German Spring Offensives 21/03/1918

[andrew pugh]

Good Morning to you all.

Regarding the remembrance and celebrations of the various years of the Great War that we have just had, does anybody think that there will be any mention at all of the German Spring Offensives in which British and Commonwealth troops the German Army to a standstill on the very battlefields of the old Somme battles of 1916.These lads were vastly outnumbered by the Germans forces and suffered terrible hardships in doing so. In fact in my opinion if it hadn't been for these brave lads doing what they did the there would not have been what we call the last 100 days leading up to the armistice. I hope and pray there will be some mention given to these brave lads of which we lost so many.

I hope and pray that its not just going to be just celebrations and Remembrance about just about the victory over the German Army in 1918 and the 11/11/1918 moment. I would be interested in your thoughts on this.

Kind Regards

Andy      

[robertb]

Were they ALL 'brave lads'?  The vast majority of British troops in 1918 were conscripted men.

[RaySearching]

8 minutes ago, robertb said:

Were they ALL 'brave lads'?  The vast majority of British troops in 1918 were conscripted men.

 

 

Conscripted or not the the officers and rank and file had no option at all but to be brave during the 1918 onslaught 

 

Ray

[robertb]

Terrified more likely.

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

22 minutes ago, andrew pugh said:

the German Spring Offensives in which British and Commonwealth troops the German Army to a standstill on the very battlefields of the old Somme battles of 1916.

 

Sorry to be pedantic, but you've missed out the verb from this bit!

[andrew pugh]

Hi.

OOp's Sorry

 

Andy

[andrew pugh]

Hi RoberT 

My Great uncle was one of those who had been out there since the 4th December 1914 until he was killed on the 24th March 1918. In-fact some of the men in the remnants of his battalion were only with the battalion for a couple of days before they were killed. I think the British 2nd Division had lost nearly half their strength by the 22nd/23rd March. Yes "all" of them were brave lads and achieved a great part in ending the war.

Regards

Andy.   

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

2 hours ago, robertb said:

Terrified more likely.

Agreed.

But that doesn't mean they weren't also brave.

Edited 12 January , 2018 by Dai Bach y Sowldiwr

[teabreak]

The question of what appears to be commemorated is a matter of perception driven largely by TV programming schedules. All these things are commemorated by somebody - but only so much gets covered on national media. The BBC's programming choices are particularly interesting - my sense (but I'd be interested in other opinions) is that the BBC produced so much programming in August 2014 ( i.e. for August 1914) that they felt they'd overdone it, and then pulled back subsequently on other events which could reasonably have been covered/commemorated. For example, Cambrai 1917 didn't seem to be that much noticed by the media in November 2017 (a few press photos, but not really much TV programming).

This raises the question of how the BBC are going to cover 1918 - does anybody have an idea?

[andrew pugh]

Hi All

I hope it is included in the 1918 commemorations,because it was a turning point in the conflict coming to an end. After all it was the last throw of the dice for the German High Command and it was these lads who caused the offensives to run out of steam and finally  grind to a halt, little did they know it at the time. And it  was such a desperate situation, enough to issue the famous Backs to the Wall speech. 

Regards

Andy

[Michelle Young]

I shall be on the the battlefields on 21/3/18 remembering them.

 

Michelle 

[Interested]

I'm in two minds on this one.  We will certainly be in the vicinity of Steenbeck and Lijssenthoek for the centenary death of my grandfather, who died in the Battle of the Lys but last year we went with my friend whose great uncle died on 3rd April 1917 and is buried in Serre, but as a result of the massive media coverage of the Somme, many sites were closed to the general public, and only accessible by the chosen few.

for me it is a personal thing, I don't need or want media coverage to share my grief.

Philip

[Peter_Ridge]

6 hours ago, andrew pugh said:

Hi RoberT 

My Great uncle was one of those who had been out there since the 4th December 1914 until he was killed on the 24th March 1918. In-fact some of the men in the remnants of his battalion were only with the battalion for a couple of days before they were killed. I think the British 2nd Division had lost nearly half their strength by the 22nd/23rd March. Yes "all" of them were brave lads and achieved a great part in ending the war.

Regards

Andy.   

My great uncle was also killed on the 24th March 1918, I'll be out there to remember him, is it true the MGC was called the suicide squad?

