Our Darkest Day Read online

  As I sit here looking over the killing field, I am struck by an overwhelming feeling of sadness. There can be few more stark examples of the futility of war than the events that took place on this land on one day in the summer of 1916. The tears of sadness soon turn to frustration as I think of the lost potential of the young men destroyed here by the stupidity and the cavalier indifference of the High Command.

  The cross marking the original grave of Captain Norman Gibbins of the 55th Battalion, killed in action on 20 July 1916 as he returned to the Australian lines after his heroic rearguard action during the Battle of Fromelles. The small plaque hanging from the cross bears a message from his sister Violet: ‘With my soul’s homage and my heart’s utmost love to my beloved and deeply mourned brother. Violet Gibbins.’ Captain Gibbins was later reburied in the Anzac Cemetery at Sailly-sur-la-Lys. (AWM PHOTO P03788.003)

  For the simple fact is that these Diggers had no chance of success. They died needlessly and futilely in their thousands here because of the ineptitude and the callous glory-seeking of their British commander. His guilt is the greater because, unbelievably, a year earlier he had made the same mistake and sent thousands of his own men to their deaths over the same ground.

  Many factors predisposed the attack to calamitous failure: poor reconnaissance; inadequate preparation; flawed execution of the preliminary artillery barrage; the size and lack of cover of no-man’s land; the depth and quality of the enemy’s defences; and the superior experience of its troops. One factor above all others condemned it to certain disaster: the lack of any proper objective or any plan for either holding the ground won or making a tactical withdrawal.

  Around 6 pm on Wednesday, 19 July 1916, in full daylight on a clear sunny day, the 5th Australian Division answered the call to attack and was thrown against the German front line as a diversion to help support the massive British offensive then in the balance at the Somme.

  The Australians charged into the teeth of German machine guns, which survived the Allied artillery bombardment in their purpose-built concrete bunkers. Our casualties were devastating – 5533 out of around 7000 attackers, with almost 2000 killed – the greatest loss of life in a night in Australian history. Amazingly, despite these losses and against all the odds, hundreds of attackers managed to break through the German front-line trenches and force the defenders to retire. But without support they were trapped by German counter-attacks and eventually either killed or captured.

  The fate of many of those who died behind the German lines has been unknown for more than 90 years. Some bodies were recovered after the war ended in November 1918 and buried in nearby cemeteries. Many of those who charged that day simply disappeared: 1299 of them are listed as missing on the wall at the VC Corner Cemetery, near the Australian front line on the Fromelles battlefield.

  The wall at VC Corner Cemetery Fromelles which contains the names of 1299 Australians missing after the Battle of Fromelles. The bodies of 410 Diggers found but not identified after the Armistice are buried here in groups of ten in 41 mass graves. This is the only all-Australian cemetery on the Western Front and the only one with no headstones, as none of the dead could be identified. (PATRICK LINDSAY PHOTO)

  In a war fought by 65 million soldiers over four years, where 37.5 million were killed, wounded, captured or went missing, you might think that thirteen hundred or so missing Diggers are a drop in the ocean.

  But that is until you remember that they weren’t numbers. They were once sons, brothers, husbands, fathers, mates. They were garbos and teachers, labourers and lawyers, farmers and posties. The dead included 24 sets of brothers and a father and son. They all had hopes of long lives, contented families and quiet retirements.

  Many of them had already survived the Gallipoli campaign only to have their lives snuffed out in a single night. As far as their families or the rest of the world knew, on 19 July 1916 they simply disappeared near a small village in north-eastern France called Fromelles.

  They remained in the mists of history until a Greek-born Australian art teacher from Melbourne began his quest to find them about eight years ago. Lambis Englezos and his team of supporters now believed they knew the fate and the final resting place of around 170 of those missing Diggers of Fromelles.

  … a wretched, hybrid scheme, which might well be termed a

  tactical abortion.

