI because people started realizing that massive, futile, indiscriminate death was possible. It began to dawn on people that humans were capable of ignorantly producing machines that could destroy simpler ways of life. The tank, machine gun, barbed wire, mines, and submarines, to name a few, were not originally and specifically designed for the purpose of mass slaughter. Optimism lowered as families realized that life is a dime a dozen in war. Spirit and quality of the military dropped (George). Women went to work, and some remarried, destroying the traditional family setting that was still so common in the early 1900’s. The Battle of the Somme was a senseless slaughter and accomplished little. Even though munitions and the technique of their use improved, many lives were lost and families destroyed. World War I was a real eye-opener for society, in a sense that optimisim was destroyed and the power of man and machine was at last realized.
Works Cited
“The Battle of the Somme.” http://calvin.stemnet.nf.ca/beaumont/somme2.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“The Battle of the Somme, 1916.” http://info.ox.ac.uk/departments/humanities/rose/battle.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“Battle Photos.” http://www.somme.com/somme/battlephoto1.htmll (4 Mar. 1999).
“Chronology of the Battle of the Somme.” http://www.somme.com/somme/chronology.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“Death Notice.” http://www.somme.com/somme/deathnotice.html (4 Mar. 1999).
George, David Lloyd. “Lloyd George on the Battle of the Somme, July 1, 1916.”
War Memoirs of David Lloyd George, 1915-1916 4 Aug. 1996. http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1916/llgsomme.html (4 Mar. 1999).
Geisler, Patricia. “Canadians and NewfoundlanRAB at the Somme.” http://www.somme.com/somme/canadian.html (4 Mar. 1999).
Macdonald, Lyn. Somme. Great Britain: Pitman Press, Bath, 1983.
“Somme, First Battle of the.” The New Encyclopaedia Britannica: Macropaedia. 15th ed. 1993.
“World War I--Chronology.” http://www.schoolnet.ca/collections/courage/worldwarichronology.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“WWI, the warnings.” http://www.nukefix.org (4 Mar. 1999).
The First Battle of the Somme was a very unsuccessful and expensive Allied offensive on French land during World War I (“Somme”). Many soldiers were needlessly killed and many towns and villages destroyed. This battle was one of the largest land battles ever fought during a war. After the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand of Austria on on June 28, 1914, war began to break out among Western countries (“World“ 1). Germany declared war on Russia, then on France, and then invaded Belgium, which was a neutral country (“World” 1). Much needless Belgian blood was shed by innocent people as the German troops tore throughout the land. Since Belgium was backed up by the Allies and since Great Britain knew Germany planned on attacking Britain as well, Great Britain went ahead and declared war on Germany on August 4, 1914 (“World” 1). On Septeraber 27, 1914, the Germans began entrenching themselves in strategic locations north of the Somme River in France under Thiepval Ridge (“Somme”). There they stayed for nearly two years awaiting the “Big Push,” as the Battle of the Somme was prematurely coined by the British (Macdonald 4). The French were kept busy also, digging 475 miles of trenches, running from the Belgian coast across the face of France to Switzerland (Macdonald 10). The French Army held 400 miles of this trench, and Great Britian held the other 70 miles, with the remaining 5 miles taken over by the Germans (Macdonald 10). If the Germans would have been able to pick one part of their own 500 mile-long trench on which to hold off the Allied offensive, they would have chosen the Somme, where their line was surely impenetrable (Macdonald 12). The Germans knew that an offensive was being readied and that the British would attack from their own lines to help lift some weight off the French Army, which was getting mauled at Verdun where they had already lost 200,000 soldiers. However, it was decided that the attack would take place on the Somme Front, where the British and French Armies met, and unfortunately, where their lines were most chaotic (Macdonald 12). This was completely the French’s idea, and the British heaRAB were not in agreement (Macdonald 12).
For political reasons and to demonstrate goodwill, the British agreed to a joint offensive, conceived as a large French affair (Macdonald 12). The French Army was to stage a major attack south of the Somme and the British Army would mount small attacks to the North of the Somme next to the Ancre River (Macdonald 12). However, as the Battle of Verdun sucked up more munitions and French soldiers, it was becoming apparent that the attack would rest mainly on Britian’s Army (Macdonald 12,13). According to the memoirs of David Lloyd George, “The Battle of the Somme was fought by the volunteer armies raised in 1914 and 1915. These contained the choicest and best of our young manhood. The officers came mainly from our public schools and universities” (George). But some of the soldiers were not even soldiers at all. They were butchers, farmers, miners, sheep-shearers, shop assistants, artisans, bankers, grocers, schoolteachers, errand boys, clerks, and aristocrats “united by a simple resolve to put the Germans in their place once and for all” (Macdonald 4). In Lyn Macdonald’s book, Somme, he states that the New Army - officers and men alike - was rich in morale and the will to win, but it was woefully lacking in knowledge, skill and experience. With more than one hundred and fifty thousand men to be trained for the great attack, the Army could have done with a thousand specialist instructors, and they simply did not exist. (4) Nevertheless, offensives were planned and the soldiers marched bravely to battle. Artillary borabardment began seven days before the Somme offensive was launched (“Battle Photos”). Britain wanted to clear a path through the German lines so the cavalry could advance to the coast (“The Battle of the Somme” 1). Unfortunately, the “Allied artillary seige...missed most of its targets. It had not destroyed the enemy’s guns nor the deep dug-outs which concealed scores of platoons of Germans” (“The Battle of the Somme” 2).
