One week before Messines - "incessant and destructive fire"

From New Zealand Artillery in the Field, 1914-18, one week before the attack on Messines Ridge, things turn more brutal and incessant. When one thinks of how many wars of various scales have been waged since these events 100 years ago - it is such an incredible waste of machine power and human lives:

On the last day in May most of the batteries spent some time cleaning up uncut wire in their zones, and by the end of the day all the wire within wire-cutting range in group zones was reported cut. From 6 a.m. this day onwards fire was maintained continuously, day and night, on all roads, bridges, communication trenches, light railway junctions, and transport halting places on the front. Thus there was no road or approach by which the enemy could transport stores or ammunition, or bring up reliefs for his weary and harassed infantry without being subject to this incessant and destructive fire. What mental and physical agony this meant when prolonged for over a week may readily be conjectured. The enemy guns were very active during the night of June 1, Hyde Park Corner, where there was always much traffic, being persistently shelled. A practice barrage with 75 per cent. of the guns only, was fired on June 2nd, and the same night the German positions in front of Messines were liberally gas-shelled. The weather continued bright and warm, and practice barrages were fired again on the 3rd and 5th. On the 3rd enemy planes were active low down over battery positions and Ploegsteert Wood was heavily shelled; but on the 5th hostile fire was particularly severe and effective. The positions of three batteries of the 311th Brigade, R.F.A., which were attached to "G" Group, were shelled practically all day. About 1,300 rounds of ammunition were destroyed, and the position was almost burnt out. The personnel were withdrawn, but returned at 3 p.m. to take part in the corps practice barrage. Two minutes after this practice barrage started the men of one battery had to evacuate the position, owing to the danger from burning ammunition dumps in rear. All the rations and stores were destroyed, and the exploding ammunition put no fewer than five guns out of action. On the following day "G" Group did not fire as the positions, several of which were very exposed, were still being shelled at intervals, and it was not desired to give them completely away before the attack. 

From June 1st the daily expenditure of ammunition had been 150 rounds per gun and howitzer, and this expenditure continued right up to the day of attack. Prior to the assault there was to be no intense bombardment and no departure from what had been for some time the normal and customary procedure in the daily and nightly attention given to the enemy. It was a critical moment in the consummation of the scheme—the hour preceding its tumultuous birth—and anything that might give the vigilant German mind any idea of the hour of the attack was to be rigorously avoided. "It is essential," said the order on the subject, "that there should be no increase or slackening in the rate of fire before zero hour, and that everything should appear normal." Such was the density of the smoke and dust resulting from the ceaseless shelling of the enemy front that the whole countryside was completely hidden from aerial observation. A cessation of fire was in consequence ordered for fifteen minutes each day, to allow aeroplane photographs to be taken.

Camouflage, sports and horse shows prelude Messines battle

Two months on from my last blog about WWI proper, Grandad (100 years ago) and New Zealand today are preparing for the Battle of Messines - or commemorations thereof. Below are excerpts from New Zealand Artillery in the Field, 1914-18 which illustrate some of the work, relaxation, and other preparations by the Artillery in the final two months preceding a major assault on Messines Ridge:

Dressing station at Messines (Alexander Turnbull Library)
via: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/page/battle-messines

 On April 1st the 3rd Brigade was entrusted with the building of ten battery positions. The infantry assisted by providing working parties, and a dump was formed and material issued to the batteries as it was required. These magnum opus positions, as they were styled, had all to be carefully camouflaged, even before work was commenced, so that not the slightest indication of their presence might be observed by the enemy. Usually the site chosen was covered from end to end by great strips of green camouflage netting, and the men toiled under cover of this. ...

In pursuance of the policy of resting the Division by units, the Artillery Brigades were withdrawn from the line in turn for a period of two weeks, which were spent in training and recreation in the Lumbres area, near St. Omer.  ... While out of the line batteries carried out a certain amount of training, but a good deal of time was devoted to sport in the way of football competitions, sports meetings, and cross-country races. The men benefited very much by the spell; but in the 1st Brigade the horses returned in rather poor condition, due to the cold weather which had been experienced and the work during training. No interruption in the works in progress had been suffered by the process of spelling the brigades, and once they had returned and settled down again, work went on with renewed energy. ...

On May 13th, the Divisional Artillery Horse Show was held near Westhof Farm; the condition of the teams and vehicles entered in the show was in all respects excellent, and reflected the greatest credit on the drivers, to whose zeal and labour such creditable results were due. The 7th Battery received the cup awarded for the best Battery Transport, and a number of prizes were secured by the sections of the Divisional Ammunition Column.

As the month progressed every day was marked by the most intense activity on the part of the British artillery, heavy and field, and by a corresponding increase in the enemy's retaliatory fire and counter-battery work. ... In reply to a practice barrage carried out on May 25th, Gas Trench and the general neighbourhood of Hill 63 were heavily shelled with 10.5 and 15cm. howitzers. The same areas were shelled on the night of the 26th, and back areas were swept with fire for several hours. We suffered a good many casualties by these bombardments, the progress of work was often seriously hindered, and dumps of ammunition, some of them containing thousands of rounds for the field guns, were blown up; but these were checks not unforeseen that in no way stayed the momentum of events.