  BRIGADIER GENERAL HAROLD ‘POMPEY’ ELLIOTT

  (ON THE PLAN FOR THE BATTLE OF FROMELLES)

  The Cross of Sacrifice at VC Corner Cemetery. The only all-Australian cemetery in France, it is the final resting place of 410 unknown Diggers from Fromelles. (PATRICK LINDSAY PHOTO)

  1

  THE BREWING STORM

  One thing is clear; we are entering the first act of a

  world-wide tragedy.

  MAXIM GORKY, 1914

  Because of the vast spread of European colonisation, when war flared in Europe in August 1914 it ignited the first global conflict in history. While the main theatre remained centred in Europe, the reverberations were felt from America to the Pacific, from the Middle East to Japan.

  In 1870 Germany’s 39 separate states had merged to form a united nation. She had much ground to make up against the existing dominant colonial nations like France and Britain. Knowing that ‘the sun never set on the British Empire’ prompted Germany to seek its own place in the sun by embarking on colonial expansion in the final years of the nineteenth century. It rapidly established African colonies in Togoland and Namibia, Pacific outposts in New Guinea, Samoa and Micronesia and a naval base at Tsingtao in China.

  THE WESTERN FRONT

  Britain grew increasingly wary of Germany’s aggressive growth and soon realised that her own far-flung Empire had become a two-edged sword: it enabled her to influence events around the world but it provided Germany with the means to stretch and divide Britain’s forces as she tried to protect her territories.

  Germany’s expansion soon threatened the world’s political status quo. Germany eyed the Panama Canal and even briefly toyed with a hare-brained scheme to attack the east coast of the USA. By 1912, it was evident that Germany was gearing up for a conflict in Europe.

  Clearly, the conflict evolved from a complicated cauldron of national and individual imperatives, but perhaps the underlying causes were best summed up by the British philosopher Bertrand Russell:

  And all this madness, all this rage, all this flaming death of our civilisation and our hopes, has been brought about because a set of official gentlemen, living luxurious lives, mostly stupid, and all without imagination or heart, have chosen that it should occur rather than that any one of them should suffer some infinitesimal rebuff to his country’s pride.

  It was a bizarre situation in which Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm, oldest grandson of Britain’s Queen Victoria, took up arms against his first cousins, King George V of Britain and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. Wilhelm, who still ruled Germany as an autocrat, said: ‘The sword must now decide’.

  In the summer of 1914 Germany’s 3.8 million troops lined up against a similar number of French soldiers to its west and around 3 million Russians on its eastern border. Germany moved swiftly and invaded Belgium in early August, sweeping aside the mismatched Belgian forces and using systematic terror to subdue the civilian population. The invaders used Belgian civilians as human shields, took hostages and torched towns and cities. On 4 August, Britain declared war on Germany. More than 6000 French and Belgian non-combatants, including women and children, were killed in the first month of hostilities. Around 180,000 Belgians fled across the Channel to Britain. Reports of the vicious German behaviour spread around the world, giving the Allies a powerful propaganda weapon to inflame anti-German sentiment and promote enlistment.

  German troops in high spirits as they head off to battle early in the war. The initial, mobile stage of the fighting quickly deteriorated into static trench warfare.

  The original Anzacs head off in convoy from Albany, Western Australia, on 1 Novem
ber 1914. The New Zealand Expeditionary Force, the largest body of men to ever leave New Zealand, had rendezvoused with the Australian Imperial Force in Albany before heading off to Egypt and then Gallipoli. (AWM PHOTO P00252.002)

  The opening days triggered a flurry of minor conflicts around the world as Britain’s allies moved against nearby German territories. On 19 August, Colonel William Holmes led the newly formed Australian Naval and Military Expedition Force (AN&MF) to Palm Island, off the Queensland coast, where it trained for three weeks. On 11 September, the force sailed to Rabaul, the capital of German New Guinea, where it captured the radio station two days later and subdued the colony. Elsewhere in the Pacific, New Zealand occupied Samoa on 30 August. By December, all the German outposts in the region had been occupied or subdued.