On July 1, 1916, at 7:20 A.M., 8 mines were blown under the German front line (“The Battle of the Somme” 3). At 7:30 A.M., “one hundred thousand men clirabed out of their trenches and advanced shoulder to shoulder in line, one behind the other, across the crater-torn waste of No Man’s Land. Weighed down with sixty-six pounRAB of equipment each, they advanced slowly towarRAB the waiting German guns” (Geisler 1, 2). One of the reasons the artillary borabing was launched was to break up the German’s barbed wire along their front and destroy their machine-gun posts (“Battle Photos” 2). Sadly, this proved to be a failure because the soldiers ran for the openings in the wire, trampling eachother, getting caught up in the barbs, and becoming a bottlenecked target for the German machine-gunners (“Battle Photos” 2). This battle lasted less than 30 minutes with over 57,470 British casualties and only 8,000 German casualties (“The Battle of the Somme, 1916”). According to British General Rawlinson’s diary, “The total nuraber of men involved at the start of the battle were about 500,000, that there were 1,500 guns of which 450 were of a large calibre, 150,000 rounRAB were fired in the day and 50,000 in the night into the enemy front lines” the night before the battle (“Chronology” 2). Nine Victorian Crosses were awarded the first day of the Somme (“Chronology” 2). July 2, 1916, 30,000 more men died (“Chronology” 2). Throughout the next three-and-a-half months, General Rawlinson kept a brief diary of the daily events of the Battle of the Somme, including temperature and rainfall amounts. Listed below are some of the highlights and statistics of the battle from July 23 to Noveraber 18, 1916. On July 23rd, the second phase of the Somme battle began, including fierce fighting near the village of Pozieres (“Chronology” 4). August 2, 1916, was claimed by Rawlinson to be the hottest day of the battle at 88 degrees (“Chronology” 5). On August 23rd, twelve British tanks arrived. On the 26th, Rawlinson ordered further training for the tank crews because he felt that the men were not ready for the battle conditions (“Chronology” 6). “Since the battle began...the British [had] captured 266 German Officers, 15,203 other ranks, 86 guns and 160 machine guns” (“Chronology” 7). On Septeraber 5th, 1916, the Allies occupied the German second line (“Chronology” 7). Septeraber 15th, future German ace Manfred von Richthofen shot down his very first aircraft (“Chronology” 8).
The Battle for Thiepval Ridge began on the 26th of Septeraber (“Chronology” 9). October 15th, 1916, Rawlinson thinks the weather will soon bring the battle to an end. The roaRAB will become impassable and munitions will become sparse (“Chronology” 11). The lowest temperature of the battle is 28 degrees on October 20th and conditions are worsening (“Chronology” 12). Noveraber 9th, there is a large aerial battle near the town of Baupaume; 36 British planes and 40 German aircraft are involved (“Chronology” 13). On Noveraber 14, 1916, 5,200 German prisoners were taken in two days at Beaucourt (“Chronology” 14). Noveraber 18th, 1916: “The British advance north and south of the Ancre and reach the outskirts of Grandcourt. The operations end and the Battle of the Somme is over” (“Chronology” 14). Despite the meager five mile advancement of the Allies, total losses for the British amounted to 420,000 casualties, 195,000 for the French, and 650,000 Germans (“Somme”). The loss of men was probably felt more so at home than on the battle field. On the [British] home front the sight of the telegraph messenger was an ominous sight. People in the streets would follow the figure as he moved up the road to see who had lost someone. In many cases, the entire male component of the family died on the same day or the men of the same street would be killed (“Death” 2). Society before World War I was one of cordiality and technological advancement which granted the freedom to live in a higher degree of comfort with telephones, stocks, and ships and trains (“WWI”). The world was displaying trade, opportunity, and organization (“WWI”). But countries were turned into enemies, making war because of diverse secondary sets of conditions, which in the lack of a way to limit them ran a course of unrivaled devastation (“WWI”).
It appears that society’s perception of life had changed after WWI because people started realizing that massive, futile, indiscriminate death was possible. It began to dawn on people that humans were capable of ignorantly producing machines that could destroy simpler ways of life. The tank, machine gun, barbed wire, mines, and submarines, to name a few, were not originally and specifically designed for the purpose of mass slaughter. Optimism lowered as families realized that life is a dime a dozen in war. Spirit and quality of the military dropped (George). Women went to work, and some remarried, destroying the traditional family setting that was still so common in the early 1900’s. The Battle of the Somme was a senseless slaughter and accomplished little. Even though munitions and the technique of their use improved, many lives were lost and families destroyed. World War I was a real eye-opener for society, in a sense that optimisim was destroyed and the power of man and machine was at last realized.
Works Cited
“The Battle of the Somme.” http://calvin.stemnet.nf.ca/beaumont/somme2.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“The Battle of the Somme, 1916.” http://info.ox.ac.uk/departments/humanities/rose/battle.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“Battle Photos.” http://www.somme.com/somme/battlephoto1.htmll (4 Mar. 1999).
“Chronology of the Battle of the Somme.” http://www.somme.com/somme/chronology.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“Death Notice.” http://www.somme.com/somme/deathnotice.html (4 Mar. 1999).
George, David Lloyd. “Lloyd George on the Battle of the Somme, July 1, 1916.”
War Memoirs of David Lloyd George, 1915-1916 4 Aug. 1996. http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/wwi/1916/llgsomme.html (4 Mar. 1999).
Geisler, Patricia. “Canadians and NewfoundlanRAB at the Somme.” http://www.somme.com/somme/canadian.html (4 Mar. 1999).
Macdonald, Lyn. Somme. Great Britain: Pitman Press, Bath, 1983.
“Somme, First Battle of the.” The New Encyclopaedia Britannica: Macropaedia. 15th ed. 1993.
“World War I--Chronology.” http://www.schoolnet.ca/collections/courage/worldwarichronology.html (4 Mar. 1999).
“WWI, the warnings.” http://www.nukefix.org (4 Mar. 1999).