The battle of Thiepval ridge

[Richard Ayling]

Hi all. I wonder if anyone can help. I am currently writing a novel with a section taking place during WW1 involving a soldier in the 8th battalion Royal Sussex Reg. Based on my great uncle Cyril who died of his wounds susstained inthe battle for Thiepval ridge on the 28/9/16. He died 2 days later at CCS44 and is burried at Puchevillers. Does anyone know the likely evacuation route from the front line for soldiers serving with the 8th battalion Royal Sussex. From the battalion diaries I believe their position was on the 'left sector of the divisional front...18th division'. If I understand correctly that puts them somewhere near Authuille.

It would be respectful I feel, if I can make this small part of the novel as potentially authentic as I can and so I throw myself at your amazing depth of knowledge for help Thankyou.

[PRC]

Hi @Richard Ayling and welcome to the forum

The 8th Battalion were Divisional Pioneers by this time, so not strictly front line troops, although they did carry weapons and could fight if needed. Buss was in B Company when he was wounded and it looks for the very detailed operational order attached at the ned of the months entries that part of their work on the day was to extend a communication trench into no-mans land when it was safe to do so.

Cyril is the only member of the Battalion recorded on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website as having died in the period 28th to 30th September 1916.

Have you checked the 44 CCS War Diary to see where they were taking casualties from at that time - you can find it in the National Archive catalogue here https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/ff1c866a18d24bc08217dbcb59981a83

Currently free to download once you log in.

Will probably reference Field Ambulances - their war diaries are available too.

Have you tried looking at the other men of the Battalion who were wounded around the same time to see if they have surviving service records? They too may have medical evacuations that lead through 44 CCS.

It's also worth checking FindMyPast for those individuals. All Medical facilities from Field Ambulances back to Hospitals in the UK kept a Medical Admission Register. After the war a 5% sample were retained for statistical analysis. These eventually ended up at the National Archive, who in turn sold on the image rights to FindMyPast. What has survived is fairly random, so you could get an Ambulance Train picking up wounded from 44 CCS to take back to a hospital on the coast for example. So even if the service record hasn't survived you can deduce three steps of the Medical Evacuation chain.

Hope that gets you started.

Peter

[Richard Ayling]

Wow thank you Peter, that's very helpful. I am deciphering the ccs diaries at the moment. Sadly it appears Cyril was just a number do no individual reference (did I seriously think there would be ***) but I have picked up field ambulance 33 a few times. Currently working on blowing up in size and  increasing the contrast to make the diary easier on my eyes to read. 

I am no war history expert at all but so want to get this bit as correct as I can...or certainly plausible for my novel. I'm definitely gaining a great deal of information from you all for which I am very grateful and have a growing interest in this part of history. I only pray I can do them all justice.

Thank you once again

[RussT]

Some great Maps and plenty of text describing the overall medical evacuation chain for the 18th Divisional front in the RAMC 18th Division Assistant Director Medical Services (ADMS) War Diary - September 1916. I think it has everything you need.

It would also be worth cross-referencing to the relevant Deputy Director Medical Services Corps War Dairy.

Regards

Russ

(Images courtesy of Ancestry)

 

[Richard Ayling]

Oh my goodness, thank you so much, this will be so helpful. Off in search of that diary now....any clues on that one?

Thank you once again 

[Richard Ayling]

Hi Russ.

Would you be able to point me in the direction of the RAMC 18th Division Assistant Director Medical Services (ADMS) War Diary. Can't find it in any searches I have done.

many thanks

Rich

[RussT]

War Diaries are free to download from The National Archives:

The War Diary for the ADMS 18th Division, for the relevant period, is here:

Headquarters Branches and Services: Assistant Director Medical Services. | The National Archives

18th Division were, at the time, in II (Two) Corps - and the War Diary of the Deputy Director Medical Services (DDMS) is here:

Headquarters Branches and Services: Deputy Director Medical Services | The National Archives

II Corps were, at this time, part of the Reserve Army - also known as 5th Army. The War Diary for the Director of Medical Services (DMS) at the Army Level is here:

Headquarters Branches and Services. Director Medical Services | The National Archives

Divisional Level (ADMS) was responsible for Field Ambulances (FA), the War Diaries for which you can also download. Sometimes, certain FAs might be designated as Corp Troops to operate certain Corps-wide medical services such as Corps Main Dressing Stations, and therefore the responsibility of the DDMS. Casualty Clearing Stations (CCS) normally came under Army Troops, so the War Diary for the Army DMS should be more relevant to that part of the evacuation chain. Motor Ambulance Conveys (MACs) would be used to transport casualties from the Aid Posts/CMDSs to the CCSs, and War Diaries for the relevant MACs and CCSs can also be downloaded.

The DMS would also be responsible for calling up Ambulance Trains (AT) to evacuate the sick and wounded from the CCSs to Base Hospitals (BH). ATs and BHs also have War Diaries although those are not relevant to your specific interest.

So in cross-referencing the War Diaries at each hierarchal level (Divisional, Corps and Army), you should be able to reconstruct the whole medical evacuation chain during a given period of time of interest from which you should be able to propose a credible evacuation route for the casualties from a given unit on a given day.

Out of interest, how do you know that Cyril Buss died of wounds at 44/CCS?

Regards

Russ

 

[RussT]

I had a quick look for Service Records for the men named in the 8/RSR War Diary as being wounded on the same day as Buss (as per the attached image)

I found two - G/2324 Lindsell and G/1747 Collins. Unfortunately, neither record details the men's evacuation route. The relevant Army Form (AF B103) for Lindsell is extant (see below) but frustratingly it does not state the intermediate medical units down which he must have been evacuated. It just says that he was eventually evacuated (shipped) to England from the No 3 Canadian General Hospital at Boulogne. Collins' record does not contain a B103.