  On 1 November 1914, a convoy of 38 ships sailed from Western Australia taking the 1st Australian Division and a Light Horse Brigade of the Australian Imperial Force (the AIF), together with a New Zealand infantry brigade and mounted rifle brigade. After some indecision about its final destination, it landed at Alexandria in Egypt on 3 December, where the Australians met their new British commander, Lieutenant General William Birdwood. Birdwood combined the force with subsequent arrivals from Australia and New Zealand to create an Army Corps, comprising two infantry divisions and one mounted division. It would go on to win fame under the acronym, ANZAC (the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps).

  At about this time the German fleet was trapped at Tsingtao after Japan agreed to Britain’s request to capture the port in what would prove a turning point for Japan’s international aspirations and a harbinger of Pearl Harbor 27 years later. Although a combined force of 60,000 Japanese and 2000 British troops overcame the 4500-strong German garrison at Tsingtao, the German fleet escaped and scattered. Its massive battle cruisers roamed the world’s sea lanes causing havoc and threatening Britain’s supply lines until the Emden met its fate at the hands of the HMAS Sydney, which had broken off from the Anzac convoy, off the Cocos Islands on 9 November. The German Admiral Graf von Spee went down with his flagship and five others near the Falkland Islands.

  In Europe, meanwhile, the 100,000-strong British Expeditionary Force landed in France, and by 21 August it had moved alongside the French 5th Army to defend the Belgian city of Mons, near the French border. Three days later, 280,000 Germans launched themselves against 70,000 British. Overwhelmed, the British and French defenders were forced to retreat in a nightmare march back to the Channel.

  In this early, mobile, period of the war the Germans made good progress and by the beginning of September they were just 45 kilometres from Paris. The French government abandoned its capital and moved to Bordeaux and a million Parisians fled westward. However, the German High Command realised that its advance was outstripping its supply lines.

  This was particularly difficult to remedy when its main form of transport was horse-drawn vehicles. Indeed, this period saw the start of the transition from ancient to modern forms of warfare: cavalry with lances was still a major player; many troops still wore gaudy parade-ground uniforms into battle making them stand-out targets; and tin helmets hadn’t been introduced. At the same time, artillery was being developed at an astonishing pace and some guns were already able to fire massive projectiles. Aerial observation was expanding, with balloons and slow-moving bi-planes acting as reconnaissance sources and, increasingly, as deliverers of bombs.

  The first of many massive set-piece battles began on 5 September 1914. The Battle of the Marne was the start of years of incessant bombardment and trench warfare. In retrospect, it was probably Germany’s one genuine chance to inflict a crushing defeat on the French. But a combination of German indecisiveness and resolute French defence resulted in what the French called ‘the miracle on the Marne’. In three days of devastating fighting, the Germans and the French each suffered a quarter of a million casualties – the highest average daily casualty rate throughout the entire war.

  The Germans were forced to break off and retrace their steps through the French villages they had earlier vanquished. Although they never conceded the point, it was the Germans’ first defeat in the field and many experts believe their chance of an ultimate victory went with it. It saw more than 30 German generals surreptitiously sacked and General Erich von Falkenhayn brought in as Chief of Staff, replacing General Helmuth von Moltke who had held that position since 1906.

  Falkenhayn tried to outflank the French and British armies in a series of engagements in Belgium and north-eastern France that became known as the Race to the Sea. Having failed there, in November he ordered his armies to fall back to higher ground and dig in. It was to be the start of four years of relentless, murderous trench warfare. The French and their Allies mirrored the German defences and soon both front lines were a series of trenches, separated by no-man’s land, which formed an ugly scar that ran 760 kilometres across Europe from the North Sea to the Swiss Alps.