[andrew pugh]

Hi Peter

I do believe they had that name attached to them. Thank you all for your comments. My brother and I shall be over in France on the 24/03/1918 to pay our respects to 22 men who were all killed on the 24th March 1918, they were all found buried together in a small mass grave and are all buried in Bancourt British Cemetery, Northern France. We managed to identify and name one of these men about 3 years ago, you may remember Cpl Thomas Houston MM and bar 2nd Bn H L I.Once again thanks for you views

Kind Regards 

Andy  

[phil andrade]

The damage inflicted by British soldiers on the Germans in the Kaiserslacht battles was immense .

 

So heavy were those German losses that I think we might attribute final Allied victory in large measure to the slaughter that British resistance exacted from Ludendorff’s legions in March and April 1918.

 

This does seem like a statement of the bleeding obvious, but I do feel that it merits emphasis and has actually been overlooked.

 

Phil

 

 

[Chemin Des Dames]

My Grandfather (Thomas Glynn 84064) was a machine gunner in the 5th Army and was there when the breakthrough came. He was a conscript and like most of the conscripts he was extremely brave - and no doubt terrified too.

 

The 5th Army staged a mass retreat but it was a fighting retreat and when the crux came with the defence of Amiens, he was there. The soldiers who defeated the Spring Offensive on the Somme, Lys and Aisne were mostly conscripts, but volunteers and conscripts alike, many of them were heroes.

 

I hope there will be a commemoration.

[Herekawe]

6 hours ago, phil andrade said:

The damage inflicted by British soldiers on the Germans in the Kaiserslacht battles was immense .

 

So heavy were those German losses that I think we might attribute final Allied victory in large measure to the slaughter that British resistance exacted from Ludendorff’s legions in March and April 1918.

 

This does seem like a statement of the bleeding obvious, but I do feel that it merits emphasis and has actually been overlooked.

 

Phil

 

 

During my visits to the area of Newfoundland Mem Park, Beaumont Hamel, Serre, Hebuterne and so on where the NZ Div was in March April 1918  I have occasionally wondered what German casualties of 1918  were and if they ever approached the levels of 1st July 1916, in the same area where the BEF suffered so badly.

 

The accounts that are available from NZ soldiers who were present are full of descriptions of disorganized German formations marching or attacking across the front of dug in NZ riflemen and machine gunners. Evidently the Germans had communication issues as formations of troops marched directly up towards the NZers in formation until engaged by machine guns at close range. Recon was poor and that resulted in the German attacks being poorly organised. The Germans not realizing that that ridge as far as Hebuterne was strongly held by NZers and Australians, and their positions were often overlooked and  they were attacking slightly uphill. The Germans are pushing formations of perhaps less experienced troops forward and with teams of machine gunners trying to cross the open ground in daylight and even at very long range the NZ machine gunners are able to hits these groups of men staggering as fast as they could carrying their weapons and equipment. Marching formations approaching within machine gun range of the front line and being duly dealt with. Once NZ artillery arrived it also had great targets with good observation over the German lines. The capture of La Signy Farm by the NZers was a small coup virtually unknown today, but at the time it appears to have been regarded as a minor turning point. 

 

There were a lot of experienced soldiers in the NZ Div by that stage and while casualties were not light these old soldiers had no doubt they were really punishing the Germans - revenge for Passchendaele seems to be a popular theme.

 

Given the French defense and then attacks before the British arrived, the British fighting there in 1916 and then the fighting in 1918 that narrow few km of front saw a lot of action.

 

James

 

[phil andrade]

James,

 

Judging by official  figures from their archives, the German casualties against the British in the fighting of March and April 1918 totalled about 350,000.  Bearing in mind how only a very small portion of these were incurred in the quiet time of the build up in the first twenty days of March, the figure for the forty odd days from 21st March to the end of April implies a daily average of about 8,500.

 

The worst calendar month for the British - July 1916 - cost about 6,500 per day ; this , of course, includes the freakishly high figure of nearly sixty thousand on the 1st of July.

 

Your speculation as to the German casualties of their 1918  spring offensive rivalling those of the British in Picardy nearly two years earlier is all too justifiable.

 

If we are to commemorate the ordeals and triumphs of British and Dominion soldiers in the Great War, might we look to the fighting of March and April 1918 as “ Their Finest Hour “ ?

 

Phil

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 13 January , 2018 by phil andrade

[Herekawe]

9 hours ago, phil andrade said:

James,

 

Judging by official  figures from their archives, the German casualties against the British in the fighting of March and April 1918 totalled about 350,000.  Bearing in mind how only a very small portion of these were incurred in the quiet time of the build up in the first twenty days of March, the figure for the forty odd days from 21st March to the end of April implies a daily average of about 8,500.