 The attack on the Messines Ridge would begin two weeks after this event.

"Bread not bombs" - then and now

"Bread not bombs" is a catchphrase of the peace movement. But it literally came true 72 years ago this week in occupied Holland shortly before Germany capitulated at the end of World War II.

I have just been reading Operation Chowhound by Stephen Dando-Collins, which tells how British Lancaster bombers and American B-17 'Flying Fortresses' turned their bomb-bays into food repositories to make dangerous low-level food drops to the Dutch population within German-held territory - comprising most of the major cities. An embattled Germany had requisitioned supplies and cut off usual food sources partly in retaliation for a transport strike the previous year.

About 20,000 people had died through malnutrition in what the Dutch called the Hongerwinter (Hunger Winter), and many more were on the brink, surviving on tulip bulbs, scavenged food, and what they could sneak in from rural areas.

Lancasters over Netherlands
(from http://www.secondworldwar.nl/#manna
via Wartime Wednesdays)

The drops were made from 29 April to 8 May, under the name Operation Manna by the British, and Operation Chowhound by the Americans. name for the operation, and it is told more fully on Dutch-based site.

According to the Stephen Dando-Collins' account, the offer to allow food drops was first instigated by the SS Governor for the Netherlands Reichskommissar Arthur Seyss-Inquart. Anticipating Germany's demise, he saw it as an opportunity to save his own neck. Unfortunately for him, it wasn't - he was executed along with other Nazi leaders at Nuremberg after the war. But the offer - to allow food drops with a promise not to shoot the planes down - was only taken up due to the lobbying of (German-born) Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, and the forethought of American General  Dwight D. Eisenhower who set plans in motion for the drops before formal approval came through from Allied political leaders. And for the first few days, the Allies were operating on a verbal agreement only.

Maaike Steenhoek's family was one that came through the Hunger Winter to witness the food drops - before central Netherlands was liberated on 5 May. Writing on the Canadian blog Wartime Wednesdays, she says, "My mother and uncle talked about this all their lives. The Manna flights remained in their memories as a miracle, a gift of food from the air. Operation Manna brought life when they were looking death in the face."

For many of the aircrew involved, after years of bombing raids bringing death and destruction, it was "the best thing they did in the war".

I share this post as an example of how swords can be turned into ploughshares, and good can shine in the darkness, from the context of our present day where about 795 million people remain hungry and 15 conflicts or wars continue which each cause more than 1000 or more deaths a year (according to Wikipedia sources).

Preparing for the assault on Messines Ridge - March 1917

I have not shown such dedication to duty as earned my grandfather a Military Medal. It has been two months since my last post, in that time (100 years ago) the New Zealand Artillery has again been rearranged, but I believe Sydney Williams is still with Z Battery, Trench Mortars. Preparations have been underway since late 1916 to attack the Messines-Wytschaete Ridge (see map)

By March 1917, concealment of these preparations was impossible, so they were being pushed on "with the utmost rapidity, and with all the resources at command."

Large scale infrastructure was necessary. According to New Zealand Artillery in the Field, 1914-18:

The railways which served the area had had to be extended, new roads constructed, and provision made for an adequate supply of water, which had to be brought forward by pipe lines from the Kemmel Hills or from sterilising barges on the River Lys. It was a huge constructive scheme, demanding much exhaustive and informed thought, and careful elaboration of multitudinous detail, and to its masterful handling throughout was due the complete success that attended it. .... The launching of the attack on the Messines-Wytschaete Ridge had been fixed for a date early in June, and fully two months before that date all the countryside behind the forward positions was alive with the countless activities which must always precede such an offensive.

On 15 March, the New Zealand Division relieved the 36th Divison in the sector from St Yves Avenue to Wulverghem-Wytschaete Rd, though the artillery relief happened in the two days after. 

Christmas 1916: 'a special programme of shooting'

I have been on holiday in Auckland for Christmas and New Years. Here is how my grandfather spent that 'cheery season' a hundred years ago at Fleurbaix, France, according to New Zealand Artillery in the Field, 1914-18:

On December 20th, and for a few days following, the guns on both sides of the line were fairly busy; but on Christmas Day, which was cold and bleak, the enemy gunners remained silent, though the New Zealand batteries carried out a special programme of shooting during the afternoon and evening. It was related that the enemy had sprung a surprise on the troops in line on the sector on the evening of Christmas, 1915, and possibly this activity was designed to provide against a similar occurrence. One day at the front is very much like another, and the only thing that outwardly marked this day as in any way different from the others was the provision of unlimited quantities of the traditional Christmas cheer. The material for these elaborate "spreads" was obtained almost entirely from farms in the back areas, where there was tremendous mortality among the cackling flocks, and from the Expeditionary Force canteens. It can hardly have been said to have been a "happy" Christmas; but at any rate everyone made the best of the untoward circumstances. The remainder of the month was uneventful enough, and batteries marked the passing of the year by a combined shoot on the enemy's roads and communications on the night of 31st December-1st January.