The 8/RSR suffered casualties on nearby other days, who are also named in the 8/RSR War Diary - so it might be worthwhile casting the net a bit wider to see if a relevant B103 for a casualty turns up.

Regards

Russ

 

[Richard Ayling]

Wow Russ this is fabulous and thank you so much for giving me the clues to hunt. I did have a look in the nat,. archive but when I looked I failed to find to the links you have given.....my techniques of knowing what to hunt for and how are very poor, but thankfully learning all the time. Off to visit them now and excited by what I might find.

I have to say what I have discovered over this last year has really sparked an interest in me for this period but i need to understand the research routes better than just shallow searches on the mighty google. Hopefully this year I will have more time to give to the project and I can develop those skills. I was surprised to learn from the battalion diaries from the R.Sx that the 5th battalion took over or possibly shared work with the 8th at Thiepval. I am hunting this line of enquiry further too as my grandfather was a bearer with the 5th. It struck me that if the two battalions mingled somehow, it may feasibly have occurred that my grandfather could have met up with his brother in law a day or two before his wounding. I understand a huge stretch of imagination, but can you imagine in the hell of it all, that happening?  

Thank you so much again for your efforts

Rich

[Richard Ayling]

Hi Russ I omitted to answer your question about Cyril dying of wounds at ccs 44 Puchevillers. Tbh it is an assumption based on the knowledge he is buried in the Puchevillers cemetery which I understand took those that died in ccs 44. Would it be possible he is buried there but didn't go through the station? Seems like a long way to take  body for burial but I guess they perhaps did. According to the battalion diaries he was Wounded on the 28th but his grave stone and records records the 30th as his day of death.

Cheers Rich

[RussT]

Thanks for the response.

The reason I asked was because I had looked high and low but I didn't find any records that indicated that he had died specifically in the care of 44/CCS. So I thought you might have had a record/document in your possession stating that was actually the case.

At the time in question both the 44/CCS and 3/CCS were co-located at Puchevillers - having multiple CCSs co-located was quite normal when active operations were on-going. You can be quite certain that he succumbed to his wounds and died at one of these CCSs. Whether he arrived at one of these CCSs on the day of his wounding (28th September 1916) or the next day or two before his death on the 30th September is open to question. That will be for you to attempt to work out by using all the information previously provided on the medical evacuation chain and whether you can find records for other wounded men who might provide clues as to his evacuation route down the chain.

In a sense, then, one can only say simplistically that there was a 50% chance of Cyril Buss dying at 44/CCS (with the other 50% chance at 3/CCS).

But we can improve on this estimate by looking for Service Records and other documented sources of the other men who also died on the 30th September 1916 and who are buried at Puchevillers British Cemetery. We can then compare those records with those of the 44/CCS and 3/CCS records.

The first image below is the War Diary entry for 3/CCS on 30th September 1916 - it states there were 10 deaths, 2 of which were German. You can tot up the deaths for all the days in September 1916 - it comes to a total of 215 of which 13 were German.

The 44/CCS War Diary does not provide a daily count of deaths - it just gives the total for each month. The second image shows this total for the month of September 1916 - there were 183 deaths in total, 11 of which were German.

The next image shows a Table with all the men who died on 30th September 1916 and who are buried at Puchevillers British Cemetery, which was downloaded from the CWGC website. There are 15 men in total, including your Great Uncle Cyril Buss, as you know.

It just so happens that the Admission and Discharge (A&D) Register for 3/CCS exists, and you can go through this Register to find all deaths at that facility on 30th September 1916. The first column in the Table records whether the man is so mentioned in the 3/CCS Register - it reveals 7 of the 15 men died at 3/CCS. Separate A&D Registers, not readily available, were kept for Commonwealth (e.g. Australian, Canadian) Troops but fortunately complete Service Records for these Troops have survived. When the Service Records for the two Canadian and Australian fatalities are examined, we find that the Canadian also died of wounds at 3/CCS. That makes 8 British/Commonwealth deaths in total at 3/CCS, exactly matching what is stated in the 3/CCS War Diary.

The implication is that the remaining 7 men who died on the 30th September 1916 must have died at 44/CCS. We can substantiate that is indeed the case for 4 of those 7 men from surviving Service Records/Soldiers' Effects Records (SR/SER - see 2nd Column in the Table). That leaves Buss and just 2 other men (Moorhouse & Heal) without any substantiating records but by a process of elimination we can conclude they also died at 44/CCS. It's noteworthy that the average British/Commonwealth death rate at 44/CCS for September 1916 was 172/30 ~ 6 per day. The process of elimination concludes that 7 died at 44/CCS on the 30th September 1916 which is very close to this average and hence also supports the analysis herewith.

In summary, I would conclude that Cyril Victor Buss succumbed to his wounds and died at 44/CCS.

Regards

Russ

 

 

 

[Richard Ayling]

Wow Russ - I truly am blown away by your effort to help me. Thank you so much. I have certainly been shown how to research for detail although I guess this is going to be a technique that will need some significant practice at, to become proficient in. The element in the novel I am writing around Cyril's demise, is a small but extremely significant pivot point in the story line. I am changing the names of the characters to protect identities and of course the cause of his injury will be open to some considerable artistic licence, however, to have the crux of detail reasonably accurate I feel is so important and respectful. To that end your contribution has been wonderful and if you are willing I would wish to add your name to the acknowledgements section of the book. I'm not sure as to the appropriate way to exchange contact details within the forum but if you would be willing to allow me to acknowledge your contribution by name perhaps you would be kind enough to let me know how I forward my email address to you in order that we may communicate this via a some form of direct messaging.

Thank you once again

Rich