La Polka- Vierstraat Line

[roel22]

So no (real) fighting going on between the dotted lines?

[CROONAERT]

Quite the opposite I'd think... that's why it was so fragmented at this point.

[bantamforgot]

This may be of interest.

Colin.

[dfaulder]

David.

nearly 3 years down the line, I don't know whether this is still of any interest to you, but here's a trench map extract showing the area with the dotted line representing the Franco-British frontline as at 9am on 26th April 1918...

Dave

Dave,

Yes still of interest; the morning of that day at that place is of particular interest to my family (see story of my Grandfather T/Capt H Faulder). In the note that I wrote about his life (and more particularly his death), I included this map from the 148th brigade diary (WO 95/2804 The National Archives, London, © Crown Copyright - Licence 9155) which proports to show the position at 9:15 on 26th April:

The War Diary of the 1/4th Y&L (the battalion to which my Grandfather was attached) states:

12:30am 26th April: The Battn took over the "BLUE LINE" from the VIERSTRAAT Rd N10 b 4.7 to N10 a 9.1 [marked with red crayon in the map above] . HQ was established in a dugout at N10 a 9.9 . 5th Y&L Rgmt were on our right and XXII Corps Mounted Troops on our left. The move was completed about 3.30am.

...

4.25am The attack took place.

[This might imply that the map above shows the jumping off points for that attack.]

The Battn was forced to withdraw to the BLUE LINE having lost several officers, including three Company Commanders [including T/Capt H Faulder], and about a third of its strength in casualties.

The diary then continues to mention that the brigade area was heavily shelled, but there is no mention of falling back further.

From 8-10am, and again from 3-3.45pm the whole Brigade area was very heavily bombarded but the rest of the day was comparatively quiet. At dusk the Battn took over a further 130 yards of front from the 5th Y&L Rgt to enable that Battn to fill a gap between their right and the left of the 9th KOYLI on their right

I am told (although I have not been there) that there is a demarkation stone close to N10 b 4.7; I do not know how much reliance can be placed on the position of that stone.

The dotted line on the "French" Map would appear to be behind the blue line, which either means there was a further withdrawal or the dotted line does not indicate the front line. (Or I am miss-reading something.)

My current interest in the area is to try and establish who else fought in this area. There does not seem to be an easy way to do this (examination of brigade and division war diaries to try and sort out which battalions were moved and where (and who relieved them - not always stated in battalion diaries) is probably the best way forward, but means calling out a lot of diaries at TNA. I would like to be able to confirm that this episode was the only epsiode when Y&L men fought in this area.

David

[CROONAERT]

The dotted line on the "French" Map would appear to be behind the blue line, which either means there was a further withdrawal or the dotted line does not indicate the front line. (Or I am miss-reading something.)

The dotted line definately represents the the 'approximate' Franco-British frontline as it is labelled up as such a little off the extract I posted. The timing must be significant, however (9am), as it's actually quite unusual to see an actual time (along with date) printed on an official trench map and not as a post-print hand annotation.

Exactly what the significance is, I don't know, but it certainly might suggest an unrecorded (in the War Diary anyway) event. ... then again...

Dave

[KONDOA]

This old thread adds a little to the scenario for the previous days actions.

http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=28829&st=0&p=226401&fromsearch=1entry226401

Roop