  The problem facing the commanders from both sides was simple and apparently insoluble: because of the mirror-image front lines that stretched across the continent, there were no flanks. If you can’t outflank your enemy, you must attack them head on. In that case, the conflict becomes a grim test of strength, a war of attrition, where men and machinery are thrown against each other in continually growing numbers. The tactics wound the clock back to mediaeval times, to the days of siege warfare.

  Germans prepare to attack at the Battle of the Marne in September 1914. It signalled the start of four years of trench warfare and was probably Germany’s one real chance at a conclusive victory over France. But German indecisiveness and heroic French defence ended in ‘the miracle on the Marne’. In just three days, the Germans and the French each suffered a quarter of a million casualties.

  General Erich von Falkenhayn took over from von Moltke as German Chief of Staff after the Battle of the Marne. He unsuccessfully tried to outflank the French and British armies in what became known as the Race to the Sea, then ordered his armies to dig in, creating a trench line that soon stretched from the North Sea to the Swiss Alps.

  As each side learned from its errors, the fighting developed into a pattern. Because the Germans had adopted a defensive posture, it was normally the Allies who attacked. Ever-increasing artillery bombardments presaged an infantry attack. The bombardments were designed to destroy the opposing front-line trenches and to force the defenders to withdraw or to take shelter in their bunkers. The infantry would then attack on foot across no-man’s land, hopefully before the enemy could reset its defensive position. Usually, despite terrible casualties, the attackers were able to break into the opposing front line. Often they broke through into the second line of defensive trenches. But both sides soon developed a very effective response – counter-attacks by troops held aside from the front lines who cut off the attacking troops, encircled them and killed them or took them prisoner.

  So while small gains, usually measured in metres, were made, the attacks invariably petered out as the counter-attacks recaptured the positions. The over-arching problem facing the commanders from both sides was how could they break through all three lines of the defences and continue the momentum so that they could achieve a strategic victory.

  2

  AT THE CROSSROADS OF HISTORY

  Stay then, village, for round you spins

  On a slow axis a world as vast

  And meaningful as any posed

  By great Plato’s solitary mind

  R.S. THOMAS, ‘THE VILLAGE ANALYSIS’, 1955

  Behind the German lines, 11 million Belgian and French civilians found themselves under occupation in what was soon run as a military state. Clocks were set to German time, whole towns and cities were dragooned into labour forces, with daily dawn parades and German identification passes. Thousands of teenagers, male and female, were rounded up and sent to industrial centres as forced labour. Resistance was swiftly and violently crushed – hostages were taken and armed resisters executed. In a frightening pr
eview of the horrors of a future war, 3000 French civilians and almost 60,000 Belgians were packed in cattle trucks and taken to concentration camps.

  The Germans scoured their newly won territory for raw materials and systematically transported them back to Germany to replace the materials denied its war machine by the blockades imposed by its enemies. The invaders also took full advantage of their conquests, which already included some of the powerhouses of French industry, using forced local labour to turn their capacity to support their war effort. Lille, in French Flanders, was an excellent example. It remained in German hands for the entire war, providing substantial industrial muscle to Germany, and was a constant Allied target.

  Situated around 11 kilometres from the French–Belgian border Fromelles, was one of the tiny villages nestled in the gentle western slopes of the Aubers Ridge on Lille’s outskirts. It would become the site of Australia’s first battle on the Western Front and the central focus of this book.

  When Falkenhayn’s order to fall back to the higher ground came, the German forces around Lille took up positions along Aubers Ridge. Using the proven system of ‘defence in depth’, they extended their forward defences in front of the high ground along a line that ran about a kilometre west of Fromelles. The British forces opposing them dug in on the flat ground facing the German trenches with a no-man’s land between the two front lines that varied from about 100 metres to 400 metres.

  Civilians flee the German advance in 1914. The invaders used systematic terror tactics against civilians to subdue Belgium. More than 6000 French and Belgian non-combatants were killed in the first month of hostilities and 180,000 fled across the Channel to Britain.