In our day, Pope Francis has marked the New Year, with a message for the World Day of Prayer for Peace preaching non-violence as a 'style of politics for peace':

While the last century knew the devastation of two deadly World Wars, the threat of nuclear war and a great number of other conflicts, today, sadly, we find ourselves engaged in a horrifying world war fought piecemeal. ... this “piecemeal” violence, of different kinds and levels, causes great suffering: wars in different countries and continents; terrorism, organized crime and unforeseen acts of violence; the abuses suffered by migrants and victims of human trafficking; and the devastation of the environment. ...
Violence is not the cure for our broken world. ... Jesus himself lived in violent times. Yet he taught that the true battlefield, where violence and peace meet, is the human heart: for “it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come” (Mk 7:21).

Pope Francis goes on to say that to be true followers of Jesus today means embracing Jesus' teaching about nonviolence, then quotes from his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI:

“For Christians, nonviolence is not merely tactical behaviour but a person’s way of being, the attitude of one who is so convinced of God’s love and power that he or she is not afraid to tackle evil with the weapons of love and truth alone. Love of one’s enemy constitutes the nucleus of the ‘Christian revolution’”.

And in case you think this is all naive optimism and the world is a lost cause, I shall end with this positive video shared with me by Avaaz:
https://www.facebook.com/Avaaz/videos/10154488492703884/

With the guns through Longueval

Still with the New Zealand Field Artillery on 15 September 1916 - on the day of New Zealand's first big push on the Somme:

Of those still living who went with the guns through Longueval that day, and down the tortured road that led on to Flers, assuredly none will forget it while memory lives. From the battery positions they were just leaving, a rough track led up the slopes and joined the main road that led into Longueval. There was but little shelling there, and only an occasional big shell fell into the village itself, but from High Wood, right along the crest to Delville Wood and beyond, the German gunners had laid down a deep, heavy barrage from seemingly every known calibre of gun. And through it ran the road to the forward positions. It might have been thought an impassable barrier; but the infantry had gone through it, and were fighting away in advance of it; and the guns went through. Battery after battery wound through the tumbled ruins of the village, and down past the ragged remnants of Delville Wood, a ghastly place where the big high explosive shells were sending up great gouts of black earth and pieces of wood, and Heaven only knew what else.

 -- New Zealand Artillery in the Field, 1914-18

"A giant machine controlled by a single mind"

Though it is now a week since 100-year commemorations of New Zealanders' entry into the Battle of the Somme, I found these excerpts from the official history of the New Zealand Field Artillery compelling - not least for the matter of fact way it speaks about New Zealand soldiers using chemical weapons for the first time. These weapons are now banned by international law, not that that has stopped a few countries from using them.

A renewed push by Allied forces on German positions on 15 September was preceded by three heavy days of artillery bombardment, which the author likens to "a giant machine controlled by a single mind".

The bombardment opened on the morning of Tuesday, September 12th, all along the line from Thiepval to Ginchy, and continued steadily for three days. The 18-prs. were employed chiefly in cutting wire, searching communication trenches etc., while the 4.5in. howitzer batteries which were not engaged on counter-battery work directed their fire on enemy trenches, observation posts, and machine-gun emplacements. ... The whole enemy system of trenches for a great depth was battered with high explosive and sprayed with shrapnel, and any belts of wire entanglements that could be observed at all were methodically wiped out; roads and communications were shelled by day, and even more vigorously by night, when they carried most traffic, and groups of heavy guns concentrated their efforts on the destruction of enemy batteries; in short, the whole area behind the enemy lines was kept under a continuous and destructive fire, blocking the movement of troops and stopping the supply of water, rations, or ammunition. Gas shells, fired by the 4.5in howitzers, were here used for the first time by the New Zealand batteries. .... 

The morning of Friday, September 15th, dawned fine, but cool and: misty—a typical autumn morning. For three days now the bombardment had gone on with unwavering persistence, neither diminishing nor increasing in volume, suggesting nothing so much as a giant machine controlled by a single mind; but at six o'clock, twenty minutes before zero hour, it seemed to increase in intensity and violence. One thought that nothing could exist under this annihilating storm of shells; but when at 6.20 a.m. the infantry left their trenches and moved forward behind the barrage, the enemy was manning his machine guns, and his artillery put down a heavy and accurate barrage. That day the new armoured cars or tanks, as they became universally known, were used for the first time, lanes being left in the barrage for their advance. Despite the fact that some of them broke down before they reached their front line, and that, of the twenty odd which managed to cross the German line, about a third were almost immediately crippled through some cause or other, they did very good work in fighting machine gun nests and strong points, and in flattening out belts of German wire. As yet, however, they were only in the experimental stage; and, undoubtedly, their greatest success that day lay in their moral effect, as they lumbered up to the German trenches, looming huge and uncertain in the half light.