 

The worst calendar month for the British - July 1916 - cost about 6,500 per day ; this , of course, includes the freakishly high figure of nearly sixty thousand on the 1st of July.

 

Your speculation as to the German casualties of their 1918  spring offensive rivalling those of the British in Picardy nearly two years earlier is all too justifiable.

 

If we are to commemorate the ordeals and triumphs of British and Dominion soldiers in the Great War, might we look to the fighting of March and April 1918 as “ Their Finest Hour “ ?

 

Phil

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is all about perception and what people are taught about.

 

Considering the NZ position I would say the following

 

The NZ involvement in the Battle of the Somme 1916 was successful for NZ, but heavy casualties and seldom gets mentioned in NZ. Although tanks were used for the first time on 15th Sept this is generally portrayed on all sides as unsuccessful, although the tanks which supported the NZ Div contributed significantly to the NZ success - were in fact I think very successful.

 

Although 1917 had Messines, Broodseinde and 1st Passchendaele, the last battle has come to represent the NZ experience of 1917. A major NZ newspaper recently referred to the unsuccessful battle of 1st Passchendaele as a repetition of the useless battle of  Broodseinde.  

 

None the less the postwar government erected battle field memorials on the Somme, Messines and at Gravenstafel.

 

Luckily for most NZers the war seems to end 31st Dec 1917 and we basically did nothing after that, until turning up at Le Quesnoy in November 1918 for some reason.

 

My personal feeling is that the the fighting of March April 1918 may have been NZs most significant battle, forgotten in NZ, and not marked in France except in cemeteries. Also need to remember NZ other small contributions in the April fighting on the Lys.  Ditto the advance to and capture of Bapaume after heavy fighting, and then the fighting and canal crossing on the way to Le Quesnoy where there is a Battlefield Memorial to mark that event but nothing else between BH and Le Quesnoy.

 

So 1918 is the year of do nothing and I suspect that will be the case this year in NZ until about the 10th November.

 

James

[andrew pugh]

Hi Herekawe

Thank you for your reply to this thread.If it hadn't been for your New Zealand lads stopping the Germans dead on the outskirts of Auchonvillers on the 26th/27th March 1918 then it would have meant another withdrawal.

Regards Andy 

 

 

[gmac101]

A descendant of one of the men on the Galashiels War Memorial contacted me about his great uncle who died during the German offensives of April 1918, he told me that he'd always been told that his G Uncle died at the Somme but in fact he died near Steenwercke with the 1st KOSB on the 11th April 1918.  Reading the war diary they fought a desperate battle in improvised trenches only falling back when units either side of them collapsed suffering close to 50% casualties in a few hours.  It's a shame that more people don't know about the important battles effectively fought by the British during early 1918

[phil andrade]

He died on 11 April 1918 ?

 

That’s the date of Haig’s Order of the Day....Backs to the Wall etc.

 

I have to agree....too little acknowledgement is afforded to the achievement of the British troops  in that desperate and dramatic phase of the war ; and it seems that New Zealanders are also not giving much attention to their soldiers’ contribution to it, either.

 

phil

[nigelcave]

I have heard on the rumour mill, right or wrong, that the NZ government is setting up some sort of centre at Le Quesnoy; so maybe not so forgotten after all?  Actually, I think the NZ Government's special commemorations through the centenary period have been pretty impressive; certainly - and I write this with some sadness - far better than the efforts of the French government.

 

The Newfoundland B-H site is fascinating as regards 1918 - so far as I know it is the only part of the Somme front where both sides settled back into the trenches that they had occupied on 1 July 1916. Talk about deja vu all over again!

[sassenach]

Apparently there is to be a public ballot (a la Third Ypres last year) for places to march past the Cenotaph on 11/11/18, which will be Remembrance Sunday. So it seems that the UK Government will be marking the centenary of the Armistice, but I'm not aware of anything to mark the 1918 battles.  

[TGM]

Just noting the following:

 

Government press release: Nation's bells to ring out together to mark Armistice Centenary   12 November 2017:

Quote

Today we begin the final year of commemorations, leading to the 100th anniversary of Armistice. We will look at how we went from the German offensive in spring 1918 to peace, and I have no doubt the public will once again help us tell this important story and share their own connections to the First World War.